Tuesday 28 January 2020

28/1/20 - Happy Tuesday! University Inspired Writing Prompt!

Today, 31/12/19, is the next instalment of University Inspired Writing Prompts. Since my first year at university, I have been compiling a collection of writing prompts inspired by my time studying in Derby. I hope that these prompts help you create your own works!

All of these prompts are dialogue based, and are inspired by real conversations I have been part of whilst at university.

PROMPT #40:

" I hate the commute to class, I’m so hungry and tired. If my rail replacement bus doesn’t line up with the connection that takes me the rest of the way to the city, I will EAT THE DAMNED BUS"

This is a quote from one of my classmates' when we were on our way to university. She was, unfortunately, a bit farther behind us than she would have liked and thus, was likely to miss out on breakfast. My friends and I happened to be quite amused by how she had articulated herself. Then again, 9am lectures do happen to bring out the best and worst in people! 

I hope that this prompt inspired something, even if it was just a smile! Feel free to check out my previous prompts by looking through the hashtags below! 

Thank you so much for reading! 

And remember! 

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

- Imogen. L. Smiley

Sunday 26 January 2020

26/1/20 - Song Of The Week Sunday!


Hi guys! I'm back with another Song Of The Week Sunday! The purpose of this segment is to give you guys a quick glimpse into my life and the things I listen to on repeat!

This week’s SOTW is Grand Escape by RADWIMPS and Toko Miura from Weathering With You.

You can listen to it on Spotify here: https://open.spotify.com/track/6CRX3ENpLq42r0iBSjOqr1

This song has so much energy to it, there’s an almost carefree and youthful quality to the tune of the song that makes it so easy to listen to. What starts off as such a soft and melodic song ends up gaining pace throughout and became a really fun backing track for my writing. I found myself trying to hit my keyboard to the tune and it really helped me produce content quicker.

It is my absolute favourite song from the Weathering With You soundtrack and I cannot wait for the film to come out on DVD so I can watch the corresponding scene that goes with this song on repeat. It is so energetic. Until then, I reckon, it will be the backing track to my writing sessions, particularly when I’m writing upbeat and optimistic pieces.

I hope you guys have had an amazing week and continue to do so!

And remember:

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

- Imogen. L. Smiley

Friday 24 January 2020

24/1/20 - Favourite Character Praise Friday! Nozomi Tojo


Hello and welcome back to Favourite Character Praise Friday! This is one of my absolute favourite posts to write and I hope you enjoy my picking apart of my favourite characters enough to stick around while I examine my next victim, I mean, character. Don’t worry, I do not rank these characters in a particular order, it just so happens that some characters are better worth sharing praise for at a different point in time to others! Remember, every fifth instalment is Least Favourite Character Praise Friday, so keep an eye out for me probing at characters I can’t stand and raving about how well they were written in order to evoke such a reaction.

So, who is the subject of my next Favourite Character Praise Friday?

Nozomi Tojo from the Love Live! Franchise



Warning: The following will contain spoilers!

Nozomi was a character that I had seen through social media prior to my joining the Love Live! Fandom. Although I am not as active in the fan-base at the moment, I do still have a big love for Nozomi. She is one of the only fictional characters that I have cosplayed at several different events throughout the years.

For those who are unfamiliar with Love Live! It is both a game and an anime. The game, released by KLab Games is a rhythm tap game, where you collect different cards, which depict various characters in various outfits and poses. Each card would have a different set of skills and abilities, and you would level up the cards to achieve better scores when playing the songs. I have had two accounts, my original was focused around my favourite characters from both of the idol groups that were covered by Love Live at the time, although a third one later came out. These favourite characters were in their third years of studying at either Otonokizaka Girls’ Academy, and part of the school-idol group Muse, like Nozomi, or their third year of study at Uranohoshi Girls’ School, and part of the school-idol group Aquors.

The anime follows the main story of the game: Otonokizaka Girls’ Academy is going to be closed down in three years’ time: after the newly-enrolled first year students graduate. It follows Honoka Kosaka, a second year student, whose mother and grandmother both attended that school, and whose little sister had been hoping to attend too, but now, would no longer be able to. Her family had a deep-rooted connection with the school and the fact it would be closing deeply upset her, so she decided that she would somehow save her beloved school from closure.

After seeing a video, mounted on a screen in the city, promoting the successful UTX Academy, and their school idol group A-Rise, Honoka decides that’s the best way to preserve her school and their legacy. In the end, she manages to recruit several classmates from the respective academic years to create a nine student strong school idol group known as Muse. The series would follow Muse as they attempted to gain enough traction to keep the school from closing down.

Nozomi Tojo is the eighth member to join Muse, quickly followed by her best friend Eli Ayase, who was the last member. They were part of the group until their graduation in the following spring.
However, that isn’t why I love her or why I decided to praise her this time!

The first thing that always drew me to Nozomi as a viewer was how easy it was to relate to her story. Most of the girls in Muse had their backstories integrated into the story through flashbacks and exposition. However, the one that hit closest to home was when her best friend, Eli revealed Nozomi’s past to Maki. Hers was the last of the backstories to be revealed that season, and explained how she had never had a group of friends before: constantly moving when she was a child lead to an immense feeling of loneliness, which was only amplified by her living alone in High School in order to stay in the same area and attend school. It explored how even though she was comfortable in her own company, she hated feeling alone, and that was why she valued her school, and was so desperate to save it as part of the student council, and as a member of Muse. It was at Otonokizaka that she managed to meet people she could class as her friends and rely upon. Her love of her friends was later exemplified toward the end of the second season when graduation was looming in front of the third years’ and the group decided to go out during the holidays and enjoy a day together where they supposedly weren’t thinking about school or graduation, or even Love Live, the school idol competition they had entered that made them famous. At the end, after visiting a beach, the girls cried together at the train station, not wanting to let each other, and their time together end.

Another reason I adored Nozomi was her awareness of her friends. Both she and Eli, had watched their schoolmates longingly but were too prideful to admit that they also wanted to join in. Both were senior members of the student council, with Eli being the president and Nozomi her vice. They had initially refused the creation of Muse and since then had seen the girls quickly improve as they gained more members. She decided to join after arguing with Eli, telling her that it was okay to change her mind and approach Honoka and ask to join Muse. In the end, it was Nozomi who managed to prompt Honoka into approaching Eli one last time so the girls could all show her that nobody was going to resent her for her hesitation and instead would embrace the ballerina into their group. After Nozomi and Eli joined Muse, their performance as a group was elevated due to Eli’s knowledge of choreography, they were no longer sloppy and unpolished, and instead sharper and enthusiastic. I felt like by having Nozomi be the one to join Muse with Eli showed the viewers that the two girls were very much inseparable and really did know each other better than they knew themselves, despite their generally reserved disposition throughout the show up until that point. I felt that the subtle nature of this depiction worked well for the characters and was implemented really well.

The last reason she is one of my absolute favourite characters is due to her passion for her hobbies, and the influence of them upon the story. Nozomi reads tarot cards as a hobby, constantly using the cards to predict the future. That was how, she claimed, she was able to suggest the name Muse to Honoka through the selection box in the school corridor, because she knew that there would be nine members, like there were nine Grecian muses. She is one of the only members of Muse to have an outside hobby that is not beneficial to the functionality of the group. Kotori’s hobby of designing clothes was utilised as she ended up making the costumes for the group, Nico’s and Hanayo’s respective obsessions with the idol industry were utilised when the girls were struggling to produce content or gain traction. The pair had a vast combined knowledge and thus could provide more insight. Eli’s experience as a ballerina in Russia was a great asset to Muse as she was able to aid Umi in making dynamic choreography for the group. The only member other than Nozomi that has a hobby outside of Muse that doesn’t necessarily help her friends succeed is Umi, who is rather skilled at archery, having previously been a member of the archery club prior to joining Muse. Nozomi, however, uses these tarot cards throughout the franchise, declaring her influence over them as a spiritual power, which she hopes her friends will respect as she would be able to predict the outcome of events with them. Without Nozomi and her cards, a vast amount of symbolism would have been lost. For example, the most prevalent example is when, in the student council meeting room, Eli and Nozomi have lingered, talking amongst themselves. It is, during this conversation, that Muse is mentioned and Nozomi begins to shuffle her cards at the windowsill, pulling cards from the deck, where a gust of wind scatters them throughout the space. This, clearly meant that Muse was about to change the path of course that the two girls had been on until that point. Without Nozomi and her cards, portraying that idea would have been exceedingly complicated.

Please, if you have opinions on Nozomi Tojo, feel free to share them with me! Don’t forget you can check out my previous Character Praise by looking through the hashtags below.

And remember!

Per Aruda Ad Astra

Thursday 23 January 2020

23/1/20 - Weathering With You - SPOILER FREE REVIEW

On Saturday 18th January I went to Westfield Shopping Centre in London in order to watch the new Makoto Shinkai film, Weathering With You with some friends. When we saw it, we were excited, particularly due to the success of its predecessor, Your Name.

But what did I think of Weathering With You?


In short, I adored a lot of aspects of the movie. The aesthetics were amazing - it is a quality I find myself constantly enamoured with. The animators did a fantastic job bringing this story to life, and the artists manage to draw vibrant city-scapes with such love and colour whilst not deterring from the colour palettes. It is so stylised and hyper-realistic all the same.

Then there's the aspect of the sublime and nature. The power of the weather is significant to the story, as demonstrated by its name. The influences that it can have on the world are shown beautifully whilst still providing a sense of fear, awe and vulnerability for the viewer. The beauty of the animation is something which draws me into all of the works I have seen by Shinkai. The style and quality of the animation is fantastic.

Another thing I loved was the music. Like its predecessor, Your Name, the music was provided by RADWIMPS - who, yet again, did a spectacular job. My personal favourite of their discography was easily Grand Escape, which featured vocals from Toko Miura. The songs are very apt and used in the story to reflect a change in the mood, or the passage of time. The pacing of each song, the tune, tempo and the usage of the composition are always well used during the film to demonstrate these shifts. However, a qualm I did have with some of the transitions was that they could be jarring. This may have been an issue that arose solely due to my watching the dub as opposed to the Japanese version with English Subtitles, but the sudden burst of song lyrics in Japanese did not take away from the overall experience.

Then there's the story in itself - which provided a broad insight and perspective into socio-polotical issues, particularly climate change. However, it is also, at its core, a love story, which looked at a concept not widely known, or at least, my friends and I seemed rather unfamiliar with it. The concept of rain and sunshine provided plenty of room for pathetic fallacy and symbolism, I really enjoyed the concept, imagery and execution. It was vert interesting and easy to watch.

I do not intend to talk much about the Easter Eggs that I noticed whilst watching this particular film. Instead, I hope to discuss them further in a follow-up post, should I get the opportunity to see the film again in the cinema, or once it is released on DVD. However, I wills say this: in short, fans of other works by Shinkai won't be disappointed in what you find.

Until then, I would like to say that I wholeheartedly enjoyed watching Weathering With You and I would recommend seeing it, if you haven't already!

Tuesday 21 January 2020

21/1/19 - Happy Tuesday! University Inspired Writing Prompt

Today, , is the next instalment of University Inspired Writing Prompts. Since my first year at university, I have been compiling a collection of writing prompts inspired by my time studying in Derby. I hope that these prompts help you create your own works!

All of these prompts are dialogue based, and are inspired by real conversations I have been part of whilst at university.

PROMPT #39:

"My mum got me a calendar filled with photos of my dog because she was sick of answering my video calls to see him" 

The above was genuinely something my mum did for my sister and I. As she was so stressed and tired from work, what she hated was having to answer a series of video calls every other night from my younger sister and I, in bad moods, desperate to see our dog in order to make us feel better. She decided that the least cost-effective means of making us stop calling her was to buy us each a small puppy calendar, filled with photos of our dog. 

I hope that this prompt inspired something, even if it was just a smile! Feel free to check out my previous prompts by looking through the hashtags below! 

Thank you so much for reading! 

And remember! 

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

- Imogen. L. Smiley

Sunday 19 January 2020

19/1/20 - Song Of The Week Sunday!

Hi guys! I'm back with another Song Of The Week Sunday! The purpose of this segment is to give you guys a quick glimpse into my life and the things I listen to on repeat!

The song of the week this week is Lana Del Ray's song Young And Beautiful, which was used as part of the soundtrack from The Great Gatsby film adaptation!

You can stream it on Spotify here!

https://open.spotify.com/track/6JF5OEqj3bIEdoBTkHVACm

I chose this song to keep up the theme from my previous post. I haven't been so excited for a new year to begin in such a long time, and while, the first month of it, is almost gone already, I have still managed to claw enough time out of my hectic schedule to binge-watch The Great Gatsby several times in the last few weeks. After my last watch, I had Lana's song stuck in my head for ages and decided that it deserved to be my next SOTW!

I hope you guys have had an amazing week and continue to do so!

And remember:

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

Tuesday 14 January 2020

14/1/20 - Happy Tuesday! University Inspired Writing Prompt

Today, 14/1/20, is the next instalment of University Inspired Writing Prompts. Since my first year at university, I have been compiling a collection of writing prompts inspired by my time studying in Derby. I hope that these prompts help you create your own works!

All of these prompts are dialogue based, and are inspired by real conversations I have been part of whilst at university.

PROMPT #38:

"What is a blue raspberry?"

The above is actually a quote from one of my colleagues from my former job at a theme park. On the last day of High-Season, where the majority of local schools had resumed, the staff had been allowed long, interlocked breaks. This meant that I ended up on an hour-long break in the company of not one, not two, but six of my colleagues from the same department, who had been sent on break within ten minutes of each other.

Before I had joined them, my friends and colleagues had played several of the arcade games, something staff were, generally, not allowed to do, as it meant that the large volume of guests were unable to do so. However, as the arcade was desolate, they had been allowed to purchase games. I had joined them with a tray of doughnuts and a slushie. It evoked ar ather strange conversation that led to a colleague asking the above question, leaving the rest of us flabbergasted 

I hope that this prompt inspired something, even if it was just a smile! Feel free to check out my previous prompts by looking through the hashtags below! 

Thank you so much for reading! 

And remember! 

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

- Imogen. L. Smiley

Sunday 12 January 2020

12/1/20 - Song Of The Week Sunday!

Hi guys! I'm back with another Song Of The Week Sunday! The purpose of this segment is to give you guys a quick glimpse into my life and the things I listen to on repeat!

The song of the week this week is Roaring 20's by Panic! At The Disco from the Pray For The Wicked album

You can stream it on Spotify here!

https://open.spotify.com/track/0wdV94AXGRphrbkDWLNzVC

I chose the above song as my Song Of The Week, mostly out of shame. Promptly after sharing the SOTW last week, a friend of mine pointed out that the more apt song-choice would have been Roaring 20's by Panic!, and thus, it has been on loop ever since. I'm excited to a decade of Gatsby-esque proportions!

I hope you guys have had an amazing week and continue to do so!

And remember:

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

Friday 10 January 2020

10/1/20 - Favourite Character Praise Friday - Mark Cohen


Hello and welcome back to Favourite Character Praise Friday! This is one of my absolute favourite posts to write and I hope you enjoy my picking apart of my favourite characters enough to stick around while I examine my next victim, I mean, character. Don’t worry, I do not rank these characters in a particular order, it just so happens that some characters are better worth sharing praise for at a different point in time to others! Remember, every fifth instalment is Least Favourite Character Praise Friday, so keep an eye out for me probing at characters I can’t stand and raving about how well they were written in order to evoke such a reaction.

So, who is the subject of my next Favourite Character Praise Friday?

Mark Cohen from the movie-musical RENT



Warning: The following will contain spoilers!

Mark Cohen is one of the six central characters in the story RENT. He and his friends are struggling artists living off scraps, unable to afford to pay for their homes. The struggling bohemians all have dreams of success, but are struggling to get the means to achieve those dreams. Mark Cohen is a filmmaker, who is reluctant to sell out and go and produce content for mainstream media, instead wanting to create a documentary about the true way that New York’s poorest people live.

One of the reasons I love Mark as a character is that he is willing to compromise in order to help those around him. His morals are flexible and he does make mistakes and contradict himself. When Mark’s ex-girlfriend Maureen’s protest about the repurposing of a space the homeless use to squat, ends up being violent, Mark records the events that take place with the intention of putting them in his documentary, as the footage depicts the police force using riot gear and attempting to physically overpower and arrest people that were partaking in what was a peaceful protest, with homeless people being beaten bloody. When he realises that this information ought to be spread further, he willingly sells the footage of the riot that took place to the 11 O’clock news in order to let the reality his camera captured be shared further than a documentary would have been. He and his friends acknowledge that that was the right thing to do. His loyalty to his friends is further exemplified when he and his friends are made homeless by their landlord for not paying their rent. Mark had been given an opportunity to be a cameraman for a tabloid newscaster and was originally going to refuse, but due to he and his friends no longer being able to afford their living space, he decided that his morals were worth the compromise in order to help everyone stay alive.

Another aspect of his character that I love is how reluctant he is to be honest with his friends about his own emotional wellbeing. In the song Goodbye Love, which is cut short in the film, Mark and his housemate, former heroin addict Roger, argue about whether he is right to be angry about Roger leaving. In which Mark loses his temper and says that he should be allowed to be angry because he is “the one of [their social circle] to survive”. The bitterness in his tone reflects the fact he resents the fact his friends are all suffering from life-threatening illnesses. Angel, Collins, Mimi and Roger canonically have AIDs and with Maureen and Joanne are people that Mark feels he isn’t really friends with. He cares for Maureen but doesn’t want to intrude on her relationship with her new girlfriend as it’s not fair on either of the women. He is angry that his friends have put themselves in a situation where they are likely to die. Angel had already passed away and he acknowledges that Collins, Roger and Mimi are all, in a way ticking time-bombs, their relationships more intense due to the fact that they have no idea when they could lose a friend. Mark seems more reluctant to do so, because the idea of losing his friends is too much to handle. He classes his point of view to be selfish and refrains from acknowledging his emotions.

The last reason I adore Mark’s character is that he is so dedicated to capturing the essence of a moment to reflect upon. Throughout the film, Mark is recording the events that occur around him to preserve for a documentary, which, when revealed to his friends in the finale, appears more like a tribute to the friendship he shares with the people around him. He has no idea whether his friends might die and doesn’t want to forget them and feel like their deaths were in vain. This is demonstrated in Goodbye Love, where he calls Roger out for leaving New York to escape from the gravity of his own condition, and the fact that the woman he’s in love with is “running out of time” even though one of his friends just died too. The fact that they could die so quickly gives Roger anxiety. Mark seems to feel the same, but he doesn’t want to make his friends feel alone and instead decides to stay behind and be with them, recording their happiness, their motion, their laughter, their existence so it doesn’t just fade away like they didn’t live. This idea of wanting to capture the moment is something I relate to immensely due to wanting to remember the good times as opposed to the bad. I felt that Mark encapsulates that essence.

Please, if you have opinions on Mark Cohen, feel free to share them with me! Don’t forget you can check out my previous Character Praise by looking through the hashtags below.

And remember!

Per Aruda Ad Astra

Thursday 9 January 2020

Imogen's A Theatre Nerd: Six: The Musical


I have been immensely fortunate when it comes to exposure to musical theatre and live-stage performances. When I was younger, my aunt used to purchase tickets for myself, my younger sister and my mother to see shows on the West End, some of which, I still have the programs for now. I remember the first West End show I went to was Hairspray when I was around eleven or twelve years old. We got to stage door after the performance and the programs we bought were covered with signatures from cast members that were delighted that we had enjoyed the show. The last time I went on one of those trips was when I was sixteen. I had seen Wicked with my family and not everyone had enjoyed the performance as much as I had. But I was still much too young to go to the theatre alone. However, my love for musical theatre in particular didn’t cease.

It was only recently, in October of 2018, that I went to another West End performance, where I saw Heather’s on tour with two of my friends, just weeks after I’d managed to purchase Hamilton tickets for myself and my mother in the new year. It was then that I realised I had happened across an expensive habit. Since then, I have made many more trips to see shows in London; Hamilton (twice), Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Harry Potter and The Cursed Child, The Great Gatsby, and Dear Evan Hansen.

I figured that, I would share some anecdotes about my experiences, because, honestly, I just love to share and remember the fun I had!


SO, Six!


Six The Musical is a pop musical that tells the story of Henry VIII’s six wives: Catherine of Aragon, Ann Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anne of Cleves, Katherine Howard and Catherine Parr. It provides a modernised and easy to access platform for history.

The musical itself is the equivalent of one act in length and runs without an intermission in an easy to follow manner. All of the songs are catchy and have a lot of character to them – that way the audience can access the story and build upon their pre-existing knowledge. Each song in the show provides context about the wives and the breakdown of their relationships with Henry VIII.

The staging is effective – with a small stage that the six actresses filled and elevated spaces for the musicians that perform alongside the cast. The lack of a background set means the eyes of the audience are caught and captured by the performance and can’t stray form the cast.

My personal favourite aspect of Six is the costuming department and how they incorporate aspects of the historical dress in the Queen’s costumes, while each are still presented as modern. They each wear high heeled shoes and wear corresponding outfits that make them resemble a girl-band. There are nods to their original portraits from the Tudor times in their costumes – from Ann Boleyn’s top and skirt combo being a glittery green tartan, a nod to her green sleeves, to the addition of glittery skeleton frames of puffed up sleeves, corsets and petticoats. These Queens would not go amiss in the sales industry.

I loved getting to see Six, I found the entire experience really empowering, the stress of needing a man’s love to be amazing and the emphasis that Henry VIII is only remembered because he had six wives, so they seemed to elevate him more than he did them. The show ends on a high note, declaring how important unity, solidarity, and supporting one another. It really is an immersive, electric, almost concert-like experience. I look forward to seeing the show on tour.

Six The Musical is playing at The Arts Theatre and tickets are available to purchase until January 2021.


Thank you so much for reading! I really hope you give this show a go! It really was amazing!

And remember:

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

- Imogen. L. Smiley

Tuesday 7 January 2020

7/1/20 - Happy Tuesday! University Inspired Writing Prompt

Hi guys! I can't believe its already 2020 and that the first of my university-inspired writing prompts of the new year is finally here Today, 7/1/20, is the next instalment of University Inspired Writing Prompts. Since my first year at university, I have been compiling a collection of writing prompts inspired by my time studying in Derby. I hope that these prompts help you create your own works!

All of these prompts are dialogue based, and are inspired by real conversations I have been part of whilst at university.

PROMPT #37:

"Oh look at you being such an adult and buying the lemon lime flavoured slushie!"

This is actually a quote from my younger sister, two years my junior from when we were out during my last summer as a student. Admittedly it is rather self explanatory but I felt it was definitely worth sharing! In comparison to my lemon lime, she had ordered a cola flavoured slush because she declared she was feeling childish. 

I hope that this prompt inspired something, even if it was just a smile! Feel free to check out my previous prompts by looking through the hashtags below!

Thank you so much for reading!

And remember!

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

- Imogen. L. Smiley

Sunday 5 January 2020

5/1/20 - Song Of The Week Sunday

Hi guys! I'm back with my Song Of The Week Sunday of the new year! I'm really excited to keep sharing music with you all! The purpose of this segment is to give you guys a quick glimpse into my life and the things I listen to on repeat!

The song of the week this week is Living Louder by The Cab from their album Symphony Soldier

You can stream it on Spotify here!
 https://open.spotify.com/track/4EM3aMnzNWt60YTe3XCXPr

I decided that the best way to celebrate the start of the new year, and a brand new decade would be to continue keeping the positive attitude up. I want to rejoice at the return of the twenties with a positive moodlet and thus opted to keeping the music upbeat and lively. So! To keep the happiness going, I'm sharing another happy song.

I hope you guys have had an amazing week and continue to do so!

And remember:

Per Ardua Ad Astra!

Wednesday 1 January 2020

2019: A Year In Review

There are many things I wish I could say as another year greets us. I'd love to look back on the last 365 days of my life with a bright smile and say that I have zero regrets about the decisions I made. But if I were to do that, I would be lying.

There are many things I regret, when looking back on 2019: from how much time I spent reading instead of writing, how many events I found myself refusing to attend at the last minute due to having a lack of motivation, to how much money I spent on iced coffee when I had a blender at home. But, I've made my choices, and, I'm still writing, so surely any other loss was not that detrimental?

That being said, 2019 was a very long, harrowing year, filled with a number of ups and downs. But, I remember discussing the events that were to come with my friend and fellow blogger Emma, almost a year ago to the date. We had spent an age daydreaming about the amazing things that could await us, for 2019 was going to be the year of experiences: the year of theatre, the year of friendship and a year I wouldn't want to go forward and forget.

We were right to say that back then. In 2019, I went and did amazing things that I otherwise wouldn't have necessarily done. From visiting Disneyland Paris, to attending numerous shows on the West End, to meeting numerous personal goals that I won't bore you with listing. 2019 was, very much, a year of experiences.

Regardless, I am glad that the year has finally come to a close. It had been a year of many ups and downs, from losing my beloved dog, and best friend, George, to struggling with post-graduation depression, 2019, had many lows.

I look forward to going ahead into the new year, with things on the way up. I will be moving into a new house with my family in a few days, and am in the process of drafting a collection of Gothic short stories. I look forward to seeing what the year, let alone the decade has in store for me.

Happy New Year to everyone reading and I hope that 2020 is kind to you!

Thank you so much for reading!
And remember!
Per Ardua Ad Astra!
- Imogen. L. Smiley

Happy New Year!

Hi guys! I hope everyone had a great festive season and is ready to take 2020 by storm! I'm so excited to embark on another year of chasing my dreams, hopefully, by this time next year, I'll be even closer to achieving them!

Do you guys have any resolutions? I'd love to hear them!

Happy 2020, everyone!

And remember!

Per Ardua Ad Astra!