#This is the plot of married thrice to salted fish

[mxtxfanatic]

Book of the Week: Married Thrice to Salted Fish

Author: Bikabi (比卡比)

Genre: transmigration, ancient setting, danmei

Rating: M (for fade-to-black sexy times)

My Synopsis: Are you ready to cry your eyes out over a plot point you can guess from the literal title? Well grab your tissues and step right up to meet our main character: Lin Qingyu, a man who thinks the worst thing that can happen to him is being forced to marry a terminally ill young master who claims to be from another world and also to have the ability to be reborn into different people. Journey with him as he wades through court and courtyard politics, wielding his genius in medicine in order to protect himself from remaining a pawn of the royal family—and struggles with the practical knowledge that all the power and medical expertise in the world cannot stop death.

My Actual Review: Yes it’s literally in the title and official synopsis that the LI is gonna die a few times. Yes I cried every time, anyways; what of it? The story can be split into two interweaving plots: 1) Lin Qingyu fighting his way into becoming a physician against the interference of multiple royal family members and 2) the main couple falling in love as the LI works in between deaths to help Lin Qingyu achieve his dream instead of meeting his end as some book’s minor cannon fodder villain. This feels like a lot, but it works really well because Lin Qingyu, who the story focal point sticks with, still has things to do while the LI is… indisposed, so to speak. He’s not just waiting around for the LI to be reborn, and the story doesn’t stop or skip around to the LI’s return since the romance is not the only story focus. However, that doesn’t mean that the romance takes a backseat or is unimportant: each death brings the main characters closer as a couple, and each new life gives them new ways to work together as a well-oiled machine—which also makes the deaths hit especially hard despite readers knowing it’s coming.

On another note, this book has a lot of extras, to the point where they almost start to feel like too much of nothing? Especially since it just takes our cast and punts them into the modern world with no rhyme or reason (or sending them back), but they’re cute if you just mentally think of it as a modern au of the main story, for all intents and purposes.

Translation: complete

[overshelter]

REVIEW: Married Thrice to Salted Fish

WARNING: It's full of SPOILERS, so CAUTION!

Well, about this one...

IT'S TOO CUTE, MY GOD! I REALLY CAN'T STAND IT!

Seriously! Despite how labored, painful and even harrowing the plot may be, MTSF is definitely a novel with a very, very cute and sweet plot!

This story is truly about love, development and how a relationship should be. The way Jiang Xing and Lin Qingyu fell in love little by little, and then got into a relationship, was definitely a sight for sore eyes, a pure delight for anyone reading! The author managed to write in such a sincere and natural way. You can clearly see the love growing between them with each reincarnation of Jiang Xing and you're able to fall in love with each interaction, as well as being fascinated by the changes in the way they treat each other with each one. I still can't get over the way they flirt! It's so sweet, funny and definitely daring that you can't help but smile with every paragraph of narration. I really love the way this author has developed them. I think I rarely come across novels where the relationship is written in a way that gives you that sense of reality, where you can feel that the couple are truly and intensely in love. And what's worse? It's not even toxic or intensely bad! It's just right!

I also love, ABSOLUTELY LOVE, Jiang Xing and his salted fish dream! I can totally relate! Too bad I'm a mere mortal and can't really reach the brain of our favorite slacker. I really wish I could, though... but even though I can't, I like having the privilege of reveling in the fact that he's still going to have to "work hard" for his Baobei for a long, long time! Anyway. Jiang Xing is also a beautifully developed character, with a captivating personality and way of thinking that easily draws anyone in. I completely understand Qingyu and why he is so enamored of this "mere student", even more so with how proficient this student is at appeasing and pampering our great beauty.

Apart from our Jiang, I obviously love Lin Qingyu, our cold and poisonous beauty, who could easily end your life with a single comment. Petty? Who cares! It's his great charm! After all, just like Jiang Xing, I can't help but get excited and anxious to see such a beautiful person poison his offenders to death and stomp on them. Honestly? If I were them, I'd even be grateful. After all, it's not every day that someone so beautiful and so prestigious is willing to pay attention to you, even if it's just to throw you in a grave. But anyway. Our beauty is not only cold, it's also unbearably cute and sweet. Of course, that's just for student Jiang and, later, a little bit for their adopted son, Shen Huaishi – another one I totally wanted to hold and spoil in every possible way! –.

Another point here is the narrative. It flows very well, and the writing doesn't leave you alone until you've consumed every chapter! I'm being honest! I finished one hundred and forty-seven of them in two or three days! I couldn't stop unless I finished it in one go and, if it hadn't been for the fact that I had obligations and had started reading in the middle of the week, I would definitely have finished it in one day after spending the night obsessively and psychotically involved with the story of these two. So believe me when I say that this is a poisonous novel that won't let you go until you have no more content left!

Well, I don't want to say too much because, even though I've already given away a HUGE spoiler just by mentioning "Jiang Xing", I still really want to preserve some things and experience before you read on. So I'm not going to say anything other than that this novel should be a must-read and high on your priority list. Especially if you're looking for a couple with real development, a compelling dynamic and a great story to tell.

In short...

READ IT FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!! I'M BEGGING YOU!!!

[spockandawe]

Fourteenth year of chenghua is still EXTREMELY good, and it's good to know that wang zhi is literally their sitcom boyfriend and breaks into their homes and eats their food, but it's kind of fascinating to me that like.... I'm not sure I've read a single book with imperial succession as an climactic plot point where the pacing DIDN'T totally lose me at the end.

(Thousand Autumns might be closest, but 1) that wasn't the climax, and 2) i did still Slump after it happened and had to consciously muster my strength)

Dreamer in the Spring Boudoir, The Disabled Tyrant's Pet Palm Fish, Qi-Ye, it's pretty consistent! Did Golden Stage do an actual succession or just apply that pressure to the emperor? Either way, my attention was clearly slipping. Married Thrice To Salted Fish! I knew that was the plot direction and was excited for it, and it still struggled to hold me. This isn't over, and I don't even know if the plot WILL fully go there, but just as things were soaring-- two year time skip. Yeah, that's more bureaucratically realistic, and there's ALSO a real emperor who stopped ruling at whatever date, but mannnnnnnnnn.

I like the majority of the book a LOT, and I literally just said the thing about admiring meng xi shi weighting stories heavier towards plots, but i could really use a bit more indulgence here 🥲 I do highkey wonder if this show/book comparison will be like the untamed or woh where no, i love the book, maybe better than the show, but the body language and microexpressions are too powerful, they cannot be denied

[aworldforastage]

Just finished: 三嫁咸鱼/Thrice Married to Salted Fish by 比卡比

Okay, not gonna lie, I'm a bit disappointed -- not to say the novel wasn't good, but my expectations might have been a bit too high due to its immense popularity, especially in the English-speaking fandom.

The story has some very interesting and refreshing ideas:

A transmigration novel told from the POV of an in-universe character rather than the transmigrator

Three separate transmigrations into the same universe

Main characters who unabashedly prioritizes their own interests

And it includes many popular tropes:

A genre-savvy transmigrator intentionally hijacks the plot from the original protagonist

A "feel-good" novel that mercilessly destroys the bad guys and other people standing in the main couple's way

Main characters are very smart and competent (if a bit OP)

The plot is action-packed and tightly-paced

The main couple has believable development and compatible personalities

But on the other hand [unmarked spoilers ahead]

I don't really like with the way the relationship arc has been handled. The gong transmigrates into three different bodies; even though it's the same spirit/personality that Lin Qingyu falls in love with, their dynamic is a bit different in each body and identity. A big part of Lin Qingyu's relationship with Lu Wancheng is them grappling with his declining health and inevitable death, and his relationship with Gu Fuzhou has a period of familiarizing with this new body. They are so distinct that I can't see it like one single relationship.

It is especially jarring to see Lin Qingyu "moving on" literally the night after Gu Fuzhou dies. Because he has been through this before, and this is meant to be Jiang Xing's "true body", there seems to be barely any adjustment. Qingyu becomes intimate with the new body before he is done processing Gu Fuzhou's death, and I feel like it was too abrupt given how deeply he has bonded with Jiang Xing-as-Gu Fuzhou.

The plot also feels more and more implausible as time goes on. The schemes Lin Qingyu and Lu Wancheng pull off in the Lu Household can be explained away by them being ballsy and smart, but as the scope of the story expands, their egregious interference of imperial politics just seems downright ridiculous. I really enjoyed the first part of the novel, where Lu Wancheng's poor health and Lin Qingyu's awkward political position give them more of an underdog-against-the-power kind of vibe. However, as they gain more political power and the "protagonist halo" , their progress becomes so smooth it can't even be called a conflict anymore.

Overall

I would summarize my impression of novel as "did not live up to the hype". It has many refreshing and enjoyable tropes, a sweet romantic arc and a feel-good kind of plot. It also has good and effective writing -- I was in tears reading about Lu Wancheng's death. Ironically, it starts in a way I really enjoyed, but shifts to a direction I enjoy less towards the end. Not a bad story, but I just hoped for something a bit more spectacular, or at least a bit different.

However, the song from the audiodrama is a bop ~

[marigoldispeculiar]

I’m really enjoying Married Thrice to Salted Fish. It feels like a just reward for having read so much danmei lol

In order to understand the story, I have to:

A) know how Chinese palace dramas work

B) know how old-school scum gong/cheap shou danmei work

C) know how transmigration stories work

There are like 3 co-occurring plots going on (original plot/transmigration plot/MC’s plot) and keeping track of them all requires being able to guess what’s supposed to happen next in each one :)

[toastofgarlic]

Recently read Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer cuz I heard about it from tiktok, which is often a bad sign, but it was actually… ok? Sort of? On one hand, it was cute, it was entertaining, but the longer I thought about it after I finished reading it, the more I felt like it could’ve been more. Idk what other people think of it but here we go:

At first I liked the character of The Villain, but as it went on and some of the “cool and mysterious” was stripped away, there was just less character to him. He’s nice to his employees and protective of Evie and that’s it? He seemed like a silly lil guy who hung heads on the office ceiling and fit the villain trope nicely, but I don’t think we should have to wait until book two (not out yet, not reading it or at least not buying it myself) for him to have some more personality.

Also it just… wasn’t what I thought it would be. With a premise of someone who’s the assistant to a cliche evil man villain, I would expect far more shenanigans, the assistant having to deal with her boss’s nonsense and complaining when the plan doesn’t go well, her accompanying him when he robs a mansion or steals soup from the king, as a bonus maybe an opposing hero and hero’s assistant, SOMETHING like that. But we do not see a SINGLE evil scheme in action! There are vague references to a plot against the king, but most of it is them looking for people and clues to figure out who in the villain’s castle is a spy working for the king! The vast majority is an office romance!! I was deceived!!!

Ahem, ahem. Just kidding for the most part. I did enjoy it, I read it in a day and laughed at some points. I’m just a bit sad because I think more could’ve been done with the concept.

But that was this book, now I’m currently slowly reading The Serpent and the Wings of Night, and also, entirely due to the title I’m reading some random danmei called Married Thrice to Salted Fish. So those will be next!

[fi-lo-b]

REVIEW: Married Thrice to Salted Fish

AVISO: Tá cheio de SPOILERS, então CUIDADO!

Beleza, sobre esse aqui…

É MUITO FOFO, MEU DEUS! EU REALMENTE NÃO AGUENTO!

Sério! Apesar de quão trabalhado, sofrido e até mesmo angustiante a trama possa ser, MTSF é definitivamente uma novel com um plot muito, muito fofo e doce!

Essa história é verdadeiramente sobre amor, desenvolvimento e como uma relação deveria ser. A maneira como Jiang Xing e Lin Qingyu se apaixonaram aos poucos, e então se relacionaram, foi definitivamente um colírio, um deleite puro para qualquer um lendo! A autora conseguiu escrever de uma maneira tão sincera e tão natural. Você vê claramente o amor crescendo entre eles a cada reencarnação do Jiang Xing e é capaz de se apaixonar por cada interação, assim como se fascinar pelas mudanças em sua forma de tratar ao outro em cada uma delas. Ainda não consigo superar o modo como eles flertam! É tão doce, divertido e, definitivamente, ousado que você não consegue evitar de sorrir com cada parágrafo de narração. Eu realmente amo demais o modo como essa autora os desenvolveu. Acho que raramente encontro novels onde o relacionamento é escrito de uma maneira que passe essa sensação de realidade, onde você consegue sentir que aquele casal está verdadeiramente e intensamente apaixonado. E o pior? Nem sequer é tóxico ou algo intensamente ruim! Está na medida certa!

Também amo, ABSOLUTAMENTE AMO, Jiang Xing e seu sonho de peixe salgado! Me identifico completamente! Uma pena que eu seja uma mera mortal e verdadeiramente não consiga alcançar o cérebro do nosso preguiçoso favorito. Eu realmente queria, no entanto… mas, mesmo não podendo, gosto de poder ter o privilégio de me divertir com o fato de que ele ainda vai ter que “trabalhar duro” pelo seu Baobei por longos e longos anos! Enfim. Jiang Xing também é um personagem belamente desenvolvido, com uma personalidade e maneiras de pensar cativantes, e que atraem facilmente qualquer um. Entendo perfeitamente Qingyu e o porquê dele estar tão apaixonado por esse “mero estudante”, ainda mais com o quanto esse estudante é proficiente em apaziguar e mimar nossa grande beleza.

Além do nosso Jiang, eu obviamente amo Lin Qingyu, nossa beleza fria e venenosa, que pode facilmente acabar com a sua vida por causa de um único comentário. Mesquinho? Quem se importa! É o grande charme dele! Afinal, assim como Jiang Xing, eu não posso deixar de ficar excitada e ansiosa para ver uma pessoa tão linda assim envenenando seus ofensores até a morte e pisando neles. Sinceramente? Se eu fosse eles, ficaria até mesmo grata. Afinal, não é todo dia que alguém tão lindo e de prestígio enorme se dispõe a prestar atenção em você, mesmo que seja só para te jogar em uma cova. Mas, enfim. Nossa beleza não é apenas fria, como também é insuportavelmente fofa e meiga. Claro que, esse lado é só para o estudante Jiang e, mais tarde, um pouquinho para o filho adotivo deles, Shen Huaishi – outro que eu queria totalmente pegar no colo e mimar de todas as formas possíveis! –.

Outro ponto aqui é a narrativa. Flui muito bem, além de a escrita não te deixar em paz até que você consuma todos os capítulos! Estou sendo sincera! Terminei cento e quarenta e sete deles em dois ou três dias! Não consegui parar a não ser que terminasse de uma vez e, se não fosse o fato de eu ter obrigações e ter começado a ler no meio da semana, eu definitivamente teria acabado em um dia depois de virar a noite envolvida de maneira obsessiva e psicótica com a história desses dois. Então, acredite em mim quando digo que essa é uma novel venenosa que só vai te largar quando você não tiver mais nenhum conteúdo pendente. Bom, eu não quero falar muito porque, apesar de já ter dado um spoiler ENORME só falando “Jiang Xing”, eu ainda quero de verdade preservar algumas coisas e experiência antes que você leia. Por isso, não vou falar mais nada além de que essa novel deveria ser uma leitura obrigatória e de alta prioridade na sua lista. Principalmente se você estiver procurando um casal com verdadeira desenvolvimento, uma dinâmica atraente e uma bela história para contar.

Em resumo…

LEIAM PELO AMOR DE DEUS!!! EU TÔ IMPLORANDO!!!

[cantalooprat]

Married Thrice to Salted Fish

What I Liked

a fun spin on the classic transmigration story, like usually it'd be the shou mc who transmigrates into the unfortunate canon fodder and he will girlboss his way to a happy ending w his local ml but this time it's the gong ml who transmigrates! it's fun seeing lin qingyu being all ?? wtf is this guy talking abt when his jiang gongzi is saying all sorts of modern stuff

the sheer emotional whiplash lmao when jiang died a second time i was like ???? wtf?? i know he's gna come back to life but did u have to make it this sad???? tbh both death scenes were done v v v well, n lin qingyu's emotional progression from unwillingness to reluctant friendship to unwitting attachment to sweet sweet love was portrayed soo well. big gap moe at work here, there's nothing quite like seeing an ice-cold emotionless beauty losing it with grief when his beloved is cruelly taken away from him

also props to jiang gongzi bc instead of being like "i can fix him" to the villainous beauty he wants to do bad things together instead... we stan partners in crime

was v v v sweet when lin jingyu was asked what his ambitions are and he just... wants to study medicine and poisons, and spend the rest of his life peacefully with his jiang gongzi. like the guy never wanted to be embroiled in politics or palace drama?? he only delved deep into schemes and deception bc ppl around him wouldn't leave him alone. imagine if the emperor and crown prince didn't look at him lustfully... they tried to mess w the wrong person lmao he is a total villain

it was a huge page turner actually, i speed read it and was like hnngh whats next!!!! the summary basically spoiled the whole plot but somehow that's what makes the process even more exciting

the cute modern transmigration where lin qingyu goes to jiang's world <3

What I Disliked

the poor jiang-lin couple in the army dying... they deserved better authornim

ig it's part of the brainless romance part of the plot but i lowkey thought the consecutive remarriages went a wee bit too smoothly n without enough scheming

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

Moon founded “The World’s Greediest Church”

The cash that built the Moon organization’s “foundation.”

▲ Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han of the Unification Church, now called the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, with one of the marble pagodas that were sold to the Japanese for eye-watering sums. Moon and Han reportedly denied knowledge of the scam.

_________________________________________

by Ben Hills Sydney Morning Herald  May 7, 1993

The Unification Church of Japan stated: “We do not participate in profit-making activities.”

“I don’t feel embarrassment … deep remorse is a better word,” confesses Kiyoharu Takahashi, blinking furiously behind his black-rimmed eyeglasses.

For 400 years, a small plot of land on the urban fringe of Tokyo had been in the family, once retainers of the local daimyo (lord of the manor). Five years ago, Mr Takahashi, then a university student, aged 26, persuaded his family to take out mortgages over the property. Although there is less than a hectare of land, it contains the family home, a turf farm, a rented house and two blocks of flats.

Even so, it still amazes Kiyoharu how much the banks were prepared to lend on it. By the time the credit dried up, he had received $67.5 million, repayments had fallen behind and the banks were threatening to foreclose. Four centuries of family history were about to go down the drain.

What caused this calamity ?

Every cent of the money – plus another $500,000 or so in savings that the Takahashis had put aside over the years – was handed over to an organisation Japanese are starting to call the greediest church in the world, the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, known to the less devout as the Moonie church – the Unification Church (and now The Family Federation for World Peace and Unification).

Its founder and Pope is the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, a 73-year-old, thrice-married father of [more than] 13 who now lives in the United States, where he has done time in prison for [document fraud and] tax evasion.

Although he is better known for his mass marriage spectaculars – last year he hired the Olympic stadium in Seoul to celebrate the wedding of 30,000 followers, most of whom had never met each other before – Moon has spent the last 40 years building up a formidable religious multinational.

And Japan is the place where Moon Industries Inc, a conglomerate that trades under more than 100 corporate identities, has made its most spectacular, and some would say ungodly, gains.

Young Mr Takahashi is only one of 8,350 people who have come forward, claiming they have been ripped off by the Moonies, since a national legal network was set up to help them get their money back six years ago. The total amount they claim to have been cheated out of is a staggering $568 million. Cases are listed in more than a dozen courts.

Many of them, like Mr Takahashi, say they have been blackmailed into borrowing beyond their means, then handing the money over. In his case, barely credibly, he was told that his father’s Parkinson’s Disease was due to an ancient curse which could only be lifted from the family by prayer … and enormous amounts of money.

Another reformed Moonie – “Tomiko” is a 34-year-old English teacher from Tokyo – was told her lack of luck in love was because of the “dirty” money which she had saved. She took her life savings, $5,000, to a flat where the Moonies sprinkled salt in the four corners of the room, said prayers, and made it all disappear.

“Unfortunately, Japanese seem more susceptible to this sort of thing than people in other countries,” says Hiroshi Yamaguchi, a member of the lawyers’ network, who is handling cases for 25 former Moonies, including Takahashi, Tomiko, and a woman in Australia who was swindled out of $12,000.

People are being enticed into a range of activities which have no overt connection with the Moonies.

There are about 100 Moonie-owned “video centres” around Tokyo where people are invited in and then recruited.

Another favourite ploy is to organise conferences by front organisations, such as the World Peace Professors’ Academy, the Society of Field Flowers, the Japan-Korea Tunnel Task Force and even the Women’s Federation for World Peace, which last year held a meeting at Sydney’s Ritz Carlton Hotel.

No-one knows how many followers the Reverend Moon has attracted since he went international in the mid-1960s. He claims five million followers in 160 countries (including Australia) but a more realistic assessment by former members of the cult is around one-tenth that number [possibly at the zenith – now many fewer].

Even so, Japan – where there are thought to be around 20,000 hard-core Moonies – is beyond doubt one of the most profitable parts of his empire. Or was, until the recent deluge of bad publicity.

Tokyo’s tabloids have been agog for a month over the disappearance of Hiroko Yamasaki, a 33-year-old former Olympic gymnast, who has provided the church with acres of publicity since her marriage at the mass-wedding in Korea last year to a groom selected for her by the Rev Moon. 

She reappeared, renouncing the church and claiming it had all been a terrible mistake.

▲ Hiroko Yamasaki facing nearly 200 journalists in April 1993.

After being indoctrinated the converts are put out on the streets of Tokyo to bring in other recruits, and to make money selling products door-to-door.

Mr Takahashi displays some of the products he was obliged to sell. There is a 300-gram jar of extract from Korean ginseng (a parsnip-like root which tastes a bit like tobacco and is reputed to be medicinal) – this sold for $1,000, when the over-the-counter price in Korea is about $150. The Reverend Moon’s Il Hwa factory near Seoul is South Korea’s largest ginseng processor.

A set of three name-seals, worth about $125, is sold for up to $15,000. All Moonies dream of selling the jewelled pagoda – a model studded with what look like bits of glass that goes for $67,500.

After her conversion, Tomiko became a real cash cow. Even though she had no property to put up as collateral, she borrowed more than $50,000 from eight different banks and handed it over. She sold her family a garage full of Moonie products – her mother paid $20,000 for a kimono, her father $8,000 for a sauna, among other things. “I became a saleswoman … they said it was the way to achieve heaven on earth.“

Gullible? Perhaps. But 8,349 more like her? Sadao Asami, professor of theology at Tohoku University, believes that there is something about the Japanese that makes them more susceptible to Moon’s brand of religion.

Professor Asami has earned a nickname, “the Devil’s priest”, from the Moonies because of the help he has given hundreds of families, “rescuing” their children from the Moonies. He has worked with 500 to 600 former followers. He says that Japanese remain dependent on their parents much longer than people in the West, and that they are thus more immature. As well, the Japanese culture entertains a variety of religious and superstitious beliefs.

They also, says Mr Yamaguchi, have a lot of money.

Until recently, the Tokyo Moonies have been trying to quietly settle most of the claims out of court. However, in January, Michio Fujii, the head of the church in Japan, wrote to Mr Yamaguchi apologising for the “mismanagement of subordinates of the Unification Church” – but saying that repayment of money would be “temporarily stopped.”

This means that Mr Takahashi is in trouble. The church had repaid most of the money and had taken over repayments on the loans. But $3 million is outstanding. The Moonies’ headquarters is in the fashionable suburb of Shibuya, a three-storey building that occupies most of a city block.

Unfortunately, neither Mr Fujii, nor anyone else, was willing to put the church’s point of view on these serious allegations. They later sent an anonymous fax, denying everything and claiming bare-facedly: “We do not participate in profit-making activities.”

The Unification Church’s own publications boast of a global business empire valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

The core is the Sae-il engineering company, which began making air-rifles, and now manufactures machine-tools in Korea, Germany and Africa. Then there is the Il Hwa company which produces more than 40 different pharmaceutical products, ginseng and soft-drinks; in Alabama, there is International Oceanic Enterprises which catches and packs seafood; in Alaska, the Master Marine company makes fibreglass fishing trawlers; the Moonies own the Paragon House publishing firm, the Washington Times newspaper and a four-storey complex in Barrytown, New York, where they run a theological seminary.

Although his worries are not over, Mr Takahashi – along with several thousand other former converts – is thankful to be out of it. And not to have to go through with the “marriage” he had in 1988 … along with 6,499 other couples. In a hall at a Seoul soft-drink factory, he saw his bride for the first time. “I had built up expectations of how beautiful she was going to be,” he says “When I saw her I got vertigo.”

Two of his fellow Moonies committed suicide. One, a middle-aged woman who was being pressured into handing over some land, jumped off a building. Another, a man who was married at a mass wedding, jumped in front of a car.

“At the time I believed in it,” says Mr Takahashi, “Now I know it was only blackmail and lies aimed at getting their money.”

▲ In 2006, the Moons were brought 240 gold crowns (120 for each ot them) in a procession at their $1billion palace in the mountains near Cheongpyeong.

___________________________________________

Hiroko Yamasaki (former Olympic athlete in rhythmic gymnastics) joined and left UC

“Moon betrayed his followers and distorted the church’s lofty goals by turning his movement into a huge money-making machine.”

“Japan. Wow! My eyes were opened.” A huge UC scam in Japan is revealed.

Video of Unification Church ABUSE in Japan shown in court

Moon personally extracted $500 MILLION from Japanese sisters in the fall of 1993. He demanded that 50,000 sisters attend HIS workshops on Cheju Island and each had to pay a fee of $10,000.

Japan High Court judge upholds “UC used members for profit, not religious purposes”. This has serious ramifications.

Religious Freedom for Japanese Members! (The FFWPU established a slave caste.)

Sun Myung Moon – Emperor of the Universe

[aworldforastage]

currently reading: for niche tropes cravings....

So, in the past week I really enjoyed the plot of 长安少年游 by 明月倾, despite not liking the protagonist or the main couple that much. I read up to the reveal about how the main love interest split from his ex, and instead of finishing the novel in which they are already BE, I started to hunt for novels that focuses on (my interpretation of) their dynamic:

Historical political intrigue

Smart characters who can keep pace with each other

Complex politics and power dynamics

Ideally with rigorous political/historical plot

Ideally with thoughtful examination of the ethics of their politics and power system

Ideally in a straight timeline (no rebirth or transmigration)

Ideally with insecurity or angst rooted in the understanding that there are more important things than their feelings

Possibly childhood friends

Possibly a reconciliation arc

After scanning through pages and pages of search results on gongzicp and recommendation lists , I ended up with a list of dozens of historical political novels. (But I'm still open to recommendations!!!)

I read two this week:

The first novel, which I will not name here, taught me to always proceed with caution on novels that do not have any ratings on JJWXC. It reads like a story written by a young person without the knowledge or life experience to back up their ideas. However, while I can't say it's a good novel from a "technical" perspective, it is surprisingly enjoyable for being so authentically self-indulgent. The main relationship develops at the speed of light. There are four side CPs with enough drama to fill a novel each. All of these characters are waaaay too young for everything they know and get up to. No government/royalty/family/relationship can even remotely resemble what happen in the story. But you get the sense that a budding author wrote out the story they want to tell, and it's kind of fun to read that.

The second novel, 渠清如许 by 清明谷雨, tracks closer to the kind of story I'm looking for. The Emperor is the dark horse winner in a vicious contest for the throne and needs to gain real control over his court. His spouse, the Lord Consort, is from a disgraced clan allied with the former Crown Prince, and wants to overturn the false charges against his family. I love their dynamic in the first half of the novel, in which they start off challenging and distrusting of each other, but grow to appreciate the other's intelligence and integrity. However, they are wary of sinking too deep into their feelings because they are constantly reminded of their own and each other's political priorities. .... I'm kind of miffed by the turn of events (and characterization) in the second half of the novel after they confess their feelings, but I'm still interested enough to finish it. Maybe I'll change my mind?

In other news, the audiodrama for Thrice Married to Salted Fish has just been announced, so that's back to the top of my reading list. I read it up to the end of the "first marriage" and lost momentum. It sort of fills the the niche I was looking for the past week, but I was hoping for stories without rebirth and transmigration. I never noticed how common those tropes are until I made a point of trying to avoid it!

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

The Ungodly Gains Of The World’s Greediest Church

Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han of the Unification Church, now called the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, at their $1billion palace in Cheongpyeong.

by Ben Hills Sydney Morning Herald  May 7, 1993

“I don’t feel embarrassment ... deep remorse is a better word,” confesses Kiyoharu Takahashi, blinking furiously behind his black-rimmed eyeglasses.

For 400 years, a small plot of land on the urban fringe of Tokyo had been in the family, once retainers of the local daimyo (lord of the manor). Five years ago, Mr Takahashi, then a university student, aged 26, persuaded his family to take out mortgages over the property. Although there is less than a hectare of land, it contains the family home, a turf farm, a rented house and two blocks of flats.

Even so, it still amazes Kiyoharu how much the banks were prepared to lend on it. By the time the credit dried up, he had received $67.5 million, repayments had fallen behind and the banks were threatening to foreclose. Four centuries of family history were about to go down the drain.

What caused this calamity?

Every cent of the money – plus another $500,000 or so in savings that the Takahashis had put aside over the years – was handed over to an organisation Japanese are starting to call the greediest church in the world, the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, known to the less devout as the Moonie church – the Unification Church (and now The Family Federation for World Peace and Unification).

Its founder and Pope is the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, a 73-year-old, thrice-married father of 13 who now lives in the United States, where he has done time in prison for tax evasion.

Although he is better known for his mass marriage spectaculars – last year he hired the Olympic stadium in Seoul to celebrate the wedding of 30,000 followers, most of whom had never met each other before – Moon has spent the last 40 years building up a formidable religious multinational.

And Japan is the place where Moon Industries Inc, a conglomerate that trades under more than 100 corporate identities, has made its most spectacular, and some would say ungodly, gains.

Young Mr Takahashi is only one of 8,350 people who have come forward, claiming they have been ripped off by the Moonies, since a national legal network was set up to help them get their money back six years ago. The total amount they claim to have been cheated out of is a staggering $568 million. Cases are listed in more than a dozen courts.

Many of them, like Mr Takahashi, say they have been blackmailed into borrowing beyond their means, then handing the money over. In his case, barely credibly, he was told that his father’s Parkinson’s Disease was due to an ancient curse which could only be lifted from the family by prayer ... and enormous amounts of money.

Another reformed Moonie – “Tomiko” is a 34-year-old English teacher from Tokyo – was told her lack of luck in love was because of the “dirty” money which she had saved. She took her life savings, $5,000, to a flat where the Moonies sprinkled salt in the four corners of the room, said prayers, and made it all disappear.

“Unfortunately, Japanese seem more susceptible to this sort of thing than people in other countries,” says Hiroshi Yamaguchi, a member of the lawyers’ network, who is handling cases for 25 former Moonies, including Takahashi, Tomiko, and a woman in Australia who was swindled out of $12,000.

People are being enticed into a range of activities which have no overt connection with the Moonies.

There are about 100 Moonie-owned “video centres” around Tokyo where people are invited in and then recruited.

Another favourite ploy is to organise conferences by front organisations, such as the World Peace Professors’ Academy, the Society of Field Flowers, the Japan-Korea Tunnel Task Force and even the Women’s Federation for World Peace, which last year held a meeting at Sydney’s Ritz Carlton Hotel.

No-one knows how many followers the Reverend Moon has attracted since he went international in the mid-1960s. He claims five million followers in 160 countries (including Australia) but a more realistic assessment by former members of the cult is around one-tenth that number.

Even so, Japan – where there are thought to be around 20,000 hard-core Moonies – is beyond doubt one of the most profitable parts of his empire. Or was, until the recent deluge of bad publicity.

Tokyo’s tabloids have been agog for a month over the disappearance of Hiroko Yamasaki, a 33-year-old former Olympic gymnast, who has provided the church with acres of publicity since her marriage at the mass-wedding in Korea last year to a groom selected for her by the Rev Moon. She reappeared, renouncing the church and claiming it had all been a terrible mistake.

        Hiroko Yamasaki facing nearly 200 journalists in April 1993.

After being indoctrinated the converts are put out on the streets of Tokyo to bring in other recruits, and to make money selling products door-to-door.

Mr Takahashi displays some of the products he was obliged to sell. There is a 300-gram jar of extract from Korean ginseng (a parsnip-like root which tastes a bit like tobacco and is reputed to be medicinal) – this sold for $1,000, when the over-the-counter price in Korea is about $150. The Reverend Moon’s Il Hwa factory near Seoul is South Korea’s largest ginseng processor.

A set of three name-seals, worth about $125, is sold for up to $15,000. All Moonies dream of selling the jewelled pagoda – a model studded with what look like bits of glass that goes for $67,500.

After her conversion, Tomiko became a real cash cow. Even though she had no property to put up as collateral, she borrowed more than $50,000 from eight different banks and handed it over. She sold her family a garage full of Moonie products – her mother paid $20,000 for a kimono, her father $8,000 for a sauna, among other things. “I became a saleswoman ... they said it was the way to achieve heaven on earth.”

Gullible? Perhaps. But 8,349 more like her? Sadao Asami, professor of theology at Tohoku University, believes that there is something about the Japanese that makes them more susceptible to Moon’s brand of religion.

Professor Asami has earned a nickname, “the Devil’s priest”, from the Moonies because of the help he has given hundreds of families, “rescuing” their children from the Moonies. He has worked with 500 to 600 former followers. He says that Japanese remain dependent on their parents much longer than people in the West, and that they are thus more immature. As well, the Japanese culture entertains a variety of religious and superstitious beliefs.

They also, says Mr Yamaguchi, have a lot of money.

Until recently, the Tokyo Moonies have been trying to quietly settle most of the claims out of court. However, in January, Michio Fujii, the head of the church in Japan, wrote to Mr Yamaguchi apologising for the “mismanagement of subordinates of the Unification Church” – but saying that repayment of money would be “temporarily stopped.”

This means that Mr Takahashi is in trouble. The church had repaid most of the money and had taken over repayments on the loans. But $3 million is outstanding. The Moonies’ headquarters is in the fashionable suburb of Shibuya, a three-storey building that occupies most of a city block.

Unfortunately, neither Mr Fujii, nor anyone else, was willing to put the church’s point of view on these serious allegations. They later sent an anonymous fax, denying everything and claiming bare-facedly: “We do not participate in profit-making activities.”

The Unification Church’s own publications boast of a global business empire valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

The core is the Sae-il engineering company, which began making air-rifles, and now manufactures machine-tools in Korea, Germany and Africa. Then there is the Il Hwa company which produces more than 40 different pharmaceutical products, ginseng and soft-drinks; in Alabama, there is International Oceanic Enterprises which catches and packs seafood; in Alaska, the Master Marine company makes fibreglass fishing trawlers; the Moonies own the Paragon House publishing firm, the Washington Times newspaper and a four-storey complex in Barrytown, New York, where they run a theological seminary.

Although his worries are not over, Mr Takahashi – along with several thousand other former converts – is thankful to be out of it. And not to have to go through with the “marriage” he had in 1988 … along with 6,499 other couples. In a hall at a Seoul soft-drink factory, he saw his bride for the first time. “I had built up expectations of how beautiful she was going to be,” he says “When I saw her I got vertigo.” 

Two of his fellow Moonies committed suicide. One, a middle-aged woman who was being pressured into handing over some land, jumped off a building. Another, a man who was married at a mass wedding, jumped in front of a car.

“At the time I believed in it,” says Mr Takahashi, “Now I know it was only blackmail and lies aimed at getting their money.”

Hiroko Yamasaki (former Olympic athlete in rhythmic gymnastics) joined and left UC

“Japan. Wow! My eyes were opened.” A huge UC scam in Japan is revealed.

Video of Unification Church ABUSE in Japan shown in court

Illegal, church-organized high-pressure sales scheme

Moon personally extracted $500 MILLION from Japanese sisters in the fall of 1993. He demanded that 50,000 sisters attend HIS workshops on Cheju Island and each had to pay a fee of $10,000.

Japan High Court judge upholds “UC used members for profit, not religious purposes”. This has serious ramifications.