painted_firefly

Thank you for adding "The Red Spark" to your list! I really hope you like it.

Please go help me pick character images to headline each section! Go into the character vote book and leave a comment and a vote of which image you think suits each character best! If none of the options feel right, don't be afraid to say so!
          
          Starting with some of our Letan characters first:
          
          Peshta-Catari
          Ospen-Seshte-Catarin
          Corrigan-Seshte
          Kai-Seshte
          
          Next week will post for Leta also:
          
          J'anla
          Kesha
          Tilly
          Ceshlen
          
          Then, I will move on to Esthia!

Mature Warnings for Mental Health Topics (Part 2)
          
          The first book, A Song in Discord, is labeled Mature specifically because of a suicide attempt in the past by one of the crew. Again, that doesn't make a character in a book or a person in real life weak. 
          People like to focus on the one day a person finally dropped it all to call that person weak for leaving. But...never think to realize that same person may have been strong for 40 days, 80 days, 500 days fighting that impulse. So, instead, 500 days of strength to fight is erased by 1 day of mental desperation where the energy to fight couldn't be found.  Now labeling the lost person as....weak. Instead of focusing on strong vs. weak with mental health, the narrative needs to change. The strength is there.... but without support, the energy to use it isn't eternal.  The narrative needs to change to support, not personal character shaming of others-here or gone.

Mature Warnings for Mental Health Topics (Part 1)
          
          Seven Hearts is a 4-book Space Opera. Each book has a multitude of characters, roughly nine to ten. As the series is a multi-pov series, that means each character gets up close and personal.  Each of these characters are fully-fleshed identites and personalities who have experienced a wide range of living.  
          Naturally,  in response to the negatives of these experiences,  mental health issues will arise. That does not make any of the characters weak. The crew of the Dnanleri deal with a wide variety of mental health issues and topics within the actual story arc of the space opera. Topics such as suicide, anxiety, panic attacks, self-worth, depression,  unresolved anger from trauma, and more are in the arc as part of their personalities.  These conditions do not make the characters weak; they make them real. How two different people react to the same scenario sometimes boils down to brain chemistry.  You can't negotiate brain chemistry or verbally tell it how you think it should behave.  
          The ways the scars of trauma alter a person over time can not be "blemished out" because it's unsightly.  It becomes a part of who they are.  A person can repair the scar over time like a piece of Japanese Kintsugi. The crack remains, just now held together with gold lining.