#just remembered about magical realism. shit there’s so many good ones…

[fourteenfifteen]

may i request some friends at the table fic recs? i haven’t ventured really into the tag

HELLO ANON yeth you can.

i am not an expert and have not read everything but i have some faves! which i will sort by season for your convenience : ] also i have not finished sangfielle so i can't help you there lo siento. if you want more fics i would say a good place to start is @arwainian's fic marathon project. he has been reading everything in the tag and recommending things as he goes there's probably as many recs as u could want right there

ALSO stating at the top that i also write fic! not going to rec any of mine but i'm kind of a hottie i won't lie to u so that's there

OK recs under the cut

these are not in any particular order within seasons!

pzn/pld [at the top bc i have a palisade fic agenda]:

bad endings by elanoides

the stellar combustor arc but a time loop. amazing writing and an instant fave as soon as i read it. i mean come on dude it's a time loop fic come onnnnnnnn

i will reveal you by rozecrest

a recent addition to the tag that i really liked very fun brnine/gucci fic. where's that post about wanting every fic to also be a literary analysis essay that's me rn

use you as a focal point by joeysnowy

theeee crysanth/SI fic which ok it's a niche market but this is just a great one

party 2nite @ bc, rsvp capt. kb by fangirl_squee

VERY fun fic where the blue channel hosts a halloween party. i was giggling bro i won't lie to you

tm:

the cat who got the whipped cream by bluecloak

how often do you get to say that the most kudosed fic in a tag totally earns that in terms of quality? lovely and funny and absolutely gorgeously written

my place to land by lady_mab

yes it's the longest fic in the tag yes it's worth the time. total au that still manages to hit that tm vibe

as many times as it takes to get it right by theorangewitch

i just read this for the first time within the last couple weeks and oof it's a great one. very funny and creative and sweet reincarnation fic

excerpts/yours/beloved/signet.asmblg by kalcifer

signet and belgard twine fic!! great shit this one goes out to all the divine likers

c/w:

rising water by yellow

in lieu of a summary i'm just going to say that i'm actively not a cassmako person but i have read this fic a dozen times

light up the way by harpydora

damn i love these crazy kids. very good fix it fic for the ppl who cried at the end of counter/weight (everyone i assume)

hieron/marielda:

moving shadows / moving light by waveridden

uhh ok so do you know the reality show naked and afraid. ephrim and throndir on that. my secsam gift from last year which was a PRIVILEGE

champions of the world by fangirl_squee

an elaborate hieron hockey au longfic. very cozy and well-thought out

presque vu by fangirl_squee

ok this one is odd and hard to describe but very cool. genuinely have read very few fics like it. read if you like: hieron's tone, weird aus, and magical realism

and i follow just to find you by angstandcaffeine

oh my godddd i love this fic. the cw's supernatural WISHES

the killing of the king god's car by the traitor prince maelgwyn by thunder_rolled_a_six

a total classic that probably everyone would recommend to you. marielda high school au but ok i don't usually like that kind of thing so trust me on this one

fits and starts by luckydicekirby

augh. oh my god. does anybody else like crying. totally amazing samfam fic that really digs into god weirdness in a way that i love and also yeah it broke my heart

making something new by harpydora

love the samol characterization in this one also i just think it's fun

other?:

who put love in my head? by kaynara

does anybody else remember half past and flashback and absolute territory? no just me? ok well in any case this fic is so fun and the character voices are so great

ok that feels like a good list! i could absolutely generate a dozen more but i'll leave it there lol generally i will say the fic generated by this fandom is pretty high quality and you'll have a decent experience just looking around in the tag like there's some good stuff in there. worth taking a chance on things (esp recent stuff!)

[dat-town]

hypnotized (in your eyes)

never seen circus masterpost

Characters: hypnotist!Hyunjae & female reader

Setting & genre: magical realism au

Summary: You find a hypnotist to forget your recurring dreams. Little do you know you once forgot him too.

Warnings: general creepiness of an eerie circus, ambiguous ending, mentioned insomnia

Words: 2.3k

For @restlessmaknae, happy D-4 <3 Not to copy you but I realized that the best way not to have to cut another story in half because I couldn't finish it in time is to make sure I can stop pretty much any point and these short stories came pretty easy. You know I already told you about this idea like last year, so here it is finally. Keep your eyes out for the next stories <3

The wind chime outside of the ragged tent played a slow symphony to the rhythm of the night breeze.

The tall boy inside was humming an old folk song as he flipped through the pages of a book. It was a slow day but it was always hit or miss with the circus. They were constantly on the move and there was no way to tell how many people would stumble upon the red lights and fake golden glitter when they stopped.

Hyunjae had already assisted a married couple by helping an old memory to resurface and a teenage girl to face her trauma. People came to him with all kinds of requests, people who were brave or desperate enough to open their minds to him, to let him reach in there and pull. Like marionettes on strings. Thoughts were like dolls for him to play with. Lucky for many, he was a nice player, especially when he was paid handsomely.

It was the wind that he noticed first. The moment of cold when the entrance of the tent opened and closed. Then he looked up from his book, over his propped up legs on his desk and saw you. Words froze on the tip of his tongue as he watched you looking around in wonder, rooted to one spot by the edge of the tent. The flower pattern of your dress reminded him of the blooming spring. Last spring when he had last seen you. You had stood right there where you did then. You were awed at the decorations of his tent as if you had never seen anything more interesting than enchantments hanging from the top and books on alchemy. You turned slowly, gaze sticking to the fairy lights hanging all over the insides of the tent and when your eyes met his, you suddenly turned bashful, a dusty pink colour high on your cheeks.

"Hello," you bowed politely like a stranger and Hyunjae had to remind himself to get his shit together. Of course, you greeted him as if you had never met before. Because for you, you never did.

"Good evening. How can I help you?" The boy asked as he cleared his throat. He wasn't proud of the way he stumbled as he put his feet down on the ground and stood up. His hands gripped on the edge of his desk when you walked closer, clueless and innocent. Just like last time.

For someone who lived longer than most people, it was quite embarrassing how fast his heart beat just because of your closeness. His chest felt tight too when he saw the apples of your cheeks grow with the shy smile blooming on your lips as you stopped on the other side of his desk.

For a foolish moment, Hyunjae hoped naively that you would tell him that you were joking, that you would call him by his name and tell him to keep his part of the promise. But of course, the rational side of him knew it didn't work like it. You weren't supposed to know who he was or recognize him even if it wasn't the first time you met. But he remembered your smiles and soft touches way too vividly to not hope you were an exception to the circus' rules: everybody was bound to forget about their visit.

"I... I was told that hypnosis can help me forget something," you answered, visibly sceptical, which made Hyunjae crack a smile. You had been just like this the last time too: you had thought he was just a con man cheating money out of naïve people. You were one of those rational people who only believed things they saw and you didn't even believe what you saw, not until you were sure it was real which was a smart thing to do at a place where you could run into people swallowing down knives.

The you from last spring would have never asked something like that of him though. You had been caught up in the rain and looked for a hideout. His tent had just been there, warm and inviting. Hyunjae had done his best to entertain you, amused himself by your stubbornness when you hadn't believed what he could do. So he wondered what could have happened that led you right back here, this time on purpose. The psychic girl from the tent next door would have told him it was destiny even though Hyunjae had never asked her to draw cards for him.

He hadn't wanted to hope in vain because he knew the inevitable: you would eventually leave and he had no choice but to stay at the circus. So in a way it felt nothing but a cruel play of the fate that it led you back to him. Yet, he couldn't send you away just to spare the heartache.

"Sure, it can. Please, take a seat," he pointed at the chair beside you before stepping to the kettle next to his bookshelf to prepare a cup of warm lotus tea. Selfishly, he stole glances at you while he was busy with the preparations. The ribbon in your hair was skewed and your lips were pink like peonies. Your curious doe eyes were warm and he remembered all too well how they used to be directed at him.

"Two cubes of sugar, a bit of lemon," he said as he slid the steaming cup in front of you and smiled knowingly at the surprise clear on your face.

"How?" You mumbled, eyes widening suspiciously which made him want to tease you. He couldn't have told you that he had learned your preference last time you had been there and he couldn’t forget it ever since.

"Lucky guess," he lied and watched as you sniffed at the sweet blue tea doubtfully before giving it a try. Hyunjae was relieved to see the corners of your mouth turn upwards even though he knew you would like it.

The boy unconsciously fixed his collar as he sat down across from you and licked his lower lip before he asked the question that had been on his mind ever since you had told him why you had come to him.

"What would you like to forget?"

You took a small, careful sip from your tea before setting the cup down again and looked up at Hyunjae. Your gaze was open and trusting and he felt his heart skip a beat. Oh, if only you knew how conflicted you made him feel.

"I keep dreaming of a place," you spoke up quietly, waiting to be interrupted but the boy waited patiently for you to keep going on. You brushed your hair out of your face, fingers tangling in your locks. "It's not even a real place. I have tried to look it up but it doesn't exist. In my dreams, I want to go there. I want to go there so bad that when I wake up I miss this place where I had never been and where I cannot go. It's like I feel trapped where I am. Sometimes I can't even sleep because I keep daydreaming about this place. I've tried everything to get my mind off it but I just can't. I know it sounds crazy but–"

"It's not," Hyunjae stopped you before you could have felt embarrassed. "Can you tell me more about this place? What's it like?"

You looked him in the eyes, gulped and then nodded, your eyes determined.

"It's a place by the sea. You can see the stars from the beach clearly and there are no villages as far as one can see. There are stairs though, in the air, that lead to a palace."

Hyunjae couldn't do anything but stare. He looked at your face closely, watching your expression, trying to figure out if you were playing a prank on him. That couldn't be. You weren't supposed to remember that. His home.

You had been daring. Calling him a fraud. Telling him to prove it if he could really hypnotise you and Hyunjae shouldn't have. He didn't use his power just for the sake of it after all, he used it for work, for actual clients, not overly curious girls. But it was raining outside and it was unlikely that he would get a new customer anytime soon, so he might as well just kill time, couldn't he?

He had sat you down, given you tea, lit candles and told you to close your eyes. Your lips were curled up in a smile, playfully mocking, as if challenging him to prove you wrong. Then Hyunjae took out his pocket watch and told you to imagine a pastel blue, endless sea.

He could have taken you anywhere. He still wasn't sure why he had chosen a place so personal to him but watching you explore the celestial palace had warmed his heart. He had told you childhood stories and anecdotes that you believed to be made up stories. You had told him so when you had opened your eyes and smiled at him so brightly. You had asked dozens of questions about his books, about how he had learned this and he had told you. He had always known you would forget it when leaving the circus, so there had been no reason to fear being exposed. You couldn't have known that though, not then.

"Will you be here tomorrow, too?" You had asked when the rain had stopped yet you had seemed reluctant to leave. Hyunjae had been too selfish to tell you to go as well. He was a lot of things but he wasn't a liar. Usually.

"Probably not. The circus never stays long anywhere," he had told you and watched the disappointment sweep into your expression slowly like a cloth drinks up liquid.

"Oh. And will you be back?" You had kept going and Hyunjae had pretended that the hope in your voice hadn't messed with his heart.

"Probably. But I have no idea when. I go where the circus goes. You will forget me by then anyway," he had said as cold and firm as he could and you hadn't asked why. You hadn't asked why people forgot, why rarely anybody had visited twice, why he was acting like it was a final goodbye. You had just leaned against the entrance, under the fairy lights, your hair still half-wet from the rain, your smile suddenly saddened.

"Can you promise me something?" You had looked at him with those pretty eyes, your voice like melting honey to his ears and it had taken everything in him not to make stupid promises. He hadn't said anything but you continued anyway. "If we meet again, remind me?"

It was a sweet memory, locked in a small jar next to Hyunjae's heart but he felt the glass cracking as his fingers around his pocket watch trembled.

"Are you okay?" The gentle voice and the warmth of a hand on his shoulder helped him snap out of it. He cleared his throat and pulled farther away from you who had circled the desk and stood right there, beside him with worry clear in your eyes.

"Yes, sorry. If you're ready, we can start. I will help you forget and stop these dreams," he told you because he hadn't promised you anything back then. It wouldn't have done anything good if he reminded you of him and your shared past. You would leave and forget either way.

You nodded but hesitated for a moment before walking back to the chair. Hyunjae felt like he could breathe again when he lit the candle in the middle of the table. He felt in control during hypnosis after all.

"Close your eyes," he instructed you in a mellow voice, never taking his eyes off your face, the way your eyelashes trembled as you complied. "Now imagine the place you told me about. Do you see the sea? The stars? The stairs?"

With each question, Hyunjae took a step closer to you, the ticks of his pocket watch louder by the moment.

"Okay, now turn your back to the sea," the boy continued after you confirmed that you were where you were supposed to be. "Good. Now turn around slowly. Once. Twice. Three times. With each turn you feel your surroundings disappear into nothing. First the palace and the stairs. Then the sea and the beach. Lastly, the stars."

"One. Two. Three," you mumbled quietly under your nose with your eyebrows furrowed in concentration.

Hyunjae leaned down with one of his hands holding onto the backrest of the chair before he snapped his fingers right beside your ears to wake you up from the hypnosis. Your eyes widened suddenly with clarity and your gazes locked. Hyunjae's breath caught in his throat. Gosh, you were magnetic, how could he have forgotten?

He couldn't make himself move, not even when you leaned forward, lifted your hand and touched his cheek, caressing almost lovingly. Your eyes were dark and dreamy, cloudy with the after-effect of the hypnosis and your lips were bitten red like cherries and your voice was like an enchantment itself.

"Hyunjae."

His name fell from your lips like a plea or a summon and it was his turn to widen his eyes in surprise. Before he could have said anything though, you fainted right into his arms.

The wind chime outside of the ragged tent played a slow symphony to the rhythm of the morning breeze.

Hyunjae was humming an old folk song about the celestial palace and a runaway immortal as he peeked outside. There was nobody there, just the clear sea and white sand with shells you collected from the day before.

The circus had left long ago.

[hausofmamadas]

MURDER HUSBANDS | Wind them up and watch them go (love letter to NBC’s Hannibal)

♫ To the tune of Climbing Up the Walls by Radiohead (with overture by Bruno Battisti D’Amario) ♫

✧

Wow

So I feel like I say this every time. But Mary mother of god, this was a behemoth. By a mile the hardest vid I’ve ever made joke’s on me bc I’m the fucking crackerjack who decided to tack on an whole ass other song as an overture bc why in the name of all cocks would I decide to make anything easy like it’s funny bc I always have an impression of how easy a vid is going to come together when I get the idea, right. And this duo with this song just pbj. So ngl I thought the shit was gonna edit itself. But guess what yall? Radiohead like … makes some intricate, complex-sounding shit stunning revelation, almost as if that’s what they’re fuckinfjsbs known for

HOWMEVER, the day has come, it’s arrived and I’ve looked at this thing for so long now, I sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, cannot tell if it’s good anymore. My last vid, I took a long break so by the end, I had enough time away from it to remember it was at least good. This? This could be visual gobbledygook, mush for your eyes, the equivalent of that shit brown shade you get when you mix too many water colors together.

But likehopefully it’s not and you can pls enjoy this love letter to one of the greatestqueer romances in modern media, which is a bold statement whatever fight me but I can’t think of a queer ship before this in tv/movies where the romance unfolds like any other hetero relationship and queer identity isn’t the focus, which even though I think is important, lbr there’s more to gays than being gay. Like it’s kinda visionary, despite the fact that neither character is explicitly queer, when it becomes clear that they’re in love with each other, no one, in-universe, is pearl-clutching all: EGAD! But Will’s never been with 😱a man😱 before?? How in THE DICKENS could he be in love with Hannibal when I don’t have definitive proof he’s even touched tips with another man let alone been balls deep!!!!!!!! How dare he not have this big, gay awakening for us all to gawk at applaud for!!!!” ?

No, literally every character: Jack, Alana, Bedelia, Margot, Mason, even Will’s wife god bless I cannot remember her name but she deserved better *shakes fist at Will* etc., all acknowledge the transcendent romantic bond btwn them and no one questions it. Well, no one questions it thru the lens of performed queerness. Tbf ppl had a lotta questions about the like probable impending multiple murders which validsisjwh

These are just 2 ppl who’re in love with each other to the point of being uncontrollably homicidal Which like … goals? Like I’ve really wracked my brain and can’t think of another queership that unfolds like every other hetero ass love story. That is to say, where fluidity is more the default, at least to the extent that no one talks about the orientation of either players within the show’s universe. Regardless of whether Bryan Fuller intended that from the start which tbh I don’t think he did but I also don’t think it’s fair to call it queerbaiting. I think he let the story unfold and realized kinda with the rest of us that this was a magical!realism romance and not a crime procedural and by S3 leaned tf into it doesn’t really matter bc the universe in which these two exist to truss each other up like Christmas turkeys aka foreplay symbolizes so much more to me than whatever it was initially invented to be. And if it’s not art, folks, idk what is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Ofc I mean the show is art, not the vid. Vid=potential gobbledygook

✧

✧

taglist: @tofuwildcard @narcolini @ashlingnarcos @drabbles-mc

[that-jack-kline-bestie]

📚

📚 favorite book

how could you do this to me /lh

I could never choose so I’m just gonna list some that come to mind

Animorphs (special mention of the Ellimist Chronicles) by KA Applegate

I talk about this one a bunch on my fandom blog @dr-reids-fidget-toy . The author was inspired by Star Trek. Kids book. Child soldiers, war horror, body horror, existential horror, age-appropriate jokes, aliens. Set in the 90s. Series of 50+ books. Many were ghostwritten. POC characters.

All of Us Villains / All of Our Demise by Amanda Foody & Christine Lynn Herman

In this world, magick is real. However, all of the high magick was depleted long ago, except for a stash of it that only 7 families know about. Each generation, a teen from each family has to fight for their life in a Hunger Games-style tournament to determine which family gets control of the high magick for the next 20 years. An anonymous author has recently published a book about this barbaric practice, and this year is the first time the outside world will know about the tournament (media coverage galore!). LGBT+ characters (Queer romance). 2 books. POC characters.

Vicious by VE Schwab (the second book is also very good but the first is my personal fave)

Two college students decide to conduct an experiment after learning of mysterious abilities developed after near-death experiences. The participants? Themselves, of course. Shit goes down. They come back wrong. Has a sequel. LGBT+ character (ace rep!!).

The Mirror Season by Anna-Marie McLemore

TW Sexual Assualt

A girl is sexually assaulted at a party, and returns home to find that her peculiar cooking abilities have vanished. Things around her start turning into mirror shards and breaking into dust. She meets a boy, and they realize they were assaulted at the same party. Buried memories threaten to surface as they become friends, and romance forms. A story about healing from trauma, with a touch of magical realism. (At least, I think it’s magical realism). Queer character. POC characters.

We Were Liars by E Lockhart

Great story with a huge twist. A rich family spends every summer on their private island. The main character is part of this family. After a terrible incident last summer, she cannot remember the event or anything her family has told her about it. She is also plagued by terrible migraines. Now, it’s summer again and her cousins are right where she expected, despite them not contacting her since the accident. POC character.

Foul is Fair by Hannah Capin

TW Sexual Assault

A girl goes to a party and is sexually assaulted by a group of boys. She plots with her 3 best friends and her parents to kill everyone involved. Short summary but trust me, read it. POC characters. LGBT+ characters.

The Gilded Wolves series by Roshani Chokshi

A group of thieves/found family are tricked into agreeing to a dangerous heist. Set in Paris, 1889. Magic is real in the form of Forging - the ability to create and imbue objects with special powers. I can’t say much without giving away the plot. POC characters. Queer characters (including a romance plot). Autistic character. 3 books.

I need to add one for Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao. Don’t let me forget

[runicmagitek]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love❤

Oh my goodness, this is so sweet, anon 🥺 I've been having a rough weekend and feeling really self-conscious about my ability/worth as a writer, so this was well-timed and genuinely made me smile. Thank you for sending this!

Ho boy, it's tough to narrow down the to my top five favorite fics, because I have a lot of fics. I love all of them for one reason or another, so this is difficult lol. That said, here's my attempt at a top five, in no particular order.

What Leads You Here A post-canon deep dive into Keitaro's and Natsuno's trauma and how they mourn what they lost and learn to heal and move on together. It picks up immediately where the game ends and explores numerous things I love, from worldbuilding to slice-of-life interactions to delicious angst to heavy hurt with equally heavy comfort. I'm really proud of how I was able to write and edit and post a 214k fic within roughly two years. I put a massive amount of research into this along with using a lot of my own personal experiences and am REALLY happy that those who stuck around til the end thoroughly enjoyed the ride. This story will always have a special place in my heart.

The Lies We Tell Ourselves It's very difficult for me to talk about this fic without ruining the entire game. But I came up with this idea and wrote/edited it within roughly four days?? Like it possessed me and I couldn't focus on anything else until I wrote it. BJ and his journey is extremely heartwrenching and just thinking about what he might have come across and how he handled any of that (or didn't) felt like a story worth exploring. It also has some of my favorite lines I've written in recent years, especially the second to last scene.

The Wings That You Burn Holy shit, I cried a lot when I worked on this fic. It's a Celes-centric fic from Sabin's POV during the start of World of Ruin. I love VI, but in retrospect, I wish Celes was given more time to heal after everything that happened at the Solitary Island. And with Sabin being one of the first people she finds, he's the perfect character to remind her she deserves to live, no matter what.

Burning Bright Yet another fic that made me cry while working on it (this is a trend - I love me some angst). I love Steiner and his friendship with Vivi and (much like Celes in VI) I was really sad there wasn't any like, touch base with Vivi after everything that happened with Black Waltz 3 and the South Gate incident. Trauma and healing are core themes that keep cropping up in my stories, which probably says a lot about myself more than anything lolsob but honestly, I really love seeing characters support one another, despite it all. And I'm genuinely thrilled so many readers said this felt like a missing scene straight out of the game, too.

Long Journey Home You guessed it - this fic also tore out my heart while writing it. There's a reason it's tagged as "sad with a happy ending". Kentucky Route Zero is such a profoundly tragic game and exploring the possibilities of Ezra's past in this fic really hit close to home for me. That and weaving in magical realism and devising fantastical situations were such a fun challenge. This also contains my favorite passage I've ever written (and I very clearly remember needing to get up and walk off the feels for at least five minutes after I wrote this damn line):

She patted his head, much like how he patted the dog’s head. When she left, Ezra stayed and listened to the water carry them elsewhere. He thought of the people he met and those who stayed and those who didn’t and if anyone ever cried for the ghosts of who he used to be.

[philtstone]

Sam and AJ and Cass, 29

#29 -- a story that never gets told

a prequel of sorts to my belovedly unhinged magical realism au, the original of which can be read on ao3 by clicking here. i wrote this prompt in random snippets on the subway, so hopefully its coherent. it kind of got away from me, but im leaning into the multiple indulged elements. most importantly, to answer zainabs oft asked question, "is this the one where he can turn into a whole ass wolf?" yes. yes it is.

Sam, as he has told his sister many a time, could learn — hypothetically — to be a great parent if he wanted to. Instead, he nobly chooses to fight for what’s right. This involves on occasion saving innocent lives amidst the unexpected collapse of Kingdoms, and more often petty magical crime, like that idiot who started going around stealing peoples sheep by herding them into his backyard, which he’d doused in a layer of magically un-solvent superglue. Thank God for Clint’s solvent arrows, which is a sentiment Sam brings up smugly whenever his sister expresses disdain towards the usefulness of magical items in completing household chores.

All of that was before Steve vanished into thin air, leaving Sam with custody of an ancient shield and a perpetually moody shapeshifter.

Hypotheticals are abounding just now. Hypothetically, Steve could just be on one long spontaneous vacation that he even logged in the shared magical calendar, which Bucky inconveniently misplaced on that last trek from North country down here. Hypothetically, Steve could have been kidnapped by a unicorn — those things are known to fuck with you just cause they can — and is currently being held in a magically enforced glade and subjected to a game of 21 riddles. Hypothetically, Steve could just be dead. Smallpox, common cold, unanticipated ogre attack on side of road. If Sam might say so himself, even the best of ‘em can get jumped sometimes; ain’t no shame in it.

“If Steve was dead, why hasn’t his ghost shown up to tell us that?” Bucky asks. He has elaborate theories on the matter, half of which involve the unicorn. The other half involve deep and cutting betrayal. Or murder.

“Steve Rogers did not just up and decide to play double agent,” Sam says, rolling his eyes. Bucky is never truly serious about this. He brings up potential intrigue in every conversation purely out of habit. And, Sam supposes begrudgingly, experience.

“So, murder.”

“Maybe ghost Steve is havin’ too much of a good time,” Sam says. “Remember that fae chick he was sweet on, and they got separated decades ago? Got him all stoic and single tear-y when her name came up? Carried her picture in his dumb little locket? She could be dead. They could be partying it up in the afterlife.”

“Bastard,” Bucky says grumpily, about Steve. “I’d tell you guys, if I died without you knowing.”

“Accidentally died,” insists Sam.

Bucky scowls. “I maintain we haven’t ruled out the double agent angle.”

“Oh my God!” says Sam, and throws his hands up in the air.

They have this exchange multiple times.

Sam sees the merit in the murder angle, but doesn’t necessarily like acknowledging it out loud. First of all, admitting Bucky might be right is always annoying, so he avoids doing it. Second, that shit’s bad juju, especially down here; you never know when a shadow man is listening in.

Just in case Ghost Steve really was murdered and forgot to tell them, though, Sam decides to conduct some scientific experiments. He makes Steve’s favourite gumbo (Sam’s mom’s recipe, of course – no one else’s can hold a candle) and bangs the pot lid loudly over the stove in case there are any spirits around to notice. He flips through Steve’s private sketchbook, left behind in Sam’s napsack — another clear evidence that he hasn’t turned coat — and makes childish faces at all the nude figures to trigger Steve’s artistic sensibilities. Then he leaves it out where the kids could find it, to trigger Steve’s moral sensibilities. 

Bucky takes more extreme measures. He goes out into the yard and yells, “Hey, jerk! You ever thought about what a basket case I’d be without you here? You don’t even got the decency to explain yourself?” after dark, into the droopy shapes of the mangrove trees. 

“Is he gonna start howling at the moon?” Sarah asks Sam one evening, though not unkindly, while they do the dishes and watch Bucky go at it through the small kitchen window.

Sam doesn’t say anything. Privately, he kind of feels like doing the same. 

Then, about three months later, after a near-coup and the revelation of multiple conspiracies and a big old honking blockade being put up all through South country, the Wakandans show up. With – holy shit, Sam thinks – a message from Steve.

“Uncle Sam, you’ve already told us that story.”

Okay, so speaking of parenting. Yeah, yeah, Sam would be a great parent in some alternate universe of events decidedly different from this one. In this universe, getting his nephews to bed at a reasonable hour when only this afternoon, a bunch of fancy people in red armour were holding a super secret outlaw meeting in the barn is proving harder than it looks. Sam almost wishes he was dealing with old Paste-Pot Pete and those sheep again.

“Uh, no I have not,” says Sam. “This version has added embellishments. The Wakandan King never challenged me to a duel, that was all Bucky’s bad luck.” 

“We’re calling ritual vengeance duels now?” asks Bucky dryly. 

“I’m just sayin’, I’m making a bunch of this up here. I am exercising creativity. Story version number one didn’t have any flying dwarves in it.”

Bucky is sitting in the doorway to the kids’ bedroom and attempting to de-encrust his favourite boots, which went through the ringer a bit on their way down through the bayou to Sarah’s three months ago. That was just after this all started. A lot’s changed since then.

Like the fact that Bucky is even in this house, cleaning boots. Or Sam’s newly discovered inability to lull little boys to sleep via adrenaline filled adventure stories while their mother takes a care package to the neighbours’ pregnant daughter in law. Sarah was very excited to see the newest in maternity fashion, which apparently Marlene had been sporting in the village all week, purchased from traveling dressmakers who might have had fae blood. Those guys always do know how to cut a cloak well. 

Bucky sniffs loudly at Sam’s defense and pulls an exaggerated face, raising the poor boot up to eye level to inspect it. “Maybe you’re just bad at telling stories,” he says finally.

While AJ and Cass giggle like the traitors they are, Sam makes a loud offended noise.

“Alright,” he says. “Fine. Fine. You know what? Just for that, I’m telling the story of how all of Petruski’s sticky sheep started followin’ your fluffy white wolf ass around.”

AJ dissolves into even harder giggles. Cass says, “Not the sheep story Uncle Sam! All you do in that one is complain!” and Bucky says, more primly than he has any right to, “I was consciously being as non threatening as possible, Samuel.”

“Yeah,” Sam says, “so non threatening they thought you were one of ‘em.”

AJ is really starting to wheeze now, so Sam hauls him into his arms to disrupt the hilarity before it gets medical. Cass brings his pillow up over his head like a crown to smother his own laughter. And Bucky winks, before – in a devastating play – letting out a quiet, plaintive pair of baas in quick succession.

Routines like this one are becoming more and more real. More and more comfortable, Sam thinks, amidst the boys’ shrieks of laughter. Being here, being in this home (their home – The home?) it fills his heart with something warm and solid and unmoving. Like he has put down a heavy load. Sometimes it is hard to imagine what is so important that makes it worth picking up sword and shield and leaving this behind. Without this, where would any of them even be?

It’s just, that thought doesn’t stop the rest of the world from banging on their door sometimes. 

Just look at Steve’s cryptic as hell note. The me you know isn’t dead. Seriously. What the fuck. Sam almost wishes he really was dealing with a unicorn.

He settles on telling the story of how he and Steve once met that tiny shrinking guy and between Captain Rogers’ knightly loyalty to his friends, some of Redwing’s more heroic moments, and the addition of the brilliant mage-princess who gifted Bucky the enchantment for his arm, both boys are appeased.

“Uncle Sam,” Cass says, sleepily, towards the tail end of the story. “’S no fair that magic skips a generation. I wanna help save the kingdom like you do.”

Sam quiets, his hand stilling where it was in the middle of brushing over AJs forehead. AJ is already fast asleep. Knocked out cold, snoring and everything. 

Thing is, Sam’s brand of magic is pretty limited — some gimmick, even, nowhere close to what his Titi had. All Sam’s good for, practically speaking, is translating messages from carrier pigeons. But it got him into this bigger world, tangled him up in it. 

Sam can see, even though Bucky’s head is down, that his friend’s expression has taken on a slight grimness.

“Cass. Hey.” Sam knuckles the boy’s nose gently. “What do you mean, like me. You know how I keep this old kingdom safe? I help your mama do the dishes.”

“Uncle Sam,” Cass says, rolling his sleepy thick-lashed eyes. 

Sam sighs. “Cass. Just because it doesn’t make for a good story doesn’t mean it isn’t important.”

More important, even. Running this old house, and its garden (with all those gnomes, little pains-in-the-ass) and its boat.

“Muh huh,” Cass manages. And then he has drifted off, the side of his face squished against the pillow.

Sam and Bucky quietly relocate to the kitchen, where Redwing is awaiting them with a new note and a dead mouse.

“Jesus,” Bucky mutters.

“You better not be about to get in a piss fight with a kestrel when there are sleeping children in the next room.”

As if on cue, Redwing flaps over lands happily on Bucky’s shoulder, startling him. The little bell on his foot jingles, and Bucky glares, which does nothing to deter the little bird’s impulse to start throwing up what appears to be more mouse. 

Bucky stands perfectly still and looks awfully close to raptorcide. 

Dude, can you like, be normal for once, Sam says, to the bird. Redwing fluffs out all of his feathers in Bucky’s face in response. 

“I don’t get into piss fights with your kestrel, Sam,” Bucky says, gritting each word out with individuality. 

Redwing twitters happily. 

He’ll come around eventually, Sam replies. He scoops the bird up in both hands and re-situates him on his own arm, and begins untying the little package wired to Redwing’s foot. Out loud, he adds, “You know, he wants to be your friend so badly –”

“He’s the one who chews through my best leather breeches twice a month –” Bucky cuts himself off, grumbling under his breath and reaching over to fumble the parchment scroll out of Sam’s hand while its messenger hops in one place and nuzzles the crown of his feathery head into Sam’s armpit. Sam’s poorly concealed smile fades when Bucky openly frowns.

“Note’s from Nakia,” Bucky mutters, tapping the amulet bracelet on his right wrist against the similar shape of beaded stone etched into the scroll’s covering as Sam strokes Redwing’s head. 

“It’s – what?”

“What what.”

“From another dimension,” Bucky reads aloud, looking increasingly incredulous. 

“What?” 

“You already said that.” Sam rolls his eyes. Bucky makes a face at the scroll. “Always gotta be another fuckin’ gimmick. Well. She’s got a guy to decode it.”

“Didn’t she cast the spell?” asks Sam, who is still processing the dimension thing. As in, like, different from their own?

Is that where Steve is?

“Yeah, but only to keep anyone else from decoding it. The bracelet itself already had a message stored in it.” 

“Beyond Steve’s disembodied voice materializing outta nowhere the first time I touched that thing to prove he hasn’t kicked the bucket.”

“Which,” Bucky starts, “for the record –”

“Was not your theory.”

Bucky frowns harder. Refocuses. “Yes. The bracelet, which was clearly a magical object enchanted to respond to your touch –”

“Could’a been our touch, you never held it before I did –”

“Fine, sure, our touch – double enchantment. This thing is stolen, and someone – my guess is Steve – managed to layer another goddamn spell on it before sending it our way.”

Sam sighs, staring at the gleaming dishes in the drying rack. A box of Arm and Magical Hammer’s peroxide sits orange and to the side. Maybe this is why Sarah refuses to use any of the handy dandy domestic enchantments he brings home for her. 

Because magic’s a pain in the ass.

“So?” says Sam.

“Uh, yeah. She’s got a guy to decode it …” Bucky grimaces, “on the other side of the river.”

Oh. Oh. Yeah, that’s gonna be rough.

“I can’t go through a GRC checkpoint,” Sam says. Redwing makes a mournful sound of agreement. Bucky is still turning the note over and over as if maybe reading it upside down will change its mystifying contents. 

“They’d recognize your beautiful knightly face,” he agrees, reciting Sam’s proffered explanation. “And then search all your bags and spook your horse. You know, she’s way too sensitive.”

“Clara ain’t sensitive, she’s emotionally intelligent. There’s a difference,” Bucky mutters something about Sam busting out his inner kingdom social worker lingo on them and Sam adds, “and you can go through a GRC checkpoint even less, by the way.”

“To be fair,” Bucky says, “they have kinda fucked up my nose in all those wanted posters. Maybe they wouldn’t recognize me.”

They both sit down at the table, resigned. It’s a sticky problem. Sam supposes, as Bucky pulls his favourite dagger out and begins flipping it in a broody manner, that they could take Sharon’s smuggler’s detour behind the wall, but she’d ask too many questions. Sending Redwing on his own is too risky (Sam admits, begrudgingly and in the privacy of his own mind). Clint’s roped into a local problem with a gang of overall-wearing gnomes, Bruce has started teaching a yoga of ogres class, even Joaquin just set up shop marketside selling his scroll encryption services … Sam’s stomach growls, and the lingering smell of spiced rice hits his nose. Sarah’s left a potfull on the stove, for them, probably. She blusters plenty, has real right to be angry plenty, and has a mean right hook, but she loves him. And she’s a lot tougher than she looks, Sam’s come to realize. Kept this whole village alive over the years with her caring, and even after they set up the blockades she charmed the border officers better than Sam or Bucky ever could.

Sam clicks his tongue against his teeth and says, “Huh.”

“What,” says Bucky.

“Lemme run a hypothetical by you.”

“Oh no.” Bucky rubs a finger over the bridge of his nose. “You always do this to me. I started like that once –”

“And have had many terrible no good get Sam’s ass in trouble plans since, brother.” Sam crosses his arms; Rewind flaps over to his little perch by the bookshelf in deference. “Hypothetically, you don’t have to look like yourself. Right?”

Bucky looks at him warily. “Well … no.”

“And … hypothetically –”

“Sam …”

“If a familiar person, say … the nice lady who used to take her gumbo to the community house every week. Was to have that bracelet in her box the next time she went –”

“You wanna send your sister through the woods on her own in this economy?” Bucky interrupts, baffled.  

Sam lifts his chin. Raises his eyebrows. Wags his head a little bit. Chirp, says Redwing from across the room, which Sam might roughly translate to it’s not rocket science, pal.

It takes Bucky a moment to get it, but when it clicks, it’s obvious.

“Oh, no,” he says, a slow horror growing in his face. “No. No, no, no, no way. I refuse, Sam.”

“I haven’t asked anything yet!” Sam says, very mildly put out.

Bucky levels the pointy end of the dagger at him. “No. You’re not entrusting me as the sole keeper of your sister’s safety in the wilderness!”

Sam leans back in his chair, eyebrows raised. “And who the hell else am I gonna entrust as the sole keeper of my sister’s safety in the wilderness?” Bucky makes a disbelieving little cawing noise, like a sad crow, to which Sam adds, deliberate: “Come on, Buck. Be serious.”

Bucky does not answer, as he seems to go through twelve different emotions at once, silently. Sam, who can acknowledge at sword-point that this is maybe a little mean of him, given Bucky’s profound loyalty to his friends and poorly-concealed devotion to said sister (hmph), gives him a minute. Finally, Bucky manages, 

“Anyone! Someone who didn’t spend the last eighty years magically entrapped by a cabal of fascist wizards in the body of a murderous rabid animal!” 

He waves his free hand, which was previously clutched in his hair for something to do. He’d look a bit wild if he didn’t look so thoroughly mundane sitting there in his shirts with his boots off. 

Well, okay. The knife’s a little intense. But it’s not like Sarah’s kitchen isn’t stacked with em.

Sam pinches the bridge of his nose. 

“Okay, first of all. Rabid is just flat out inaccurate.”

“Sam,” Bucky grinds out.

“I’m just sayin’,” Sam says. “You’re not diseased. And like, present day wolf you can even be kinda cute. You seen how fluffy you are? Those sheep definitely did.”

Bucky actually growls at him.

“That doesn’t actually dispute my point,” says Sam, “which is that this, right here, is objectively our best plan.”

“I won’t do it.”

“I’m asking you, Bucky.”

“It’s a terrible plan!”

“Says the guy who only ever comes up with the most unhinged plans ever!”

They glare at each other, for a prolonged, stone-headed moment. Sam thinks that next time he tells the kids a bedtime story, he should include a Mexican standoff somewhere in there. Then Bucky raises the knife again, very very slowly.

“Only if Sarah says yes.”

“Which,” Sam agrees, “is extremely unlikely. If magic could be wrapped up in a tiny little football, she’d probably drop kick that thing into the Mississippi like a quarterback.”

Marginally, Bucky’s face relaxes.

“Yeah,” he says, and now Sam is starting to feel some relief too, because really, what the hell is he thinking? Sending his baby sister out into the wilderness so they can all uncover some great conspiracy … “Yeah. Yeah, okay. If she says yes, I’ll do it.”

And then, of course, she does.

[morrigan-sims]

Criminally Underrated Books (aka, books that are Actually Good)

After ranting about BookTok for longer than I should have, I thought I’d share some recommedations of books I never/rarely see talked about that are Actually Good. The list is going to go under the cut in case I want to add to it, and also beacuse it’s long as fuck.  I suck at summaries, so you might have to look up a summary yourself.  My “summaries” are mostly me rambling about why I like it, ajsdkajs. EDIT: this is going to be mostly sci-fi/fantasy or maybe speculative fiction, and also YA-heavy, since that’s what I read a lot of.  (moving more away from the YA now, but still sci-fi/fantasy obssessed.)

1. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel This one got some traction after being made into a miniseries on HBO (which I have NOT seen, for the record), but I still have never heard anyone talk about it.  It’s a beautiful book, and feels like a work of art.  The writing is beautiful, the characters are painfully human, and the whole book is a beautiful essay on / loveletter to humanity.  Yeah, sometimes we suck, but sometimes we make beautiful things, and most importantly, SURVIVAL IS INSUFFICIENT. (P.S.: Can people stop thinking that that quote is from Station Eleven?  It’s not.  It’s from Star Trek.  It says it in the book, that it was chosen as their motto but they didn’t make it up.) (P.P.S.: The “no more” chapter is the best thing ever, and I love it.) Trigger Warnings: death, disease (world-ending plague, remember?), violence, wepaons, cult-y shit.

2. The House In The Cerulean Sea + Under the Whispering Door by T.J. Klune THITCS is gorgeous, and adorable, and just a beautiful comfort book.  It’s cute, happy, gay, no teenage drama, just some middle-aged gay guys falling in love, with a healthy dose of Found Family and Fuck Beaurocracy thrown in for good measure.  (also, magical realism) TW: uhh, idk off the top of my head. UTWD is the only book that has ever made me cry, because of a goddamn ghost dog.  It’s cute, and funny, and sad, and it’s about death.  And I love it.  And again, more middle-aged gays and magical realism.  Also, the majority of the main cast are POC. TW: death (obviously) (but in a postive way??), animal death, suicide mentions, brief mentions of homophobia.

3. Nimona by Noelle Stevenson Adorable graphic novel about found family, good and evil not being what you thought, and shapeshifting.  Also, dragons. (kind of) TW: violence (nothing graphic, but it does have visuals)

4. Villains series by V.E. Schwab Since BookTok won’t shut up about Addie LaRue, I thought I’d shine some light on Ms. Schwab’s better books.  An amazing take on superheroes (and villains) and how no one is totally one or the other.  Also, I’ve never seen someone put as much thought not only how heroes get their powers, but also why they get what power.  It’s amazing worldbuilding, and I love it. Also, Found Family, morally grey characters, and some badass showdowns. TW: death (So. Much. Death.), violence, blood, weapons, animal death, cursing, abuse (mostly book 2), and Religious Stuff (christianity, not in a good way).

5. The Illuminae Files by Jay Kristoff and Aimee Kofman Sci-fi adventure with very high stakes, a lot of plot twists (but not too many), and a lovable cast of characters.  Low-key some found family.  But the best part of this story is the way it’s told.  The entire story is told via documents.  Trancripts of audio recordings, chat logs, etc.  There is no “normal” prose in these books, and it works out brilliantly.  Fast reads even though the page count is high. TW: death, violence, gore (mostly book 2), war, weapons.

6. Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein Gorgeous, showstopping, spectacular, brilliant.  I’ve read it 5 times.  Deals with a female spy and her friend a female pilot during WWII.  I know, I know, another WWII book.  But this one is different!!  As I said, I’ve read it 5 times.  Should probably have made me cry, but didn’t.  Also, Rose Under Fire and Black Dove, White Raven by the same author are wonderful as well. TW: War, torture mentions, weapons, violence, injury.

7. On The Edge of Gone by Corinne Duyvis A gorgeous book about the end of the world and leaving things behind.  A host of POC and disabled characters, and the main character is autistic and Black.  (the author is also autistic + POC, so dw.)  It’s gorgeous, and I love it, and I’ve read it 3 times now.  There is a scene that almost made me cry (again, has to do with animals), but I love it, and I relate very strongly to Denise, the main character.   TW: injury, end-of-the-world stuff, animal death, death mention, ableism.

[tossawary]

I'm sorry this feels real weird, but I love PINTWILF a lot, and the fact that you really expanded on SQH's role and everything. And I really loved that you added the other unnamed peaks and melded them in, everything that you wrote about the peaks actually really fleshed them out and their roles. So what did you name the three other peaks, and what are their roles? I think I only really understand that Xi Jiao is an animal/beast peak?

It’s not weird! I’m quite pleased with the sect logistics I’ve been writing in PINTWILF (from a humor angle, not a realism angle) and so I’m happy to talk about it. This is the order of peaks I’ve been using in PINTWILF: 

(1) Qiong Ding Peak - Peak Lord: Yue Qingyuan (Canon) 

Apparently they’re responsible for general affairs. I’ve always assumed they’re also responsible for dealing with other sects and politics, outside of peak-specific specialties where another peak lord has the authority to represent the sect. 

(2) Qing Jing Peak - Peak Lord: Shen Qingqiu (Canon) 

Peak of scholars and strategists. I assumed from there that they would also be responsible for a lot of library and archive-related duties, and that they would have some talisman and seal experts, etc., and that QJ and QD would be closely tied in many matters. 

(3) Wan Jian Peak - Peak Lord: Wei Qingwei (Canon) 

Peak of sword masters. I assumed that this meant both martial weapon specialists and sword smiths. I also assumed that this could be expanded to many kinds of metal work. Where WJ and AD meet is probably where a lot of non-weapon-related fabrication happens. 

(4) An Ding Peak - Peak Lord: Shang Qinghua (Canon, minus #?)

I’ve seen people put An Ding anywhere from 4th to 12th. I’m not sure that An Ding has a canonical number. I prefer An Ding being 4th because of 1) how closely Qiong Ding and An Ding’s work would be tied and the importance of logistics, but 2) mainly how funny I think it is if SQH is only three murders away from being the sect leader. 

SQH: “Wei Qingwei, you cannot die. The chances of Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan offing each other is too high for you to die on me. YOU’RE MY LAST LINE OF DEFENSE. DON’T MAKE ME BE SECT LEADER.” 

(5) Xian Shu Peak - Peak Lord: Qi Qingqi (Canon)

It’s unclear what specialties XS has, probably because it only existed in PIDW as the “hot lady peak” (and MXTX never actually expanded it post-transmigration). It’s never come up, but I kind of dig the idea of XS doing some textiles work, anything from weaving fine fabrics to rope-making. (Who makes stuff like Immortal Binding Cables? It could be Xian Shu.) 

(6) Xi Jiao Peak - Peak Lord: Tang Qingling (Non-Canon) 

Yes, this is an animal/beast peak, because I’ve seen it brought up in a few fics, and I thought it would be funny for SY to be entranced by the idea, only for SQH to go, “Bro, I hope you have the stomach for blood and literal shit, because that’s where they butcher monsters for parts and collect crap for fertilizer.” 

I also like the idea of Cang Qiong Mountain Sect having actual pipelines based on the specialties, which make it a very profitable and efficient sect. (Also, where are they getting their food? Do they have livestock? Do they buy it all from the surrounding towns and cities? Xi Jiao is me deciding that, yes, they have livestock.) Liu Qingge brings in a monster, it goes to Xi Jiao, then the parts go out again to Wan Jian, Qian Cao, Zui Xian, and others. to become armor, medicine, potions, etc.. Or maybe just to An Ding to sell. 

(7) Bai Zhan Peak - Peak Lord: Liu Qingge (Canon) 

They make people who fight good. 

(8) Qian Cao Peak - Peak Lord: Mu Qingfang (Canon) 

Trains healers and makes medicine. I assumed that they would grow as many of their own plants as they could and do a lot of plant breeding. Medicine could also be a great source of income for the sect (another reason why QC is one of Shang Qinghua’s favorite peaks). 

(9) Ku Xing Peak - Peak Lord: Wang Qingjie (Canon, minus # and peak lord) 

The peak name is canon, but I can’t remember if they have a canonical number and they don’t have a canonical peak lord. They’re all all-male peak with an ascetic lifestyle, living akin to monks. 

I think I decided that they specialized in talismans and the creation of other spiritual tools, including and as well as ceramics. So, they work closely with many of the other peaks, but especially An Ding in supplying other peaks. I can’t remember why I decided this. I think maybe I decided that Ku Xing might have a philosophy that “to create purifying objects, the maker must also be free from impurities”? Hence the ascetic lifestyle. 

I also thought it would be funny if Ku Xing and Qing Jing had a little bit of a rivalry going on. Shen Qingqiu makes very good talismans and Wang Qingjie is NOT angry about it (in the way of someone trying not to be angry). 

(10) Zui Xian Peak - Peak Lord: Zhang Qingyan (Canon, minus # and peak lord) 

Again, the peak name is canon, but I can’t remember if they have a canonical number and they don’t have a canonical peak lord. This is the peak that apparently specializes in alcohol. 

So, I decided that they might as well be responsible for brewing other potions and solutions. Maybe they have people who specialize in alchemy. Qian Cao and Wan Jian and Xi Jiao (and nearly every other peak) probably do their own brewing of certain things, but it probably helps to have someone else dedicated to brewing on a large scale. Qian Cao grows the plants for a common medicine, then ships them to Zui Xian for mass-production, and the An Ding takes the result and sells it to all the nearby towns and cities. 

Zui Xian probably saves and makes Cang Qiong so much money. 

(11) Long Sheng Peak - Peak Lord: ??? (Non-Canon) 

This is a newer invention and I haven’t come up with a peak lord yet, but they’re named after “The Dragon’s Backbone�� and they specialize in plants and agriculture. This is my “this is how the sect gets fed” peak, alongside Xi Jiao. 

Maybe they don’t grow all the sect’s food themselves, but they support and work with the surrounding towns and cities to make sure that the local harvests survive all of PIDW’s horrible plants and monsters. Sometimes you need cultivators who can tell you why this year’s harvest is haunted and what to do about it! Maybe Airplane invented the equivalent of magical locust swarms and didn’t think twice about it, so someone has to deal with that! Maybe they grow the materials for Xian Shu’s textiles work! 

They work closely with Xi Jiao, Qian Cao, Zui Xian, and An Ding. 

(12) ??? 

I haven’t actually named the last peak. I haven’t really seen a need to invent one yet and it’s kind of been a in-joke with myself. It’s fun to imagine people being like, “Cang Qiong has twelve peaks, right? What’s that last one called again? I can never remember what that last peak is called.” 

Notes: 

I imagine that most of the peaks’ specialties overlap in one way or another. An Ding, Zui Xian, Qian Cao, and Long Sheng each do some agricultural stuff, but Qian Cao and Long Sheng (especially LS) do most of it. And so on. 

Cang Qiong Mountain Sect also doesn’t have to do everything in-house. Shang Qinghua also has to make orders from other sects and merchants for stuff that Cang Qiong either can’t make or don’t have the space/time to make. I just like the idea that CQ is so powerful partly because they’re so independent. 

If I keep the details loose, I can get a lot of fun humor out of it. 

[twopoppies]

Hello :) I was wondering if you could possibly rec me some lighthouse/ B&B fics? Maybe similar to TTS? Like with the whole isolation, strangers to lovers kinda thing ? Or even any eroda themed ones. I can't seem to find very many and was hoping you'd know a few.

Hi sugar. I’ve got a few. I hope these are new to you.

Jump Before We Fall by green_feelings / @greenfeelings (E, 114K) I loved the way the location of this fic became part of the story and I quickly found myself rooting for these boys to figure their shit out. Louis (and Zayn) run a hotel by the sea. Harry is just there for the summer.

the moon made me think of you by anabsolution (E, 16K) This is one I read years ago, but there’s moments in it that still stick with me. Set in the ‘90’s, Harry works at a motel. Louis checks in.

To the Ends of the Earth by stylinsoncity (M, 68K) I read this one years ago, so I don’t have great notes, but this author has written some of my favorite fics. What I do recall is that it was beautifully written, painful but ultimately so lovely, and of course...sexy. Louis visits Harry at his cabin in Idaho.

all my love was down in a frozen ground by navigator (E, 16K) This is an old one that I didn’t have bookmarked for some reason. But it’s a favorite and I love everything this author wrote. This is one of those quiet, soft fics with a bit of angst and a lot of internal monologue and gentle conversations. I don’t know, there’s something so touching about it. Louis goes into the woods to hide for a bit. Harry finds him there.

The Woods are Lovely, Dark and Deep by @helloamhere (4 part series, mixed ratings, 128K) Amazing world building, complex characters, beautiful writing. Louis finds himself drawn to the woods.

Soul of the Sea by vurdoc (E, 33K) A gothic romance set in a small Scottish village. Mysterious, melancholy, tender, and such a pleasure to read. Harry owns a B&B near the coast. Louis was just passing through.

wake the morn and greet the dawn (with hearts entwined and free) by mixedfandomfics (T, 21K)I cried the first third of the way through this because this author painted such a beautiful picture of Harry’s emotions, his found family, and the setting. I love how they slowly unraveled Louis’ story and the tender, sweet way they ended up together. And Niall!! The best friend/brother you could ask for. Harry lives in a remote Scottish village. Louis moves into town.

Little Technicolor Things by scary_crow (M, 72K) This is truly one of the most beautiful pieces of writing I have ever read and it is an absolutely travesty that it’s not being talked about every day. This fic is gorgeous and poetic and romantic and heartbreaking and an explosion of metaphoric images and everything I never knew I needed but now that I have it I want to read it over and over and over. Harry is an artist, holed up in a big house. Louis is a depressed poet who finds him there.

Until You Remember by Throwthemflowers / @hazzabeeforlou (E, 21K) Louis finds himself mysteriously drawn to a seaside town. It’s just a beautifully written story and made me cry. I really need to read it again, actually!

Take Care Down By The Water by shyserious (M, 37K) Again, not quite mermaids, but oh my goodness I loved this fic. Magical realism, mythical creatures, dreamy/moody atmosphere, beautiful writing. The fic has been deleted, but the link is to a download.

And the one you mentioned:

Tired, Tired Sea by mediawhore / @mediawhorefics (M, 113K) Always a favorite author, this one is beautifully descriptive and moody and charming. I loved the way Harry’s character unfolded and let Louis in, the way Louis made space for him in his life (and heart), and the way Harry’s character struggled with and eventually found a way to live and be happy with his fame. Louis runs a lighthouse and B&B in Scotland.

[grittyreadsfic]

hello my friends, one singular person asked for this weeks ago so i’m here with my most unhinged rec list yet: tk and nolan.

now, this one was hard to reign in, so i really didn’t. this pairing had maybe 230 fics in the tag when i first started reading hockey fic, and it’s now over 900, and i’ve read far too many of them, and that makes it so hard to parse it down. so i just...didn't!

so with that said, please enjoy so you want to get into tknp: a beginners guide to a classic case of idiots to lovers

i told myself that i couldn’t rec an author’s entire body of work but then i remembered this is my blog and i do what i want, so i did some consolidating. here’s a list of the quintessential authors for this pairing, you can start at any of their profiles and pick any of their fics at random, and it’ll be one of the best ones for the pairing, hands down.

therainbowsedge: i’d start with the summer camp fic, or the sex toys one, as both beautifully capture the true idiots to lovers nature of this pairing, but just top tier writing all around

manybumblebees: the wedding fic is so tender and port stanley is a classic, but literally pick any single fic and you’ll have a perfect tknp fic. i’m not kidding

jamesvanriemsdick: their tknp fics in their series are some of the hidden gems of this pairing (the tk heartbeat fic makes me LOSE it) but the delaware fic or the seattle fic…..there’s really something for every mood

catchascatchcan: start with era of gods because i could write literal essays on how it’s some of the best fantasy worldbuilding i’ve ever read, but then just read everything else on their account, including non tknp fics. you won’t regret it

hackysack: ao3 user hackysack has written one of two timeloop fics that i absolutely adore, and i thought about just calling that one out in particular, but all of their work deserves the attention

canary: nothing to prove was the first tknp fic i ever read and i was immediately hooked. all of their fics are a good starting place for the pairing, and just really give you a feeling for the pairing

and now, for the fic recs!

to be, despite it all by smudgedfreckles

summary: or, nolan patrick’s gender thesis, by travis konecny.

why i love it: there’s not a lot ofo nonbinary characters in media, even in fic, but this fic’s treatment of nolan and their path to figuring out their gender just feels so real and made me feel so seen. tk’s characterization is also just top notch, and it’s just a super sweet story about two people who love each other

last ones standing by makeit_takeit

summary: If you’re committed to finding your future spouse, reads the last line of the ad, and are ready to look at yourself and your love life in a whole new way, apply now.

At the bottom of the ad there’s a link, and Travis finds his finger hovering over the screen, lip still caught between his teeth.

“I mean,” he says very reasonably, speaking out loud to his empty apartment like some sort of possibly-crazy person, “just applying doesn’t mean anything. Maybe I just fill it out, and see what happens. It’s not like I’m really gonna get picked to be on TV, come on.”

He snorts out loud, just to show his apartment he hasn’t lost his grip on reality or anything; he fully understands how ludicrous that would be.

Then he clicks the link anyway, because yolo or whatever.

why i love it: what part of a married at first sight fic doesn’t make you want to immediately dive right in? the concept is fun, the execution is absolutely flawless, and it captures their dynamic so well while letting it develop naturally

motivation by connectknee

summary: Kevin knows when to back off, the article said. He knows just when to shut up and leave Patty alone, something Travis has never known how to do.

why i love it: the thing i love about this pairing is that tk is loud and in your face, and nolan’s more reserved, a little quieter, a little harder to read. this fic does a really great job of exploring how tk could feel like maybe he’s just a bit too much and is one of my favorites in terms of miscommunication

a tenderness grows by rusesdeguerre

summary: Nolan wouldn’t say that landing a job as the Philadelphia Flyers’ psychotic and probably clinically insane mascot was a childhood dream of his. Maybe tangentially: playing pond hockey in –30°C weather and pretending to be Sidney Crosby is practically a rite of passage when you grow up in Manitoba. That, and experiencing the distinct displeasure that is thousands of mosquitoes sucking your blood out when your father drags you on a father-son camping trip into the backwoods of the northern Canadian Prairies.

why i love it: this was the first fic i recced on this blog, and i stand by that decision. a fic where nolan is not only not a hockey player, but is in fact the person in the gritty suit? absolutely perfect, and so charming from start to finish

meet me at my window by springsteen

summary: Travis has lived in Philadelphia for a few years now, long enough to know there isn’t a major city in America where superheroes don’t destroy an entire city block trying to save humanity or whatever. He can deal with all the super-shit, but Travis did not sign up for getting woken up from a deep sleep because some fucker’s trying to break in through his window.

(5 times the super-villain known as "The Cat" breaks into Travis's apartment, plus 1 time Travis invites him in.)

why i love it: there’s a lot of things to love here, but the concept is just absolutely one of my all time favorite aus ever. it’s fun and charming and the perfect glimpse into a world where heroes and villains exist, and what it’s like just to be a run of the mill kind of guy existing in it. tk and nolan’s back and forth in this make it so engaging, and it’s such a top tier fic

body’s in trouble by cloudsandpassingevents

summary: “Oh, sorry,” someone says. “Didn’t know anyone else was here.”

Nolan freezes, then turns around very slowly. When he looks up, Nicklas fucking Backstrom is standing behind him in a hoodie and baggy sweats, holding the biggest bag of Swedish Fish Nolan’s ever seen in his life in one hand.

“Uh,” Nolan says around the pop tart between his teeth. “Yeah.”

What the fuck, his brain helpfully supplies.

why i love it: from nolan’s inner voice, to the way the author explores all the dynamics within the team, to the way they write the unexpected but actually, it kind of makes sense friendship between nolan and backstrom, is just absolutely fantastic. there’s a lot of moments that circle back and build on each other in a way that really just makes it super compelling

rhizomatic foundations by lighthousetowers

summary: Twenty days after he moves in with Kevin Hayes, twenty days – three months, five months, depending on how you look at it – after not talking to TK, TK shows up at the front door with a plant the size of a basketball in his hands.

TK grins. "Patty, meet Reginald." He lifts up the plant. "Reggie, meet Patty. He's going to be your new - caretaker."

"What the fuck," says Nolan, not moving a single muscle.

Or: That Nolan can hear the plant talk might as well just happen.

why i love it: this is probably my favorite magical realism fic just about ever. it’s fun and charming and a little weird, but in the best possible way. there’s such a wonderful narrative in it, and lighthousetowers always has such beautiful writing, and it really shines in this one. the dialogue and nolan’s characterization are also part of what set it apart for me as one of the best tknp fics

in the dark of any town by mengetpegged

summary: If the voice has an accent at all, it’s a flat prairie Canadian, with none of G’s French-Canadian softness at the edges. But mostly, the accent is just ‘pissed off,’ which TK believes is a default setting for ghosts.

“Who are you?” TK asks, and he doesn’t like how strained his voice sounds, doesn’t like the tinge of anxiety tinting the rise of his question. He tries to regulate his breaths—in through his nose, hold, out through his mouth—but it feels like he’s not getting enough oxygen, which makes him panic even more.

“Someone with a fucking migraine, dickhead,” the voice says. “So keep the lights off and shut the hell up.”

(or: Nolan Patrick, Hotel X Ghost)

why i love it: i’m usually not super into ghost fics, both the spooky kind and the nonspooky kind, but this one is a rare exception. it’s charming and fun and tender and it’s got some of, in my opinion, the best characterization of tk and nolan in any fic. the way the author writes their dynamic and their dialogue is just unmatched

lets_make_this_moment_a_crime.mp3 by honeydripping

summary: Travis meets Nolan at a Midtown show in 2002 when he punches Nolan in the face. He can’t help it, “Like A Movie” just goes off.

But he does feel guilty about it.

or

TK and Patty work at a bakery together. They go to punk shows to pass the time.

why i love it: idk if anyone asked for an early 2000s emo/punk/alt au but wow! i sure am glad it exists! really the vibes of this fic, as silly as that sounds, are absolutely unmatched. i love the structure with the music, the development of their relationship, and just everything about how the author wrote the setting (there’s this whole thing with tattoos in it that makes me feel absolutely insane)

you’re ripped at every edge by you’re a masterpiece by conformityissuicide

summary: “Ugh, look, this yoga teacher has it out for me, man. And I can’t go back there without at least having some of the basics down. I’ve got to win this battle.”

“Yoga isn’t really something you win at,” Hartsy starts.

Travis cuts him off, “You can win at anything if you try hard enough.”

+++

OR that time Nolan's a grumpy yoga teacher and Travis realizes he wants to bone him and prove him wrong about Travis' non-existent yoga abilities.

why i love it: listen, if you want tknp, at least one of them has to be an idiot, and this tk absolutely captures the obliviousness i love to see in him in fic. it’s such a great characterization of them both and such a great concept (and even better execution)

you form a terror pack (and i’m aware of that) by dalmatienne

summary: “Can I help you?” TK snarks, both eyebrows hiked up in a way that has earned her many elbow checks to the ribs.

The chick looks down her nose, long thick eyelashes fluttering. Red-bitten lips part to blow a florid pink bubble and TK can smell the chemical sweetness when it pops.

“Yeah,” she says in this monotonous voice that seems almost at odds with her bubble gum and neon skates. She jams her stopper into TK’s thigh again, literally inches away from where it’d really hurt. “Tie ‘em.”

why i love it: to be honest, i generally don’t read rule 63 within hrpf, but this one is just absolutely knocks it out of the park. the concept (i fuckin’ love roller derby), the characterization of nolan, the pacing, the rituals, the tone of the entire fic, it’s just all around a perfect read from start to finish

thrills and grills by bitter_leaf

summary: Travis can’t even begin to wonder what he did in a previous life to incur the wrath of this fucking cook. Travis thinks he’s a nice person, doesn’t conduct himself in any way that could be considered particularly dickish, and unless this guy has some sort of issue with hockey bros or people from the boonies, he’s not sure how he started shit without even knowing.

__

Patty has a vendetta. Travis just wants to eat his eggs in peace.

why i love it: honestly this is the enemies to lovers fic i’ve been waiting for. i remember seeing the reddit post when it first went viral and thinking it would make such a great fic premise, so stumbling across this one was just so wonderful. super engaging and fun and so hilarious to read!

nothing but room for you by fightingfuries

summary: When his agent tells him he’s going to be traded to the Devils, Nolan isn't sure how he feels about it. Might be easier if he was going somewhere farther away, like California or fucking Florida. Somewhere sun-soaked and foreign. Someplace so different from Philadelphia that he can forget he ever played for the Flyers, forget everything that happened there.

Or Nolan fucks up, gets traded, gets his shit together and falls in love. Not necessarily in that order.

why i love it: i cannot stress to you how much i love trade fics, and this one is one of my absolute favorites. the trade to the devils-so close to philly, still, but there’s more to distance than physical miles-was such an excellent choice and the split timeline adds so much to the narrative, and the emotions are real and messy and complicated in the best way

a couple of runaways (i’m glad you stayed) by overturnedgoal

summary: The person in the video he’s watching is super annoying. Some obnoxious holier than thou granola type who keeps talking about their environmental impact as if they aren’t driving a gas guzzler around, but the basic idea of living in a van, driving around wherever, camping all the time, just going hiking and swimming and seeing the whole country? It sounds pretty dope, honestly.

why i love it: i like to watch tours and conversions of vans/buses into tiny homes as a self soothing method, and this fic has the same impact that watching those do. it’s such a fun concept, and it’s so fuckin’ soft, and the dialouge between tk and nolan is just *chef’s kiss*

all candor and style in the crook of your smile by p3trichor

summary: It’s a photo of Nolan on his knees with someones’ fingers in his mouth, lips slick with spit. Travis flicks by it almost too fast and he’s only got seconds to decide if he wants to screenshot it, if he wants to just give up the ghost right then and there. Except Travis’s phone freezes momentarily and then the group refreshes, sidcros87, Bert59 and 14 others took a screenshot!

It’s gone before Travis even has time to process it and he already wasted his replay of the day on a stupid video of a stupid fish that Hayes caught.

Can you send me that screenshot Travis texts Bertuzzi before he can overthink it, his dick already stirring in his sweats. Tuzzi sends back the cry-laughing emoji and then the screenshot before Travis can be too annoyed at him.

Or, Nolan is being weird about Travis's break-up and TK is maybe not straight.

why i love it: i genuinely don’t think i have words for the amount i love this fic. it took me forever to actually read, but it’s absolutely one of my favorite fics, and it’s an absolutely riot to read. carter’s meddling and the presence of tyler bertuzzi both make it extra fun, in my humble opinion

[the-bjd-community-confess]

Dear 'Anime Bad' Anon: I Want To Help I pity your situation, so please have a list of weebshit that isn't moeified, or wherein the cutesy art-style serves a greater purpose. (Note: though they won't be soft marshmallow uguuuu, they may still have issues in other ways. Some may have aged badly with regards to how society views or portrays groups or beliefs, some may have upsetting content and dark themes, and some may simply not be to your taste. Note: Anime is a genre, not a monolith, and the disparaging stereotype that it's all cute girls uwuing over their brother s-s-senpai!!! is as much of a disservice as saying all western movies are just vapid cash grab superhero movie sequels with no inegrity or thought put into them. There are indeed a lot of superhero movies, but they're not all identical schlock (megamind vs venom vs kick-ass),  but even more than that, there is a wealth of creative endeavor just beyond the veil of Marvel's cape: just as there are plenty of good anime if you dig past the isekai high school harem wish fulfillment genre that no one wants to keep making but people keep making because it prints money to a very small demographic of the animation equivalent of a mobile game whale thereby allowing this frankly quite-small industry to work on engaging and worthwhile series where the budget permits, Regardless,)

Mushi-shi: -Pros: gorgeous animation, tranquil vibes, episodic stories so you can cram in an episode between classes or on your lunch break. highly recommended by the literal-who typing this out. -Cons: some themes or stories may cause emotional distress, learning to tell apart Urushibara Yuki's characters is a learning curve.

Baccano-Pros: meticulously-researched 20s-and-30s-era mafia violence with a hint of the supernatural, as a treat, told anachronistically with flair and jazz music. practically made to be binge-watched. the novels are finally getting translated into english as well. -Cons: lots of characters to keep track of, fair bit of blood and violence, some scenes or themes may be upsetting, lots of jumping around between different time periods. See Also: Durarara, another series by Ryōgo Narita with a ton of characters and a plot with more threads an overpriced sheet.

Cowboy Bebop-Pros: incredibly well-regarded, space bounty hunters are cool, episodic series that slowly takes on a plot towards the end, fantastic animation, scoring, and even dub work.  -Cons: some scenes or themes may be uncomfortable, some parts have not aged quite so well, the smart doll version of the main character is ugly, you're gonna carry that weight.

Trigun-Pros: starts lighthearted, develops an increasingly investing plot as the series goes along. fictional westerns are cool. this world is made of love and peace -Cons: some scenes or themes may be upsetting, and probably will be. gun violence is naturally present, but that ain't all of it.

Hellsing (standard or Ultimate. or Abridged)Pros: vampires killing nazis. the original adaptation isn't bad, the second adaptation (ultimate) is generally viewed as an improvement. abridged is a youtube parody version that was so popular the voice actors reference it in convention interviews.Cons: a Lot of violence, even trending to the gorey side of things. Uncomfortable Themes Everywhere, but it's a horror-tinged action series about killing nazis, so that's to be expected. 

Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood-Pros: while the original anime was quite good, the second iteration is a large improvement. does to alchemy what naruto does to ninjas: It's Basically Battle Magic. the plot starts on a strong note and doesn't let up from there. -Cons: there are distressing scenes and themes that may or may not be tolerable to the viewer. there are moments of cheesecake and even an occasional joke or a moeblob here and there, and it's not all doom and all gloom all the time, but this doesn't detract from the abject horror-despair that comes to permeate this series as it progresses. finally understand why people on the internet respond so negatively to the name 'nina'! 

[Mod: many more recs/reviews under the break, worth reading for those who like more obscure anime and animation]

Grave of the Fireflies-Pros: you will remember how to cry. it's a good reminder that one country's 'triumphs' often come at the expense of another country's people.  -Cons: this movie is incredibly dark, do not watch if you are in a bad headspace. see also: Barefoot Gen, a similar tale but this time from the perspective of an actual survivor from Hiroshima.

Michiko to Hatchin-Pros: an actually diverse cast of characters tangled up in a messy and very humanizing story, interspersed with Shinichiro Watanabe's particular flare for adventure. -Cons: some scenes or themes are very likely to be distressing. can be tricky to find, too.

Mo no no Ke (not the ghibli movie, though it is also quite good.) -Pros: incredibly unique art style and pacing that draws heavily from japanese theatre traditions, every screenshot is wallpaper-worthy. -Cons: may cause motion sickness. it is a psychological horror series, and one that does not need blood, nor gore, to cause visceral emotional response in the viewer. scenes and themes will be distressing- as really, that's the point.

Tokyo Godfathers-Pros: a transwoman, a (self-identified) homeless bum, and a runaway teen girl find a newborn in the baby on christmas. incredibly wholesome, somehow, and grounded in reality, with wonderful animation from the tragically late satoshi kon. -Cons: it is grounded in realism, and sometimes, people are dicks. mild transphobia warning, too, but in-universe- the transwoman herself is portrayed with kindness and allowed to be her own (wonderful!!!) person. still, viewer be mindful.

Kino no Tabi (the first series is my preferred, the second is shinier but lacks emotional impact- in my onion.) -Pros: mostly episodic, very unique series that can be gritty where it counts and kind where it matters. -Cons: some scenes or themes might be disturbing. finding it's not easy, either, and unfortunately, i don't think the novels are being translated right now, either.

Spice and Wolf-Pros: it's mostly about economics. there are shenanigans, a harvest god, and a slowly burgeoning romance, sure, but it's still mostly about economics. -Cons: there are moments of cheesecake and comedy, and moments that may cause distress to the viewer. it may or may not be to your taste.

Puella Magi Madoka Magica-Cons: yeah i know, it's moeblobs.  -Pros: you're gonna watch 'em die, though, in case that may interest you. it's quite a good subversion of the magical girl genre overall. somehow volks hasn't made an MDD of anyone from the series and i will never understand how that didn't happen.

Wolf Children: Ame to Yuki-Pros: watch a family grow together as a newly-single mother does her best to raise her twin children after the tragic loss of their father.  -Cons: keep tissues handy. certain scenes or themes may be uncomfortable.

Lupin III (Red Jacket, Ghibli, and the new 3D animation are all A+) pros: heist comedy elevated to an art form before half (or more!) of the people reading this were born. the english dubbed series that used to air on adult swim is a treat. cons: this franchise started in THE SIXTIES, so naturally, some shit has not aged well. certain series (fujiko mine) are darker than others in themes and material. the 3d movie that released recently is an excellent starting point.

Samurai Champloo-Pros: breakdancing samurai, a fascinating roster of characters, and a superb soundtrack by the tragically passed Nujabes. -Cons: it was made in the weird era of the transition from analog to digital animation and so the /series master/ was animated at a painfully low resolution, so even if there's a bluray out there (I haven't looked,) it will be an upscale, which doesn't always look the best. as well, there are scenes and themes that may make the viewer uncomfortable here and there.

The Works of Studio Ghibli Oh, I'm sorry, Ponyo too suffused with childhood wonder for you? My Neighbor Totoro not depressing enough?  In addition to the infamous Grave of the Fireflies, Studio Ghibli has made a wealth of movies that aren't aimed squarely at the kodomo (children's) sector. -Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind: climate change existential dread, the movie -Castle in the Sky: government obsession with obtaining weapons of mass destruction destroys everything beautiful, the movie -Pom Poko: human-caused deforestation and urbanization is destroying the natural world and all that live in it, the movie -Princess Mononoke: industrialization will be the death of everything beautiful in the world, the movie, with a side of sometimes everyone (and no one) is the villain when everyone is simply trying to survive -Howl's Moving Castle: The Physical Manifestation of Depression is a Liquid Ooze, the Movie, also War Is Bad It's not all depressing, but let it never be said that Hayao Miyazaki was subtle. Whisper of the Heart is a good coming-of-age story, Kiki's Delivery Service is a classic, Tales from Earthsea is divisive among fans of Ursula K. Le Guin but I personally liked it. From one studio alone there is a wealth of opportunities.

And that's really the point. These are just some from the top of my head. There are so very many options outside of the cute-girls-doing-cute-things genre that I couldn't list them all if I was here for a week. Or as Madoka Magica so ruthlessly showcases, even series that appear a certain way on the surface might not be what you bargained for once you look into them! These are all (I think) mostly older, mainstream-appeal series that should be easy to track down, too -- there are all kinds of singular animations like The Diary of Tortov Roddle, crowdfunded experiments like KICK-HEART, Masterpiece World Theatre renditions of classic (western) novels that never get talked about, films like A Silent Voice that confront social issues- and of course, series like Rozen Maiden that helped popularize this very hobby!

There is literally an ocean of content to explore from Japanese creators alone, and it opens up even more if you look into works from other parts of Asia- just look at how popular manwha have become, or Chinese animations like Leafie, a Hen Into the Wild! It's a genre unto itself, with all the breadth of content and inter-industry problems that come with it, and without any of the respect that similar art forms have been granted over the years. The way an entire culture's art form is often disparaged, disregarded, and belittled- and by extension, the way most of Asia's animated endeavors are often rolled up into that reductive dismissal along with anime and manga- is honestly Not Great, and there is absolutely a thread of xenophobia that runs through it. The industry has so very many problems (low wages, poor training, overwork of everyone ever, archaic financial modules, the exclusivity and breadth of merchandising necessary to turn a profit and how it leads to consumer burnout and disconnection over time, and yes, the way minors are portrayed not just in anime, but in Japanese media in general- and how much of that is actually bad (some of it is indeed,) and how much if it is cultural difference (I've heard people call the scene where the family in Totoro bathe together problematic because of the nudity, but I've also only heard people say that from the West)

-- none of the actual problems affecting the people who produce this medium are gonna improve when the general response to "animators frequently have to live at home to survive" is "that's what happens when you're a weeb."  It's 5am and I'm gonna point out the problems in the narrative around how we discuss this genre of entertainment because it's important, damn you! Regardless, thank you for coming to my unasked for and overlong TED talk about animation on a doll collecting drama blog, feel free to call me a pathetic weeb etcetera on your way out- but while you do so, might I suggest you also go watch a choice animated series! My current go-to is Bofuri, which is a cute-girls-doing-cute-things moefied isekai series that I refuse to apologize for watching. Be free. (The battle scenes are great and it captures the feeling of learning to play a new MMO with your friends better than most video-game-based anime I've seen in a long, long time. does anyone even still remember .hack? how about serial experiments lain...?)

~Anonymous

[realife-mermaid]

Reading Log for May/June

We are GETTING INTO THIS SHIT lmao I was behind in my goodreads goal and slacking on some of my reading goals so I tried to read more for May and June. Here is that effort, I think I did a fantastic job, and also I read a lot of books that I fOcking LOVED which was a nice change from the “mostly eh” pattern I’ve been stuck in.

I also bought a bunch of books (mostly starring queer and/or characters of color bc I realized my books feature way too many cishets) then inventoried all my books and redid my counts. And in June I ONLY read queer books as a “this is a gays only event go home!” power move on all the heterosexuals currently on my bookshelves. Can’t let those dudes get too cocky, they gotta know they’re on a Bisexual Bookshelf and they can’t be embarrassing me. So books 7 on are all queer in some way, and most of them were written by queer authors as well.

New Total Books Count: 184

New Unread Books Count: 94

Goodreads Goal: 49

This Place: 150 Years Retold Anthology - 3.5 stars. Eh. To be honest the summary was really misleading. I thought it would be more post apocalyptic takes on colonialism but instead it was mostly just straight history. Some of them did not have enough story for the pages they got and some of them had far too much story for the pages they got, or told them in a really awkward way. Still, seeing history centered from an Indigenous perspective was interesting and there’s some beautiful art here. Standouts include Red Clouds (read that one during daylight hours for my peace of mind if no one else’s lol), Rosie (BEST art by far), and Migwite’tmeg: We Remember It.

The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven by Sherman Alexie - 5 stars. I know he’s a grade A creep but I bought this several years ago before I knew that and I wanted to at least read it once. I both understand why it’s considered a classic (the stories about Norma, Samuel Builds-the-Fire, and James Many Horses really stuck me with specifically) but I can also Really pick up on Alexie’s opinions of women lol.

Clockwork Prince by Cassie Clare - 4.5 Stars. So much better than the first one. Felt like there was more going on, the romantic scenes are SO beautifully romantic, the character arcs more well defined, and the writing really improved. Still too long, and idc what she says, Jem should have gotten a POV chapter and the fact that he didn’t bc ~plot reasons~ is just laziness, so I knocked half a star off. Also, the audiobook I listened to was AWESOME, the male voice did such a good job, and the female voice improved as well.

Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones - 5 stars. This was a solid, 4 star horror urban fantasy/coming of age story and then the last two chapters just punched me in the chest and took it into “absolute favorites” category. Told from the point of view of the nameless nephew who may or may not be a werewolf, raised by his werewolf aunt and uncle, who have been on the move since his grandfather died, it’s a fantastic horror book and a fresh take on werewolves and also just a great book.

Luck of the Titanic by Stacey Lee - 5 stars. Historical fiction about a Chinese aspiring acrobat who boards the titanic in the hopes of reconnecting with her twin brother. It’s SO GOOD, so engaging, with characters that feel so alive and painfully real. Loved it and loved being emotionally destroyed by the ending. The injustice of what happened to the lower class passengers really STUCK with me, I had to sit with my feelings after.

Among Others by Jo Walton - 5 stars. I don’t even know how to describe how much I loved it. I think The Book Thief might have a rival for my affections. It’s magic realism about a girl named Mor in, as she puts it, the Scouring of the Shire section of the story. Evil has been defeated, so what do you do next? It’s about grief, disability, abuse, and the power of connection and love and LIFE and I cried reading it. Everyone should read it.

Nature Poem by Tommy Pico - 4 stars. This was an audiobook listen and I loved hearing his narration. Very animated and fun. The poem itself is very interesting and there’s quite a few bits that really stuck with me about like Indigenous Experience and also about being gay and Indigenous. Excited to read more of his work.

Space Opera by Catherynne Valente - 5 stars. I would like to formally apologize to my friend Addi @monstersandheartache who recommended this to me like a year ago and I dragged my feet on reading it because I’m a dumbass holy shit. So funny, so witty, so zany, and yet so ripe with emotion. It’s Eurovision in Space and pays homage to sci-fi and glam rock, and the general overreaching theme reminds me a lot, of all things, Pacific Rim - it’s a humanist ballad of queer rockstars singing to (and often fucking and flirting with) aliens and it’s so damn good.

Beast by Brie Spangler - 3 stars. The writing was solid, I liked how Jamie as a trans girl was written to be very Aware of how others perceive her but just ignoring it bc she’s here to Have Fun, and the beginning was very good but the characters went from lovably dumb to plain annoying around the 70% mark. There comes a point when there has to be more to the plot than “I say something dumb, we argue, don’t talk, and then make up” ya know. Disappointing bc I was looking forward to this one.

Howl and Other Poems by Allen Ginsburg - 3 stars. I think every teenager should read howl because that’s when it’s most gonna resonate, when it’s the first time you’ve read something like this, because the Beat Generation WAS the first time they were doing this. Now though, there’s so many poems that say similar things that the moment of “I didn’t know other people felt like this” won’t ring as true. I did really like A Supermarket in California.

Fortitude Smashed by Taylor Brooke - 3 stars. This is one of those “clock runs out when you meet your soulmate” stories and it was really boring. There were also a lot of PoV switches, like multiple in one chapter and I found it distracting and annoying.

No Man of Woman Born by Ana Mardoll - 5 stars. It’s a short story compilation about trans characters subverting gendered prophecies. Really smart, interesting world building and it also juggled giving characters personalities with very little time to do it incredibly well. I liked the third story about Nociem (awesome world building) and the sweet wish dragon story at the ending.

Selected Poems of Oscar Wilde by Oscar Wilde - 4 stars. I wasn’t like, exactly sure how to rate this because the prose is beautiful, Ballad of Reading Gaol is just amazing, and several other poems really spoke to me and then BAM anti-semitic reference to the merchant of Venice. It was a lot, but also, I liked it enough I might finally read his other stuff.

Cinnamon Blade by Shira Glassman - 3 stars. It’s sort of urban fantasy esque erotic short and tbh, I think if it had been a full length novel I might have liked it more. Just too much going on in the background, and Soledad didn’t really have a personality beyond “quirky.”

Girls Made of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan - 5 stars. This is a heavy book. It’s centered around a girl named Lei from the paper caste, the lowest caste, who is forced to be a concubine for the demon king. While there, she comes to grips with the oppression her people face and falls in love with another concubine, Wren. The love story is sweet and well developed but this is a difficult book. I was unsettled and panicked the whole time I read, just like Lei is forced to be. The rough, vivid, and fascinating world building makes this an awesome, but disturbing read. I’m so excited to be deeply unsettled when I read the sequel.

Marriage of Unconvenience by Chelsea M. Cameron - 3.5 stars. Sweet, cute, and funny but it reads more like fanfic than a novel in a bad way. Like, it really needed a round of edits and also the backgrounds characters change personalities a few times. But still a fun and cute story about a lesbian who marries her best friend for the money, only for the two women to fall in love.

Our Bloody Pearl by DN Bryn - 3 stars. The concept is great but the dialogue was weird and preachy and the narrative voice was sooooo boring. It’s cute but forgettable and a lot to get through.

The Cursebreaker Countess by Sasha L. Miller - 4 stars. Kas breaks a curse on a sleeping woman named Anika mostly because the curse freaks her out, only to get dragged into a political feud involving magic that she barely understands. This was slow moving, more adventure fantasy than high fantasy, but I liked the slow pace. It was like unraveling a knot. Also Kas and Anika are awesome characters separately and as a couple they’re adorable.

Heart and Hand by Rebel Carter - 4.5 stars. Julie answers an ad for a mail order bride, packing up from her high society life to move to the Montana terrifies - except she will be marrying not one man, but a pair of best friends. I thought this was MMF bc it was on a bunch of “Bi love interests” and MMF lists but it is in fact MFM, which was slightly annoying bc the relationship between Will and Forest was incredibly romantic and it felt like a waste of a great dynamic. So I knocked off half a star. Otherwise this was a really solid read. Incredibly well written with a town that is well developed as it’s own entity, and three characters that all have lovely arcs. It’s steamy, romantic, and sugar sweet and I loved it (also WoC in a historical AND a triad romance? Bro sign me UP).

Peter Darling by Austin Chant - 5 stars. Once again I should never doubt Addi ever because holy crap this was so good. Peter Pan goes back to Neverland only to find that since he’s grown up, Neverland doesn’t appeal like it used to, but neither can he go home, to where he would never be accepted as Peter, but forced to live as his assigned gender at birth. This is like. Immaculate. Beautifully written, fast paced, romantic, heartbreaking, but with an ending that feels so full of hope. Not wrapped up with a neat bow, but instead looking to the future.

New Books Read: 19

Rereads: 1

Total of Books Read: 14/94; 19/184

Goodreads Goal: 30/49

[mappingthemoon]

July 21, 2021. We visited the Moon Tree in Athens GA. Ten years ago (in a past life), c. used to tell me that there was a Moon Tree in Athens, but I’m not sure I exactly believed him back then. We walked along this street often and as we passed by he’d occasionally point and exclaim, “that tree went to the moon!” -- but see, I’m not sure exactly what tree it was. I’m not sure he always pointed to the same tree. I didn’t know anything about the Moon Tree program, had never learned about it in school or anywhere else. I didn’t know what c. was talking about, didn’t think it was “real.” I thought at first that this mythical Moon Tree was just another aspect of his curiously whimsical creativity, his particular brand of magical realism: pointing to an object in the world and redefining it according to some strange personal mysticism I wasn’t much privy to but was fascinated by in those early days. In the later days when I grew bitter and disillusioned by his inability to stay tethered to sober reality, I suspected perhaps the Moon Tree was nothing more than another drunken non sequitur, a made-up story. The Tree That Doesn’t Exist. Another lie to add to the pile, right? Turns out, the Moon Tree just didn’t have a plaque. So how could c. have known exactly which tree it was? I only found out myself because the city installed a plaque earlier this year, which I’d only heard about because they put a blurb about it in the water company newsletter that’s included with my bill every month. While this entry was still languishing in my drafts, the Atlas Obscura newsletter coincidentally served up their article on the Moon Trees and I’ve since learned that in fact, many of them had been lost or forgotten over the years, often simply due to lacking or misplaced documentation &/or bureaucratic inertia. This recent article from the Banner-Herald makes it seem like the Athens Moon Tree was forgotten fairly soon after its planting; and c. didn’t arrive in Athens until the late ‘90s/early ‘00s so I wonder how he’d even heard about it. An elementary school lesson remembered from his childhood in a smaller Georgia town? Some fellow weirdo Athenian sharing a secret local legend to a new arrival?

I mean, ultimately this story isn’t particularly profound or traumatic or whatever and I’m probably getting florid & overanalytical here. But I do feel a little bad for doubting him. Back then, I had every reason to be divisive: I was deep in the shit and I had to split everything into either/or to protect myself, in a way. So that I could latch on to what was really real and find myself out of a harmful sanity-destroying relationship. It had to be drunk or sober, abuser or victim, truth or lie, all or nothing, good or evil. No nuance, no in-between. No containing multitudes. This attitude extended beyond the survival/necessity of parsing the relationship and in some ways became its own neurosis (cf. #getting over punk which was perhaps an important emotional detoxification but also a stubborn and aggressive denial of [an aspect of] self!). It has taken me nearly a decade to be able to soften the edges and consider the gray areas again -- like, in a general way. I am not trying to embrace amorality or make any sort of Statement about unreliable narrators here. I just have a lot of years of hindsight now and am feeling more comfortable about sitting with ambiguity again. It’s kind of a new feeling.

I’ve been doing a lot of digital housecleaning lately, archiving (i.e. hiding/making private) old entries here. I’ve had this blog for almost 12 years. In many ways I hate the ease with which one can call up past lives on the internet. It doesn’t matter if the timestamps on aged entries are readily apparent, doesn’t matter if I’m probably the only person who’s creeping on my old entries -- just the nature of the medium makes it feel like everything online is always happening in the present. You don’t have any of the physical signifiers of the passage of time: adding /chrono to the end of a tumblr tag is nothing like experience of pulling an old journal out of storage and reading the private scrawls of my former selves. If I put something on the internet I feel like I have to be prepared to answer today for every single thing I have ever shot into this weird void that is not exactly public but certainly not at all private. Like as long as something I have posted remains available online, it must still be representative of Who I Am Right Now and cannot possibly be read as An Aspect of Who I Once Was, a stop along the way, a part of the process. And it’s not like I have anything terribly embarrassing or shameful to hide -- it is simply the strange mental exhaustion of knowing I am virtually dragging all of this emotional baggage around. I don’t want it to be that easy to collapse the temporal distance anymore. I want to give myself the freedom to forget.

[galadrieljones]

There’s a TWD article out by someone who’s previewed some of 10C that says Daryl and Leah were out in the woods for five years. (So most of the timeskip after the bridge blew.)

It’s not a biblical seven years, but it’s close. Though it’s probably been seven years since they first met, what with Leah’s actress apparently back for season 11 🤔

Oh wow. What. 👀 For anyone who’s confused, this is a reference to my Daryl/Jacob Biblical symbolism post, and I have...more to say now! SHOCK.

Wait, it’s speculated that they were together for FIVE YEARS?! I’m super curious about this. See, I don’t look at Leah as a usurper, so much as just like a major symbolic opportunity. I know a lot of people are quick to dismiss everything this show does that bothers them as “bad writing,” but I find too much of that to be a cope. I can see how having to deal with seasons 7-8 over a period of years could wear a person down, but the writing for TWD is actually...often...good! It’s weird. It takes chances. Yes, it disappoints us at times, but that’s the rub. When it’s on, it’s fucking on. Seasons 7-8 were NOT on. In general, I noticed a really obvious, periodic decline in quality post-Coda and 5b tbh, and I’m not just saying that because of Beth. (Tho I am starting to believe more and more that Beth was not initially supposed to die, that her death was pressured based on some sort of perceived, utterly cracked backlash per the age difference. The writers then had to grapple for a while, and it was the beginning of the end for Gimple, who never got his shit back on track ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ )

Anyway, I know I’m far from the first person to point out that Angela Kang wrote both “Still” and “Coda.” She wrote the first and final moments of Daryl and Beth, as we know it. Her vision for The Walking Dead also feels much more genre-forward to me, ie: post-Gimple, TWD has become much more of a genre piece, and I kind of think that’s important here when talking about Biblical allegory as a genre in and of itself. The Walking Dead begins and sustains for a long time as a sort of 00s era fabulism, a la shows like Breaking Bad and The Sopranos, which take place in a familiar world and focus on realistic relationships and situations, but the settings and scenes contain a light fabulism, or just this spare, Lynchian layer of magic, ghosts, mysticism, dream states. But in seasons 9/10, with Kang at the wheel, elements of Fantasy, Science Fiction, and even the American Western have really been ratcheted up. There are kings and queens and princes, tigers and horses and knights in shining armor and cowboys. There’s even a movie theatre. Plus the Whisperers, who are initially presented as supernatural, lead by Sycorax and Caliban creatures, and now the hard scif-fi nature of what’s going on with Jade, the helicopters, and finally the insane cliffhanger with Eugene, Yumiko, Ezekiel, and Princess. 

I’m just saying: I think we can only expect more of this. Like, rather than the very Frank-Darabont-esque “gestures” to genre in favor of realism, we can expect big, sweeping oceans of genre, in which “realism” becomes whatever the creators want it to be. When you start steering a show or a story this way, you’re opening up all sorts of possibilities, a la, anyone who’s watched Supernatural or the X-Files knows that where science fiction and fantasy are concerned, NOBODY IS EVER REALLY DEAD, NOT REALLY. We know that the show is priming us for the return of Rick. We know that Connie is not dead. No matter what, the notion of resurrection in this show is not only possible at this point, it’s inevitable. We know, too, that @twdmusicboxmystery​ and other TD sleuths have established in aces that even after five seasons, the writers have still never definitively closed the door to opportunity for Beth’s return, not in-show, not offset. In some ways, they even seem to invite it! I mean?

So now, with genre on display, and resurrection on the table, when I think about them bringing in LEAH, magically, like, I KNOW it’s on purpose. The writers could have named her anything. But they named her...Leah. Leah?? They also mysteriously removed one of the wings from Daryl’s vest during the 6yr time jump, something that has still never been overtly explained (which is on purpose, it’s a symbol, but of what?). In reading Daryl as a Jacob character, I see his lost wing as a symbol that he has fallen from his ascent to heaven, re: Jacob’s Ladder:

He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. - Genesis 28:12

Jacob’s Ladder is a unique symbol in Judaism and Christianity because it not only communicates the traditional spiritual story of ascent (mainly: to heaven, or a to a heaven place, Elysium, spirit realm, etc), but also DESCENT. Angels are going up, but they’re also falling down. We cannot ascend in life without periods of descent, or backsliding, etc. Nobody is perfect. Season 10 (and honestly, seasons 5-10 but that’s another post) shows a period of obvious “descent” for Daryl. He is a fallen angel, but at the end of season 10, Judith (with her Beth braid and her Sheriff’s hat and her many resounding Beth themes), gives Daryl a new wing. Season 10 then ends on an upswing for Daryl. He defeats Beta, atones with Negan, and saves his people. He is heading up again. 

It’s worth remembering, too, that Daryl’s relationship with Leah is not new, or present. It is past-tense. It took place during a major descent for him. It is not Leah who lifts Daryl up out of this descent. In a purposeful choice by the writers, it is Judith--a clear symbol of his past, of Rick, and of Beth--who returns his wing to him. Judith is also an important symbol of the future. She survived against all odds, the firstborn of the apocalypse, a shepherd of her father’s people. 

SO, YEAH. It IS interesting. I am SUPER interested. In the wake of seasons 9/10, crazy genre-heavy seasons that introduce resurrection as a distinct, inevitable theme, Daryl’s weird, overt angel imagery, Jacob-parallels, and now: LEAH. Why would Kang toss in some random LI for Daryl, knowing full well what the reaction will be, only to then NAME HER LEAH? Jacob worked for seven years to marry Rachel, but he was deceived into marrying Leah instead. The notable caveat to this story is that, ofc, Jacob also gets to marry Rachel! but not until after his wedding period with Leah, and he has to work SEVEN MORE YEARS, too. Jacob gets kicked down a lot! His name literally means “heeled.” But in the end, he is the wrestler of angels, contender with God, father of Joseph, etc. etc. He ascends.

So I honestly have no idea what any of this means! But it makes me type a lot. And I DO know it means something, because it is true that, in The Walking Dead, everything means something, especially now, with Angela Kang, Bethyl writer and genre/symbol lover in charge, and with every bit of genre and every symbol ratcheted up to like, 11, and LEAH. No matter what, we can’t take it for granted!!

[ceruleanwhore]

Let’s talk about LoK’s shit worldbuilding

Technology is what I’ve seen the most people the most opinionated about, so that’s where I’ll start. Plenty of people out there share my opinion that having LoK be set in basically the American 20s is just some really shitty worldbuilding but I’ve also encountered plenty more who are of the opinion that since it’s technically possible, that means it’s good. For those who aren’t aware: just because something is technically possible does NOT make it good. AtLA is set in a more traditional fantasy world with a hard magic system where the setting, character design, and everything else are meant to feel older (even though this time it isn’t modeled after Europe). There is some technology in AtLA and what is shown works with the nature of their world and their society so it isn’t like, say, a lamppost from England being dropped right into this little fantasy world and disrupting things. The trains in Ba Sing Se are a perfect example of this with how they are operated by benders and also fit, visually, with the surrounding buildings and whatnot.

The issue with LoK is that it seems that there was no real thought around the development and incorporation of new technology in the context of the world. Instead, it’s as though they copied and pasted the American 20s in there and it’s really jarring. This would be the part where I said that just because it’s possible doesn’t mean it’s good writing- just because our industrial revolution was at breakneck speed doesn’t mean that having your fantasy world develop the same way is a good idea. For a little context, let’s compare this to the Lord of the Rings. Imagine that Christopher Tolkien one day decided to write a whole new four part series set a century after the end of Return of the King. So now, seemingly out of nowhere, boom, technology. Minas Tirith is basically 1920s Chicago, they have cars and stuff. And the thing is that there was a little bit of technology in LotR, just like with AtLA, so that is a fair comparison. 

Also, like I said earlier, it feels lazy with how they’re just throwing in some of these different types of technology. For example, a glove that electrocutes people with no explanation whatsoever on how it works doesn’t make sense. Not to mention, the fact that anything relies on lightning bending, which is SUPPOSED to be super fucking rare (more on that later) is beyond stupid. 

I think this reflects an ongoing issue with Korra where they clearly think that they should be trying to make things more “realistic” but either don’t realize or don’t care that in the process they’re wrecking that ‘fantasy’ feel their world used to have, which brings us to our next topic: people.

Just like how they decided to go the ‘realism’ route with a breakneck industrial revolution, they also decided to go that same route with homosexuality and, more importantly, homophobia. Friendly reminder that if you’re writing fantasy and you spice it some with some good, wholesome gay content, you DO NOT have to ruin it with fucking homophobia. It’s supposed to be fantasy, you dense fuck. It has its own problems but the Dragon Prince is an absolutely perfect example of how to write gayness in fantasy, i.e., perfectly common with zero homophobia to be seen. Writing it like Bryke did just to double down on “it’s been like 90 years since the war ended but did you know the Fire Nation is fucking TERRIBLE and Sozin is basically HITLER?” is weak, stupid, and fucking annoying.

The other thing I want to touch on is race. Basically, put whoever you want in your story and have them look however you want them to look but keep in mind that the way you do or do not introduce groups of people can affect the quality of your writing. What I mean is that with a fantasy universe like this, it’s all wysiwyg. When the gaang traveled around *the world* meeting and interacting with all kinds of people from all kinds of places in all 3 remaining nations (and showing memories of the air nomads that are now gone), that’s your chance to showcase all that wonderful diversity. By the end of the series, when their tour of the whole world is over, you should have a complete picture. 

Again, think about LotR for a second. By the end of Return of the King, you’ve encountered all the different types of men that ever existed in any of Tolkien’s writings (kinda sorta including the dunedain, and there’s even a reference or two in there with Aragorn tying that in all nicely), multiple kinds of elves, dwarves, goblins, hobbits, ents, huorns, the eagles, Tom Bombadil and Goldberry, the Nazgul, and multiple maiar (some good, some corrupt). The only race that hasn’t appeared in any of this that does exist in Tolkien’s other works is the valar but, otherwise, you, as the reader, along with characters like Frodo have been introduced to each and every race in middle earth, and, frankly, the Valar can be excused because they all are in the Undying Lands (plus Manwe might have been mentioned with the eagles.) Now, compare that to LoK where, with a Rowling level of retconning, they decided to just add some more races out of nowhere with no explanation 90 years or whatever after the original series. 

I just know that, for myself, I would’ve loved to see all this included from the beginning and incorporated into the original series and the travels of the gaang. Instead, we have it so AtLA is pretty set one way and then in LoK there’s just that one random dude with an afro and then, going into the comics afterwards, they decided to start incorporating different races in a way that feels like a JK Rowling tweet (“Hermione was black all along, even though I described her in the books as having light skin and picked a white actress to play her, I swear!”) So, basically, when you’re writing fantasy, you kind of have to include everything like that because that’s how the genre works and it’s not like in normal fiction where you can just have a black character without any explanation. Once again, the difference between how fantasy writing works and things being “realistic”.

As for realism, yanking the white lotus out into the open by their ear like an errant child is so unspeakably dumb and unrealistic. They’re a SECRET society who transcend the four nations and operate in SECRET jfc. After the war ended and the old folks home was no longer fighting the Fire Nation, the rest of them should’ve been able to go back into hiding no problem. But to drag their asses into this mess just to make them like Korra’s personal bodyguards and guards at high security prisons is so fucking stupid it hurts.

So then, to finish this up, let’s talk about bending. First off, there’s the issue of how bending forms have just… ceased to exist and/or been replaced with vague yet aggressive punching. Remember when Katara had to learn all those water bending stances and there was even a scroll of them? Or when Aang had to learn fire bending forms from Zuko? Well fuck that, now everyone can just punch at stuff instead. Never been able to airbend even with what should be proper form? Try waving your fist around!

The other thing is how so many of these characters are just “so naturally gifted” and can either successfully bend well with little to no experience or casually do stuff that’s supposed to be hella difficult. An example of the first point is Zaheer who just got his airbending like 3 days prior but suddenly can fucking fly and an example of the latter would be the blood bending, just all of it. That’s kind of another thing, though, how they’ve taken these things that were special and notoriously difficult and then watered them down and made it so literally everyone can do it. You know how lightning bending was a really cool thing only Ozai and Azula, the Fire Lord and princess who are both also known to be especially skilled benders, could do? Not anymore, now pretty much any fire bender with a pulse can shoot lightning out of their fingers. Same goes for blood and metal bending.

Also, can I just say that I’m mad at how pro bending was done? The earth bending stuff with the Boulder and all that worked because that framework of wrestling is really well suited to the element. Now, it’s what I’ve been saying where it’s like ‘oh yeah we can just put all the elements together in this boxing type shit because everyone in this fucking series can bend by punching, right?’ They had an awesome opportunity here to figure out different styles of fighting sports tailored to the different types of bending and they said ‘nope, fuck you’ and gave us that shit. Or just sports, in general, based around if the people playing and benders and, if so, what type of bending they have.

The last main thing with bending though is the absolute horseshit of harmonic convergence and kinda just season 2 in general. For starters, Korra getting her bending back because dead Aang was like “here ya go” was bullshit. I feel like it would’ve been better if that had been when Unalaq got introduced as her spiritual guide and, through working with him, she eventually was able to reach Wan, see his whole backstory like we got in episode 7, and then, afterwards, she could contact Raava directly and somehow with her get her bending back. Then, afterwards, she could go back to Republic City and give everyone their bending back and start helping with reconstruction from Amon. Season 2 doesn’t need a villain and it most certainly does NOT need that dumbass ‘dark avatar’ bullshit. 

Also, in terms of the air bending, seriously, fuck that shit. If air bending is going to come back then maybe, I don’t know, after following my other advice have Korra realize that not only can she take bending away (like Aang) but she can also give it so she could just go around to all the acolytes and make them airbenders. Or, if that would fuck up the balance or some shit, have her go around and make all the people who lost their bending to Amon into a fresh batch of air benders. You can’t really introduce something like energy bending and then expect us to believe that the only way to bring air bending back is for Aang to fuck a lot and then rely on following generations and subsequent incest, plus hc is fucking stupid when you have a character who can straight up just give people bending.

Oh and all that convergence shit brings up my last point of discussion, the way they retconned and fucked up the lore. Just like with what they did with lightning, blood, lava, and metal bending, they also decided to just do everything they could with those fucking turtles. Just like with Azula’s lightning bending, the entire fucking reason the lion turtle works so well is because of how it is so rare and special and all that so once you take that away, it doesn’t matter anymore smh. For most peope, champagne is special. You know why? Because most of us aren’t out here drinking the shit by the gallon every day. So yeah, between that and the way they threw away already established lore (that was further reinforced by experiences of characters in the show) makes it just a big old “yike”. All they had to do was fanagle a bit to keep Raava and Vaatu but ditch the whole hc shitshow and just maintain the parts that are already established.

[khaotungsfirst]

That's so true. In books you have to get used to the characters at the same time, whereas in fic you already know them so it's just seeing how they act in different settings. Even if done right in books miscommunication can work well, but most of the time it's ... 😰 Speaking of books though, do you have any favourite stories that you'd recommend? I'd be really interested to hear what ones caught your attention, and what it is about them that you loved! 😊 - CC 🦊

YES LET ME TALK ABOUT BOOKS!!! okay so i haven’t read any books since i got obsessed with mdzs (🥴) but i’m usually quite an avid reader so get ready

My absolute favourite book series EVER is The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel by Michael Scott. I think I’ve read it 6 or 7 times by now. This series to me is what Harry Potter is to other ppl. I grew up with it and waited each year for the new book to be released so I have major nostalgia for it and don’t actually know if it’s good but you should try it anyway 😅It’s Young Adult without any forced romance can u imagine?? bless! 

Then I have to mention the no. 1 tumblr book series: The Raven Cycle by Maggie Stiefvater. Gosh, it’s so!! good!!! I literally love every single character and their group dynamic is just 🙌 and the story is just weird enough to get you hooked and then once you reread it (because you will!) you notice all the little details and foreshadowing and how much thought was put into it and aaaahhh!!

A book I never expected to give 5 stars was The Martian by Andy Weir. I didn’t understand half of it because it’s literal rocket science but no other book has made me laugh out loud as much as this one. If you’ve seen the movie and you liked it, read the book!

It’s been so long since I’ve read The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern so I don’t remember a lot from it except that it was absolutely MAGICAL!! It pulls you in and doesn’t let you go. If you’re into magical realism and enemies to lovers and circus aesthetics, read this!

The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton is a murder mystery for which you’ll need an excel spreadsheet, a character mindmap, and a detailed timeline of events because DAMN!! It gets complicated but oh it’s so mindblowingly good! You need to go into it blind so you can get the full experience of this masterpiece.

I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson is a rollercoaster of emotions that not many contemporary novels manage to be for me. Nelson’s writing is just so... heartbreaking? profound? full of yearning? I can’t even describe it. I just know I love it. It just hits you right in the feels whether that be happy ones or sad ones.

The Inkworld Trilogy by Cornelia Funke is a german staple. It feels like a love declaration towards books and book characters and has fantastic world building! I really need to reread it because I don’t remember shit lmao. But I’m waiting for the 4th book (after 14 years!!!!) so I can fully indulge in it.

Now how about you, CC? What are your favourite books?