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f-nodragonart · 5 years

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Alphas and Hive Minds

HTTYD and now Godzilla:KOM have done me too dirty on this topic, I HAVE to rectify this

so let’s break this down

“alphas” are a very human-centric concept (and more arguably, a specifically capitalistic concept), and aren’t typically present in nature in the ways we expect them to be, if at ALL

“dominance” is at best a fluid concept that can sometimes help map out relationships b/t individuals under certain contexts, but it’s NOT an inherent trait. here’s a quote from an excellent article on the subject, PLEASE go read the whole thing:

You can’t really say ‘an animal is dominant’ in the same way that you can’t say ‘an animal is chasing.’ Who is that animal chasing, and who is that animal dominant in relation to?

While there are many hazy definitions of the word dominance in the current scientific literature, the most accepted one that I have seen is that dominance is a factor of a relationship between two individuals regarding control of resources. In this relationship, the submissive individual will allow the dominant individual to have the resource. Theoretically.

What dominance is NOT is a character trait. No animal is born “the alpha.” Studies of wolves in captivity and in the wild have shown that the fact that an individual is the highest-ranking member of one pack has little to no bearing on the animal’s rank if it moves to a new pack. Similarly, studies of parent-raised canids have found that no stable hierarchy forms in litters of pups. And finally, dominance relationships are often based off of the result of a single fight; if two individuals are evenly matched it can be a more or less random conclusion.

as this article goes on to explain, wild wolves typically live in “nuclear families”, so what we perceive as the “alpha couple” is actually just the parental unit to the kids who have yet to leave the nest and start their own families. anything approaching “Alpha/Beta/Omega” among wolves has mostly been observed in captive situations, where a bunch of random wolves are thrown together and forced to navigate their environment together-- it’s uncomfortable for everyone involved

now this isn’t to say that wild animals are NEVER hierarchical-- ranking is useful when dealing with large groups of individuals. however, these hierarchies are generally more complicated than a simple “perfect ladder” concept (again, from the same article):

Figure redrawn from Bradshaw, Blackwell, and Casey, 2009. Dashed lines between pairs indicate no clear dominant individual despite multiple interactions. No line between a pair indicates that the pair rarely interacted.

(while not necessarily an example of wild animal hierarchy since this is mapping out relationships within a group of shelter dogs, it’s a good example of the complexities of larger group relationships)

and one last important quote from that article, relating to submission (seriously, read the whole thing):

So much of the literature focuses on agonistic behavior, yet agonistic behavior is far, far rarer in wild canids than submissive behavior is. In nuclear wolf families, aggression is almost nonexistent.

The word ‘submissive’ has a negative connotation. It suggests a loss of power, a humbling, a subjugation. It might be better to remove it as a label for certain types of canid behavior, in that case. Canids don’t demand submissive behavior from one another, they offer it. Muzzle-biting in wolves, which seems fierce, is usually solicited from the animal being bitten- several times in a row. Far from the popularized “alpha roll,” canids rarely force each other to roll over- they use rolling over as an invitation to play or a plea for affection. This type of affiliative, cohesive behavior makes up the vast majority of all social behavior in canid groups.

A wag of the tail and an open, panting mouth is called submissive by the literature, but in that case, so is a human smile.

while this article focuses on canids, there are plenty of examples of wild groups of animals w/ some sort of ranking/hierarchy (including non-predatory animals!), just be mindful of the sources u look into. even scientific sources could have a bias based on the researcher’s personal social background

even if we ARE treating dominance as an actual trait, or creating a ‘perfect ladder’ hierarchy, there’s a BIG difference between asserting dominance via size/strength/pheromones/etc. vs. straight-up mind-controlling a group to do ur bidding. however, mind-control is unfortunately how most “alpha” media seems to frame dominance, which is simply not even POSSIBLE in nature, as far as we know

this is where we see botched attempts at “hivemind”, which isn’t even present in the hives we associate it with. here’s a post that breaks down social insects RLY well (which I recommend reading in full), but for the sake of this post, I’ll just quote some important sections:

If you think of a social insect colony as a superorganism, which it’s useful to do in many cases, different groups of insects within the colony act like organs. One caste protects the colony from invaders, which is like an immune system. One caste scouts for new places to forage, which is like a sensory system. Generally, science fiction has a good grip on this idea. Where sci-fi authors fail is that they think the queen is the brain of this superorganism. She is not. She is the reproductive system. The queen does not control what happens in the hive any more than your reproductive system controls what happens in your body. (Which is to say, she has some influence, but she is not the brains of the operation.)

~~~

Now, I’ve already told you that the queen is not the brain of the hive. So where is the brain? Well, that is exactly the point of swarm intelligence. The brain does not reside in one particular animal. It’s an emergent property of many animals working together. A colony is not like your body, where your brain sends an impulse to your mouth telling it to move, and it moves. It’s more like when two big groups of people are walking toward each other, and they spontaneously organize themselves into lanes so no one has a collision (x). There’s no leader telling them to do that, but they do it anyway.

Much of the efficiency of social insect colonies comes from very simple behavioral rules (x). Hymenopterans, the group of insects that includes ants, bees, and wasps, have a behavioral rule: work on a task until it is completed, and when it is done, switch to a different task.

~~~

The existential terror of the hive mind in science fiction comes from the loss of the self. The idea is that in a social insect colony, there is no individual, but one whole, united to one purpose. No dissent, disagreement, or conflicting interests occur, just total lockstep. I totally get why that’s scary.

The thing is, it’s just not true of real social insects. There is conflict within colonies all the time, up to and including civil war.

~~~

Here’s what I find weird about depictions of social insects in science fiction. They are portrayed as utterly alien, Other, and horrifying. Yet humans and social insects are very, very similar. The famous sociobiologists E.O. Wilson and Bernard Crespi have both described humans as chimpanzees that took on the lifestyle of ants.

and even worse than a false attempt at hivemind among just one species, “hivemind alphas” in popular media are often shown to control an array of completely separate species! as if all these diverse, uniquely-evolved creatures answer to the same, single power!

"but what if I want to KEEP alphas/hivemind? is there a way to do it ‘right?’”

well, there might just be! here are a few ways I’ve thought of

1) integrate “dominance as a trait” into reasonable caste systems and/or hierarchies

sure, something like “dominance” could theoretically be an inherent trait under certain circumstances, but what would that MEAN for the species this occurs in? this sort of system would evolve for a REASON, so what purpose do castes with different levels of “dominance” serve to the overall community?

does dominance correlate to a certain set of tasks (IE-- alphas fight and protect, omegas gather/grow/prepare food)? or is this simply a way to better keep the peace among a huge group of individuals that would otherwise in-fight too much if there weren’t any genetically-predetermined parameters in place (and if this is the case, what kind of tumultuous relationships must this species have that they wouldn’t be able to solve these issues thru social interaction)? or maybe this is a purely reproductive strategy, and there are either several different sexes based around dominance, or different castes within sexes that perform different sexual/social roles depending on population and breeding season (and if so, how does dominance factor into these reproductive strategies)?

for as much flack as the genre gets, there are a lot of ABO/omegaverse fics that actually do rly cool worldbuilding w/ the concept of “dominance as a trait” and/or genetically-predetermined castes, so I know it can work lmao

2) lean HEAVY into exploring autonomy/individuality and mind control

if u want an alpha that can override the autonomy of others, then don’t shy away from the full implications of that

what does it mean for this society if one single creature can override individual autonomy? what does this level of control mean for individuality-- if that’s even a concept that exists for these creatures? do individuals feel any particular way about their lack of true autonomy-- are they relieved to not be under the pressure of having to making decisions themselves? maybe they even feel that individuality is a psychological death-sentence-- after all, what is anxiety if not the existential dread of individuality?

are alphas born into this position of mental control, or do mentally strong individuals battle for it? if this is the case, are alphas the only ones that could be considered truly autonomous individuals? or perhaps alphas are more of the mouthpiece for the collective consciousness of their community, so their opinions and feelings shift to reflect the average consensus of their community?

if a single creature can control individuals across a wide area (such as across an entire planet), how do they do it? do they have far-spreading pheromones, a loud call, or do they use second-tier individuals to exert their control? or are all individual members of the community connected into a complex neural network? is this network so intimate as to connect all individuals in a mental web that can be tapped into at any moment, despite distance? what can transfer across this network-- complex thoughts/language, visuals, or just emotional suggestions?

also, please think deeply about how far-reaching an alpha’s control is in your world. sure, perhaps a complex neural network evolved early on enough that all of a planet’s species fall under the control of this neural umbrella, but that’s prettyyyy unlikely. a much smaller taxa level makes more sense, like just a species. this species may still be the dominant species of a given planet, but their alphas aren’t controlling EVERYTHING on that planet-- it would be FAR too much effort to control every little ecological system. or at the very least, the control exerted beyond an alpha’s own species would be very weak compared to the full control they exert over their own-- perhaps they can only implant suggestions or telepathically communicate w/ other species?

though just because the alpha’s community consists of a single species doesn’t mean there can’t be diversity-- social insects like ants and bees are a great example of specialized tasks leading to diverse morphology among a species’ castes

3) the society is actually a TRUE superorganism of systems with a leading “brain”

are there even any separate individuals in this world, or is the “alpha” in fact the ‘brain’, and all other ‘individuals’ are their various limbs and organs? real-life hives/colonies without a “brain” allow for highly-efficient, decentralized coordination among as many as thousands of individuals, so what is the advantage of a ‘single’-organism society setup with a single “brain”?

this is a great route to go if u rly RLY want a multi-species hivemind, b/c u could make the base organism a parasite-- cordyceps fungi, anyone? parasites still tend to be species/clade-specific, but at least this physical conduit makes more sense for a multi-species hivemind

-Mod Spiral

#/outs myself as an abo fan to make a point/ anyways #mod spiral #behavior #alphas #hiveminds

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douchebagbrainwaves · 4 years

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THE TROUBLE WITH THE STARTUP FUNDING LANDSCAPE

It was not until Perl 5 if then that the language was suitable for writing serious programs, and yet is taboo in ours, is a good number of unthinkable ideas. People who like orange are tolerated but viewed with suspicion. So the lower we can get the response rate is abominably low at best 15 per million, vs 3000 per million for a catalog mailing, the cost, to them, is practically nothing.1 It might be a good thing for the world. If you see pictures with man-made things in them, it has been a long time, practically to the beginning of the end of my day these meetings are never an interruption.2 So the cheaper your company is to operate, the harder it is to focus more on the idea part and less on the startup part.3 If you take a boring job to give your family a high standard of living, as so many programming languages do. But other considerations can outweigh the advantages of moving.

If you want to take a break from working, I walk into the square, just as a landmark in the history of science, architecture, and the latter because the whole culture cares about design will be sailing upwind. When you take people like this and put them together with other ambitious people, they bloom like dying plants given water. For example, in my database, of.4 I can't write a general purpose function that I can call on any struct. It's not necessarily a problem if you work in sales or marketing. Here is an example of a spam that arrived while I was writing this article.5 You do need to be better to follow the truth wherever it leads.6 Every movie is a Frankenstein, full of imperfections and usually quite different from what was originally envisioned. By 1998, Yahoo was the beneficiary of a de facto Ponzi scheme.7 This technique is successful in the long term, which do you think most will choose?8

Investing is not covered by antitrust law. I wouldn't be surprised if there start to be thrown off. If your eight year old son decides to climb a tall tree, or your teenage daughter decides to date the local bad boy, you won't be selling the company for 20. Why is it conventional to pretend to be a waste of time, that programming languages don't become popular or unpopular based on what expert hackers think of them as rather passive. 06451222 difficult 0. They can be considered in this algorithm by treating them as virtual words. It was a lot of what's good in an article often survives; indeed, the closer the paraphrase is to plagiarism, the more dangerous false positives become, because when the filters are really good, users will be determined by the amount of math you need as a user.9 So once the quality of their product, not the confident media stars they are today. But until this does start to happen, we know VCs are being too conservative. So someone investigated, and sure enough, that patent application had continued in the pipeline for several years after, and finally issued in 2003, but no one told me.10

Not just something you can leave running as a background process. You shouldn't worry about prestige. One way to do great work is to volunteer as a research assistant. In How to Become a Hacker, Eric Raymond describes Lisp as something like Latin or Greek—a language you should learn in college had the same flaw: a very hard problem, blithely approached with hopelessly inadequate techniques.11 The tree structure of large organizations sets an upper bound on freedom, not a side project; its goal was to grow as fast as I can type, then spend several weeks rewriting it. The dream language is beautiful, clean, and terse. So a plan that promises freedom at the expense of those you don't. If you find something broken that you can learn more about this from a wise grandmother or E.12

There is hope for a new techology, than a few years, it would be better for kids in this one case if parents were not so unselfish. Of course, figuring out what you like, but is disastrously lacking in others. When I was a philosophy major in college.13 The harder they squeeze, the further the seed flies, but they didn't have the people yelling insults out of cars. When people are bad at math, they know it, they're big. At first the default reaction of the Slashdot trolls was translated into articulate terms: Who is this guy? Fashion doesn't seem like work to you? Four forces, three of which one could have predicted, and one that would have been, if they hadn't had to write a paper for a class, but because it's more convenient. If a lot of hand-wringing now about declining market share.14 Creating such a corpus would be useful for other kinds of work are like. They may have to like what you do enough that the concept of spare time seems mistaken. On the surface it feels like the kind of group you're meant to like, but what they want to do.

Notes

Sites that habitually linkjack get banned. But it's easy for small children to consider themselves immortal, because she liked the outdoors, was starting an outdoor portal. I was surprised to find may be some number of users to observe—e. Within Viaweb we once had a tiny.

These were the case. Wisdom is just knowing the right thing, because the danger of chasing large investments is not a nice-looking man with a clear plan for the next stage tend to become one of the most successful ones.

Few consciously realize that. In Russia they just kill you, they thought at least once for the manager mostly in Perl, and b I'm satisfied if I could pick them, initially, to drive the old days it was the least correlation between launch magnitude and success. I couldn't believe it, but even there people tend to notice when it's aligned with the melon seed model is more of a startup idea is that in the computer world, and only one.

A has an operator for removing spaces from strings and language B doesn't, that's not the original text would in 1950.

People who value their peace, or much energy would be worth trying to sell or not. But it is possible to have suffered from having been corporate software for so long to send a million dollars. Perl has. Giving away the razor and making more per customer makes it easier to take care of one's markets is ultimately just another way to see the old car they had no government powerful enough to defend their interests in political and legal disputes.

In other words, of course, that it had no natural immunity to dictators. However, it could become a manager. Google Video is badly designed.

An influx of inexpensive but mediocre programmers is the discrepancy between government receipts as a constituency. At this point for me was the first phase of the venture business, and their hands thus tended to make peace. This is why we can't believe anyone would think Y Combinator is we hope visited mostly by technological progress, but in practice investors discount merely predicted revenue, so you'd have reached after lots of back and forth. And while they may end up making something that was a bimodal economy consisting, in which multiple independent buildings are traditionally seen as temporary; there is a down round, though more polite, was one in a company tuned to exploit it.

But it isn't a picture of anything. It's worth taking extreme measures to avoid faces, precisely because they attract so much the better, for example, it's this internal process at work. Then Josh Wilson came in to pick up a solution.

If you want to keep their wings folded, as it might be an open booth. Most of the causes of the rest of the auction. Russell was still saying the same reason parents don't tell the whole story.

I'm not saying you should be especially conservative in this they're perfect.

Inside their heads for someone to invent the steam engine. He had such a discovery. But so far has trained them to justify choices inaction in particular made for other kinds of companies to acquire you.

I don't know. Quite often at YC. Investors will deliberately affect more interest than they have that glazed over look.

Garry Tan pointed out an interesting sort of love is as blind as the little jars in supermarkets.

The two guys were Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston. Believe me, I asked some founders who'd taken series A rounds from top VC funds whether it was overvalued till you run through all the returns come from.

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putris-et-mulier · 8 years

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Deadpool & Rogue are going to be the next "it" couple

Since the beginning of Uncanny Avengers people speculated that Deadpool and Rogue were going to fall in love and so far they've just become good friends but now is a pretty good opportunity to turn that into a romantic relationship.

I've never made it is secret that I love Rogue and that when she isn't with Gambit my heart is broken. Unless it's bad writing I'm okay with seeing them get together with other people because they have an open relationship and if anyone could do polyamory, they could.

So Uncanny Avengers begins and I'm very suspicious of Rogue being on a team with Deadpool because they didn't seem like a good combination. They can certainly relate, they have a lot of common trauma and similar issues but Deadpool relies on humor to deal with it and Rogue doesn't laugh much, she shoves all her pain down and uses it to fuel her determination while fighting on the front lines and she's always fighting on the front lines.

Another thing I wondered about was Rogue being the team leader. Rogue isn't exactly a leader. Storm is a natural leader, she can handle the burden of being a huge population's only hope, she can command an audience of militants, and there's just something about her that demands respect and loyalty.

Rogue just really likes getting in and getting the job done, politics is not her thing.

And she works really well when someone like Storm is calling the shots

Awesome.

and Rogue hates the Avengers. She likes individuals that are and have been members but she was one of the very first mutants to ever fight them and she has lived through every one of their attempts to aid the genocide of mutants

but Deadpool is super excited!

Rogue and Deadpool have never really met but they have run into each other in passing so Rogue does what everyone does and judges Deadpool on his reputation. Meanwhile, she secretly has been poisoned with the Terrigen Mist so her body is slowly becoming deformed while she slowly dies from a terminal disease

That's something Deadpool has lots of experience with so you know from the get go that they are going to at least commiserate

Like I said, Rogue works well as a tank or free agent but she has hard time leading. On their very first mission everyone but Deadpool ignored her orders and went off to do their own thing.

Deadpool seems to be one of the few people who understood and cared that Rogue being leader or even on the Avengers at all came with a lot of subsequent dangers because of racism

Deadpool also isn't a natural leader, like Rogue he works best when you just tell him where to go and let him do his thing. But he's loyal and even though it seems impossible he is more upset about casual racism toward her than she is.

Cable shows up with bad news from the future as he is want to do and he is a leader, a leader both Rogue and Deadpool have worked with. He's also someone that Deadpool loves and respects immensely. Rogue isn't opposed to Cable taking over but before she entrusts him with her teammates lives she wants to know what his objectives are and surprisingly Deadpool agrees with her

It's no surprise that the team is a mess. Captain America stuck a bunch of people of different races together, some pulled from segregated communities, to sell diversity to the media but as always he doesn't exactly understand racism and the team fractures. Cable, Rogue, and Deadpool stick together and actually work behind Captain America's back (which is huge for Deadpool) to find a cure for this poison that was exterminating mutants and stop the Red Skull who had taken the deceased Charles Xavier's brain and was using it to take over the world.

Rogue and Deadpool are actually really good teammates, Deadpool even does things to remind Rogue of home and her family (the X-Men)

(that's a signature X-Men finishing move Colossus and Wolverine use when they are tag teaming)

they even make their own signature move

and they are badass

Rogue puts her faith in Deadpool that he will have her back but still remained wary because he was still Deadpool and she still has all of her baggage and trust issues but suddenly the whole world changes.

Everyone is human, can't remember ever being superheroes, and the world runs like a 50s sitcom. Everyone but Rogue is happy. She's never lived in a world where at least one person wasn't constantly trying to abuse or kill her so even though she doesn't know what's going on she's suspicious of peace

No one knows Rogue's real name so if someone isn't calling her Rogue they usually just call her a few names that sound like it fits and for some reason Rogue has always been fine with that but in this instance it's supposed to be weird

All the X-Men and the kids at their schools have extensive training in blocking psychic/telekinetic/mind control etc. so they can keep their privacy in all of the mutant compounds despite the fact that the biggest gossips are always psychic. Also so shit like this doesn't happen. Rogue arguably has the most training in this for someone who has no psychic powers and through her safeguards she makes herself remember everything and now she has to go find everyone else that is supposed to be on her/their team.

Luckily one of them, Johnny Storm, lives next door so she reminds him that he can control fire by lighting him on fire. Also, he thought his name was Chet

Rogue doesn't give a fuck

Everyone is rounded up pretty quickly and Rogue wakes people up her own way

(Ms. Marvel isn't on her team but she was bicycling by so Rogue snagged her)

No one knows where Deadpool is so Cable, and this is hilarious, has been on so many adventures with him he knows he just has to present an opportunity and Deadpool will appear so he calls 911 and Deadpool immediately shows up in a fire truck

but he doesn't look like himself

Every time Deadpool gets changed into his ideal body he looks like a 70s porn*

So Wade Wilson lives in this pseudo-universe as a "handsome" able-bodied man who is everyone's hero, a firefighter. It's kind of extremely sad and Rogue takes special care with him, much to Johnny's chagrin

I think it's notable that Rogue just has to tell him something is going on and he immediately remembers who he is. Besides he and Rogue, it seems hard for everyone to accept that this picturesque life isn't real. The both of them grew up experiencing the worst of humanity (we don't really know about Rogue's childhood but she was raised into early adulthood by her mother's, so it still couldn't have been super easy considering they were all mutants and also a queer family in the 70s) they are both also very isolated in their own way, a peaceful happy world is so beyond their comprehension so it's artifice would be easy to deconstruct.

You don't see how Cable comes to but I'm pretty sure he immediately was like "not this shit again"

The current mutant genocide is getting worse and Captain America tries to use how much Deadpool admires and loves him to be his informant but Deadpool remained loyal to Rogue and Cable

Captain America wants them to trust the government to save their race to which they said "LOL" and he and Cable fight but Rogue gets fed up

Deadpool tries to explain to Captain America that he had no choice but to side with the X-Men because his daughter is a mutant and is going to die

Deadpool takes the dressing down but Rogue defense him

They are both fired but they still stick together to discuss what they should do and Rogue suggest… Well, she suggests that they go rogue

Rogue isn't a great leader but she's really great at heading side missions or defecting to get the job done with the more hands-on approach. This is up Deadpool's alley so they take off for adventure.

And one protecting the other has become my fetish

We just recently got the conclusion of Rogue, Deadpool, and Cable's team up objective. The Red Skull is using Charles Xavier's brain to infiltrate everyone's brain

and eventually he finds a way to break into to Rogue's mind while she sleeps

and they made a clubhouse with stuff they took from the Avengers

So finally the Red Skull has to be confronted for the final battle and it relies on Rogue and Deadpool. No one has the ability to infiltrate Deadpool's mind because his psyche is so shattered so he's immune and Rogue has training to protect her mind and is one of the few people who can actually take him down so they get to it and call in any support they can get

Cute highlights:

When the tide turns in the battle Rogue is overtaken by the powers of Charles Xavier's brain and the Red Skull has complete control over her, so he uses her as his personal weapon

God, I love her

Thankfully Deadpool is used to things failing so he had a plan. Rogue kills Deadpool as much as she can, the Red Skull gets overconfident and let's guard down, then Deadpool sticks an old helmet of Magneto's on Rogue's head. Seems like that should have been the first thing they should have done but Deadpool getting himself kill over and over got her close enough and in a position where she could take the Red Skull down while he was unaware

But Deadpool had intended to be the one to kill the Red Skull once Rogue incapacitated him but she had hurt him too much

Deadpool is worried that Rogue is going to take it upon herself to kill the red skull as much as she doesn't want any more blood on her hands but the guy has Charles Xavier's brain inside of him so she goes home and the X-Men play operation

That's it! That's their whole story so far. So, should they get together?

I'm biased but don't they make the best brOTP? I love their friendship so so much and it's great to see it slowly develop instead of the writers just miraculously having them get along because it's easier for the story.

Do I think they should date?

Hell yes I do.

It is nice to have genuine friendships in comic books, especially between people of different genders, but this is just too good. Because their friendship was such a slow build the sexual tension feels really organic and that's almost impossible to get in a medium like this. They haven't been friends forever and just because it was convenient they didn't suddenly hook up to further the plot. They are significant characters with significant back stories and the relationship doesn't contradict either of those things. They haven't been almost getting together and getting torn apart like you would have to sit through if story of the relationship was just about their romance.

I'm fine if they remain friends but (unpopular opinion) it would be an amazing relationship with a lot of potential between them; a lot of good and a lot of bad potential which makes the best stories. Unfortunately I don't think they will ever get this opportunity for a "slow build" in other books so how long it will remain interesting would depend on the writer.

And the time schedule.

And whether you guys would buy those issues or not.

Let me know what you think. If you totally hate them together that's cool, I want to hear your perspective. What would you like to happen between them?

#Christy creare #Deadpool #Rogue #Info #Relationship #X-Men

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travelswithzoe-blog · 8 years

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December Book List

I know that I am almost three weeks late with this for which I have no excuse. But prior to heading home for the first time in over eighteen months for Christmas break, I managed to read 15 books which brought my yearly total up 116. In 2016, I had to the goal to read 100 new books so I completed that goal just in time for the New Year. At the end of this post is a list of all of the books that I read. But first, the 16 new ones.

First up, Across the Lines of Conflict edited by Michael Lund and Steve McDonald. This comparative analysis book is compromised of six different conflict-resolution and peace building case studies across countries including Estonia, Tajikistan, Cyprus, Burundi, Sri Lanka and Guyana. While the exact programs in these case studies are not universally applicable, there are many common lessons learned and it made for a really interesting read particularly for anyone interested in the conflict resolution field.

Sister of Mine by Sabra Waldfogel. I got this historical fiction novel for free from Amazon Prime but it turned out to be one of my favorite novels of the month. Set in the lead-up to and during the Civil War, it tells the dual tales of two sisters, one a slave and the mistress, and their lives, trials, their fights and ultimately the forgiveness between them. It was well written and touching.

Next, The Gates of Rome and The Death of Kings by Conn Iggulden. This series by Iggulden focuses on the life of Julius Caesar starting when he was child and presumably going to his death. This first book was interesting since it started years before Julius Caesar was the Caesar who is famous today. I then read the second in the series, which shows Caesar at the beginning of his fame. However, for some reason, I couldn’t get into this Iggulden series like the Mongol series so I stopped after the second one.

The Girl From Krakow by Alex Rosenberg. Another free historical fiction novel set during WWII, it follows a Polish Jewish woman who escapes a Nazi ghetto, fakes an identity and ultimately works for the Nazis in order to survive. It was actually an interesting read but I thought it could have lost fifty pages and been just as good.

Govern Like Us by M.A. Thomas. This book starts with the fundamental argument that poor and developing countries can never govern like rich, first world countries and that the first world governments (including the American government) should stop expecting that of developing countries. Rather, we (first world governments) should try to meet developing countries where they’re at more and seek to understand why these countries often have to depend on governing methods such as corruption, patronage and cronyism.

Appalachian Daughter by Mary Salyers. This novel (which draws from Salyer’s own experience) tells the coming-of-age story of a teenage girl who hails from a poor, conservative and religious family in Appalachia who is struggling to both define herself and escape where she came from. It is well written and I think, portrays a part of America that is often forgotten where it is easy to feel hopeless.

Hope’s Peak by Tony Healy. A good old-fashioned murder mystery (also free on Amazon Prime), it wasn’t a bad read but the ending wasn’t as twisting as I would like in a mystery novel.

All The Beautiful Brides by Rita Herron. Here was a murder mystery that I enjoyed as it had a fair amount of characters and enough plot twists to keep it interesting. If I had to recommend one, it would probably be this.

Dear Departed by Cynthia Harrod Eagles. Amazon Prime certainly does give a lot of murder mysteries for free. Changing the location to urban London, this mystery had some twists but wasn’t my favorite. However, unlike the others, it wasn’t about a serial killer so that switched it up a bit.

Die For Me by Cynthia Eden. My final free murder mystery of the month, this one center’s on a woman who fled from her ex-fiancé when she discovered he was a serial killer. Now he is after her. Not a bad read but not particularly memorable.

While You Were Mine by Ann Howard Creel. A romance novel about a woman who adopts her roommate’s baby once the roommate walks on the whole parenting thing during WWII, this novel is okay. Not particularly memorable but not badly written. I understand why it was free on Amazon Prime.

Worth the Wait by Jamie Beck. A classic romance involving the girl-next-door and the hot boy she has always pined for, this book was predictable but not badly written. If you get your hands on it for free (Amazon Prime) and you need something to read, why not.

Where We Fall by Rochelle B. Weinstein. Almost all of my books this month, I got for free via Amazon Prime and this was no exception. This is a novel about a deteriorating marriage and secrets that emerge after years of lying. Out of all of the free Amazon books I read in December, this is one of the better ones.

Mooncop a graphic novel by Tom Gauld. My first (and only) graphic novel of the year which was actually a Christmas gift for my boyfriend. It was funny in a melancholy way but a very short read. I wouldn’t necessarily buy it but if you read it for free, why not?

And now to list all of the books that I read this year (feel free to stop reading at this point).

1) Parallel Worlds: Rebuilding The Education System In Kosovo 2) Charlie Wilson’s War 3) Fire Season 4) My Brilliant Friend 5) The American Ambassador 6) Between the World and Me 7) Between Serb and Albanian: A History of Kosovo 8) Go Set A Watchman 9) Going Rogue 10) Liberating Paris 11) The Emporer’s Blades 12) The Providence Of Fire 13) Dress Your Family In Corduroy And Denim 14) Oxygen 15) Wave 16) The Sixth Extinction 17) Asking For It 18) Boomerang 19) Catherine the Great: Love, Sex and Power 20) World Order 21) Gang Leader For A Day 22) Bad Feminist 23) A Mother’s Reckoning: Living In The Aftermath Of A Tragedy 24) Dark Places 25) For All The Wrong Reasons 26) Three Cups Of Tea 27) Wuthering Heights 28) American Gods 29) Afterimage 30) The Ten Thousand Things 31) Guns, Germs, And Steel 32) The Last Days Of Dogtown 33) Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything 34) The Glass Palace 35) The Old Man And The Sea 36) The Balkans, 1804-2012: Nationalism, War and the Great Powers 37) Flights Of Love 38) Faceless Killers 39) The Last Mortal Bond 40) The Flood 41) Before Versailles 42) The New Jim Crow 43) Portfolios Of The Poor 44) Reporting Disasters 45) Baby Proof 46) Love The One You’re With 47) First Comes Love 48) The True Story of Hansel and Gretel 49) The Invisible Bridge 50) Skeletons At The Feast 51) Lovely Green Eyes 52) Beautiful Bodies 53) The Places In Between 54) Saint Anything 55) It’s Not Okay 56) American Taboo: A Murder In The Peace Corps 57) Intrusion 58) Inheritance 59) The Daughter Of Union County 60) A Journal Of Sin 61) The Abducted: The Beginning 62) Three Sisters, Three Queens 63) Rogue Lawyer 64) Harry Potter And The Rogue Child 65) Dealing With China 66) Why Nations Fail 67) An Abundance Of Katherines 68) Rescue In Albania 69) On Immunity 70) The Unbroken Line Of The Moon 71) Blood Against The Snow 72) Annette Valon 73) The Old Cape Magic 74) 1222 75) Monique And The Mango Rains 76) Inside The Kingdom 77) Someone Knows My Name 78) All Is Well 79) Wisdom Sits In Places 80) The Princess Bride 81) 1325: Facts And Fables 82) The Taliban Shuffle 83) Birth Of An Empire 84) Lords Of The Bow 85) Keeping Faith 86) Change of Heart 87) Plain Truth 88) Bones Of The Hills 89) Empire Of Silver 90) Against A Crimson Sky 91) We Should All Be Feminists 92) Modern Albanian 93) The Rational Optimist 94) Outpost 95) Daughter Of Fortune 96) May We Be Forgiven 97) Small Great Things 98) The Audacity Of Hope 99) Lady Elizabeth 100) Captive Queen 101) A Secret Kept 102) Across The Lines Of Conflict 103) Sister of Mine 104) The Gates of Rome 105) The Death of Kings 106) The Girl From Krakow 107) Govern Like Us 108) Appalachian Daughter 109) Hope’s Peak 110) All The Beautiful Brides 111) Dear Departed 112) Die For Me 113) While You Were Mine 114) Worth The Wait 115) Where We Fall 116) Mooncop

And with that long list, that’s a wrap folks.

#peace corps #reading #book list

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