#my main interests are 1) nature and 2) prehistory

[radioactive-worm-on-string]

WHY AM I ONLY INTERESTED IN ACADEMIC FIELDS THAT HAVE NO JOBS

[lokilickedme]

Master Fic List ~ updated 7/13/20

Sorry for taking so long to do this...it was brought to my attention that it’s been almost a year since I updated this list and several people have requested it - so here you go, my fully updated and almost completed Master Fic List with links, synopsis, character rosters, pairings, ratings, word/chapter counts, warning tags with squick notices, and update dates.

All fics on this list are posted at AO3 unless noted

*The Loki Reads series is exclusively on tumblr.com

Everything is under the cut because this list is LONG (75 individual works, 13 series, plus published works included at the end of the list)

Fics are categorized by main character (i.e. Loki, Tom Hiddleston as Original Characters, etc)

Series and associated AU’s and side stories are grouped together (Chemical + Prehistories + Troika Apocalyptica + Penumbraluna + Wolfsbane…you get the idea)

Fics are identified as WIP (work in progress) or complete, with associated word counts and chapter amounts.  Latest update dates are noted for WIPs.

WARNINGS are notated, though the warning tags at AO3 should be paid attention to because they are far more complete and detailed.

Fic genres (romance, comedy, thriller) are briefly notated but these are general.

There is a link at the end of the list to my published books at Amazon, if you’re interested in those.

This list will be updated as fics update and incomplete information will be added as I have time.

Click READ MORE to see the complete list:

Exclusively on tumblr:

Part 1 - Loki Reads The Night Manager Part 2 - Loki Reads High Rise Part 3 - Loki Reads Fifty Shades of Grey

~WORKS AT AO3~

Word/chapter counts are current as of 7/13/2020

Loki

Jack Montague - WIP - 183,860 words, 65 chapters, ongoing - WARNINGS: hardcore sex, language, violence, sexual deviance, mentions of abuse, mentions of depression, explicit everything, blood/vampyric activities, numerous smutty kinks, and whatever else you can think of.  Not kidding, everything in this one is really hardcore.  Supernatural romance/adventure in the post-MCU/Post-2012 Avengers.  Main character - Loki.  Secondary character/love interest -  Jack Montague.  Relationship - Loki/Jack. Side characters - Adam (OLLA), Thor, Nick Fury, Eve (OLLA), Selina (Sanguine).  The Trickster God has been exiled to Earth for a very long time…as the oldest living monster in the realm, he’s bored off his skull and endlessly intrigued when he runs across a monster of an entirely different kind - and strikes up a playful romantic partnership with a vampire who may be far more than he bargained for.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*  Updated 6/14/20

Sugar Skull - complete - 3115 words.  Side story to Jack Montague, part 3 of The Joker And The Thief.  Main character - Loki.  Side characters - Jack, Thor. WARNINGS: Language, sex.  What Loki does every year on Halloween.  *MATURE*   **also published in the Trickster Tales compendium

The Gucci Incident - complete - 4278 words.  Side story to Jack Montague, part 2 of The Joker And The Thief.  Main character - Loki.  Side characters - Adam.  WARNINGS:  Mostly language.  Loki and his vampire father-in-law Adam chase a pair of bedroom slippers across New York City.  *MATURE*

The Trickster’s Wife - complete - 71,001 words, 31 chapters.  Post Avengers, MCU.  Romance/epic adventure.  WARNINGS:  Very explicit sex, some language, some violence, very adult themes, mentions of abuse.  Main character - Loki.  Secondary character/love interest:  Princess Anja.  Relationship -  Loki/Anja.  Side characters - Thor, Odin, Frigga, Bragneire.  Asgard needs Loki, but Loki has a price - a wife he has no right to ask for.  So of course he does just that.  *MATURE, EXPLICIT*

The King of All The Rest - WIP - 1444 words, 1 chapter, ongoing (Part 2 of Myths of Asgard) - Sequel to The Trickster’s Wife.  Romance/comedy. Main characters - Loki, Bragneire, Anja.  Relationship -  Loki/Anja.  Loki has retired, left Asgard, left the throne, left everything save for one beautiful thing that he’ll never lose again…the wife he fought so hard to keep.  WARNINGS: Sex, language. *MATURE*

The King’s Heart - complete - 47,229 words, 21 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, sexual violence, abuse, language, mental illness, blood, grief, very adult themes.  Main character - Loki.  Secondary character/love interest - Lyra.  Side characters - Thor, Frigga, Aleks Lokisson, several offspring.  Post-Avengers UA.  Loki has been given the throne, but his apparent madness prevents him from opening his heart to his new queen. *VERY EXPLICIT*  **currently being reworked for publication

The Wolf King - complete - 44,315 words, 17 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Sexual activity, language, some violence, smutty talk from Loki, adult themes.  Fluffy adventure/romance.  Loki’s son Aleks has been handed the throne, but he doesn’t want it yet - not while there’s a universe to be conquered in “other” more satisfying ways.  But a mysterious pair of offworlders have a vested interest in the boy king fulfilling his prophecy the way his famous father did.  Main characters - Aleks, Loki.  Secondary characters/love interests - Cara, Lyra.  Side characters - Thor, The Syl, Sleipnir, Loki’s daughters, some surprise guests at the end. *MATURE*

Lost Creatures - complete - 4929 words.  Main characters - Loki, Thor.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, explicit language, violence, male/male.  Loki and Thor have always loved as much as they’ve hated…but which of the two emotions is the stronger?  *EXPLICIT*  **published in the Trickster Tales compendium, original version remains on AO3

Civil Disobedience - complete - 1066 words.  WARNINGS:  Spanking, nonconsensual. Main character - Loki.  Short vignette involving a Dominant Loki and his disobedient plaything.  *EXPLICIT*   **Rewritten for publication in the Trickster Tales compendium, original version remains on AO3

Mine - complete - 2051 words.  WARNINGS: Explicit sex, language, voyeurism, angst.  Main character - Loki. Side characters - Thor, the bride.  She was one thing over all others…she was mine. *EXPLICIT*   **published in the Trickster Tales compendium, original version remains on AO3

THE TEMPEST SERIES

Main character for all parts - Loki.  WARNINGS FOR ALL PARTS:  Hardcore sex, strong language, some violence, implied bestiality, very heavy smut.  All parts complete.  Dark romance/thriller.

Part 1 - Darkness Lives In Me - Loki’s fall from grace (1421 words) Part 2 - Before Chaos - Loki plots to take over Midgard (3120 words) Part 3 - After The Maelstrom -  Loki kills some time before the conquest (3088) Part 4 - Eye of The Storm -  Loki finds a way to…well… (2369 words) Part 5 - Her Side of The Storm -  Loki’s chosen conquest tells her side (2476) Part 6 - A Perfect Whirlwind -  Loki serves his time, misses his chosen (2928) Part 7 - Cyclone In A Teacup -  A conjugal visitation to Midgard (2654 words) Part 8 - An Intemperate Rain -  Loki comes bearing gifts (2132 words) Part 9 - Darkening Skies -  A trinket with…dubious powers (4304 words) Part 10 - The Nature Of Thunder -  Loki, kidnap, what could go wrong? (3325) Part 11 - Lightning Strikes -  Fury’s revenge, Loki’s redemption (3905 words)

*All parts of the above series:  EXTREMELY EXPLICIT including violent consensual sex*

No Regrets -  complete - 1634 words. WARNINGS:  Crazy explicit sex, language, absolutely no plot.  Smutty comedy.  Loki, dad’s throne, and a willing partner…just another Wednesday on Asgard. Main character - Loki.  Side characters - woman, Thor, Odin. *EXPLICIT* **published in the Trickster Tales compendium, original version remains on AO3

Whisper -  complete - 6440 words, 6 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, explicit language, threatened explicit violence.  Main character - Loki.  Side character - woman.  Romance.  Asgard has fallen while Loki is imprisoned far beneath the city, leaving him the sole survivor - and as the world slowly decays above him, he opens a path to escape through the dreams of a Midgardian female.  *EXPLICIT*

The Dragon Queen - complete - 37,503 words, 28 chapters. Main character - Loki.  Relationship - Loki/Eira.  Romance. WARNINGS: Very hardcore sex, violence, rape, abuse, language, torture.  Odin has given up trying to break Loki - until the day he sends his other prized prisoner into the Trickster’s cell.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*  *WARNING - CONTAINS NONCONSENSUAL SEX SCENES*

The Good Stuff -  complete - 3513 words.  WARNINGS: Crude explicit language, some smutty sex and references and drunkenness.  Comedy.  Main characters - Loki and Thor.  Side characters - Frigga, Odin, castle servants.  Two bored brothers, one long night, and mom’s secret hooch stash - what could go wrong?  *MATURE*  **published in the Trickster Tales compendium, original version remains on AO3

Smooth Criminal - Part 1 of the Criminal Activity Series - complete - 4252 words.  WARNINGS: Explicit sex and dominance.  Avengers (2012) adjacent.  Where did Loki get that suit anyway?  *EXPLICIT*  **published in the Trickster Tales compendium, original version remains on AO3

Blue Collar Criminal - Part 2 of the Criminal Activity Series - incomplete - 1171 words.  Post-Avengers.  WARNINGS: None really, it hasn’t gotten far enough yet.  Sitting on the throne is dull as fuck.  Might as well hit Asgard again, only this time Loki only intends to conquer one human - the girl from the suit shop.  *WILL BE EXPLICIT IF I EVER FINISH IT*

Tom Hiddleston as Original Characters

The Department - WIP - 148,227 words, 37 chapters, ongoing. *UPDATED 7/10/20* Main characters - Greta (OFC), Chief (Tom Hiddleston).  Side characters - Andy (Andrew Hozier-Byrne), Cree (Jason Momoa), Cade (Chris Evans), Kevin (Dave Bautista), Hawk (David Tennant), Sarah (Sarah Lancashire), Ted (Sebastian Stan), Wilson (Owen Wilson).  Pairings:  Greta/Chief, Greta/Andy (FWB).  Comedy/romance.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, explicit crude language, sexist banter, minor violence.  Greta arrives in a small town in Minnesota to wait out her disciplinary review after an on the job accident and struggles to survive a crackpot stationhouse full of cops who may or may not be quite what they seem…while trying really hard not to fall in love with the Chief.  *EXPLICIT*  - updates weekly (Sundays) **now off hiatus!

Hammer Of The Gods - WIP - 29,935 words - 28/30 chapters, ongoing.  *UPDATED 4/18/20*  Main characters - Jake (Tom Hiddleston), Tate (OFC), Pete (Chris Hemsworth).  Pairing: Jake/Tate.  WARNINGS: hardcore language, explicit sex, mild/brief violence, referenced mental/emotional/verbal abuse.  AU Loki and Thor as human construction workers renovating a house next door to a recently divorced mom who really needs to learn how to live again.  *EXPLICIT*

Sunflower - WIP - 33,577 words - 13/15 chapters, ongoing.  Main characters - Tommy (Tom Hiddleston), Chloe (OFC/Dove Cameron).  Side characters - Amy (Sarah Wayne Callies), Martin (Idris Elba), Blake (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) , Tony (Robert Downey Jr).  Pairing: Tommy/Chloe.  Sweet romance.  Don’t park in the disabled spot unless you’re ready to fall in love with the girl you stole it from.  WARNINGS:  Sex, mild language, injury description.  *MATURE*

THE MCCLARY CHRONICLES

Part 1 - Sgaile Leannan -  complete - 58,066 words, 20 chapters.  Main characters - King McClary (Tom Hiddleston), Molly Thompkin (OFC).  Romance.  Molly arrives in Scotland on a work assignment and meets her nemesis - the surly kilted sheep farmer who owns the land she’s trespassing on. WARNINGS:  Very explicit sex, explicit language, mild violence.  This story was rewritten for publication with changes - original version remains on AO3.  *EXPLICIT*

Part 2 - Samhach Mhiannan -  complete - 78,763 words, 25 chapters.  Molly returns home to Philadelphia with a little secret - and her world flips upside down when King shows up at her door months later.  SAME WARNINGS AS PART 1. This story was rewritten for publication with minor changes - original version remains on AO3.  *EXPLICIT*

Part 3 - Na Binne an Leann -  complete - 77,600 words, 25 chapters.  Molly moves to Scotland to be with King, but her future with the cranky sheepherder is, as always, shaky and uncertain.  SAME WARNINGS AS PARTS 1 AND 2. This story was rewritten for publication with minor changes - original version remains on AO3. *EXPLICIT*

A Meeting With The King - complete - 2507 words.  Side story to The McClary Chronicles. What really happened that day at Clendon Williams when King met Ian, told from King’s POV. WARNINGS: Some language, mild violence.  *MATURE*

Aingeal Ard - WIP - 16,297 words - 16/20 chapters, ongoing.  *UPDATED 10/14/19*   WARNINGS: rough language, explicit sex.  Main characters - King McClary (Tom Hiddleston), Molly Thompkin (OFC). A retelling of Sgaile Leannan from King’s POV, chapter by chapter.  *EXPLICIT*

Chemical and its Related Side Stories

Chemical - incomplete version, ended - 263,007 words, 58 chapters.  This story was rewritten and completed for publication in two volumes with major changes - the original version minus the final chapters and epilogue remain at AO3.   AU Loki/Tom Hiddleston as a bartender in San Diego who falls for the last girl he should ever look at - who just happens to be his soulmate.  Main characters - Tom Heyworth (Tom Hiddleston), Anja Black (OFC).  Side characters - Chris (Chris Hemsworth), Ewan (Ewan McGregor), Pop Heyworth, Cara, Kady, Robert Laing, Eric (Michael Fassbender).  Romance.  WARNINGS: Extremely hardcore sex of all kinds, language, mild violence, references to past sexual abuse and child abuse. *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT, NOT REMOTELY KIDDING*

THE CHEMICAL PREHISTORIES

All parts complete, all parts MATURE AND/OR EXPLICIT for sex, language, references to past abuse, mild drug use.  **This series of shorts have now been published as Volume Three of the Chemical books

SIR -  Characters:  Anja’s mother and her lover; young Anja Das Vorspiel -  Characters:  Alicia and The Boss Quiet Gods -  Narrator:  Eva.  Characters:  Eva, Tom, Chris Medialuna -  the original unused ending to Chemical Two Princes -  Narrator: Anja ADDITIONAL WARNING: character death The Mechanic -  Narrator:  Chris.  Characters:  Chris, Tom, Anja Eidolon - Narrator:  Emma.  Characters:  Emma, Tom, Anja ADDITIONAL WARNING: disturbing imagery, imagined character death, mental illness The Scottish Barman -  Narrator:  Ewan.  Characters:  Ewan, Tom, Anja Taos -  Narrator:  Alicia  ADDITIONAL WARNING: character death Girly -  Narrator:  Anja

Penumbraluna -  complete - 19,179 words, 10 chapters. Main characters - Tom and Chris (as teens).  Side character - Meredith Hemberley.  Coming of age.  WARNINGS:  Strong language, references to sexual abuse and child abuse, mild drug and alcohol use, male/male (brief), semi-explicit sex, character death.  Tom’s friendship with Chris, from the day they met as kids up to the point where Chemical begins.  *VERY MATURE THEMES*  **This novella has been published as part of Chemical Volume Three

See You After The Apocalypse - Part 1 of the Troika Apocalyptica series - complete - 5414 words.  Chemical AU, post-Chemical - Tom, Anja, Chris, Pop, Cara, and Tom & Anja’s two babies have all survived the zombie outbreak, hunkered down in the cabin in Big Bear.  But Tom sends Anja and the two little ones away with Chris when the mountain is overrun with the undead.  Will they find each other alive when it’s all over? WARNINGS: Suspense, mild violence.  *MATURE*

Meet Me In Phoenix - Part 2 of Troika Apocalyptica - incomplete - Characters: Tom, Anja, Pop, Chris, Cara.   Chemical AU in which Tom & company survive a zombie apocalypse, are separated, and embark on a cross country quest to find each other again.  WARNINGS: language and some sexual references.  *MATURE*

Wolfsbane -  complete - 1826 words.  Tom/Anja Chemical AU side story.  Assassins in love.  Tom and Anja are agents assigned to bump each other off, if they can stop seducing each other long enough to pull the trigger. WARNINGS:  Language, sex, mild violence.

Tales From Quarantine - ongoing, limited series of oneshots - 6171 words currently, 2 chapters.  Short stories featuring several of my fic couples in lockdown during the covid-19 crisis: Tom and Anja from Chemical, Jack and Loki from Jack Montague, Molly and King from The McClary Chronicles, Adam/Eve/Selina from Sanguine, Jake and Tate from Hammer of The Gods, Tommy and Chloe from Sunflower, Greta and Chief from The Department.  WARNINGS:  explicit sex and language

Tom Hiddleston as Himself:

Body Double - complete - 143,489 words, 40 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, language, references to past sexual and physical abuse, brief reference to miscarriage, heavy Dom/sub undertones.  Main character - Tom Hiddleston (as himself).  Secondary character/love interest - Anna (OFC).  Side characters - Chris Hemsworth, Ian. Pairing: Tom/Anna.  Romance.  An actor and a body double working on his film embark on a romantic relationship after the movie wraps.  *VERY EXPLICIT*

Other TH Original Characters:

Burn -  complete (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Would You Like To Play A Game? -  complete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Golden Boy - incomplete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Awakening -  complete - RPF -  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Beautiful Disaster -  complete  (will fill in this summary ASAP) **this fic has been partly rewritten and published, the original version remains on AO3

Dandelion Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 - complete (will fill in summary ASAP)

Broken Petals - A Magnus Martinsson fic - incomplete

Yes Please, Magnus - Magnus Martinsson fic - complete

Weekly Meetings of The Most Useless Muses in The History of Fanfiction - incomplete - 23,802 words, 22 chapters.  Pretty much what it sounds like.  Characters - all of them.  WARNINGS: All of them.

Adam - Only Lovers Left Alive

Sanguine -  complete - 28,795 words, 16 chapters. Main character - Adam.  Secondary characters - Selina, Eve.  Romance/mystery.  WARNINGS:  Very explicit sex and violence, language, vampirism, blood, pregnancy, rape.  A redemption tale twisted up in an epic love story between a vampire and a mortal who break a few rules and make a few of their own in the process.  *EXPLICIT*

(Adam is also a prominent character in JACK MONTAGUE and THE GUCCI INCIDENT)

Thomas Oakley - Unrelated

Sleep -  complete - 1471 words.  WARNINGS: Sex and language.  Thomas Oakley is chosen for a college sleep studies program.  Too bad the only thing that puts him to sleep is an orgasm.  *MATURE*

Tom Hiddleston - Jaguar Promo

The Way of The Cat -  complete (summary will be filled in ASAP)

Andrew Hozier-Byrne

THE TALIESIN SERIES

Part 1 - Nobody -  complete - 3293 words.  Romance/fantasy.  WARNINGS: character death, raunchy language, implied sex, implied drug use.  A perpetually reincarnating Celtic deity (Andrew Hozier-Byrne) just won’t stop causing problems for the Pantheon, no matter how many times they reboot him and his lover.  Loosely based on the song.  *MATURE* 

Part 2 - Shrine Of Your Lies - WIP - 1011 words, 2/15 chapters, ongoing.  Romance/fantasy.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, some language, some implied violence.  Taliesin (Andrew Hozier-Byrne) and his lover have been reincarnated again, this time without any memory of who they are - or of each other.  Fate won’t let them wander for long though and their paths cross over two parallel lifetimes. *MATURE*  - this fic may not be updated on AO3 as I plan to change the background setting and include it in the upcoming WICKLOW HOUSE book of short stories

(Andrew Hozier-Byrne is also a prominent character in THE DEPARTMENT)

Can Yaman

Kiz Yan Kapi - The Girl Next Door - WIP - 5533 words, 3/10 chapters  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Chris Hemworth

Thor’s Beard -  complete - 3163 words (Part 2 of Forgotten Gods, side story to Hammer Of The Gods).  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, language.  Pete from HoTG hooks up with Jake’s older sister and a battery operated device.  *EXPLICIT*

See You After The Apocalypse - see above under The Chemical Prehistories

(CH is also a major character in Hammer Of The Gods and Chemical)

Allan Hawco/Frontier inspired

A Wife For Mister Brown -  complete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Et Tu, Mister Brown? -  complete (will fill in this summary ASAP)

~~PUBLISHED BOOKS~~

All of the following are available at amazon.com in both paperback and Kindle formats:

Sgaile Leannan - Rewritten from AO3 version with changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations.  *EXPLICIT*

Samhach Mhiannan - Rewritten from AO3 version with some changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations.  *EXPLICIT*

Na Binne an Leann - Rewritten from AO3 version with minor changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations.  *EXPLICIT*

Chemical Volume One - Rewritten from AO3 with major changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations, references to past child abuse.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*

Chemical Volume Two - Rewritten from AO3 with major changes/additions (includes the final three chapters, ending, and epilogue that are not included in the AO3 version).  Sex, language, adult situations, references to past child abuse.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*

Chemical Volume Three - The Prehistories and Penumbraluna - a compilation of the Chem shorts and the novella (some are partially rewritten)  *EXPLICIT and VERY ADULT THEMES*

Here And There - Book One of The Strada Series - not associated with any AO3 fics.  Sex, language, violence.  Paranormal romance.  A man falls out of the sky - literally - and Holly’s quiet existence goes all kinds of sideways when his otherworldly nemesis follows and the two of them end up in her bed…and inextricably in her life.  The Strada have been here longer than mankind, but their existence has been closed off to the “There” - a dimensional prison realm that separates them from the humans by a split second of time.  When the protective barrier between the dimensions begins weakening, the most dangerous creatures ever created start coming across to wage war against their own kind, using the world of the humans as a battlefield.  Two angelic criminals - Keene and his soulmate Baltho - have been conscripted to regain control...but do either of them want to?  And perhaps more importantly, can they stop fighting with each other long enough to do their one job?   *EXPLICIT SEX, violence*

The Carmichael Addendum - not associated with any AO3 fics.  Sex, language, violence.  Paranormal/supernatural romance.  Clarissa is one of a final few peacekeepers left in a world where the monsters have quietly retreated into myth - but the local library has started spitting immortals and werewolves out through a rift in the Genealogy section, and it’s time for the last two slayers - Clarissa and her ex-husband Kaine - to come out of retirement.  But orchestrating peace with the enemy is a difficult undertaking when you can’t even work out a visitation schedule with the ex and your self-help divorce group is peopled with oddly sexy males of dubious origin.  A heated love triangle with monsters on the side and a middle-aged single mom heroine who’s more than a few years past her prime.  *EXPLICIT SEX, violence, language, adult themes*

Trickster Tales - a compilation of  seven Loki fics that originally appeared on AO3 (most were rewritten to varying degrees for publication).  Includes Mine, The Good Stuff, Civil Disobedience, Smooth Criminal, Lost Souls, No Regrets, and Sugar Skull.  *EXPLICIT SEX and adult themes*

Beautiful Disaster - a short romance in three acts - *adult themes*

*All of the above are available in both paperback and Kindle format

Complete officially published works on my author page at Amazon

[kierongillen]

Writer Notes: the Wicked + the Divine 455

Spoilers, obv.

The specials have been quite the time, having several ways to stress everyone the hell out. The amount of work that goes into a special is far more than any single script can justify in cold commercial terms. It's lucky that I'm only choosing periods that I'm interested in researching to death.

I suspect (or at least hope) that in terms of background reading, 455 is the most. 1831 was hard, but is a relatively tight period I looked at in depth. 455 basically involved researching the whole of the Western Roman Empire. This means the work was a much broader sweep. In the same way I suspected the 1831 story would be about Frankenstein, I knew this would probably be about what happened at one of the sacks of Rome. Not definitely – I've always got room to change tack if something more profitable turns up in the research – but likely.

As I started work, I realised the main advantage of the sack near the end of the Western Roman Empire is that it means you can do a swan song for the whole thing. Everything has already happened, so you can use it all. Thus we've got something which feels a little like a Roman Greatest Hits story.

Simultaneously, there's the awareness that while I think a lot of this is relatively well known, even the most basic facts aren't. Early readers made me aware that even basic ideas like Julius Caesar being dead for 500 years by this period can't be assumed – a level of historical literacy equivalent of not blinking if Joan of Arc turned up in a WW2 story. That's just audiences, and the vague sense of “Rome stuff” fills about 1000 years of people's imagination. As such, that our story is acounter-history required the introduction of what the real history actually was.

As I knew this was coming along way off, the research was a slow boil. I knew Rome, in various periods, relatively well. From the Punic Wars to Augustus is stuff I've read about many times – Carthage is something I've always wanted to do a story about. What I was looking for is a long sweep across the whole thing, to live with it a while, and let me think along the way. The actual device I used was The History Of Rome podcast by Mike Duncan, which goes from legendary prehistory to about 20 years after 455. It's about 60 hours of stuff, by my rough match, which I worked into my listening routine – which is mainly when working out, running, travelling or doing the dishes. I listen to my podcasts at 1.5x.

That was for most of 2016. After that, it was digging down into specific texts, the majority which happened in December/January. Trying to play with various theories about the decline of the Roman Empire was paramount. Everyone has one, and be suspicious of anyone who gives you one reason. The book which generally was most influential in terms of how I chose to present Rome was The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History by Peter Heather, which basically forwards the idea that Rome fell due to trade across their borders creating increased population density of Barbarian tribes which (as opposed to earlier periods) the Romans were unwilling to integrate into the fabric of the Empire.

I went with my own counter-theory, of course, which was that an Old Lady Did It.

(The Old Lady Did It is a Roman Trope of long standing. I'm a proud owner of a Livia Did It T-shirt.)

Anyway – too much research, and I'll try and drop some things I'd wanted to use but didn't as we go through it. Suffice to say, there's nothing comforting about reading about Rome in the current political climate.

Anyway – Andre! I'd first encountered his work in Avengers AI, written by my friend Sam Humphries. That weird, neon-infused Cyberpunk vibe was a big part of the book's appeal for me, so I started following him. I believe we started talking properly around the time of his own Man Plus, which was is a Otomo-does-Akira-In-Portugal kick, and was another thing which made me file Andre in my “Sci-fi artist file.”

However, after we got talking, he showed me some of his other in-development pitches, which included historical and fantasy work. Which made me go “Hmm.” He's got a mass of gifts, but I had one image that I knew I needed for 455 – the Roman Triumph, with a God in the chariot. That demanded a certain sort of artist, namely one who was happy to actually draw a triumph in all its ludicrous glory. Andre, someone whose work had more than its fair share of city-scapes and crowds, seemed like someone who'd nail that – plus the confluence of European and Manga influences in the work would gel interestingly. We'd get Rome as a place, and that's what we needed.

He was working on Generation Gone with Ales Kot, but they talked, and Andre took as month off the preparation for that to do the special. Thanks, guys.

Colours are provided by Matt “Eisner For Matt” Wilson, and seeing how the two of them worked together was definitely one of the more intriguing parts of the process.

Andre's Cover

Done early, before the script was actually completed, which meant we were more conservative with the choice. The Laurel reef being lowered by elderly hands, the arrogance of it. A call back to the head-shots of the first year of WicDiv too. Also, compare and contrast Matt's colouring choices here with his ones in the issue. This is a much more subdued, chalkier mode. Or that's wot I think anyway.

Jamie's Cover| We were originally talking about statues of multiple gods, but as the script was still in process we didn't want to tie down any of the cast bar Lucifer. Equally, we leaned symbolic on the cover – the flames of Rome, the statue, the grafitti's Chi-Ro in paint (or blood)? Symbolic is good. We like Symbolic.

The Chi-Ro is an old Christian symbol. It's what they say Constantine had his soldiers paint on his shields to ensure victory. My fave thing of Constantine from the research was that while he was more responsible than any for the Christianization of the Empire, he didn't convert until just before his death. I enjoy the theory that it's because the idea that baptizing may have been a one-time “clear all your sins” opportunity. The idea of confession and absolution wasn't around as much. So if you convert and then commit a mortal sin, you're off to hell. But if you commit a mortal sin and then convert, you're fine. So Constantine may have just been gaming Christianity to ensure the best chance of a good afterlife.

IFC

Oh god. Looking at the last paragraph makes me think this could be eternally long if I just keep on stopping and telling you fun anecdotes from memory. Also, factually dubious, as they're from memory, and my memory cannot be trusted.

Jamie designed the icons, and had to work out what vibe to give it. I suspect he was grateful to me for having most the cast already being dead so saving him work.

The Inverted Chi-Ro isn't a real symbol anyone used, but our best way to make a Lucifer. The biggest historical cheat in the series is using any Lucifer figure like this in the period – as far as I'm aware, the idea of a singular satanic adversary in this mode simply wasn't around. But it dovetails with our mythology.

I get asked whether any special will happen earlier in the cycle. The tendency to lean towards the ends is basically the same urge which pushed towards a Roman Special at the fall. Ends let you write about the whole thing. It's only at the end where you can say with any hope of being correct what was really happening, and even then it's only a hope.

But the 1920s special is a little earlier than the end, if only because we've seen the actual end in issue 1.

(More on the 1920s special soon – there's been a few changes in my planning on that.)

The text on the page is the standard WicDiv one, but the final two lines, briefly explaining the history of the Vandal sack in 455 were added at lettering to provide the necessary context to a reader.

Page 1-2

Steady angle shot, three panels on each page. The issue has been compare to Uber by several readers, primarily for the volume of the violence and the detail of the historical focus. It's also a little like it in its storytelling like this – this lingering attempt to make a scene very normal. We don't see the battle against the Vandals – instead, we observe from a distance. We try and make it documentary, with us an observer.

The animal being gutted is a goat.

An example of an earlier tweak, the shepherd's first line was “Wh...who in god's name are you meant to be?” This could read as that our Lucifer actually is Julius. Changing it to “Dressed up as?” brings the artifice closer to the surface. While the nature of lucifer/Julius is explained in a few pages time, it's not meant to be a mystery. Creating a false uninteresting question is just a distraction for the reader.

I kind of laugh at the idea of Lucifer wandering around near Rome, trying to find an army.

Ave Atque Vale! Is a quote from Catallus, related to death. Originally was Ave in my first draft, which of course means “Hello!” so makes no sense to say when he's heading away to the shepherd. If you were generous, you could say he was greeting the Vandals.

The first pages which Matt coloured were these, and when I saw them, I knew it was going to be something special.

Yes, panicked sheep in the second panel of page 2 is a star.

Page 3-4

WicDiv is about many things, but “The fucking obvious” certainly rates highly. Triumphs are one of the big core Roman rituals we think of, when a general is given a personal parade. They're rare and hugely important. The slave whispering “remember you are only a man” to warn against hubris is the detail which everyone loves. Clearly, in WicDiv, the resonances are all kinds of fun.

In terms of how comics panels are not one moment in time, have a nose at the last panel. You read the line, then the Oh!, and then the response of the slave seeing something, and then you look at the miracle, the smug, painted face, of Lucifer, and his Heh.  That's a little journey.

The red face paint is ceremonial, to be akin to Jupiter. Bear that in mind for later, obv.

The big triumph is the first issue money shot – after 3 pages of very low atmosphere, we have the sprawl of Rome. Choosing the direction of the march was key – I gave Andre the best guess route of the triumph, and he chose his angle. By luck, he would enter via the gate here Lucifer is dragged out at the end of the issue. The triumph also ends at the temple of Jupiter, which is yet more fun subtext for those who really like digging into it.

We tweaked the colouring on the crowds, to try and get more of the cosmopolitan nature of Rome. The majority of legionnaires are white, but that's because most were Germanic in this period.

The triumph was originally planned for a spread, but I decided I needed another page later in the comic.

Page 5

Title drop, and a bleak laugh. The idea of calling a story IMPERIAL PHASE which isn't in the actual Imperial Phase trade came from thinking of Julian Cope having his single World Shut Your Mouth not on the album World Shut Your Mouth, an idea he in turn got from some sixties band I haven't time to look up.

The date was tricky to decide exactly, due to the timeline of real world events I wanted to get in. Clearly, for full trash-Roman pulp, I'd have pushed this story March, so I could Ides of March it, but alas, no dice.

Page 6

Nice atmosphere in the first panel, in terms of going from the chaos of the Triumph to something a little more contemplative.

Enter Dionysus/Bacchus. Flashback colours and... one of the thoughts of Matt was that the SFX budget for God Stuff would be lower back here. So the god powers aren't quite as SFX-y as they are in the present day. Not that there's much here, but I'm reminded by how low-key this is. The intent here is that he's done his god thing on stage and come off... but he could just be an actor, which is about as close as WicDiv gets to a 1:1 thing.

The nature of art in Rome (or “Rome”) is key here, and talked throughout. Actors were the underclass. To act was to be disreputable. The “actress as sexworker” trope arrives in Rome, I believe. I reference Lou Reed in the panel descriptions, in terms of these being a Walk On The Wild Side Romans.

Falerian is a type of fine wine. Mithras is presumably one of the other gods – Scythia being a place.

The nature of Imperial Phase has been about women involved with women, which has nagged. Having the humanising part of the story be a love story between men felt timely. It was a place we could do it, so we should. Though more on that later, in terms of the specifics.

There was the obvious worry of doing it, of course – where Lucifer ends up. Lucifer is not good representation. I haven't seen anyone pick up on that angle. We spend a lot of time worrying about stuff no-one picks up on, which is why we spend all that time worrying about it.

The word “play” is, of course, loaded, as are the name changes. Story about identity, we are in it.

Page 7

The best thing about the specials is definitely getting a chance to write Ananke again. She is a fun time.

If I had more space, I'd have almost certainly done more with Lucifer's adventures during the day. It's worth stressing that by this point, I believe Gladiatorial fights were no longer actually happening in Rome, due to Christianisation. My research has went straight on from Western Rome and barged into Byzantine Rome, and the story of the chariot races there is a delight.

Page 7-8

These scenes are very much me getting my I, Claudius on. Very limited set, two actors going off at one another. Of course, all of this will resonate with anyone who's been following the main series.

Panels 3 and 4 on page 7 are the bit of tight acting I like most from Andre here – it's all about the actions, and the space, with us positioned a little back from it.

I smile at Lucifer referencing something that was said of 2014-Lucifer in the first arc. Ananke has been doing this for a very long time.

A quick buzz through various other gods' fates in the first panel on page 8. There's a lot of historical reference packed in there to unpack for those who wish.

The Inanna/Attila The Hun panel is, I think, the largest panel description in the issue. Well... not true. The Rome Triumph one is much longer, but that's a splash. This one included a potted history of a bunch of Hun-related information for Andre to play with, in terms of deciding the looks, etc.

It was also the most discussed panel at the stage of pencils – avoiding objectifying Inanna here was key.

Attila The Hun died on (one of his) wedding night in the real life.

The “As I understand” is pretty key in the captions, as is other distancing effects. Lucifer would not have been a god when Inanna did this. It is very early in this pantheon's time.

I think this may be a place to have a word about Pantheon times through history. 455 doesn't seem to fit in one of these 90 years, if you follow that strictly.

The short version is, as seen in the first scene of WicDiv which ends the 1920s pantheon at Dec 31st 2013 and we start our story about 6 months into the new Pantheon on January 1st 2014, the question of where the 90 years is measured for has to be (to some degree) flexible. Gods appear over a period of a year or so in our 2014, and die at their own rates. You can assume that the “true” length of a pantheon can wiggle a little – some would be less than a year, some could theoretically stretch across 4 calendar years. As such, it's hard to predict exactly on which year any given recurrence could occur – even from the data we have from 1831, 1923 and 2014, we know that.

I suspect before the end I may give hard dates for every Pantheon. I suspect, anyway. I know where it would appear.

Page 9-11

You know, I suspect Page 9 – for an action scene – is one of the most story-beat laden of the issue, in terms. Lots of great Andre stuff here – the casual-ness of both the burning and the brutal-ness of the kick. Matt goes to town on the colours too, the reds taking over. Obviously the fire is a key thing with Lucifer, and his flame grows and ebbs as we progress.

There's some difficult hard cuts here – page 10 to 11, for example. We just have the “Ananke leaving” beat there, then moving to Dio and Lucifer in bed.

There is a tendency when discussing the ancients to be a bit blasé in terms of writing about their sexual habits. This normally is based around us mapping our readings of sexuality onto the past, while erasing their own social mores. I've ran with some of the information on page 11 before, when doing THREE, specifically the politics of different sexual roles. Relevantly, the status elements Lucifer alludes to here – in terms of being a bottom is always dishonourable. I could ramble at this at length, but I'll spare you.

Lots and lots of stuff here, in terms of trying to set up thematic elements here, but let's just say none of it would matter at all if Matt and Andre hadn't nailed the last panel.

Page 12-13

Lots of historical bits and bobs here. Perhaps the implicit question we don't answer is “what happened to the last Emperor?” He was cut to pieces a few days before this and thrown in the river, because he'd pissed off the Vandals enough to have them invade.

You may notice how thin the senate is populated. That's because the majority of the population of Rome have fucked off to hide. Rome's population is artificially lower during this point in history, which is a thing which tries to lend a little credulity to the Ananke/Geiseric cover-up.

The main tweaks here was making sure the exact nature of Lucifer's slip was tricky. Someone getting mixed up in the time-line requires making sure the reader understands the timeline. I half wonder why I went with Crassus rather than Pompey.

Anyway, let's hope that Lucifer manages to keep on the straight and narrow.

Page 13-14

Well, that escalated quickly.

When planning the issue, you start doing maps of time and space, and I rapidly realised with 25 pages, and so many other essential scenes, there was no possible way to show a slow descent.

The story's structure immediately suggested itself.

While the Triumph was the image we needed to enter the world, this is the one that will be remembered. People reference my Crossed work here – which is true, to some degree, in that it was also about turning flesh into art. I suspect I was more thinking of Banks, and a certain beat involving a certain object of furniture. I say, dancing around spoilers.

The influence here which gets kind of buried is Domitian, who threw the most goth parties of all time. Have a nose at this here, in terms of Things Emperors Got Up To.

Page 15-16

We've already namechecked Caligula and here comes Nero, the other of the most famous Roman Bad Emperors. The elements about Nero here were the closest thing the research unveiled which made me want to reposition the story to a different period – Nero interacting with the gods would have been fascinating, for all the reasons described here.

We had a reader question the direction of Imperial Phase, in that the insanity-leading-to-murder trope that appeared to be coming and the inherent ableism in that. It was a usefully timed question, as it made me dig more sharply into the exact choices we were making in explaining the idea. This isn't about going mad. This is – as Dionysus puts it – about excess. I'm thinking of Bowie living off cocaine and peppers. We lean into it pretty heavily in this issue, and hopefully it delineates the aim.

Just looking at my script, and found the anecdote about the time I threw up a handful of blood slipped in there. I'd forgotten that this page was autobiographical. Comics, eh?

Look at what Matt's doing with the colours here – the whole panel is bloodshot as we progress.

Page 17-20

In terms of buried research in the comic, that a hole was knocked in the roof of the Temple of Jupiter during this sack of Rome is the one which makes me laugh. Behold! Let team WicDiv present the true story of how the temple of Jupiter got a dirty great hole in it.

(I also like that this makes the sack of Rome much more efficient for the Vandals.)

This is an actor making a soliloquy scene, perhaps obviously, recalling both the stage and the Passion. While this issue is heavily in the research, it's also doing ahistorical work. Shakespeare's fingerprints is all over this, to state another obvious thing.

The “Emerge like an Eagle” thing is very much Roman Pagan belief.

I mentioned Nero, Caligulia and Julius. The other Roman Emperor who is in the mix with Lucifer was Julian the Apostate who was the last Pagan Roman emperor, and tried to revive Pagan Rome before dying early. A “What if Julian had lived?” is a counter-factual history which is always a fun one to swill around your mouth. He's the one we don't reference, but much of Lucifer's thought comes from mashing Julian with someone of lower birth and more melodramatic tendencies.

This is the sequence which I cut the page from the Triumph earlier to expand. Clearly this could happen quicker, but we need to let the death sequence come out, in all its horror. Also, the collapse on the page turn seems essential.

I'm almost surprise Et Tu Jupiter reached the final page. We were always wondering whether it was too funny. In the end, it was decided it was, but in juxtaposition with the art, sufficiently bleakly to not break the mood. Especially before the collapse on the next page, which is very much human stripped by the divine.

Clearly this plot beat, is the biggest one for close followers of the book. I suspect at this point of the story, there would be strong suspicions that the “you die in two years” isn't true. Unless this sequence is deeply deceptive, it is true. You die in two years, by yourself. We place the specials pretty carefully, in terms of what they reveal, so this being half way through Imperial Phase underlines what could await our cast.

In terms of craft, going silent for a page after the monologuing seemed key. I mean, Ananke's fundamental disrespect in terms of how she's carrying Lucifer says everything.

Page 21-25

Out the gate towards the Tiber. The names listed are famous Romans whose bodies were thrown in the Tiber so that they could have no honourable end – and in the case of Marius, that there was no place for his followers to gather. The man who did that was Sulla, btw. Marius was dead, he dug them up.

The “Pagan burial, but a shit one” is very much Ananke at peak “I will tell you the truth, but you really have to pay attention to the details” mode.

And here's Geiseric! Looking good. The Vandals have been in Carthage for 20 years, but we decided to have him be kind of pallid so as not to confuse people. Stories like THREE were all about the pure-historical aspect and risked (and often did) lose people by doing things in line with the best research rather than common belief. WicDiv has a slightly different set of priorities, especially on secondary aspects like tanned Vandals.

Heh. Story starts with butchery of a goat, and ends with butchery of Lucifer. WicDiv is a very subtle comic.

Sulla's an interesting dude, and I think the use by Ananke here seems pretty fair. The future she's pointing towards never happens – the marriage is there. Germanic hands ended up ruling what came after the Empire, but that's not really what is going. Of course, Geiseric is also entirely right in recognising he's being manipulated.

They're a fun pair, actually, in terms of the fencing. I kind of realise this is the sort of conversation which is going to be key in Spangly New Thing, which makes me excited about writing it again.

I smile at the Vandal line. People have wondered why I didn't do the earlier sack, so I could have had the goths. Well, it didn't really work for the story, which is about the end of an era. But also it would have been perhaps too much. I did have a joke take, where Ananke is debating which Germanic tribe to manipulate into invading Rome. “The Goths again? No. No More Goths.”

But 455 isn't that kind of book.

The final image! Lovely, in its bleak and awful way.

Page 26

City of God being Augustine's book, written primarily in response to the crisis of faith in the Empire over the 410 sack of Rome by the aforementioned Goths.

Anyway – thanks for reading, and thanks for Andre for joining us on this beast. We're back (eek) tomorrow, with Imperial Phase II. Onwards, etc.

[riikkamhaynes-blog]

Reading wrap up (Feb, 2019)

I was kinda in a reading slump this month, but it wasn’t too bad. I finished 13 books this month. 

#01 Anatomy of spirit by Caroline Myss

Anatomy of the Spirit is the boldest presentation to date of energy medicine by one of its premier practitioners, internationally acclaimed medical intuitive Caroline Myss, one of the "hottest new voices in the alternative health/spirituality scene" (Publishers Weekly). Based on fifteen years of research into energy medicine, Dr. Myss's work shows how every illness corresponds to a pattern of emotional and psychological stresses, beliefs, and attitudes that have influenced corresponding areas of the human body.

I ended up giving it a two-star rating. It just wasn’t for me. 

#02 You by Caroline Kepness

When a beautiful, aspiring writer strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe Goldberg works, he does what anyone would do: he Googles the name on her credit card.

There is only one Guinevere Beck in New York City. She has a public Facebook account and Tweets incessantly, telling Joe everything he needs to know: she is simply Beck to her friends, she went to Brown University, she lives on Bank Street, and she’ll be at a bar in Brooklyn tonight—the perfect place for a “chance” meeting.

As Joe invisibly and obsessively takes control of Beck’s life, he orchestrates a series of events to ensure Beck finds herself in his waiting arms. Moving from stalker to boyfriend, Joe transforms himself into Beck’s perfect man, all while quietly removing the obstacles that stand in their way—even if it means murder.

I was pleasantly surprised by the book. I thought the writing style would be unpleasant to read, but in the end, I ended up liking it. It does baffle me that some people see this as a romance story, whereas it’s actually a horror. The book was not amazing by any means. I am not planning on continuing the series. I would recommend this as an after-reading-slump-read since the writing was smooth and the story structure was fluid. 3/5

#03 Reindeer moon by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas

A fictional account of the life of a Siberian tribe 20,000 years ago, from the author of "Harmless People" and "Warrior Herdsmen". It is both the story of a daily struggle for survival against starvation, cold and violence and an evocation of spiritual journeys and primitive magic. ~Goodreads

I found the Finnish version of this book while digging through my grandmother's stuff. The premise was unlike anything I had ever seen. I have for some time been curious about prehistoric life. 

The book's depiction of life after death left me feeling hopeful. The story has two timelines, one of the main character growing up and one of her as a spirit. I would recommend this for anyone who loves animals and is interested in prehistory.

#04 Chant and be happy by Swami A. C. Bhaktivedanta Prabhupada

I haven’t the slightest clue why I decided to read this. The book is about the “Hare Krishna” mantra. I am not much of a believer, and the book ended up being a big meh for me. I would recommend it if you are interested in Buddism. 2/5

#05 Theft of Swords by Michael J. Sullivan

There's no ancient evil to defeat or orphan destined for greatness, just unlikely heroes and classic adventure. Royce Melborn, a skilled thief, and his mercenary partner, Hadrian Blackwater, are two enterprising rogues who end up running for their lives when they're framed for the murder of the king. Trapped in a conspiracy that goes beyond the overthrow of a tiny kingdom, their only hope is unravelling an ancient mystery before it's too late.

It ended up reading a bit too much as a young adult. I think I would have prefered the story more if it was written as an adult novel. The reading experience was weird. I constantly felt like there was just something off with the story. After finishing it, I realised what it was. This book is what shonen anime would be like in a novel format. It was especially apparent in the way the scenes switched and moved on during the third acts. 

I don’t know how to explain it. I feel like everyone who has watched Naruto would know what I’m talking about. 

The story structure and plot twists weren’t the most surprising, but I didn’t really mind. It was an incredibly easy read. I will continue the series even though technically speaking I think it’s trash. 3/5

#06 The unwanted: A novel by Christiaan Barnard

I don’t really know what to say about the book. It was quite average. The characters were forgettable and the plot wasn’t anything special. I am glad I read it, but it wasn’t anything special. I would recommend it for someone looking to learn about racism in 20th century America. 3/5

#07 War Horse by Michael Morpurgo

In 1914, Joey, a beautiful bay-red foal with a distinctive cross on his nose, is sold to the army and thrust into the midst of the war on the Western Front. With his officer, he charges toward the enemy, witnessing the horror of the battles in France. But even in the desolation of the trenches, Joey's courage touches the soldiers around him and he is able to find warmth and hope. But his heart aches for Albert, the farmer's son he left behind. Will he ever see his true master again?

This book was a childhood favourite of mine, and I read it to see if it would hold up. I still enjoyed it, but it was apparent that it was meant for a younger audience. It took me roughly two hours to finish it. I would recommend it as an easy middle grade read. 4/5

#08 Before they are Hanged by Joe Abercrombie

How do you defend a city surrounded by enemies and riddled with traitors, when your allies can by no means be trusted, and your predecessor vanished without a trace? It’s enough to make a torturer want to run – if he could even walk without a stick – and Inquisitor Glokta needs to find answers before the Gurkish army comes knocking at the gates.

Northmen have spilled over the border of Angland and are spreading fire and death across the frozen country. Crown Prince Ladisla is poised to drive them back and win undying glory. There is only one problem: he commands the worst-armed, worst-trained, worst-led army in the world.

And Bayaz, the First of the Magi, is leading a party of bold adventurers on a mission through the ruins of the past. The most hated woman in the South, most feared man in the North and most selfish boy in the Union make a strange alliance, if only they didn't hate each other so much, potentially deadly ones.

Ancient secrets will be uncovered. Bloody battles will be won and lost. Bitter enemies will be forgiven – but not before they are hanged.

I was quite afraid to reread it since second books in trilogies tend to feel like filler. I was pleasantly surprised. I ended up liking the second book more than the first one. The characters, the dialogue, the writing, I adore everything about Joe Abercrombie’s books. I said I was going to do a review about the trilogy in my previous wrap up. I don’t know if I’ll actually do it since I still can’t really say for sure why I love this trilogy this much. 

I would recommend the First Law trilogy for anyone who feels like GRRMs SOIAF is too big of a commitment and want to read something similar and easier. 5/5

#09 Stones to Abbigale by Onision the onion boi

I posted my Goodreads review of this book. Check it out. 1/5, would recommend for laughs.

#10 Last Argument of Kings by Joe Abercrombie

The conclusion to the 'First Law' trilogy is here. Battles will be fought, kings will be made, love will be won and lost and cities will be destroyed. Magic is going to be unleashed, heroes will fall and the First Law will be broken once again. The end may be coming.

I loved it with all my heart. I did go into a small reading slump while reading it since it was so long. 5/5

#11 No Longer Human by Osamu Dazai

Portraying himself as a failure, the protagonist of Osamu Dazai's No Longer Human narrates a seemingly normal life even while he feels himself incapable of understanding human beings. Oba Yozo's attempts to reconcile himself to the world around him begin in early childhood, continue through high school, where he becomes a "clown" to mask his alienation, and eventually lead to a failed suicide attempt as an adult. Without sentimentality, he records the casual cruelties of life and its fleeting moments of human connection and tenderness.

Semi-autobiographical, No Longer Human is the final completed work of one of Japan's most important writers, Osamu Dazai (1909-1948). The novel has come to "echo the sentiments of youth" (Hiroshi Ando, The Mainichi Daily News) from post-war Japan to the postmodern society of technology. Still one of the ten bestselling books in Japan, No Longer Human is a powerful exploration of an individual's alienation from society.

I don’t want to say too much about this book since it is basically a fictitious autobiography of the author. The book left me feeling blue. I didn’t rate it because of the autobiographical nature of the book. 

#12 Room by Emma Donoghue

To five-year-old Jack, Room is the world.

It's where he was born. It's where he and his Ma eat and sleep and play and learn. There are endless wonders that let loose Jack's imagination--the snake under Bed that he constructs out of eggshells, the imaginary world projected through the TV, the cosiness of Wardrobe below Ma's clothes, where she tucks him in safely at night in case Old Nick comes.

The room is home to Jack, but to Ma, it's the prison where she has been held since she was nineteen--for seven years. Through her fierce love for her son, she has created a life for him in that eleven-by-eleven-foot space. But Jack's curiosity is building alongside her own desperation--and she knows that Room cannot contain either much longer.

Told in the poignant and funny voice of Jack, Room is a story of unconquerable love in harrowing circumstances, and of the diamond-hard bond between a mother and her child. It is a shocking, exhilarating, and riveting novel--but always deeply human and always moving.

Although the story is quite dark, the fact that it was written from a child's point of view made it strangely uplifting. The first half of the book was slow, but I think it’s worth struggling through it. 4/5

#13 Ted Bundy: Conversations with a Killer by Stephen G. Michaud and Hugh Aynesworth

Drawn from more than 150 hours of exclusive tape-recorded interviews with Bundy, this collection provides shocking insights into the killer's 11th-hour confessions before his death in a Florida electric chair. A unique, horrifying self-portrait of one of the most savage sex killers in history.

A definite must-read for anyone interested in serial killers and true crime. 5/5

[riverofhistory]

Episode 1: Dissecting the Past

The following is the transcript for the first episode of On the River of History.

For a link to the original podcast, go here.

The podcast will now be hosted here. This episode has now been split into 4 parts for easier listening.

Part 1

Greetings everyone and welcome to the very first episode of On the River of History. I’m your host, Joan Turmelle, historian in residence.

In this series, I will be taking up the task of explaining the history of the world. As any historian may tell you, it is never an easy job and it is certainly never one that will be truly complete. Put basically, there is just so much to tell and so many ways to tell it. While I am devoted to my goal of keeping this series holistic in scope, it may be inevitable that some parts of the story will be left out.

In preparation of this series, I had gone through several different options for how I wanted to tell this story. One way was an old-fashioned route: going through a complete nation’s history from past to present and then onto the next nation and starting the same process over, much like Will and Ariel Durant or Henry Cabot Lodge. Another way was to focus on geography: staying on one continent, going through the history of all the societies that were birthed there and moving on, a method similar to the work of Ralph Linton or Glenn King. In the end, I settled on a compromise.

Our journey on the River of History begins with the formation of the Earth and the subsequent origin and evolution of living things. Afterward the focus will shift to just one organism, that being (of course) our own species Homo sapiens. Following humanity’s spread across the world and the various ways in which different peoples adapted to the ice ages and their aftermath, the series becomes slightly episodic. While always moving forwards in time, I will be jumping from various geographic locations, tracing different societies as they develop and change. For example, in the story of China’s history, I will discuss the rise of states and the Shang Dynasty, before leaving to focus on another region, but in time I will return to China to discuss what happens next. And this will continue further and further forwards towards modern times.

As far as what will be discussed itself, I do not intend to just simply talk about the basics of a nation’s rise and fall or single out major events like key battles. When relevant interest arises, I will take the time to discuss the different aspects of a historic society: breaking down the intricacies of its art, language, belief systems, architecture, and science, as well as notable individuals.

Indeed, the river is vast, and we will sail it together.  

For all intents and purposes this episode acts a sort of prologue. Before we jump into the main narrative, I’d like to spend some time talking to you all today about historiography. This is the study of how historians look at and record history, be it that of their home nation or of the globe. In doing so, I hope to share with you all just how complicated it can be to write a history of, anything really. There are many ways to do it, and they all have their pros and cons.

But now comes the million-dollar question: what is history? In analyzing the various aspects of historiography, I hope to be able to provide an adequate answer.

We often divide our past into two parts: history and prehistory. Prehistory, as the etymology suggests, is the time before history. So then, where is that cut off point? The most common definition is that history begins when people started writing down records of events in their lives. As such, many historians tend to focus on documents, records, and journals: anything that can be traced to an individual or many at some point in the past who can be named and perhaps traced to a living lineage. These can be found among families who have held onto these documents, or they can be found in places of worship, banks, libraries, and museums. So, in a sense, history would be tied to the practice of writing.

With this in mind, we recognize that history would have begun at different times for different societies. The people of Egypt created hieroglyphics around 5,300 years ago. Sumerian cuneiform developed from earlier pictorial systems around a hundred years later. In present-day Pakistan, the people who settled along the Indus River Valley created a script (still undeciphered) 4,600 years ago, and the Minoans of Crete made an equally undeciphered script 3,900 years ago – though these latter two may have arisen from contact with the peoples of Sumeria and Egypt. The written word did not see the light of day in the Americas until 2,400 years ago, probably among the Olmec. China gave us the last independently created writing system roughly 4,500 years ago. Over time, as peoples and ideas moved across the world, so too did their writing systems, slowly changing and developing into new forms. Thus, the histories of those different societies could officially begin.

In keeping with this concept, we must also recognize that many peoples around the world would not have had their own histories because they never developed writing. For the indigenous peoples of Australia, New Guinea, much of the other Pacific Islands, most of the Americas, and in vast regions of Africa and Asia, their histories came when outsiders (primarily Europeans) introduced writing to them. In keeping with a good definition for history that we want to work with, should this be so? I say, no.

As many indigenous peoples will tell you, there are other ways of recording the events of the past. Oral traditions are words and stories transferred by speech. These have often been dismissed by historians and others, on the assumption that a) they are unreliable because of the nature of human communication, essentially working like one long game of telephone and b) they can only go back a few generations. But continuing work with first nations peoples are shattering those assumptions.

Take aboriginal Australians, for instance. Linguist Dr. Nick Reid and colleague Patrick Nunn have worked with various nations throughout the island continent and were able to analyze 18 oral histories and stories. They tell of times when the continent looked different from the present day: The Great Barrier Reef was originally connected to the mainland of Queensland and the Wellesley Islands near Carpentaria formed a sharp peninsula. What fascinating the researchers was not so much the stories themselves, but these tidbits of information preserved within them. It is nothing new to historical geologists that Australia’s coastlines looked very different once upon a time: with the growth and decline of the great glaciers of the northern hemisphere during the ice ages, the sea level rose and fell in tow. Parts of the coastline originally extended for hundreds of miles and New Guinea and Tasmania belonged to the same landmass. For living aboriginal Australians to keep memories of these environmental changes in their stories means that their oral histories extend not for centuries, but for thousands of years. Dr. Nick Reid has estimated that the oldest of these histories could be at least 10 to 12,000 years old.

The situation is similar for indigenous Americans too. The Klamath, who live in present day Oregon and California have an oral history of a large volcano that once erupted, later collapsing and becoming what they call giiwas, but we you may know as Crater Lake. Geologists, again, are very familiar with the formation of Crater Lake: like many such phenomena, after the caldera cools rain falls and slowly fills the crater until it turns into a lake. This particular event has been dated to 7,700 years ago and that means that the Klamath have retained this cultural memory in their stories for that long.

It is clear that oral traditions can be just as accurate and just as informative as written records. I have just spoken of the memories of geologic events. But that is just a small fraction of the knowledge preserved in this manner. There are tens of thousands of myths, medicines, recipes, natural histories, agricultural techniques, chronologies, and other aspects of society that have lasted millennia.  

I think the point has been made. Whether written or spoken, history should not be so clear cut as this. Besides, though both methods are valuable in their own ways, they can be prone to issues. It cannot be denied that biases have always be present in many historical records. Sometimes, people lie or do not recall things clearly. Sometimes there are contradictions between different texts that report on the same events. Sometimes not enough information on a particular battle or ceremony of holiday was not collected, and the author was forced to make up details. Places names are recorded but never their locations. Documents may lack signatures or dates. Perhaps most frustrating of all, the livelihoods of one nation’s people can be observed and recorded by representatives of another neighboring nation. Should these nations be in conflict with each other, those records may be biased and even derogatory. And the historian is left to figure out fact from farce. What then?

Part 2

There are other tools that a historian can use to unravel the past and indeed the following three methods have provided some of the richest (and in many cases the most accurate) details.

Archaeology is the study of past peoples and their societies from a purely material perspective. Despite what you may think or have heard, archaeologists are not concerned with prehistoric animals, like the popular Mesozoic dinosaurs: that is the domain of the paleontologists (though the two fields share many methods). The historical evidence an archaeologist is looking for is in the earth and soil, where time and environment have overtaken the hands of workers and warriors and buried them away. What an archaeologist may find is nothing more than scraps (indeed, there is a technical term for a garbage dump – they’re referred to as middens), but on many occasions are the rewards breathtaking. Entire cities buried in sand, horse-drawn chariots with horse and chariot still attached, beautiful frescos, and even long lost written documents. If I’m making things sound romantic, you’ll have to forgive me, much of archaeology’s early history was treated this way, often by people who sought recognition or a source of personal riches. Interspersed among these individuals were dedicated researchers who truly wanted to know the past like the back of their hands.

In the deepest ways, archaeologists face a tougher time reconstructing the past than traditional historians. The impression is given that a researcher working with scraps or pottery shards or fragments of wood has little to imagine or even work with. Thankfully, archaeology nowadays is blessed with a rich back catalog of past sites and societies. One fantastic resource, for example, are the Human Relations Area Files which include a database of archaeological traditions that can be used by students and researchers (and I will put a link in the show notes). Many archaeologists have become specialists of a particular time period and locality, so what may look like useless pebbles to the layperson can be like diamonds. And if any artifacts happen to me in poor shape, they’re kept anyway for future students. They may yet be diamonds themselves.

Though the technology has changed dramatically, the methods of archaeologists have more-or-less remained constant. First and foremost, appropriate permission must be given by government officials or anyone else involved – sometimes sites are found by accident on a person’s property, sometimes a construction project has to be delayed for fear of destroying a historic site. Because their targets are underground, the next step in an archaeological project is to do a survey of the area. Sometimes an old map or document must be consulted for clues on what to expect. Often a site is much too large to be seen from the ground and drones or helicopters need to be used to fully observe a site. In the air, the team can conduct photographic or geophysical surveys: mapping out the land from above and looking for anything that might aid the eye. During a survey, it helps to plot out the desired excavation site onto a grid. This can be done with simple tools like string and posts of wood or nails. This ensures that any artifacts found are identified with their locations in the place they were originally buried. If you want to reconstruct a historic site accurately, or even understand the circumstances that led to a site’s demise, it helps to know where you found everything exactly.

Archaeologists nowadays rarely excavate entire sites unless absolutely necessary. The process is long, costly, and inherently destructive. Rather than simply pick up a shovel and start digging, all possible excavation sites need to be carefully planned out and singled to the most appropriate spots as determined by the previous survey work. Then the work begins, digging vertically through parts of the soil and dirt to reveal any layers present. These layers correspond to specific points in time. The farther down you dig, the older the remains or, alternatively, the youngest layers are the newest: this is the law of superposition. At all times there are workers cataloguing recovered specimens, creating drawings and taking photos of the excavation process, and generally recording any information recovered. Often there are conservators on site as well, developing strategies to best collect fragile objects like pottery shards or thin human bones. Timing is key: some archaeological sites are lifelong projects with researchers returning every few years or so, while others come and go depending on what restrictions on time are present. The site of Little Egypt in Georgia (preserving Native American burial mounds from the Pre-Columbian period), was only excavated twice before the construction of a local dam resulted in the site being flooded in and destroyed.

Archaeology offers a materialistic look into the human past that is often missing from traditional historical practices, and when brought together sometimes the two can corroborate and expand our understanding. More often than not, the two can also cancel each other out: usually it is the work of archaeologists that run historical records afoul. The anonymity of the subjects is prevalent as well. When you’re dealing with periods of time that extend far beyond written records it’s impossible to know the names of any individuals found. Their careers and stories of demise, sure, but never their names. Not to mention the names of societies as well. Archaeologists have had to provide technical names to now lost cultures, because they’ve been gone for so long that no one survives to inform us about what those people called themselves. In this series, when I use names like Solutrean, Mississippian, or Afanasievo, I’m referring to archaeological terms, not the actual names of the societies themselves.

Linguistics is the study of languages and historical linguistics concerns the evolution of languages and how much (or how little) they have changed. Nowadays, learning a language is easy and most countries today provide education for students wishing to learn any number of world languages. Back in the past, however, languages were often tied to specific societies. Whenever a people had to move, they brought their language with them. Sometimes they came across new aspects in the places they traveled to or ended up inventing a new tool that had to be named. This was the way that new words were created, and these would have been taught to the younger generations, eventually becoming a basic part of the lexicon. In other cases, when peoples spread to new lands they conquered and subsumed the local populations. If these people were to be integrated into the dominant culture, it made sense to teach them the dominant language too. If the process is forced enough, the local languages may become extinct, but there were occasions when subjugated or enslaved peoples were able to incorporate the dominant language among their own: thus keeping their original tongue alive in a modified form. These creole languages eventually developed into full languages in their own right. In the era of European colonization, several creole languages formed, with the most familiar being those among enslaved Africans in the Americas. Languages can also have cognates: these are words that share a common ancestor. Sometimes cognates stem from related languages, but they can also derive from completely unrelated languages too. The word for ‘hurricane’ in English was created from the Spanish ‘huracán’, which itself stems from the Taino name for the god of hurricanes ‘Juracán’. The Amerindian language of the Taino peoples, called Arawak, is as distantly related to Spanish as Spanish is from Mandarin Chinese. Cognates can be found everywhere. But there can also be false cognates as well: two words that seem to be related in a common origin but are actually completely different.

So, what does this all have to do with history? Simply put, when you study a language, or two, or three, you are reading the work of hundreds or thousands of years. The presence of certain words can reveal what sorts of items were used or what animals and plants past peoples encountered. Historical linguists are also faced with the task of analyzing and classifying languages, trying to find the familial relationships between them. They have recognized that Spanish, French, Italian, and Portuguese share enough features that they belong to the same language family, called Romance. Similarly, Romance languages are similar to Osco-Umbrian languages. This is a family that includes historic languages spoken in Italy that are now mostly extinct, but we have records of them from documents. So, the two families are grouped together in an even larger family called Italic. And you can take it even further. By grouping languages in this way, researchers can reconstruct the evolutionary history of languages, and because in these pre-modern times societies and their words were often closely knit, the past movements of peoples can be deduced as well. It’s not the most exact method and many studies trying to tie languages to the movement of peoples have since been debunked, but it offers an accompanying body of information that, save for written documents, would otherwise be lost.

The last method, and perhaps the newest (relatively speaking) is the use of DNA or Deoxyribonucleic Acid to study the past. All humans, indeed, all living organisms on Earth, use DNA to house the genetic material needed to grow and reproduce. The field of biology has advanced tenfold in recent years, and the process of collecting and sequencing an organism’s DNA is pretty mundane stuff. What fascinates scientists is the information that is available in DNA, and what it can tell us about the past.

Nearly all DNA sequences contain differences between each other, the result of copying errors during the process of DNA replication. These mutations remain in the genetic code, and when an organism reproduces, those mutations can be transferred from parent to offspring. Often a mutation does nothing in particular; sometimes it alters the way a gene is displayed; other times it can prevent a gene from functioning. When a mutation changes how a gene is expressed, it can have consequences on the organism that houses that genetic code. If the mutation provides a benefit for the organism, like it helps the animal or plant survive in its environment, then there is a likely chance that the mutation will be transferred again once that organisms reproduces. And so on, until that change is present in the entire population. I’ll be discussing the ramifications of this process in a later episode, but for now I want to illustrate why this process is important for the historian.

In an individual’s genome (that is, their complete genetic code) there are a multitude of different mutations that have accumulated over time through that person’s family history. Compare two people’s genomes and you can see how much of their DNA are similar or different to each other. Biologists have been able to work out the average rate of mutations in human beings, and so they can examine two people’s genomes and see how long it has been since those family lines diverged from one another. This is a bit of an oversimplification, but the basic idea is there. Human geneticists have now studied the DNA of millions of people (from the past and present) and have been able to build enormous data sets that analyze the population histories of human beings. People are notoriously messy, however, and populations have often interbred with one another. This the traditional historian, as well as the layperson, knows too well: we live in a vastly interconnected global ecosystem, and it is nothing for two people separated originally by vast expanses of land and water to meet up and start a family. And the opposite end of the relationship spectrum is unfortunately present as well: years of study of historic societies have demonstrated a sickening trend of warring nations raiding a settlement, killing the men, and sexually assaulting the women. In time, the subjugated women give birth to children, and those children will eventually grow up and start their own families. All of this complex history of genetic mixing can be found in human genomes, and researchers have been able to reconstruct the past movements and intermixings of populations. They have even been able to discover demographics of people who no longer exist in an uncontacted form. Again, I will be elaborating on these discoveries in later episodes.

Historic documents and records, archaeology, historical linguistics, and human genetics. The story of the human past, and the methods used to uncover it, has never been as rich and as fascinating as it is right now.

Part 3

It’s easy to think about the past hour, or the past day, or the past week. Extend your reach and the month will be familiar too. Continue on to a year and then gaps will appear in your memory. The further you go back in time, the difficult it is to remember what occurred. Such is the issue of the historian who wishes to understand the events of the past. Many individuals from several different societies have developed calendars that help us make sense of everything, but even then, there is room for disagreement.

The most commonly used calendar in the world is the Gregorian Calendar. Named for Pope Gregory the 13th. In 1582 AD, he established the calendar as a replacement and an update to the older Julian Calendar, which itself was the creation of Julius Caesar in 46 BC. Both calendars had the same purpose: the year was divided into 12 months, with the months at their current lengths. However, the Julian Calendar originally reduced the actual solar year by 10 minutes. Trivial? Perhaps. But from its inception, the Julian Calendar gradually began to slow down the passage of time. Every three years, a leap day had to be added as an attempt to correct this. However, the years continued to shorten, until the time of Pope Gregory, when Christmas Day was now 10 days behind schedule. As Christmas was seen as an important day, the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, it was urgent that something be done. Thus, Pope Gregory sought to reform the calendar and institute his own. The difference? Those 10 unnecessary days were removed, and the leap day was added every four years, on February 29. Our last leap year was in 2016 and the next will be in 2020. This reform greatly improved the accuracy of counting the years and was widely accepted among the Catholic Church. It took two centuries before the Protestants made the switch, and now most of the world uses the Gregorian system, save for some of the Orthodox churches.

What makes the Gregorian and Julian Calendars unique are the way they divide the past. Both calendars officially start in 1 AD, that is, Anno Domini (a Latin phrase meaning in the year of our Lord). Thus, we are currently in the year of our Lord 2019. All times prior to 1 AD are labeled with BC, which means in basic English “before Christ”. The decision to start the date in 1 AD stems from the work of Dionysius Exiguus, a monk of the Eastern Roman Empire, who developed the system in 525 AD. It is currently unclear as to why Dionysius argued that Jesus of Nazareth was born on 1 AD, but no matter how he came to that conclusion, we now recognize that he was mistaken. The work of biblical scholars and other historians have argued that the most accurate date for the birth of Jesus was sometime in the year 4 BC (and no, it would not have been on Christmas). That is the current consensus, so both calendars are technically flawed in this respect. Despite this, the Gregorian Calendar is the most accurate method for calculating time as it closely matches the actual solar year and there are no signs that it will be replaced any time soon.

But others have tried. In 1993, geologist Cesare Emiliani created his Holocene Calendar. He recognized the accuracy of the Gregorian Calendar and its system of leap years, but he was concerned that the recognition of a ‘year of the Lord’ posed a philosophical problem for historians. While the life of Jesus and the advent of Christianity were (and are) important events in their own right, in the grand scheme of human history highlighting this date of birth is, to put it as polite as possible, arbitrary. Many regions around the world did not have any means to recognize this era, nor would they have known of Jesus himself: in the Pre-Columbian Americas, for example, it can be argued that the effects of Christianity wouldn’t take part until Christopher Columbus and his men forcibly placed them upon the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean after 1492 AD. Then there’s the inconsistently of the lack of a year 0. There is no 0 BC nor 0 AD: it goes from 1 BC straight into 1 AD. It’s a strange mathematical situation.

As a better and more holistic solution, Cesare Emiliani’s calendar begins roughly at the start of the Holocene Epoch, the time in the geologic history of the Earth to which we currently live. The International Commission on Stratigraphy recognizes the beginning of the Holocene at 11,700 years ago, but Cesare’s calendar extends to 12,000 years ago (it is based on an earlier calculation). Within this period of time, all of human civilization developed, from the earliest agricultural projects and community structures to the modern age. Thus, Cesare argues, the beginning of the Holocene is a more noteworthy start to a calendar. In essence, 10,000 years are added to AD dates, and BC dates are to be subtracted from 10,001. That makes our current year 12,019 of the Human Era (this is the calendar’s Anno Domini), and also gives us a year 0.  

It’s a nice system, in this historian’s opinion, and others have made attempts to gain the calendar more acceptance. But for now, it’s a niche calendar.

Moving on to the other concerns in understanding time, we recognize that our calendars only work to a limit. When a historian finds a document that was written before the advent of the Gregorian or Julian Calendar – that is, another calendrical system is used or just none at all – they have to find a means to place the true age of the document in its place. Archaeologists face this issue too. Nearly all of their finds lack signatures or dates, so they have to find other ways to calculate their true age.

In the study of time, there is relative dating, and there is absolute dating. Relative dating is elementary: as I have previously described in my discussion of archaeological methods, artifacts and settlements buried in the uppermost layers of the ground are younger than those buried below them. Archaeologists can excavate many items from several layers and then place these in a row and trace their development over time. Flinders Petrie, an Egyptologist working at the beginning of the 1900s, famously cataloged hundreds of preserved Egyptian pots and placed them in an intricate system from oldest to newest. In doing so, he was able to identify any pot that came his way just from its shape and form alone.

Absolute dating is more precise, and its methods varied but always based upon the rate of decay of atoms.

In radiocarbon dating, samples are recovered from organic materials like wood, bone, coal, and hair. Chemists recognize that carbon-14 is taken in by plants during photosynthesis, where it is converted into oxygen. These plants can be ingested by animals that will eventually die, or the plants will die on their own, or the wood from trees is cut and re-purposed into furniture or housing, which will eventually be destroyed by rotting or by fire or whatever. In any case, the exchange of carbon for oxygen ceases, and the carbon-14 undergoes decay at a known rate. The half-life of carbon-14 – the time when half of all the carbon has decayed – is 5,730 years. The older a sample is, the less carbon-14 it has. And this can be taken back 50-40,000 years, when nearly all of the carbon has broken down. By taking organic samples, archaeologists can measure the rate of decay and determine how old the samples are and these can be checked against our own calendar for precision.

The other method is potassium-argon dating. Here the situation is similar: potassium atoms decay at a known rate, only this time they develop into a new atom, argon. Samples have to be uncovered in volcanic rocks in order for potassium-argon dating to work, but the method is great for remains as old as 4.5 billion years. As you might guess, this is one of the preferred methods of archaeologists concerned with the earliest humans and their ancestors.

There are other methods as well, but I’ll leave you all with these for now. It is important to recognize that historical records do not have to end with writings or even oral traditions; they can be extended as far as the beginnings of the Earth. Historians today have access to a larger set-piece than they previously had.

Part 4

I’ve spent a while talking about how historians find out about the past, but now I must discuss what we do with this information. While it is one thing to study human history in order to know when events occurred, many people have made attempts to find meaning in it all. The questions beg: why does our history matter? What can our history tell us about ourselves today? What was the causation or chain of events that led to event x happening? Is there a natural progression to history, like some underlying process of growth or progress? Can a study of historic happenings help us predict future events? These are deep and loaded questions, but that has not stopped historians.

One of the most familiar attempts to reveal hidden truths to history was by historian Arnold J. Toynbee in his 12 volume work A Study of History. This was a major book series, with the first volume published in 1934 and the last not seeing the light of day until 1961. Through an exhaustive comparison of world civilizations, Toynbee attempted to find a set lifestyle for society. He imagined civilizations like living organisms: being born, reaching adolescence, experiencing a peak age, and eventually declining into unrecognizability. Toynbee argued that the key to a civilization’s success was in the efforts of what he called “creative minorities”, who were essentially rulers that sought solutions to any issues facing the societies they oversaw. If the issues threatening a civilization were at the right caliber (just shy of insignificant, but far below apocalyptic), then they can be overcome, and the society grows. If the opposite occurs, and a civilization’s leader ceases to come up with good solutions, then that nation simply faces desolation. Toynbee’s study of history relied on a supposed notion that all civilizations share a form of destiny. Ideas like destiny are ambiguous matters: there is no hint that the future is written in stone and no way to test that idea scientifically. Many critics have pointed this out among their reviews, and so Toynbee’s view of history has faded into obscurity.

The writer H. G. Wells, familiar to many through his science fiction work, completed The Outline of History in 1920, right at the end of the first World War. His outline was just that: a rundown of the events of the past. One of the larger overarching themes in Wells’ book was that the history of humankind was marked by a near ubiquitous goal of creating the most beneficial and most educated societies. Over time, different nations slowly drew themselves together through alliances, and there was be a steady path that culminated towards a single nationality, humanity. War, famine, poverty, nationalism, and prejudice would have to be fervently abandoned, while reason, science, and compassion be embraced wholeheartedly. One world religion, one education system, a democratic political system, and a single economic system that benefited all. This vision of utopia was common among many twentieth century authors, as the horrors of World War 1 provoked many into wishing for a better future for humanity. Indeed, some even argued that this Great War would be the last major war and that their vision of a perfect world was on the horizon. While there can be no doubt that a brighter future for the human species is a noble goal, the failure of H. G. Wells and of the other utopian authors laid on the circumstances of the world history that happened following WW1. Instead of the “Modern World State”, they saw the Great Depression and the ten-fold devastation of WW2. The vision of world history as a road to utopia was quickly expunged, and by the time of the final revised edition of H. G. Wells Outline of History in 1971, the final chapter became sharply agnostic and worrisome.

Nikolai Berdyaev, a philosopher, released The Meaning of History in 1923. His analysis was, in the end, rather pessimistic. He saw history as an endless series of human failures and that any attempts at achievement were doomed to fail as well. Likewise, the historian Oswald Spengler saw that the outcome of all world civilizations was decline and death; like Toynbee, he suggested that societies had natural lifecycles and elaborated on that idea in his 1918 book The Decline of the West. In an honest and thorough examination of world history, it is truly difficult to find any indication that societies truly die at all. While many distinct cultures have certainly seen their day, aspects of those cultures have survived to the present day. Take the Phoenicians, for instance, who no longer dominate the Mediterranean and its trading routes but have provided the world with the modern alphabet.

Most of these attempts to find an overarching theme to world history have not succeeded, but there was at least as many attempts to uncover the lessons of history. I, like many historians, would agree that there are valuable things to learn from an understanding of the past. One of the most famous and continuously repeated quotations regarding this matter comes from a Spanish philosopher, George Santayana: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” These words derive from a volume of Santayana’s book The Life of Reason from 1905-1906. Admittedly, the quote has been reproduced many times into different forms, but the meaning is generally the same. What Santayana was arguing was that human beings should look to events of the past to see what has worked and what has not, so that they do not make the same mistakes twice. The usefulness of this philosophy can only work so far, because in principle it relies on the suggestion that human affairs are predictable. If something is done one way and had this outcome, then if repeated the outcome will be the same. Many philosophers have debated the truth of this matter: how exactly can we be sure that things really play out in this way? What about “third times the charm”? These are questions that historians have debated fervently, especially when political parties and their followers suggest solutions that have been attempted in earlier times to little avail.  

What about the notion of progress? Progress is defined as the improvement of some aspect of life. Many have argued that history has an inherent progress, and that human societies naturally follow a path from primitive to advanced. Things have steadily improved and the world of the 21st Century is a better place than any other period in history. On the surface this seems to be true: human life expectancy has risen over the years; the birth rate is higher than the death rate (so children are actually surviving through childhood); literacy rates have increased; education is now available for more youth; and so on. However, there are cracks in the façade. Certain aspects of human existence are improving, but our global environment is failing rapidly. The world’s natural resources are in decline; wild populations of plants and animals and their habitats are being wiped out with no replenishment; not to forget the rise in carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels that is warming our atmosphere at such an alarming rate that vast populations in Africa, India, and the Pacific Islands are dying due to their effects. The oceans are swamped with microplastics and are gaining acidity and many parts of the land are no longer viable for agriculture. Human beings have created a healthier and well-educated population, but they’ve also disregarded the natural environment that this same population depends on. What measure then is this supposed progress, if all that we’ve gained can so easily be taken away in the coming decades? Human beings have bit the hand that fed them, and that hand is their own.

Some historians have more or less abandoned any suggestion that progress is something that can be measured, or even something that matters. Historian Felipe Fernández-Armesto has provided a strong counterargument to the idea that there is a progression from primitive to advanced: he writes “Strictly speaking, ‘primitives’ do not exist: all of us are the products of equally long evolution.” Groups of uncontacted peoples in the Amazon, subsisting on foraged meals, are on equal ground with the citizens of São Paulo, the most populated city on Earth. These Amerindian peoples have lasted as long as their Latinx neighbors: when you travel back in time far enough, you find a common ancestral population that started with the same circumstances. Similarly, one could argue that periods of time in the past were better than modern times: see the various arguments by archaeologists about the apparently better health of pre-agricultural groups than their farmer descendants. A foraging lifestyle is difficult, and starvation was often at your doorstep, but at least you didn’t have to worry about arthritis, cavities, or monocultural diets. Progress is at best illusionary: as a concept it is useless to the historian and it is not a view that I will be subscribing to in this series.

I’ve discussed the various ways in which historians can know the past, and I’ve followed with a rough and patchy look at how those same historians have attempted to make sense of this knowledge. But what about you, the listener? If my presumption is correct, you’re listening to this series in the hopes that you will gain some insight into the history of the world, or at least you’re here because you genuinely like history as a topic. I enjoy history because of the doors that it opens. The worlds of the past offer a far more enriching experience than any imaginary world, in my opinion. In a fictional setting, any and all of its laws and causations are already set in stone. Everyone has a name, every place has a known location and system of rules, and every event has an explanation. Historic times do not have this luxury. The farther you go back in time, the more difficult our understanding becomes. There is always a sense of mystery here. There are details that are still unknown, details that may never be known. The past is enticing and exciting.

That’s why it saddens me to see world history treated with such carelessness by both young and old. In many polls, history classes are among the least popular subjects among students. Some schools have even removed history as a compulsory subject, relegating it to an elective. National histories are often given precedence over world history, and while it is certainly valuable to know the history of the nation to which the students belong, most of the time those classes are swamped with nationalism and falsehoods. Key facts about historic individuals and events are inaccurately told and these errors are repeated through textbook after textbook. The complexities and nuances of battles or political debates are downgraded into “good vs. evil” stories as if they were fairy tales. Lists of dates and names are required to be memorized, but teachers often fail to give explanations as to why these records are important in the first place. Then comes the issue of so-called “great-man” history: the idea that all the events of the past were the result of singular men (and it is usually always men) and the actions they took to change their world. Any historian can tell you how difficult this view is to hold in light of a proper understanding of the past. It’s not so simple. There is rarely (if ever) any role of Socratic discussion in these classes – textbooks treat the historical narrative as a series of facts that are to be regurgitated. Concerned and responsible individuals are working to change this, and there are some beautifully rich resources out there for students of history, but there is still much work to be done.

The famous musician Sting offers a curious recount of his time in history class: he said “I once asked my history teacher how we were expected to learn anything useful from his subject, when it seemed to me to be nothing but a monotonous and sordid succession of robber baron scumbags devoid of any admirable human qualities. I failed history.”

History is important because it is our shared heritage. It is the accumulation of millennia of individuals with now unknown names who were able to adapt themselves to their environments and then create their own habitats. Despite the distances, peoples around the world fostered beautiful and rich cultural traditions that have slowly changed over time and influenced each other. There were times of dread and death, but these were punctuated by periods of hope, hope that always kept people inventing and exploring and creating. That you are here right now is the result of an endless chain of individuals who survived despite the odds. A proper history of the world can do more than recount the stories of the past, it is a chance to answer questions about the present, and the future. The issues of our times, the circumstances that led to the development of all our conditions, the reasons that peoples and nations act the way they do, all those quandaries are available to you when you explore world history. That is what history is.

With all this being said, what makes me qualified to talk to you about the history of the world? I’m a United States citizen of Puerto Rican and French-Canadian heritage. I’m a transwoman and a secular humanist. I have never left the United States or its territories. My experiences are not universal to all people, not even members of my own family. Why should I speak for Earth?

This is the same problem that faces all historians around the world. Some solved the problem by collecting their peers together to tell the story – so that no single voice takes prominence. Most world history books or television productions are the result of work by multiple people from various backgrounds and historic fields. Singular authors of world history do exist, of course, but to complete their task they have often found themselves having to move beyond their sphere of life in an adventure of “thinking outside the box” and often the results fail due to personal prejudices slipping in anyway. With an appropriate use of cultural relativism, a historian can understand other past societies. Not to the level of the people who actually lived there and experienced the world in their own ways, but just enough to give an honest voice. Physicist Nigel Calder offered the analogy of looking at world history “like a Martian”. That is, separating yourself from all your personal opinions and identities and looking around the world as if you had never been born on this planet. Each new society and culture is a learning experience, like being in kindergarten again. In this light, everything – from politics to science to the arts – are given a new perspective and a new light. From there, you can gain new understanding, not just of others, but of yourself, and tell the story of humanity in an enlightened way. That is easier said than done, but it can be done.

We may look different, believe in different things, live in different places, but we all belong to the same species, Homo sapiens. With this recognition in mind, I will use the humanity I share with all of us to tell the greatest story of all time, the history of the world.    

And with that, we must lay anchor to our river journey. On the next episode: we will begin at a time long before humans. Before life on Earth. In order for there to be a world history, there had to be a world, and I will share the long-lost secrets that geologists and cosmologists have revealed about the formation of the Earth and its land and oceans, which laid the foundations for all that we know.  

That’s the end of this episode of On the River of History. If you enjoyed listening in and are interested in hearing more, you can visit my website at www.mixcloud.com/RiverOfHistory. A transcript of today’s episode is available for the hearing-impaired or for those who just want to read along: the link is in the description. And, if you like what I do, you’re welcome to stop by my Twitter @KilldeerCheer. You can also support this podcast by becoming a patron, at www.patreon.com/JTurmelle: any and all donations are greatly appreciated and will help continue this podcast. Thank you all for listening and never forget: the story of the world is your story too.

[lokilickedme]

MASTER FIC LIST ~ *updated 10/27/19*

Newest updates:

The Department - updated 10/27

Previous recent updates:

Aingeal Ard - updated 10/14 Hammer of The Gods - updated 10/20 The Department - updated 10/21

All fics on this list are posted at AO3 unless noted

*The Loki Reads series is exclusively on tumblr.com

Everything is under the cut because this list is LONG.

Fics are categorized by main character (i.e. Loki, Tom Hiddleston as Original Characters, etc)

Series and associated AU’s and side stories are grouped together (Chemical + Prehistories + Troika Apocalyptica + Penumbraluna + Wolfsbane...you get the idea)

Fics are identified as WIP (work in progress) or complete, with associated word counts and chapter amounts.

WARNINGS are notated, though the warning tags at AO3 should be paid attention to because they are far more complete and detailed.

Fic genres (romance, comedy, thriller) are briefly notated but these are general.

There is a link at the end of the list to my books at Amazon, if you’re interested in those.

This list will be updated as fics update and incomplete information will be added as I have time.

Click READ MORE to see the list:

Exclusively on tumblr:

Part 1 - Loki Reads The Night Manager Part 2 - Loki Reads High Rise Part 3 - Loki Reads Fifty Shades of Grey

WORKS AT AO3

Word/chapter counts are current as of 10/21/2019

Loki

Jack Montague - WIP - 176,534 words, 62 chapters - WARNINGS: hardcore sex, language, violence, sexual deviance, mentions of abuse, mentions of depression, explicit everything, blood/vampyric activities, numerous smutty kinks, and whatever else you can think of.  Not kidding, everything in this one is really hardcore.  Supernatural romance/adventure in the post-MCU/Post-2012 Avengers.  Main character - Loki.  Secondary character/love interest -  Jack Montague.  Relationship - Loki/Jack.  Side characters - Adam (OLLA), Thor, Nick Fury, Eve (OLLA), Selina (Sanguine).  The Trickster God has been exiled to Earth for a very long time...as the oldest living monster in the realm, he’s bored off his skull and endlessly intrigued when he runs across a monster of an entirely different kind - and strikes up a playful romantic partnership with a vampire who may be far more than he bargained for.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*

Sugar Skull - complete - 3115 words.  Side story to Jack Montague, part 3 of The Joker And The Thief.  Main character - Loki.  Side characters - Jack, Thor. WARNINGS: Language, sex.  What Loki does every year on Halloween.  *MATURE*

The Gucci Incident - complete - 4278 words.  Side story to Jack Montague, part 2 of The Joker And The Thief.  Main character - Loki.  Side characters - Adam.  WARNINGS:  Mostly language.  Loki and his vampire father-in-law Adam chase a pair of bedroom slippers across New York City.  *MATURE*

The Trickster’s Wife - complete - 71,001 words, 31 chapters.  Post Avengers, MCU.  Romance/epic adventure.  WARNINGS:  Very explicit sex, some language, some violence, very adult themes, mentions of abuse.  Main character - Loki.  Secondary character/love interest:  Princess Anja.  Relationship -  Loki/Anja.  Side characters - Thor, Odin, Frigga, Bragneire.  Asgard needs Loki, but Loki has a price - a wife he has no right to ask for.  So of course he does just that.  *MATURE, EXPLICIT*

The King of All The Rest - WIP - 1444 words, 1 chapter, ongoing (Part 2 of Myths of Asgard) - Sequel to The Trickster’s Wife.  Romance/comedy.  Main characters - Loki, Bragneire, Anja.  Relationship -  Loki/Anja.  Loki has retired, left Asgard, left the throne, left everything save for one beautiful thing that he’ll never lose again...the wife he fought so hard to keep.  WARNINGS: Sex, language.  *MATURE*

The King’s Heart - complete - 47,229 words, 21 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, sexual violence, abuse, language, mental illness, blood, grief, very adult themes.  Main character - Loki.  Secondary character/love interest - Lyra.  Side characters - Thor, Frigga, Aleks Lokisson, several offspring.  Post-Avengers UA.  Loki has been given the throne, but his apparent madness prevents him from opening his heart to his new queen.  *VERY EXPLICIT*

The Wolf King - complete - 44,315 words, 17 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Sexual activity, language, some violence, smutty talk from Loki, adult themes.  Fluffy adventure/romance.  Loki’s son Aleks has been handed the throne, but he doesn’t want it yet - not while there’s a universe to be conquered in “other” more satisfying ways.  But a mysterious pair of offworlders have a vested interest in the boy king fulfilling his prophecy the way his famous father did.  Main characters - Aleks, Loki.  Secondary characters/love interests - Cara, Lyra.  Side characters - Thor, The Syl, Sleipnir, Loki’s daughters, some surprise guests at the end.  *MATURE*

Lost Creatures - complete - 4929 words.  Main characters - Loki, Thor.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, explicit language, violence, male/male.  Loki and Thor have always loved as much as they’ve hated...but which of the two emotions is the stronger?  *EXPLICIT*

Civil Disobedience - complete - 1066 words.  WARNINGS:  Spanking, nonconsensual.  Main character - Loki.  Short vignette involving a Dominant Loki and his disobedient plaything.  *EXPLICIT*

Mine - complete - 2051 words.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, language, voyeurism, angst.  Main character - Loki.  Side characters - Thor, the bride.  She was one thing over all others...she was mine.  *EXPLICIT*

THE TEMPEST SERIES

Main character for all parts - Loki.  WARNINGS FOR ALL PARTS:  Hardcore sex, strong language, some violence, implied bestiality, very heavy smut.  All parts complete.  Dark romance/thriller.

Part 1 - Darkness Lives In Me - Loki’s fall from grace (1421 words) Part 2 - Before Chaos - Loki plots to take over Midgard (3120 words) Part 3 - After The Maelstrom -  Loki kills some time before the conquest (3088) Part 4 - Eye of The Storm -  Loki finds a way to...well... (2369 words) Part 5 - Her Side of The Storm -  Loki’s chosen conquest tells her side (2476) Part 6 - A Perfect Whirlwind -  Loki serves his time, misses his chosen (2928) Part 7 - Cyclone In A Teacup -  A conjugal visitation to Midgard (2654 words) Part 8 - An Intemperate Rain -  Loki comes bearing gifts (2132 words) Part 9 - Darkening Skies -  A trinket with...dubious powers (4304 words) Part 10 - The Nature Of Thunder -  Loki, kidnap, what could go wrong? (3325) Part 11 - Lightning Strikes -  Fury’s revenge, Loki’s redemption (3905 words)

*All parts of the above series:  EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*

No Regrets -  complete - 1634 words.  WARNINGS:  Crazy explicit sex, language, absolutely no plot.  Smutty comedy.  Loki, dad’s throne, and a willing partner...just another Wednesday on Asgard.  Main character - Loki.  Side characters - woman, Thor, Odin.  *EXPLICIT*

Whisper -  complete - 6440 words, 6 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, explicit language, threatened explicit violence.  Main character - Loki.  Side character - woman.  Romance.  Asgard has fallen while Loki is imprisoned far beneath the city, leaving him the sole survivor - and as the world slowly decays above him, he opens a path to escape through the dreams of a Midgardian female.  *EXPLICIT*

The Dragon Queen - complete - 37,503 words, 28 chapters. Main character - Loki.  Relationship - Loki/Eira.  Romance.  WARNINGS:  Very hardcore sex, violence, rape, abuse, language, torture.  Odin has given up trying to break Loki - until the day he sends his other prized prisoner into the Trickster’s cell.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*  *WARNING - CONTAINS RAPE SCENES*

The Good Stuff -  complete - 3513 words.  WARNINGS:  Crude explicit language, some smutty sex and references and drunkenness.  Comedy.  Main characters - Loki and Thor.  Side characters - Frigga, Odin, castle servants.  Two bored brothers, one long night, and mom’s secret hooch stash - what could go wrong?  *MATURE*

Smooth Criminal - Part 1 of the Criminal Activity Series - complete - 4252 words.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex and dominance.  Avengers (2012) adjacent.  Where did Loki get that suit anyway?  *EXPLICIT*

Blue Collar Criminal - Part 2 of the Criminal Activity Series - incomplete - 1171 words.  Post-Avengers.  WARNINGS:  None really, it hasn’t gotten far enough yet.  Sitting on the throne is dull as fuck.  Might as well hit Asgard again, only this time Loki only intends to conquer one human - the girl from the suit shop.  *WILL BE EXPLICIT IF I EVER FINISH IT*

Tom Hiddleston as Original Characters

The Department - WIP - 56,810   words, 17 chapters, ongoing.  *UPDATED 10/27/19*  Main characters - Greta (OFC), Chief (Tom Hiddleston).  Side characters - Andy (Andrew Hozier-Byrne), Cree (Jason Momoa), Cade (Chris Evans), Kevin (Dave Bautista), Hawk (David Tennant), Sarah (Sarah Lancashire), Ted (Sebastian Stan), Wilson (Owen Wilson).  Comedy/romance.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, explicit crude language, sexism, minor violence.  Greta arrives in a small town in Minnesota to wait out her disciplinary review after an on the job accident and struggles to survive a crackpot stationhouse full of sexist cops...while trying really hard not to fall in love with the Chief.  *EXPLICIT*  - updates weekly (Sundays)

Hammer Of The Gods - WIP - 23,305 words - 24/30 chapters, ongoing.  *UPDATED 10/20/19*   Main characters - Jake (Tom Hiddleston), Tate (OFC), Pete (Chris Hemsworth).  WARNINGS: hardcore language, explicit sex, mild/brief violence, referenced mental/emotional/verbal abuse.  AU Loki and Thor as human construction workers renovating a house next door to a recently divorced mom who really needs to learn how to live again.  *EXPLICIT*

Body Double - complete - 143,489 words, 40 chapters.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, language, references to past sexual and physical abuse, brief reference to miscarriage, heavy Dom/sub undertones.  Main character - Tom Hiddleston (as himself).  Secondary character/love interest - Anna (OFC).  Side characters - Chris Hemsworth, Ian.  Romance.  An actor and a body double working on his film embark on a romantic relationship after the movie wraps.  *VERY EXPLICIT*

Sunflower - WIP - 33,577 words - 13/15 chapters, ongoing.  Main characters - Tommy (Tom Hiddleston), Chloe (OFC/Dove Cameron).  Side characters - Amy (Sarah Wayne Callies), Martin (Idris Elba), Blake (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) , Tony (Robert Downey Jr).  Sweet romance.  Don’t park in the disabled spot unless you’re ready to fall in love with the girl you stole it from.  WARNINGS:  Sex, mild language, injury description.  *MATURE*

THE MCCLARY CHRONICLES

Part 1 - Sgaile Leannan -  complete - 58,066 words, 20 chapters.  Main characters - King McClary (Tom Hiddleston), Molly Thompkin (OFC).  Romance.  Molly arrives in Scotland on a work assignment and meets her nemesis - the surly kilted sheep farmer who owns the land she’s trespassing on.  WARNINGS:  Very explicit sex, explicit language, mild violence.  This story was rewritten for publication with changes - original version remains on AO3.  *EXPLICIT*

Part 2 - Samhach Mhiannan -  complete - 78,763 words, 25 chapters.  Molly returns home to Philadelphia with a little secret - and her world flips upside down when King shows up at her door months later.  SAME WARNINGS AS PART 1. This story was rewritten for publication with minor changes - original version remains on AO3.  *EXPLICIT*

Part 3 - Na Binne an Leann -  complete - 77,600 words, 25 chapters.  Molly moves to Scotland to be with King, but her future with the cranky sheepherder is, as always, shaky and uncertain.  SAME WARNINGS AS PARTS 1 AND 2. This story was rewritten for publication with minor changes - original version remains on AO3. *EXPLICIT*

A Meeting With The King - complete - 2507 words.  Side story to The McClary Chronicles.  What really happened that day at Clendon Williams when King met Ian, told from King’s POV.  WARNINGS:  Some language, mild violence.  *MATURE*

Aingeal Ard - WIP - 16,297 words - 16/20 chapters, ongoing.  *UPDATED 10/14/19*   WARNINGS: rough language, explicit sex.  Main characters - King McClary (Tom Hiddleston), Molly Thompkin (OFC).  A retelling of Sgaile Leannan from King’s POV, chapter by chapter.  *EXPLICIT*

Chemical and its Related Side Stories

Chemical - incomplete version, ended - 263,007 words, 58 chapters.  This story was rewritten and completed for publication with major changes - the original version minus the final chapters and epilogue remain at AO3.   AU Loki/Tom Hiddleston as a bartender in San Diego who falls for the last girl he should ever look at - who just happens to be his soulmate.  Main characters - Tom Heyworth (Tom Hiddleston), Anja Black (OFC).  Side characters - Chris (Chris Hemsworth), Ewan (Ewan McGregor), Pop Heyworth, Cara, Kady, Robert Laing, Eric (Michael Fassbender).  Romance.  WARNINGS: Extremely hardcore sex of all kinds, language, mild violence, references to past sexual abuse and child abuse.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT, NOT REMOTELY KIDDING*

THE CHEMICAL PREHISTORIES

All parts complete, all parts MATURE AND/OR EXPLICIT for sex, language, references to past abuse, mild drug use.

SIR -  Characters:  Anja’s mother and her lover; young Anja Das Vorspiel -  Characters:  Alicia and The Boss Quiet Gods -  Narrator:  Eva.  Characters:  Eva, Tom, Chris Medialuna -  the original unused ending to Chemical Two Princes -  Narrator: Anja  ADDITIONAL WARNING: character death The Mechanic -  Narrator:  Chris.  Characters:  Chris, Tom, Anja Eidolon - Narrator:  Emma.  Characters:  Emma, Tom, Anja  ADDITIONAL WARNING: disturbing imagery, imagined character death, mental illness The Scottish Barman -  Narrator:  Ewan.  Characters:  Ewan, Tom, Anja Taos -  Narrator:  Alicia  ADDITIONAL WARNING: character death Girly -  Narrator:  Anja

Penumbraluna -  complete - 19,179 words, 10 chapters.  Main characters - Tom and Chris (as teens).  Side character - Meredith Hemberley.  Coming of age.  WARNINGS:  Strong language, references to sexual abuse and child abuse, mild drug and alcohol use, male/male (brief), semi-explicit sex, character death.  Tom’s friendship with Chris, from the day they met as kids up to the point where Chemical begins.  *MATURE*

See You After The Apocalypse - Part 1 of the Troika Apocalyptica series - complete - 5414 words.  Chemical AU, post-Chemical - Tom, Anja, Chris, Pop, Cara, and Tom & Anja’s two babies have all survived the zombie outbreak, hunkered down in the cabin in Big Bear.  But Tom sends Anja and the two little ones away with Chris when the mountain is overrun with the undead.  Will they find each other alive when it’s all over?  WARNINGS:  Suspense, mild violence.  *MATURE*

Meet Me In Phoenix - Part 2 of Troika Apocalyptica - incomplete - Characters: Tom, Anja, Pop, Chris, Cara.   Chemical AU in which Tom & company survive a zombie apocalypse, are separated, and embark on a cross country quest to find each other again.  WARNINGS:  language and some sexual references.  *MATURE*

Wolfsbane -  complete - 1826 words.  Tom/Anja Chemical AU side story.  Assassins in love.  Tom and Anja are agents assigned to bump each other off, if they can stop seducing each other long enough to pull the trigger.  WARNINGS:  Language, sex, mild violence.

Other TH Original Characters:

Burn -  complete (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Would You Like To Play A Game? -  complete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Golden Boy - incomplete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Awakening -  complete - RPF -  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Beautiful Disaster -  complete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Dandelion Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6  - complete (will fill in summary ASAP)

Broken Petals - A Magnus Martinsson fic - incomplete

Yes Please, Magnus - Magnus Martinsson fic - complete

Weekly Meetings of The Most Useless Muses in The History of Fanfiction - incomplete - 23,802 words, 22 chapters.  Pretty much what it sounds like.  Characters - all of them.  WARNINGS:  All of them.

Adam - Only Lovers Left Alive

Sanguine -  complete - 28,795 words, 16 chapters.  Main character - Adam.  Secondary characters - Selina, Eve.  Romance/mystery.  WARNINGS:  Very explicit sex and violence, language, vampirism, blood, pregnancy, rape.  A redemption tale twisted up in an epic love story between a vampire and a mortal who break a few rules and make a few of their own in the process.  *EXPLICIT*

(Adam is also a prominent character in JACK MONTAGUE and THE GUCCI INCIDENT)

Thomas Oakley - Unrelated

Sleep -  complete - 1471 words.  WARNINGS:  Sex and language.  Thomas Oakley is chosen for a college sleep studies program.  Too bad the only thing that puts him to sleep is an orgasm.  *MATURE*

Tom Hiddleston - Jaguar Promo

The Way of The Cat -  complete (summary will be filled in ASAP)

Andrew Hozier-Byrne

THE TALIESIN SERIES

Part 1 - Nobody -  complete - 3293 words.  Romance/fantasy.  WARNINGS: character death, raunchy language, implied sex, implied drug use.  A perpetually reincarnating Celtic deity (Andrew Hozier-Byrne) just won’t stop causing problems for the Pantheon, no matter how many times they reboot him and his lover.  Loosely based on the song.  *MATURE*

Part 2 - Shrine Of Your Lies - WIP - 1011 words, 2/15 chapters, ongoing.  Romance/fantasy.  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, some language, some implied violence.  Taliesin (Andrew Hozier-Byrne) and his lover have been reincarnated again, this time without any memory of who they are - or of each other.  Fate won’t let them wander for long though and their paths cross over two parallel lifetimes.  *MATURE*

(Andrew Hozier-Byrne is also a prominent character in THE DEPARTMENT)

Can Yaman

Kiz Yan Kapi - The Girl Next Door - WIP - 5533 words, 3/10 chapters  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Chris Hemworth

Thor’s Beard -  complete - 3163 words (Part 2 of Forgotten Gods, side story to Hammer Of The Gods).  WARNINGS:  Explicit sex, language.  Pete from HoTG hooks up with Jake’s older sister and a battery operated device.  *EXPLICIT*

See You After The Apocalypse - see above under The Chemical Prehistories

Allan Hawco

A Wife For Mister Brown -  complete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

Et Tu, Mister Brown? -  complete  (will fill in this summary ASAP)

PUBLISHED BOOKS

All of the following are available at amazon.com:

Sgaile Leannan - Rewritten from AO3 version with changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations.  *EXPLICIT*

Samhach Mhiannan - Rewritten from AO3 version with some changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations.  *EXPLICIT*

Na Binne an Leann - Rewritten from AO3 version with minor changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations.  *EXPLICIT*

Chemical Volume One - Rewritten from AO3 with major changes/additions.  Sex, language, adult situations, references to past child abuse.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*

Chemical Volume Two - Rewritten from AO3 with major changes/additions (includes the final three chapters, ending, and epilogue that are not included in the AO3 version).  Sex, language, adult situations, references to past child abuse.  *EXTREMELY EXPLICIT*

Here And There - Book One of The Strada Series - not associated with any AO3 fics.  Sex, language, violence.  Paranormal romance.  A man falls out of the sky - literally - and Holly’s quiet existence goes all kinds of sideways when his otherworldly nemesis follows and the two of them end up in her bed...and inextricably in her life.  *EXPLICIT*

The Carmichael Addendum - not associated with any AO3 fics.  Sex, language, violence.  Paranormal/supernatural romance.  Clarissa is one of a final few slayers left in a world where the monsters have quietly retreated into myth - but the local library has started spitting immortals and werewolves out through a rift in the Genealogy section, and it’s time for the last two slayers - Clarissa and her ex-husband Kaine - to come out of retirement.  *EXPLICIT*

*All of the above are also available in Kindle format

Complete officially published works