Rock Reading Tuesdays

Hello and welcome to Rock Reading Tuesdays!

This week we are going to be covering the manhwa Sincerely: I Became a Duke’s Maid by Joo A-ra illustrations and artwork was done by Roha. This story was advertised to me months ago on Instagram through Pocket Comics. It is a story about a girl who loves the duke that met a tragic end within her favorite story. She was so heartbroken by the turn of events in the story she prayed to the gods that if she was in that story, she would help the duke. Because in her heart the duke did not deserve the treatment he got, unloved by his parents, being cursed by the emperor, and losing the love of his life. Miraculously our protagonist is transported into the book as a maid character, and she uses her outsider knowledge to give the duke best life she can. Which would be filled with the one thing he was missing his whole life, love.

The artwork within this story is beautiful, the detail with the eyes and emotions of the characters is beautiful. The outfits the characters wear is beautifully designed and drawn, it transports us into a 18th century world filled with magic. There is so much about this world we as the readers have not discovered yet continues to grip its audience in this mystery tale. Every page you turn you find yourself on the edge of your seat. This story holds your attention both visually and artistically your brain is constantly trying to figure out what is the next turn of this mysterious tale.

The protagonist is a headstrong woman, she refuses to let anyone, and anything stop her from helping the duke. She remains quirky and funny throughout the story and constantly shows her strength. The characters are dynamic, and they come off the page, I highly recommend this manhwa. If you ever decide to purchase this story you will not be disappointed.

That concludes the reading portion of Rock Reading Tuesdays, tune in next week for a taste of some alternative Rock music.

Thomas Benke: Looking Around In Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott, in the Chapter “Looking Around,” says this: Now, if you ask me, what’s going on is that we’re all up to here in it, and probably the most important thing is that we not yell at one another. Otherwise we’d all just be barking away like Pekingese: “Ah! Stuck in the shit! And it’s your fault, you did this …” Writing involves seeing people suffer and, as Robert Stone once put it, finding some meaning therein. But you can’t do that if you’re not respectful. If you look at people and just see sloppy clothes or rich clothes, you’re going to get them wrong. She goes on to speak about empathy for other people and also, as an extension empathy for yourself. So, in a sense as you try to write believable, relatable characters, you will come to forgive people their trespasses—because no one believes they are the villain of their story, so you have to write “bad,” or “evil” characters from a point of view where they rationalize what they are doing in such a way that it is the right or only way they see is possible. By extrapolation, then, if you begin to forgive and withhold judgment from your less-than-desirable, or annoying characters, perhaps you can extend the same courtesy to yourself and forgive your own trespasses and sins. This, for me, starts to enter the realm of “writing as therapy,” and though I am a firm believer in that—I practice it to this very day—I think I would caution anyone who thinks that simply writing through things is going to lead you to a place of light and love. I am not saying it can’t by any means. What I am saying is I have wrote through my thoughts and my problems and my desperation and depression for decades and I still had enough baggage on my shoulders to supply an army platoon with rations for a year. In any case, when thinking about craft, it is very important to step into the shoes of all of your characters, especially those characters that you see as antagonists and villians. I believe there are very few universal maxims in writing but one thing is virtually certain: every character you write is your version of that human being. Confucius said “everywhere I go, there I am,” and that is never more true than when you are writing. So if you are writing a character that is distasteful to you, it might be effective for you to ask yourself why that is the case. I wrote a blog for Obscura last semester titled, “The Puppy Had It Coming.” The gist of the article was to pose a puzzle to writers. How can you write a scene where an adult human kicks a puppy across the room and the reader at least understands why. I am not saying there is any way to justify the action or for the readers to be on the human’s side unless they are sociopaths. I am saying you need let the reader know how dark the place is in the character’s mind that he is capable of doing that.

Rock Reading Tuesdays

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