#sbbookclub long read

[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Hello once again dear friends!

It is June, and with it, comes the annual Skeptic Believer Book Club LONG READ.

For the entire month of June, the book club gets together and reads a chunky boi, a fic of over 45k words. We had some absolutely stellar nominations this time, and some close votes, but we did arrive at a winner and it was was 6HoST Air by ÉcrivainFantôme.

This casefic is set in the early 90s, and features a Ryan with an underground radio show, a Shane who shows up to skeptic Ryan’s believer, and the team up of the decade, all centered around a mystery that has kept the book club guessing! This week, we finished it up together. We decided, that in addition to our usual book club thoughts, we’d solicit creative submissions as well, some of those are below.

Rating: E

Summary: The year is 1993 and Ryan Bergara runs a semi-popular underground radio show for “6H0ST Air” under the pseudonym ‘The Revenant’. Each week, he regales his listeners with unsolved crime stories and supernatural disturbances, asking them for their own theories and stories that they can post on his forum.Soon, another poster starts populating his forum - a person by the name of $K3PT1C who enjoys poking holes in everyone’s theories.The show will be forever changed when the two decide to team up to discuss and research, using a more… hands-on approach.

Book Club Thoughts

my favourite part of ryan's characterisation in this fic is his very real life canon way of like. he so clearly feels the things he feels but his own anxiety categorises his feelings in the most convoluted fucking way the emotional payoff in this fic is just so good I also like the descriptions in this fic in general, like when they go to investigate the warehouse or the roadtrips it's very cinematic and you can easily imagine how it looks like the atmosphere of a ghost hunt was captured so well, they felt tense and creepy, and I want to see Ryan continuing to grow as a ghost hunter in whatever comes next.

Creative Submissions

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[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Shippers & readers!

We've hit the halfway point in our June Long Read and believe me when I say, all of us were hard pressed to not read the rest of it one sitting! This week, we did some screaming as we read chapters 3 and 4 of A Symptom of Time by fightingfuries

As the plot continues to unfold and the mechanics of the time loop requires a lot of compromise, the book club was devastated and excited by the reveal at the end of chapter 4

Rating: T (E eventually)

Summary:

"Sure," Shane says easily, like he doesn't believe Ryan for a second. "You're living out the plot of the 1993 Bill Murray vehicle Groundhog Day. Now where does the kissing factor in, exactly?"

"You were all like 'I'm Shane, I don't believe in magic but you should find a tall brunette to kiss.’"

Shane laughs again, helplessly. "I'm the tall brunette? I obviously meant Andie McDowell." He catches himself. "If I had said that, which I didn't, because time loops aren't real."

Or, Ryan is stuck in a time loop and needs true love's kiss to get him out of it. Maybe.

Book Club Thoughts

I kept going back and re-reading [chapter 4] because it makes me so sad and it makes every time their kisses went a little further hurt all the more Even though this story is told from Ryan’s point of view, I just love how the writer wrote Shane because I feel like I understood all of his motives and thoughts without having to read from his pov Like you know people often alude to them ghost hunting in AU's or whatever but this is more connected. It kind of makes me think of that "Ryan pictured shane at his wedding because they spend so much time together" like he's exploring new things and Shane is there and it's like ghost hunting but not. I’ve been having a blast trying to predict which way the story is going to go; I love how idiotic they’re being about this whole time loop business and the fact that it takes Steven calling Ryan out on it for him to actually try to start thinking about solving it another thing I wrote a note down for are the philosophical implications of the lottery being "random". first, this of course is used to demonstrate that shane has tested it. but second, how does that work? is everything else not random? are our choices so set in stone by the choices we made before, and so somehow only these numbers are random every day? is there anything else that is truly random? I loved the way that the passage of time was shown via the shows that they were working on; it was a very immersive aspect because I feel like this is what they would be relying on, using them as markers when time is nebulous.

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[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Hello friends! 

It is June, and with it, comes the annual Skeptic Believer Book Club LONG READ. 

For the entire month of June, the book club gets together and reads a chunky boi, a fic of over 45k words. We had some absolutely stellar nominations this time, and some close votes, but we did arrive at a winner and it was was 6HoST Air by ÉcrivainFantôme. 

This casefic is set in the early 90s, and features a Ryan with an underground radio show, a Shane who shows up to skeptic Ryan’s believer, and the team up of the decade, all centered around a mystery that has kept the book club guessing! 

Rating: E

Summary: The year is 1993 and Ryan Bergara runs a semi-popular underground radio show for "6H0ST Air" under the pseudonym 'The Revenant'. Each week, he regales his listeners with unsolved crime stories and supernatural disturbances, asking them for their own theories and stories that they can post on his forum.Soon, another poster starts populating his forum - a person by the name of $K3PT1C who enjoys poking holes in everyone's theories.The show will be forever changed when the two decide to team up to discuss and research, using a more... hands-on approach.

Book Club Thoughts

the execution of the cafe scene felt cinematic. I could hear the soundtrack stop

i love love love love in AUs when all the same references are there, like the bfu episodes and everything. it makes me kick my feet in glee going "i understand this reference!!"

shane keeping things secret for no reason is in character

i wanna touch on how sweet the ryan and sara friendship is. i love a good platonic m/f friendship

i never did college radio, but this fic makes me feel like i did. it is ridiculously evocative

i gotta say i LOVE so much of shane's dialogue in this. it is SO GOOD, you have studied the fuck out of the way he talks and it shows

I ADORE how 90's this fic is

love how obvious it is that Shane is crushing HARD on Ryan but Ryan is oblivious. Girl, please! He's into you! Sara sees it, why can't you!

i am on the edge of my seat for Mystery

WOULD YOU LIKE TO JOIN US FOR OUR NEXT DISCUSSION? CHECK OUT THE FAQ, AND SEND US AN ASK! IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR FIC RECS, PLEASE CHECK OUT OUR READS, NOMINEES AND BOOK CLUB REC LISTS!

[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Hello once again dear friends!

It is June, and with it, comes the annual Skeptic Believer Book Club LONG READ.

For the entire month of June, the book club gets together and reads a chunky boi, a fic of over 45k words. We had some absolutely stellar nominations this time, and some close votes, but we did arrive at a winner and it was was 6HoST Air by ÉcrivainFantôme.

This casefic is set in the early 90s, and features a Ryan with an underground radio show, a Shane who shows up to skeptic Ryan’s believer, and the team up of the decade, all centered around a mystery that has kept the book club guessing! This week, we read chapters 6 and 7, by ao3′s reckoning, and we had a blast.

Rating: E

Summary: The year is 1993 and Ryan Bergara runs a semi-popular underground radio show for “6H0ST Air” under the pseudonym ‘The Revenant’. Each week, he regales his listeners with unsolved crime stories and supernatural disturbances, asking them for their own theories and stories that they can post on his forum.Soon, another poster starts populating his forum - a person by the name of $K3PT1C who enjoys poking holes in everyone’s theories.The show will be forever changed when the two decide to team up to discuss and research, using a more… hands-on approach.

Book Club Thoughts

I really love the dialogue in this fic it's hilarious and very them

I love when authors in this fandom use the angle that it's their banter and the way they fight that makes them so much fun to watch

oh so yeah since these were the first chapters with sex, holy crap VERY WELL DONE SEX

it's just so Spicy. The dirty talk goes so hard. I love activated Shane

I love the easiness with which a web show translates to a 90s radio show

i think the thing i am most intrigued about is shane's whole entire mystery business

the setting descriptions were real good - i love to be able to picture the place around the characters

imagine, you tell a guy your real name and the first time he uses it is to tell you to turn around so he can fuck you

I also continue to enjoy seeing the weird little meals that Shane gets at Tom's

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[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Hello once again, shippers & readers!

We have come out the other side of June, sparkling and satisfied because as of this week, we have completed our month-long read! Together, we dove head-first into the last four chapters of Ballad of a Thin Man by chapscher.

Contextually, the journey together gave us the rare opportunity to experience the thrills and the twists at the same time and getting to the conclusion and reacting all at once to what we felt was a fitting end (especially in the live read where we were treated to the author themself dramatically reading its conclusion), we are now mostly morose that our current "water cooler" fic is over.

In the end, we were so moved by the dedication the author put into detail and foreshadowing for where the fic took us and it was more than satisfying to be able to bring our long list of analyses about Shane's perspective in this and feel vindication and awe at the ending's execution.

Rating: M

Summary:

He was far too tired for this. He couldn’t even clearly remember what Ryan’s rental car looked like. He told himself that Ryan was probably out parking somewhere and expected Shane to check them in; which was essentially how they worked whenever they filmed on the road. But Shane didn’t think he ever checked them in while he was quite this tired before. He couldn’t even remember getting out of the car. - Shane finds himself in a strange hotel that lingers in the space between memories and the unimagined.

Some Long Book Club Thoughts To Go With Our Theme:

The intimacy at the end is so emotional, somewhat because their injuries prevent more physical intimacy, but also how far they've come to be close.

reading it was like true detective season one, trying as a whole group to put pieces together and find clues and talk through symbolism. very satisfying as a group read

i like, also, inside the sweetness of this moment they're having, this is really the first time all fic we get ryan-and-shane banter

The fic is so lonely up until now. Even though there's been figments for Shane to talk to, he's really just been alone with himself. And now Ryan is there and Shane can let himself really be with him

[the author's] analysis of Shane’s brain is probably one of the best character analyses I’ve ever read

[The author] really manages to be so immersive but without it ever feeling bogged down or too heavy. Like the subject matter is kinda heavy and the mental journey shane takes is A Lot but it’s not so dense storytelling that it slogs along or anything. Which I v much appreciate cuz sometimes stuff like this where it’s so heavy on vibes and esp when it’s all ~ooh it’s in their heads~ it can get tiresome. This didn’t

i love some solid visual psychoanalysis, my first "getting some strong mulholland drive vibes" instinct in chapter one was correct and it was extremely satisfying to experience that wild ride

i love scott and ryan's conversation that we hear, it feels very real and also like we've been dropped into the middle of something that's been going on for days

ryan anguishing over his guilt and trying to stay in the suffer space because he doesn't feel like he deserves rest or food and Scott just kind of coaxing him toward being normal againit's nice

i keep thinking about the two of them irl have sort of tested the waters now and then of dancing together when the whole journey of their relationship and meeting and getting to know one another has been its own parallel dance of never touching whether that's them on opposite sides of the country or in different headspaces in their belief or even now with their work but they're always side by side doing the same thing

THE LOVE CONFESSION AND THEM KISSING SO PASSIONATELY WHILE TEMPORARILY FORGETTING THEIR INJURIES BEFORE IT WAS LIKE OW AND RYAN KISSING SHANE SO BREATHLESS THEY HAD TO STOP LIKE FUCKING FUCKKKKK.

the experience of getting to read the story with so many people in here, going on the journey together, was such a treat.

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[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Hello friends! 

As mentioned in last week’s post, the book club is doing it’s annual long read. In the month of June, we pick a longer fic, something we wouldn’t normally get through in the usual two week span, and let ourselves live inside it for the whole month. 

We’re really in it now, dear readers, as we read chapters four through eight of Ballad of a Thin Man by chapscher. We gathered in our usual places this weekend to talk about these four chapters, and tease out the symbolism and the metaphor, as we follow along with Shane while he tries to resolve his surrealist nightmare into some kind of reality. 

Rating: M

Summary: 

He was far too tired for this. He couldn’t even clearly remember what Ryan’s rental car looked like. He told himself that Ryan was probably out parking somewhere and expected Shane to check them in; which was essentially how they worked whenever they filmed on the road. But Shane didn’t think he ever checked them in while he was quite this tired before. He couldn’t even remember getting out of the car. - Shane finds himself in a strange hotel that lingers in the space between memories and the unimagined.

Book Club Thoughts

I keep growing fascinated with the not quite right world [the author] is building on here, it's unsettling in a way I enjoy a lot

I really love unreliable narrators, the way that you have to keep everything in mind, creating a web as you read along.

this fic is such a great Shane character study

there’s a lot in this about Shane trying to be more comfortable with his individuality.  normally he’d face this kind of stuff with Ryan but he can’t

To me there’s a strong implication that Shane could get lost in this world without the idea of Ryan propelling him forward... which is much like we see him in his career.

I liked very much the device of having Obi sort of be shane's white rabbit

i think [Steven] may be the voice that shane associates with, like, logistical competence. the bones

I love love loved the forest of memory tree stumps

The visual imagery in this was top notch as per usual. The memory pools and surrounding forest just sounded so lovely but the ache of Shane's emotions was present too.

I loved how [the author] took us through the memories like a thematic journey through Shane's inability to communicate who he wants to be to Ryan while being so afraid to be without him to that moment of the both of them sort of arguing and the visceral imagery of the crash

i really like the description of the crash, personally. economical and effective.

Very great stylistic choices all throughout this fic so far

I am so fucking curious about those jellybeans.    

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[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Hello again, shippers & readers!

We're one week into June and it's almost summer, and last summer we took it upon ourselves to try a hand at a long fic. We had loads of fun, experiencing a lengthy, creatively inspiring, and emotional journey together with the fic we chose so we thought, hey, why not make this an annual thing? So we solicited our members to nominate any fic they most would love to read and discuss together that was over 40k in word count.

And so began our journey into the meandering and mysterious landscape of the first four chapters of Ballad of a Thin Man by chapscher.

Many of us are reading this for the first time and we're finding the descriptive haunting prose examining the prison of Shane's thoughts so beautiful and drawing and we're excited to read the next four chapters this week!

Rating: M

Summary:

He was far too tired for this. He couldn’t even clearly remember what Ryan’s rental car looked like. He told himself that Ryan was probably out parking somewhere and expected Shane to check them in; which was essentially how they worked whenever they filmed on the road. But Shane didn’t think he ever checked them in while he was quite this tired before. He couldn’t even remember getting out of the car. - Shane finds himself in a strange hotel that lingers in the space between memories and the unimagined.

Book Club Thoughts

What a story! The atmosphere-setting is akin to Mulholland Drive or Bad Times at the El Royale, quite movie-esque.

There's something about [the author] prose, very evocative and colorful and sets you in the scene very easily

I think one of the things I really about the beginning of the fic is Shane having to, in a way, face his skepticism.

the excerpt where obi is meowing and shane is straining his ears for a hint of ryan speaking to him i wanted to crawl out of my skin and eat my own heart

i have zero idea where it's going because it's got that dream vignette pacing but with enough conscious introspection that it's more unsettling than that, which is a very good thing. love not knowing what to expect and rolling along with it

something that i think is really hard to do in fic is that like, edge of unreality that you can do fairly easily with a more visual medium

i love both shane and then steven's reactions to ryan's body -- it really nails down that air of unreality even before we see steven as the hotel clerk

reading this feels like moving thru molasses but in a very good way. it all feels thick and heavy and so atmospheric.

[The author] very deftly handles the surreal and the absurd which is VERY difficult to do and remain engaging for the reader.

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[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

Hello lovely followers,

Ever wonder about the fics that don’t make it through the final round of voting for the bi-weekly read in the book club? You’re in luck!

The book club is structured so that we solicit nominations from our members, either based on a theme or a trope or simply a request for their favorites, and develop a list of ten nominations, which are then narrowed down to a top three. The top three fics end up in our weekend vote and the winner of that vote becomes our book club fic for that week.

Every year in June, we hold a special Long Read event, where we spend the whole month reading a fic or series that’s too long for our regular discussion cycle, and discussing it over a period of several weeks. Any fic with a word count of 40,000 words or over is eligible for nomination, and as the Long Read only comes around once per year, the bar is high and the voting can get fierce!

Without further ado, the Long Read runners up for 2022 are:

So He Won't Break - drunkkenobi | 40k, E, complete

Shane breaks his ankle and needs help so Ryan offers to stay with him. Lots of hurt/comfort with a side of broken ankle related hijinks and a nice helping of mutual pining.

The Thrilling Case of the Mysterious Five - MiraclesofPaul | 57k, E, complete

Shane has spent the last two years arguing with Agent Bergara, a crazy conspiracy theorist and believer in the supernatural. When a woman goes missing, they hit the road to investigate The Five, a cult that chases UFOs around the country.

Or

An X-Files AU if Mulder and Scully initially hated each other and constantly got into unprofessional arguments.

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[skepticbeliever-bookclub]

As mentioned previously, the Book Club is currently doing its annual Long Read, where we spend a full month tackling a fic that’s longer than we’d normally have time for in one of our regular bi-monthly rounds.

This week we read Chapters 9-12 of Ballad of a Thin Man by chapscher, as Shane begins to unpick the tangled web of metaphor that’s keeping him locked in an inescapable hotel with Ryan’s comatose body, to figure out the truth of what’s happened to him—and what he might need to do to escape.

Rating: M

Summary: 

He was far too tired for this. He couldn’t even clearly remember what Ryan’s rental car looked like. He told himself that Ryan was probably out parking somewhere and expected Shane to check them in; which was essentially how they worked whenever they filmed on the road. But Shane didn’t think he ever checked them in while he was quite this tired before.

He couldn’t even remember getting out of the car.

-

Shane finds himself in a strange hotel that lingers in the space between memories and the unimagined.

Book Club Thoughts

I don’t know if there is anything more intimate than non sexual personal care

There is something so fulfilling there [...] in the discussion of queer love being seen as predatory and the way we all have that innate fear of our feelings and heart being seen as a Problem

so fascinating that Shane imagines Steven to be interested in him the way that he fears Ryan isn’t / and i still can't decide if he's picking on something there or if he's just projecting

every time someone in a fic comes up with a really good show idea, i immediately need it to be a reality

the shane in this fic, i think, on the outside, seems to be performing a lot to hide what he's got going on underneath / the circus acts emphasize that

the visuals in this fic are stunning

it's really just an ingenious move having us read Shane in the middle of "being" with Ryan while being so wholly separated from Ryan; so close to being on the same page but also they're so far away from each other

sometimes the sexiest lines in a fic are just one line that gives your brain the kick start to imagine all the rest of it

every week it gets harder and harder to not give in and read the whole thing, and it's all been so good, the narration, the characterization, the unravelling of plot

it really is his connection to ryan keeping him going which is peak romance to me

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