Lila Gaela
is a Peruvian web literature writer and critic who mains on Wattpad and produces both original and fan fiction. She had a very brief stint on Archive of Our Own and Amino Apps, where she respectively cross-posted her works and fan theories.
Gaela is fluent in Spanish (her native tongue), English, and French. She has passing knowledge of Quechua as well.
Her writing style is easily recognized by seamlessly merging prose with literary tools typically found in poems, such as rhymes, musicality, and multi-layered symbolism but without the text being structured in stanzas. Gaela calls it 'poetic prose' and it's more prevalent in her original pieces due to their shorter length.
All of her posts and author's notes end with 'Con cariño, Lila' (translation: 'Love, Lila').
She claims inspiration from author Sylvia Plath (for the confessional not-poetry), music band La oreja de Van Gogh, and various Symbolist poets, including her long-deceased compatriot José María Eguren.
Gaela's fan works are centered almost exclusively on Winx Club, with her having contributed to the lore of fellow Wattpad writer Bloom_Farella's Paradoxus. However, she has written pieces for works such as Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Bicolor as well. Some of her content includes fan theories and Point of Divergence scenarios.
Another pastime of hers is to review the literary production of both budding and well-established Spanish-speaking Wattpad writers in a Constructive Criticism but humorous manner; good-natured rants, if you might. Proof of this is that she's on friendly terms with every author she's reviewed. She also hosts a club with strict formatting guidelines where budding writers can review each other and learn from the experience.
Along her literary analyses, Lila Gaela posts various writing advice, from how what to have in mind while crafting a magic system to how damn useful is to organize one's work around a Central Theme. Some of the entries are her followers' contributions she shares with permission.
Or well, she used to until she retired all her literary production from her accounts due to mental health reasons in 2021.
Gaela's works:
Fiction- Amaranthine Shadows (a Winx Club Point of Divergence fanfic; the archived version can be found here)
- Cronicas de un gato a medianoche (an anthology of poetic prose and her schoolgirl poems; an incomplete, archived version can be found here)
- "Alas arrancadas" (a Winx Club one-shot for a Wattpad fantasy contest; finalist)
- "Demon's Madness" (a PMMM The Movie: Rebellion short fanfic)
- "Irises Infectas" (an original one-shot for a Wattpad short story contest)
- "Un océano en otra galaxia" (a Bicolor short fanfic)
- "Palabras huecas" (an original one-shot for a Wattpad social critic contest)
- Delirios de un incendio nocturno (her first original web novel)
Music
- "Saudade" (a one-minute piano composition)
Non-Fiction
- Catálogo de fanfics
- Club de reseñas de Lila
- Reseñas: Club Winx
- Reseñas de fantasía
Works Gaela has reviewed:
Original works- Claroscuro by fabulista del ayer
- Historia de un hada El deseo de una diosa by Hinata Hanzo
- Lancel y el crisol maldito by J. C. Kings
- Leyendas de cristal by Jeninffer B. G.
- Monstruos de raza by Baltmica
- Nocturno by Fantagoria
- RECORDARI by Noirdandelion
- Reminiscencia by Arias of Snow
Winx Club fan works
- Almost Magical by chocolatesmoothie
- Calcetines y munequeras by Cereza Prohibida
- Corrompidas by Icy_Queen_W
- Dragons Daughters by Bloom_Farella
- Luz mas alla de la oscuridad by isadorarocio
- Mi yo del pasado by F. L. Miller
- El oscuro pasado de Flora by llinicua
- La pesadilla de Flora by chosethebooks
- Phoenixs Secret by Krokodilena
- Los problemas de las Winx by Karla Elizabeth
- La superviviente de Domino by LeDuchesseNoire
- Supervivientes de la corrupcion by Blake Reese
- La ultima lagrima
Tropes pertaining to Gaela's works:
- Dead Fic: After taking it down in 2021 along with the rest of her works, Amaranthine Shadows has become permanently stuck at the beginning of Musa's betrayal arc, when she goes to a secret meeting with Darcy for the first time. Galatea's mental state after her mid-training breakdown is also left uncertain; not to mention Bloom's chances at living post-Water Stars attack.
- Death Amnesia: Inverted in Amaranthine Shadows. When Bloom dies, she becomes an amnesiac soul who doesn't remember anything from when she was alive. The interludes show that she goes onto a hectic afterlife in which she has to traverse some sort of underworld. As the events are narrated in reverse, we see her progressively recover her memories. In the prologue, which comes chronologically last, the only events that she can't recall are the ones that lead to her death, so she's confused when her beloved friends and girlfriend ignore her—they can't interact with her because she's a ghost.
- Fiction Science: Some of her writing advice entries (as well as those collected from her followers) detail real-life topics in regard to how they can be used in literature. The topics include Peruvian Pre-Columbian Civilizations and child psychology.
- Hero Looking for Group: In Amaranthine Shadows, it's more like Anti-Villain looking for group. Darcy actively seeks new converts to her Ikisat Cult, comprised of fairies and witches alike who worship the Goddess of Death in exchange for a toxic boost of magic. The power-up is how she lures them into allying with her, as the various characters she converts seek power to do justice or for personal reasons. Darcy's actual goal is to overthrow Valtor.
- Mesodiplosis: In the seventh chapter, this is Lost in Translation from Spanish to English. Galatea suffers from a PTSD flashback episode about Icy tearing her wings. The narration establishes a metaphor between that traumatic event and a spider eating a butterfly trapped in its spiderweb, so the pain caused by the spider's venom is equaled to the pain provoked by the flashback. So we have: "The spider's venom gnawing at her insides. Of the spidery memory of her broken wings." In the original Spanish text, the word "arácnido" is located in the middle of both phrases and used as both a noun (arachnid) and an adjective (spidery) to reinforce the parallel.
- O.C. Stand-in: Amaranthine Shadows has a rather particular and more fleshed-out version of Galatea, a very, very minor character in the Winx Club series. In canon, she's a plot device whose only purpose is to be rescued by Musa so the latter can gain her Enchantix and use her Fairy Dust to heal the former's ripped-off wings. One might think that any fairy would suffer severe trauma after losing her wings thanks to a witch, even if she later regained them. Winx Club's creators shoved aside all of this after that episode so this fanwork occupies itself on correcting the loose ends. Galatea indeed gets PTSD afterward and a real personality. She's a perfectionist, she's haughty, and since her wings don't immediately grow again after being healed by Musa, she thrives for power in order to regain control.
- Shout-Out: The opening paragraph of Crónicas de un gato a medianoche references José María Eguren's poem "(R)eyes (r)ojos" word by word. Gaela uses it as a shortcut metaphor for weary eyes while keeping the original's Bilingual Bonus. It also makes an allusion to one of Homura Akemi's witch transformation stages in Puella Magi Madoka Magica The Movie: Rebellion —specifically, when spiderweb-bleeding red moons replace Homura's eyes.
