Spooky Panda 🇺🇦
@floofpaldi@mindly.social  ·  activity timestamp last week
#PennedPossibilities 732 — Is your WIP a singular novel, a series of books, serial fiction, comics, or fanfiction? (Or something else entirely? Explain.)

Although I write a little bit of everything, The City of Opulence is the first novel in the Digital Dystopia series. It's a dark romance series set in a science fiction fantasy (and cyberpunk-inspired) universe.

I'll leave everyone with a quote that sums up this series quite well. It was said by Dr. Arcturius "Dante" Cason in the first novel.

"A better future will come. We need only work for it."

#LGBT#LGBTQIA#TheCityOfOpulence#DigitalDystopiaSeries#Cyberpunk#SFF#ScienceFiction#Romance#Worldbuilding#AmWriting #WritingCommunity
Spooky Panda 🇺🇦
@floofpaldi@mindly.social  ·  activity timestamp last week
#PennedPossibilities 730 — 2nd Anniversary Edition: Share a blurb, summary, or tiny snippet explaining your WIP to everyone in the hashtag.

Happy two years, everyone! We made it! 🤍

This is actually my summary:

This is the story of one man, more machine than human, and how he survived the centuries. Something is coming, someone from his past, and it's time to prepare.

Citune is a cyberpunk-inspired world. Alexios is the leader of Destiny's Maelström, a rebel gang and crime circuit. They own various warehouses and other businesses in the city of Ethera. Before forming his gang, centuries prior, he had been a nomad on his own with nothing more than a motorbike, his belongings, and a dark past. Now his gang operates on the black market selling various antiquities, oddities, weaponry, and medical equipment for docs, all while raking in more money than any other gang involved in underground sales.

#LGBT#LGBTQIA#TheCityOfOpulence#DigitalDystopiaSeries#Cyberpunk#SFF#ScienceFiction#Romance#Worldbuilding#AmWriting #WritingCommunity
Spooky Panda 🇺🇦
@floofpaldi@mindly.social  ·  activity timestamp last week
#PennedPossibilities 731 — MC POV: Tell us about the last time you felt guilty.

Alexios: Time for some honesty... I told someone that there was nothing between us. (Not naming names, but it might've been Trick.) The night before, we had sex. For context, he has a brain chip from his days as a prozzie (prostitute), and it alters the brain chemistry of possible clients, making them think and feel like they want to say yes, if you catch my drift. Said chip, which he hadn't yet removed, went haywire and randomly turned on. I was already under the influence, having been drinking. We both were. That bloody chip only worsened things. A day later, I told him it meant nothing, that it was all down to the chip. I told him it couldn't happen again. I lied. It wasn't just the chip. I suppose the inhibitions were gone, that's all. Instead, I should've just told him that I love him. Guilt doesn't even begin to describe how I felt.

#LGBT#LGBTQIA#TheCityOfOpulence#DigitalDystopiaSeries#Cyberpunk#SFF#ScienceFiction#Romance#Worldbuilding#AmWriting #WritingCommunity
Spooky Panda 🇺🇦
@floofpaldi@mindly.social  ·  activity timestamp last week
#PennedPossibilities 730 — 2nd Anniversary Edition: Share a blurb, summary, or tiny snippet explaining your WIP to everyone in the hashtag.

Happy two years, everyone! We made it! 🤍

This is actually my summary:

This is the story of one man, more machine than human, and how he survived the centuries. Something is coming, someone from his past, and it's time to prepare.

Citune is a cyberpunk-inspired world. Alexios is the leader of Destiny's Maelström, a rebel gang and crime circuit. They own various warehouses and other businesses in the city of Ethera. Before forming his gang, centuries prior, he had been a nomad on his own with nothing more than a motorbike, his belongings, and a dark past. Now his gang operates on the black market selling various antiquities, oddities, weaponry, and medical equipment for docs, all while raking in more money than any other gang involved in underground sales.

#LGBT#LGBTQIA#TheCityOfOpulence#DigitalDystopiaSeries#Cyberpunk#SFF#ScienceFiction#Romance#Worldbuilding#AmWriting #WritingCommunity
Spooky Panda 🇺🇦
@floofpaldi@mindly.social  ·  activity timestamp last week
#PennedPossibilities 729 — Tell us about one place your MC would love to either visit or revisit.

Whenever Alexios needs a holiday, he takes off to the forest. He enjoys visiting the citrine gemstone cliffs. No one ever ventures out past the city, past the desert, to head into the forest and mountains. It's a beautiful area on Citune. The moonlight make the cliffs sparkle and shine. Alexios would love to take Trick out there with him someday. He wants someone to share the peace and beauty with, despite how unwilling he is to admit that fact to anyone.

#LGBT#LGBTQIA#TheCityOfOpulence#DigitalDystopiaSeries#Cyberpunk#SFF#ScienceFiction#Romance#Worldbuilding#AmWriting #WritingCommunity
Spooky Panda 🇺🇦
@floofpaldi@mindly.social  ·  activity timestamp 2 weeks ago
#PennedPossibilities 728 — Write about something your antagonist (or villain) frequently forgets.

That people aren't slaves and should never be experimented on.

Okay but seriously, let me answer this differently, just as it was intended. He often forgets what day it is. He'll be down in his lab, "working," of course. He won't realize how much time has passed.

#LGBT#LGBTQIA#TheCityOfOpulence#DigitalDystopiaSeries#Cyberpunk#SFF#ScienceFiction#Romance#Worldbuilding#AmWriting #WritingCommunity
Spooky Panda 🇺🇦
@floofpaldi@mindly.social  ·  activity timestamp 2 weeks ago
#PennedPossibilities 727 — MC POV: Do you remember your 21st birthday? Describe it as best you can.

Alexios: Mmm. I was so young and naïve. I'd give just about anything to relive that day, too. I had just graduated from university and there was this lass I fancied in my class... She wanted to see a film together for my birthday. I spent the morning with my parents, helped my mum in the garden, and spent some time with family. I was over the moon that this lass had asked for a date night, said yes, and picked her up around dinnertime. We had a meal, enjoyed the movie and all that. It was a great time. I miss being young. Everything felt so much easier back then, didn't it?

#LGBT#LGBTQIA#TheCityOfOpulence#DigitalDystopiaSeries#Cyberpunk#SFF#ScienceFiction#Romance#Worldbuilding#AmWriting #WritingCommunity
Michael Whelan
@MichaelWhelan@mastodon.art  ·  activity timestamp 2 weeks ago

CROWN OF SHADOWS (1995)
Acrylic on Panel - 28" x 22"

There's something in the complexity of an anti-hero that grabs the attention of readers. Such rich characters naturally provide an illustrator with opportunity to revel in the shadows. 1/4

#fantasy #fantasyart #sff #illustration #csfriedman #coldfiretrilogy

An elegant man with shoulder length blonde hair and eyes glinting gold strides between a pair of trees barren of leaves but colored by alien lichen creeping up the trunk. He holds aloft a black sword drenched in purple flame. The edge rides a sinuous curve peaking high then retreating to upturned quillons and a curved grip tapering thin in the middle. The modest flames stand in contrast to shaded greens that tint the mountains behind him. His bearing is regal; his clothes made of fine black leather with gold trim and filigree. A purple sash runs beneath his long jacket, which sways trailing his motion. Behind him ephemeral spirits rise—the most prominent female with one arm and one knee raised. A volcano dominates the background, billowing smoke as it roils with electric green flame.
An elegant man with shoulder length blonde hair and eyes glinting gold strides between a pair of trees barren of leaves but colored by alien lichen creeping up the trunk. He holds aloft a black sword drenched in purple flame. The edge rides a sinuous curve peaking high then retreating to upturned quillons and a curved grip tapering thin in the middle. The modest flames stand in contrast to shaded greens that tint the mountains behind him. His bearing is regal; his clothes made of fine black leather with gold trim and filigree. A purple sash runs beneath his long jacket, which sways trailing his motion. Behind him ephemeral spirits rise—the most prominent female with one arm and one knee raised. A volcano dominates the background, billowing smoke as it roils with electric green flame.
An elegant man with shoulder length blonde hair and eyes glinting gold strides between a pair of trees barren of leaves but colored by alien lichen creeping up the trunk. He holds aloft a black sword drenched in purple flame. The edge rides a sinuous curve peaking high then retreating to upturned quillons and a curved grip tapering thin in the middle. The modest flames stand in contrast to shaded greens that tint the mountains behind him. His bearing is regal; his clothes made of fine black leather with gold trim and filigree. A purple sash runs beneath his long jacket, which sways trailing his motion. Behind him ephemeral spirits rise—the most prominent female with one arm and one knee raised. A volcano dominates the background, billowing smoke as it roils with electric green flame.