Always An Angel Never A God

Enemies/Friends to Lovers & more Masterpost

Enemies to Lovers (and vice versa)

How to write Enemies to Lovers + Dialogue Prompts

Oblivious Enemies to Lovers Prompts

Enemies to Lovers: Falling for the flirt

Enemies to Lovers: Co-worker Edition Part I

Enemies to Lovers: Co-worker Edition Part II

Enemies to Lovers: Meet Ugly College Edition

Enemies to Lovers: Drama Club Edition

Enemies to Lovers: Apocalypse AU

Enemies to Lovers: Band Edition

Enemies to Lovers: Assassins Edition

Enemies to Lovers: Martial Arts Edition

Enemies to Lovers: Given up on life

Lovers to enemies

Reasons for lovers turning to enemies

Exes to Lovers

Exes to lovers prompts

Exes to lovers dialogue

Friends to Lovers

Reluctant allies to friends to lovers dynamic

Friends to lovers Prompts

Flirty friends to lovers Prompts

Friends with benefits to lovers Prompts

Friends to Lovers Ideas

Best friends to lovers Prompts

Childhood friends to lovers Prompts

Childhood friends to enemies to lovers Prompts

More:

Enemies to friends with benefits Prompts

Enemies to friends Prompts

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one day i will make a comparative analysis of oz-arthur father-son dynamic and lilia-silver father-son dynamic. i love it when a hundred/a thousand year old wizards unintentionally adopt a kid who has royal blood ❤️

Crush 💘

In 2024, I managed to finish 14 Filipino-written books; among them, I can recommend seven:

Lucia Dreaming by Lucia Asul—This is a dream diary written and illustrated by Lucia Asul. It has a very cool art style, and dreams range from creepy to horrific to cosmic. The smell of this book is also unbeatable, IMO. It's the best-smelling book I've ever read.

Isabela by Kaisa Aquino—I have a review for this one here. I hesitate to call this a novel; it reads like a short story collection featuring women and men with similar names, all surrounding armed resistance and agrarian strife in Isabela to Manila. Very literary in the way it was written.

The Three-Cornered Sun by Linda-Ty Casper—Another one that I've written a review on. This historical fiction chronicles the Philippine revolution and features a family who found themselves on different sides of the war. Many beautiful and existential passages as the war went on. This book also features some of my favorite passages on rivers.

Love Without a Heart (May Pagsinta'y Walang Puso) by Inigo Ed Regalado tr by Soledad Reyes—A romp. I had such a good time with this book. It's a romance novel written in 1921, and the melodrama is so fun to read. Nothing hits like this anymore, I swear.

Tiempo Muerto by Caroline Hau—Is yet another one I've written more about. This is set on the fictional island of Banwa but tells the history of Negros, in an ancestral Bahay Na Bato House, where the protagonist's mother was lost in the aftermath of a typhoon that hit the island. Has a gothic, haunted house vibe in places but is ultimately about agrarian strife and the connection of resistance with our mountains. A really great read.

Tao sa Prowa: Mga Tala, Mga Taon ni Allan Popa—This is a series of vignettes featuring mundane things, then the author's reflections springing from them. This is a beautiful, well-curated collection. A bit pricey for a zine, but whatever. There are plenty of nuggets of gold in here.

Manansala by Enrique Villasis—Speaking of beautiful collections, this poetry collection features, converses with, meditates, reacts to and reimagines some of the works of the legendary cubist Vicente Manansala. As a nature writing fan, I especially loved the nature-adjacent works, but what I love most is the concept of this poetry collection. Auto-buy author sakin si En Villasis after reading this.

There you have it, my recommended Filipino-written works! Tell me if you've read books from this list and what you thought about them!

[Birthday] Shino (April 14th, 2025)

Twitter thread | Bluesky thread

Thanks for the lemonade. It's just what I needed after all this training. Want some? You've been standing there watching me all this time. Aren't you tired? Heh, of course I could feel you looking my way. It's not like you were trying to hide it, you know.

Birthday morning

Shino: You said we can do whatever I want today, right?

Shino: Then, you should come watch me train. I want to show you some real cool moves I’ve been practicing.

Shino: Prepare to be blown away!

Voicelines

Shino: … Heath, do you want to go to the party together? …Heck yeah. My birthday won’t be complete without you by my side. …I gotta find Cain and thank him later. …No, it’s nothing. Come on, the party’s about to start.

Faust: Happy birthday, Shino. I noticed you’ve become rather studious lately, and as a result, your grades have improved as well. Keep up the good work. …Heh, I have to give credit where it's due.

Heathcliff: Today’s your special day Shino, so feel free to ask for anything you want. As long as it’s within my capabilities, of course… You want to go to the party together? …How can I say no! Let’s eat and laugh to our hearts’ content and make tonight a birthday to remember.

Nero: ‘appy birthday, Shino. Ya sure have a way with words, but sometimes ya gotta take a step back an’ indulge yer childhood self. ‘Ere’s some warm soup for ya. Now, ya better drink up an’ go to bed, or you’ll never grow taller than me.

Oz: ...Is it Shino’s birthday today? He came up to me and declared he would defeat me one day… That boy knows where his strength lies, and he’s determined to grow stronger. He’s far from being on par with me, but he’ll undoubtedly become a powerful wizard in the future.

Arthur: Happy birthday, Shi– Whoa, where did you find this beetle? It’s huge! It must’ve come all the way from the depths of the forest to wish you a happy birthday. …Right, I came to find you to do just that too! Happy birthday!

Cain: It’s gonna be fine, don’t sweat it! Just go up to Heath and tell him you wanna celebrate your birthday together. He’s gonna fold immediately, bet! Now, take deep breaths a–nd off you go! …Those two never change, do they?

Riquet: Master Sage, look! Shino and Heathcliff are heading to the dining hall together. It seems like they’ve made up. Cain and I were a bit worried, but thankfully, it ended well. After all, there’s nothing more precious than celebrating your birthday with your best friend.

Snow: For his birthday, Shino requested a joint lesson with us Northern wizards, so we're consulting with Faust about it. Knowing each other’s homeland is more important now than ever after all. Our present will come a bit late, but we hope Shino will be pleased with the results.

White: Not only is Shino interested in a lesson with the Northern wizards, but with the Southern ones as well. He’s taking his studies very seriously these days, so they're holding a special classroom lecture for him later. Oh, how we look forward to seeing his continued growth!

Mithra: Happy birthday, Shino. Say, your magical artefact is quite impressive. Could I try holding it for a bit? …Hmm, I didn’t expect it to be so small since it always looks massive next to you. Well, regardless, it’s still a cool weapon to have. 

Owen: Happy birthday, Shino. I have a very special guest I’d like you to meet. It’s my dear Cerberus. He’s not as loyal to his master as you are, so I’d like him to learn a trick or two from a well-behaved dog such as yourself.

Bradley: If ya really wanna impress yer elders, it ain’t enough to jus’ keep bumpin’ up yer age. Ya gotta make the most outta every opportunity an’ put in the effort to grow. Kiddos like you are always lookin’ for that approval, yeah? …Eh? Yer past that age already?

Shylock: Welcome in, Shino. I made you a special birthday drink using orange juice and a touch of bitter herbs to give it an alcoholic taste. You’ll have to get used to the flavour eventually should you want to drink one day. Worry not, I also have a palette cleanser prepared.

Murr: Here’s your present! A lapis lazuli amulet made by yours truly! Even a real go-getter like yourself can feel lost from time to time, right? Well, this amulet can help ya find your way when ya need it! Probably! …Ahaha, got your attention?

Chloe: Isn’t Shino just so~ badass? It’s like nothing can bring him down… OMG wait, this is giving me so much inspiration! I feel like I could make him a ton of new outfits right now! Wouldn't that be an awesome birthday gift!?

Rustica: You and I once had a discussion on love, did we not? Now that you’re older, I’d love to tell you my own love story. I’ll set a table for us, brew a pot of tea, and prepare some suitable music… That sounds like a lot of trouble? Well, love can be quite troublesome.

Figaro: There’s a cafe around here that makes delicious lemon pies, so I could take you sometime. I do know a thing or two about sweets after all. ...Is it really so surprising that I’m up-to-date with where the youths like to hang-out? I am a youth myself, I’ll have you know.

Rutile: Here you go, Shino! I saved the best cut of meat for the birthday boy! …Ahaha, you got me. Heath was the one who asked me to do this since he thought you’d just give it back if he came himself. Look, he keeps sneaking glances at us, so you should accept it for him!

Lennox: Happy birthday, Shino. I hear you’ve been taking your studies seriously as of late. I’m sure Lord Faust has been very happy to see you challenging yourself. ...Now, I should challenge myself and learn how to smile? Haha, I’ll do my best too, then. 

Mitile: Hey, Mister Shino, why don’t we take a study break here and head to the cafe? Since it’s your birthday, I want to treat you to something! I probably can’t afford the most expensive cake on the menu… But hopefully, I’ve saved enough for the second most! 

The thing about the 'Ugliest King' title and All The Ensuing Conversations that occur as a result, is that it works in the wn because we, the readers, have Absolutely No Idea what Kim Dokja looks like. Yes, there's the picture on the description page of the cover, but wn readers are trained to ignore those. Cover art is guidance for a character but when most of the cast will never wind up being pictured, you draw your grasp of their appearance based on description in-book and how the other characters describe their looks.

Even without KDJ's famous soliloquy in JTTW about YJH's appearance, we know that he's handsome and fit. We know that HSY is pretty but most of the time she has her face pulled into exaggerated expressions that make you instantly forget that. We know what kind of clothes the characters wear, whether other people think they're attractive, and how they're perceived generally. So, what does the reader get told about Kim Dokja?

Kim Dokja describes himself as average. He used to take bathroom selfies, but he's not particularly good looking. And the book plays into that! He's assigned 'Ugliest King' and it's partly a joke but partly to tell us something. Kim Dokja isn't your stereotypical secretly-handsome MC. As the book unfolds, we learn that there's a reason why people think he's ugly, but even beyond that specific metatextual one, there's more. We learn that towards the end of the novel, he's become more tanned and healthy-looking. We're told that at the beginning of the novel, his skin was pasty from a lack of sunlight. He was skinny from a diet of what he could afford at the corner store. He likely had dark circles from staying up late. These are all things that help us to develop a picture of Kim Dokja as a person. Even beyond that, the question of whether Kim Dokja is actually ugly was a debate that I miss having, mostly because I think SS were trying to show that you don't need to be handsome to be loved.

There's a lot that I don't agree with the webtoon team on, and I won't go into that here, but I would argue that possibly the worst thing they did for ORV was make Kim Dokja look like every other secretly-handsome MC. How can the reader grapple with him being given the ugliest king title when they can plainly see in every chapter that he's been drawn with bishie sparkles in the horniest way possible? It breaks immersion and squanders the value of the discussion to be had by its inclusion in the novel.

Tldr; kdj should be drawn swagless assless and looking like a mess.

Peter, not slept in 2 days and on a minecraft binge: no, no Mr. Stark dont turn the lights off or else the mobs will spawn

Tony, standing by the labs light switch: the who

Editing Your Novel Part 2: The Plot Pass

Okay, it's finally time to edit. You've got all your materials sorted, it's time to dive right in. You want to start with the big edits first, aka the plot pass.

Now listen. You're going to want to linger and fix those little bits of grammar or dialogue, and I know it's so hard not to, but letting yourself get off-track might mean wasting hours on a scene you realize later you have to delete. Fix a few spelling errors, leave a note, and stay plot-focused.

Making Sense (Of the Plot)

In the plot pass, you're asking yourself some basic questions:

Do events follow a clear order? - When you're getting everything down on the page for the first time, scenes might get jumbled up or events might not have clear causes. Maybe you have a car crashing into the cafe pages before, but in a writing haze, you wrote your main characters having a casual conversation moments later. If the bad guy beats your heroes to treasure, is it clear how they got there? (Not everyone can be Yzma.)

Do circumstances feel contrived? If there are any problems that can be solved by your characters sitting down and talking to each other, it may be better to lean into their motivation for not speaking to each other, rather than coming up with bad romcom scenarios. If the plot can be resolved by the mcguffin the grandma had the whole time, it might be better to make finding that mcguffin part of the plot instead.

It doesn't have to be perfect, and you don't have to reinvent the wheel. If someone gets bitten by a werewolf, it's perfectly fine to have them turn into one at the worst possible moment. When it comes to contrived, you're looking for problems that seem easy to solve and look for more interesting ways to complicate them.

Are your character motivations consistent to the characters throughout the story? - They can change throughout the story, but character motivations do need to be linked to the actions they take. An out-of-nowhere betrayal is way more satisfying if you lay the groundwork for it ahead of time.

Take a moment to list out the motivations of the characters in a scene you're not quite sure of can help you figure how to fix it. Having an outline helps with this a lot!

Are you following an "if... then" format? - My brain doesn't work like this when I'm writing, because as a writer you know how A got to Z, and it seems (in your head) obvious how it happened. This is where my scene card outline come in handy, because I can look at my overview of what should happen and why, and then compare it to what actually happens in the scene. I've discovered so many threads I forgot to connect that way, like why a character had a certain device (I forgot to have him pick it up two scenes earlier), or adding a few simmering dialogue bits that make the big fight pay off much better.

Can you fix the "Because the Plot Demands It" scenes? - Look, sometimes your character needs to be in that haunted house to see that damn ghost, but your character isn't the type to set foot in such a place. It's really easy, especially in the first draft, to contrive a way in there (she took a wrong turn on her way to grandma's!), but retooling these scenes to connect them to the characters motivations and needs is the way to go. The main character doesn't want to go into that obviously cursed place, but her best friend hasn't shown up for school in three days and now she's crying for help from the second floor window. Your character's strong desire to be there for her friend is a much better way to get her into that house.

This is not always easy - it took me six fricken drafts to realize a critical part of a character's motivation was because his father blamed him for his mother's death - but it is going to be worth putting in the work to hammer down.

Do you have a solid timeline? - This might not seem as important, but it's super easy to accidentally fit two weeks worth of activities in three days. Make sure you have that on reference, even if you don't mention it in the book. Also make sure to gauge your distances if your characters are on a trip, because if you do accidentally say it takes two hours to drive from Seattle to Spokane instead of five, someone will dive down your throat for it. Not me. Just someone.

Okay, maybe me. Slow down, you maniacs.

Next post we'll dive into the structure pass. See you then!

sa tur ooo