This is a thread for discussing my luminous!Twilight fic, Luminosity (inferior mirror here), its sequel Radiance (inferior mirror), and related topics.
PDFs, to be updated as the fic updates, are available of Luminosity (other version) and Radiance. (PDFs courtesy of anyareine). Zack M Davis has created a mobi file of Radiance.
Initial discussion of the fic under a Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality thread is here. The first dedicated threads: Part 1, Part 2. See also the luminosity sequence which contains some of the concepts that the Luminosity fic is intended to illustrate. (Disclaimer: in the fic, the needs of the story take precedence over the needs for didactic value where the two are in tension.)
Spoilers are OK to post without ROT-13 for canon, all of Book 1, and Radiance up to the current chapter. Note which chapter (let's all use the numbering on my own webspace, rather than fanfiction.net, for consistency) you're about to spoil in your comment if it's big. People who know extra stuff (my betas and people who have requested specific spoilers) should keep mum about unpublished information they have. If you wish to join the ranks of the betas or the spoiled, contact me individually.
Miscellaneous links: TV Tropes page (I really really like it when new stuff appears there) and thread. Automatic Livejournal feed.
Order of operations matters. When Chelsea's on the ball and has a seed, she can sprout that seed, coax it to arbitrary levels of growth, and keep pulling it back when it shrivels up a bit. Sure, the plant she grows will wilt whenever it occurs to the victim "hey, my friend here tortured me for several years", but unless this goes on unchecked long enough to leave no seed at all, Chelsea can just haul back the liking again. Eventually, I think somebody who finds that no amount of dwelling on the torture bit can let them stop liking the torturer will find a way to excuse or ignore the torture. On the other hand, if you like someone to begin with and then they torture you the sense of betrayal might be immediate and dreadful enough to completely obliterate the sort of seeds Chelsea needs to function.
Fortunately I have never been tortured (or had loved ones tortured/raped/murdered), but I imagine that the practical limit of how much you can hate someone is a lot higher than how much you can like someone (not so sure about love, but that doesn't seem to be what Chelsea's doing), and if you both liked and hated the same person as much as possible the hate would dominate.
To amend the example: First you are tortured for a long time by a masked person for selfish reasons, then the torture ends and you become close friends with someone, and finally that f... (read more)