#to the point where it was often borderline fetishistic

[gaylactic-fire]

I still maintain there was (and probably still is) a very weird circlejerk surrounding whump/angst in the LU fandom

[globalcatastrophe]

Blonde -2022

Written last year, longlisted for the Anthony Burgess Prize for Arts Journalism.

Blonde – 2022

For a film purportedly about the ‘real Norma Jean’ (or what is left of her), the Great Spirit that is Marilyn Monroe looms large in perpetuity over the narrative, to the point where, as often happens with biopics, the famous images necessarily dominate. Besides, what would the subject be without them? Where would the interest lie in Norma Jean Baker without her conjoined twin? Marilyn stands above the grate, white dress billowing. Marilyn smiles at us with bedroom eyes. Marilyn cries, and finally, Marilyn dies. The Norma Jean that was has by this time faded into the background completely. Presumption takes the place of knowledge when there is very little information to be found that isn’t fabricated by those who knew her the best, honest, or would have known her best or even saved her if only they could have met her, scout’s honour. The controversy of Blonde, shared with the Joyce Carol Oates novel on which it is based, seems to lie chiefly in how many liberties it is appropriate to take when telling the story of a deceased subject who appears to have suffered enough, frankly.

The first act of the film is a passably sensitive examination of a troubled childhood, a sequence of maternal alcoholism and mental illness, paternal absenteeism and eventual near abandonment of poor Norma Jean, what we now can clearly see as the fatal starting gun to her inevitable death race. The second act, the longest, is much wobblier in quality, so brimming with passion play pathos (and talking foetuses) as to be almost comical. After a few scenes with Showgirls-esque line delivery from the principal players, one is tempted to discard the film as yet another piece of underdeveloped Marilynalia, but perhaps it is necessary to look deeper. Ana de Armas (who apparently received approval for her performance from Marilyn herself, such is her omnipotent loyalty that she still makes time for fans from the hereafter) appears on the film poster in perfect Marilyn drag, all thick red lipstick and bleached curls, and the likeness really is rather uncanny at times. She does an impressive job of portraying all the Marilyns we know and love. Marilyn as giggling, dizzy, fizzy movie star, Marilyn as Dostoyevsky reading intellectual and Actors Studio disciple, Marilyn as a grown-up little girl still aching for the love of a father figure, Marilyn as wife, Marilyn as almost-mother, Marilyn as abused object of male (specifically Kennedy) lust and finally, Marilyn the most famous corpse in the world, sprawled upon her satin sheets. Unfortunately, de Armas’ performance as a believable Marilyn is patchy, giving the impression of a Marilyn waxwork or, at darker moments, an act of necromancy gone horribly, horribly wrong. Marilyn the smiling, shining star, transformed into a pitifully weeping child, each tear lavished with attention, the famous red rictus pained and hinting at the horrors to come, as come they do in the third act, the spinning camera turning Marilyn’s Hollywood bungalow into a disorientating house of horrors, claustrophobic Blair Witch impressions in abundance, the dark fairies finally arriving to steal the princess away for good, to eat her up and swallow her.

It is as a horror film that Blonde gives the most satisfactory viewing. As a traditional biopic it is a borderline offensive exercise in stretching artistic licence to its absolute limits. As a raw piece of reflection on Hollywood’s treatment of women, it is too voyeuristic and fetishistic, all-too male to be taken seriously. It does however, work masterfully when considered as an expression of the great booby-trap of fame. Marilyn as the corrupted ideal, a glittering object of fantasy transformed into abjected object of ghoulish pity, to be enjoyed and reviled in equal measure. Ultimately, it says more about ourselves than about her. It speaks to our tabloid hunger for pain and pity. After the execution we soak our handkerchiefs in their blood then wipe our tears with it. In this sense, the Marilyn of Blonde functions as a cipher for several familiar stories of tragic Hollywood doom.

Marilyn’s persistence in our memory is reflective of our continued reverence for sainthood, of death without putrefaction, an object corrupt yet incorrupt. We want her both as we remember her when alive, and we intone the piteous circumstances of her death time and again, in songs, in books, in films. If we view Blonde as a forceful cultural exorcism of one of our most eminent departed, every possible instance of pain considered in conscientious detail, and ended with a full stop, perhaps when the next nostalgia cycle comes around the necromancers will have nothing left to resurrect. No more illusions left to shatter, Marilyn can rest in peace, lipstick, diamonds and satin sheeted death all but forgotten. An unlikely story. The Blonde remains.

[watching-pictures-move]

Movie Review | Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS (Edmonds, 1975)

This review contains spoilers.

Despite my love of cinema in even its less reputable forms, one genre that I’ve hesitated to dive into is Nazisploitation. Quite frankly, a genre built around milking one of the worst crimes in human history for sordid entertainment value seemed a little too tasteless, even for a wildly undiscriminating viewer such as myself. I’ll admit to even having been bothered by allegedly respectable takes on such material (The Night Porter might be one of my most hated films). Yet, as one does when stuck inside during a raging pandemic with limited ways of keeping oneself occupied, with one’s interest piqued by a viewing of a documentary on the subject (Fascism on a Thread, available on Tubi, the best bang-for-your-buck streaming service in that it’s free and actually has a decent amount of good shit), I figured that perhaps I should give it a chance. (I have previously seen Salon Kitty, although I understand that might be a borderline case with its relatively high production values.) And what better way to get acquainted with the genre than by seeing one of its best known and most notorious entries, Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS? After all, the film opens with text telling us that it’s “based on documented fact” and is dedicated with “ with the hope that these heinous crimes will never happen again.” Perhaps it wouldn’t be as disrespectful as I’d expect?

That sentiment lasts for about as long as the opening text is displayed. We first meet Ilsa as she’s getting it on with a prisoner. After they finish, in a wild overreaction to a lousy lay, she has him castrated in the first of many graphic torture sequences and says she’ll be sending off his dismembered...member to some kind of museum dedicated to Aryan superiority. (Depending on how often she does this, I wonder if she ships them in bulk?) The rest of the movie follows a similar pattern. Lots of admiring nudity of both the female prisoners and the female guards, with Ilsa’s cleavage subjected to an especially loving gaze. Various torture scenes with an undeniable fetishistic element: shaving pubes, insulting the male prisoners’ penis sizes, an electrified dildo. (Less overty fetishistic but still notable: there is a scene of a pressurized chamber containing a busty prisoner played by none other than Russ Meyer regular Uschi Digard.) Ilsa herself is undeniably a dominatrix-type figure, her Nazi uniform practically serving as fetish gear. The atrocities depicted in the film are an extremely objectionable step or two beyond what some might call a good time, posing a kind of challenge to the audience: how low will you sink to enjoy some T&A?

The film does have some sense of arc, driven by two primary developments. One, Ilsa beds an American prisoner who not only is able to bring her to climax but can refrain indefinitely from climaxing himself, which results in her becoming the female equivalent of “whipped”, so to speak. (The two funniest moments in the movie involve the drum-and-fife music that plays after this scene, a cross between “Yankee Doodle Dandy” and “Dixie”, and the shocked reaction of another prisoner upon learning his abilities. The American is also tested later with a threesome.) Two, a visit from a general (during which he is entertained by a naked woman hanging over the table onto a block of ice while he has dinner) who seeks to learn about Ilsa’s progress with her experiments but strongly objects to her “private research” (which doesn’t seem all that different from the rest of her handiwork). At the end of the night, he begs Ilsa for a golden shower, an act which manages to repulse even her (despite, you know, everything she’s done in the movie up to this point). The movie climaxes with a revolt by the prisoners led by the American, featuring some low rent action and a fetishized comeuppance for Ilsa (in lingerie, tied with stockings to her bed), followed immediately by the German army putting down the revolt immediately, a downer ending to an overall pretty dismal affair.

On one hand, Ilsa is undeniably a pretty offensive affair, trying to exploit the Holocaust for schlocky entertainment. On the other hand, it’s pretty hard to really be offended by. The movie, despite the opening text, makes little pretense of dealing with its subject in any serious capacity, meaning that any insult to its real life inspirations doesn’t hold water the way it might in a more serious film about the subject. (The Night Porter filming its concentration camp scenes like softcore is more objectionable than Ilsa doing the same as the former actually expects you to take those scenes seriously while the latter is clearly going for thrills, albeit of an extremely degraded kind.) The film was made fast and on the cheap, shot in under two weeks on the sets of the recently canceled Hogan’s Heroes, but the artless, rudimentary filmmaking gives it a certain stylistic purity. The movie delivers exactly what it promises you, no more, no less, without any attempt to alleviate it with style or class. A certain campy quality results from juxtaposition of the bargain basement production values with the slipping German accents of the cast, so that the movie plays like a sketch comedy where the jokes have been replaced by war crimes. If you think the worst thing a movie can be is boring, this certainly isn’t guilty of that.

And it must be said that as Ilsa, Dyanne Thorne is quite watchable. She definitely looks the part, having landed the role after she showed up to the audition dressed in her uniform from her day job as a chauffeur. She plays the character through enthusiastic teeth gnashing and grimacing, doing justice to her character’s dominating and sadistic qualities. (I understand the director Don Edmonds thought the script was the “worst piece of shit [he] ever read.” If she had a similar low opinion of the project, it doesn’t come off in her performance.) She figured heavily as a talking head in Fascism on a Thread, and from her interviews she comes off as a sweet lady who I’m glad got this moment in the spotlight. I understand she reprised the role in a few sequels (one of which was directed by Jess Franco) which mostly sound less morally objectionable than this one, and I can’t say I’ve ruled out seeing them at some point.

[turtletotem]

KissCam

@kernezelda Here is the Cherik fic you won in the second Star Bright release party challenge! I hope you enjoy!!

Inspired by this video clip :)  Also on AO3.

En Sabah Nur portrayed for us here by Oscar Isaac sans smurf makeup.

.

Charles wasn't much of a sports fan, but he wasn't opposed to attending the Yankees game. He'd been following the story of Yankees player Carl DeMarco, who was fighting to keep his contract after coming out as a mutant. When the very handsome Egyptian immigrant who had become Charles's coffee shop pal suggested they make the Yankees game their first date, therefore, Charles was all for it. He bought a "NY <3 DeMarco" flag, wore his big red M lapel pin, and let En Sabah Nur pick him up in a startlingly expensive Mercedes-Benz.

En Sabah Nur had always been friendly, witty, and attentive at the coffee shop, but today he was distracted, constantly on his phone, and far too smug about his car and his expensive clothes, expecting Charles to be impressed. Charles, who could have bought the clothes, the car, and the coffee shop and still had room for a yacht in his monthly allowance, was not impressed. Just because he preferred broken-in tweed jackets and lowering his carbon footprint with public transit didn't mean he was going to get stars in his eyes at the sight of a Rolex watch.

Perhaps Raven was right, Charles thought with a sigh as he paid for his own hot dog and tried to block out Sabah's irate phone conversation. Raven had seen them together often enough—she worked at the coffee shop, which was why Charles went there—and she was convinced he only wanted Charles for his body.

There were worse things to be wanted for, honestly. It was all very well to be loved for your mind, but Charles had encountered enough telepathy fetishists to find a certain relief in straightforward physical lust.

The two seats on Charles's right had been empty; now, with the game about to start, a man about Charles's age helped a frail but bright-eyed older woman into one of them, and sat down next to Charles himself.

"Hey!" Charles barely rescued his soda from the man's careless elbow.

"Watch it!" the man snapped, as if Charles had been the one at fault, only to pause and grimace when he realized his mistake. "Um… sorry."

"No worries," Charles said lightly. "Of course you're focused on your—mother?"

"Yes," the man said, and turned back to the woman in question, fussing over her comfort until she batted him away with a fond expression. He settled in next to her, looking disgruntled.

"Sorry again, about that," he said after a moment, shooting Charles a sideways glance. "It's too cold out here for her, but she's a big baseball fan—us immigrants have to love the Great American Pastime, right? And she insisted on coming to support DeMarco. You're a fan of his, too?" He nodded at the flag.

"Mutant solidarity!" Charles said, flashing his M pin. "Oh—what's that you've got on yours?"

"Mutant solidarity." The man's grin was all teeth, but in a surprisingly attractive way. In terms of appearance he was right up there with Sabah, in fact, lean and chiseled with fascinating gray-green eyes. It took Charles a moment to force his gaze onto the pin the stranger wore in the same place Charles had his mutant M. This pin was larger and made of multicolored metal, a rainbow flag with an M in the middle, and words along the top and bottom. QUEER FREAK.

"Oh, I love that!" Charles cried. "Where did you get it? I'd love to have one!"

The man's cheeks reddened and he looked suddenly bashful. "I made it. I'm a magnetokinetic—I work with metal." He opened his hand, and the pin lifted from his jacket to settle into Charles's hand.

"That's brilliant!" Charles knew he was getting overexcited in the way Raven always teased him about, but he couldn't help it—the infinite variety of mutation was always so fascinating. "Oh, but I couldn't take yours, you need it to show your support—could I commission one from you? Do you have a card?"

"Sure." The man let his pin return to his jacket, and fiddled in his wallet for a minute before handing Charles a card with a phone number, email address and the words Erik Lehnsherr, Custom Metalwork.

"What's your mutation?" the man—Erik, the trim-yet-spiky German name fit him perfectly—was asking.

"I'm a telepath," Charles said, and this was always the tricky moment, seeing how a new acquaintance—even another mutant, sometimes especially another mutant—would react.

"Impressive," Erik said, his eyebrows lifting, and his mental sense (even muted by the thick shields Charles had to erect in a crowd like this) was all interest and admiration, no trepidation at all.

"You're a telepath?"

Charles turned toward Sabah's voice, sudden and sharp on his other side. "Yes? Hadn't I mentioned that? I usually do, I'd rather know sooner than later if it's going to be a problem." That last sentence came out stiffer than Charles intended, but this date already hadn't been going well…

But Sabah didn't look panicked or judgmental. He was smiling, with (finally) a spark of focus in his eyes. It should have gratified Charles, but somehow it unsettled him instead. He tried to remember what Sabah had said his mutation was.

"Quiet now, boys, the game is starting!" Erik's frail mother said excitedly, and they all turned their attention to the ballfield.

It wasn't long, though, before Sabah leaned in close to Charles and caught his eye. Can you hear this, Charles? Can you hear me thinking?

With an inward sigh, Charles replied, Yes, I can hear you.

Sabah's smile widened. That's amazing. What else can you do? Can you…

The stream of obscene scenarios and intricate fantasies that followed could not have all occurred to En Sabah Nur in the last three minutes.

"I'm trying to watch the game, Sabah," Charles said loudly. "We can discuss all that later."

"Oh, okay," Sabah said in a tone that made Charles wish he'd phrased that differently. Something more like We won't be discussing that at all. It wasn't even that Charles was opposed to using his powers in bed; there was indeed some incredible fun to be had that way. But…

Erik, frowning, leaned in close to his other side. "Is this guy bothering you, um… Mister..?"

"Xavier," Charles said automatically. "Charles Xavier. And no, of course not, he's my date, we're just—I'm just—"

"You're just realizing he's a jackass?"

Charles couldn't repress a snort of startled laughter, but was saved from further conversation with either man by DeMarco taking the field. All four of them cheered wildly, waving their flags and, in the case of Erik's mother, unfolding a small banner that she made Erik help her hold up.

The announcers were talking about DeMarco's mutant coming-out, of course, and how various parties were trying to get him disqualified from the league.

"Unbelievable nonsense," Charles said, just as incensed now as the first time he'd heard it. "His mutation doesn't even have anything to do with his performance. The man talks to plants, for heaven's sake."

"It shouldn't matter if his mutation was 'always wins at baseball,'" Erik said next to him. "Everyone's born with natural advantages and disadvantages, they shouldn't penalize DeMarco any more than any other player with the lucky genes for strong arms and long legs."

That sparked a lively argument, which Charles found more intriguing than irritating; Erik had several good points, some of which Charles struggled to refute, and while he criticized Charles's logic without mercy, Erik didn't seem to be remotely angry at him personally.

"What do you think about it, Sabah?" Charles said eventually, chagrined that he had half-forgotten his date.

"Oh, I'm sure you're right, Charles," Sabah said absently, one eye on the game and the other on a text message.

"You're terribly distracted today," Charles said, trying to keep the irritation out of his voice. "Something wrong at work?"

"Oh, you know, there's always something." Taking the hint, Sabah put his phone in his jacket pocket. "If it were easy to take over the world, everyone would do it, right?"

"Er, right," Charles said, trying to remember what it was Sabah did for a living. He was starting to realize he didn't actually know very much about this man, for all of their cozy coffee shop conversations. The 'take over the world' remark had to be a joke, his expression indicated it was a joke, and yet… jokes had a pretty distinctive mental feel, almost like a lie but without the ill intent. That hadn't felt like a joke or a lie to Charles's telepathy.

"What are you and this guy arguing about, anyway?" Sabah asked.

"Mutant rights, what else?"

"Well, I'm in favor of them," Sabah said dryly. "The natural order is for the strong to rule the weak, and mutants are the next step of evolution. Eventually, mere humanity's going to be left in the dust. The sooner the better, in my opinion."

Charles blinked at this calm, confident declaration of a borderline genocidal sentiment. "Well, that's—I mean, mutation is evolution in action, but mutants are human, the next step of humanity, not—I mean we're considerably more alike than not, and there's no reason we can't coexist peacefully—"

"If one or the other has to be on top," Erik said on his other side, "and history suggests one does, it should be mutants. But," he sighed, "in my experience it's a lot easier to say 'screw the baselines' than it is to look at the actual baselines around you and say 'screw you.' My daughter Anya's baseline. My mother's baseline." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at her, then did a double-take. "And she's taken off her coat! Mama, what are you doing?"

"That one itches, schatz. Look, Frankson is going to take third base—yes, he's doing it! Look at him go!"

"Here, she can wear mine," Charles said, shrugging out of his coat; he had a heavy sweater underneath and was a bit overwarm with both.

"Thanks," Erik said, and bullied his mother into the coat.

"If you think he's wrong about things," Sabah murmured to Charles, "you can just… change his mind, can't you?" His voice was disturbingly sultry.

"I certainly cannot," Charles replied coldly, but Sabah only chuckled and turned his attention back to the game.

When Erik settled back into his seat, Charles, feeling squirmy and embarrassed that Sabah had even brought that up, changed the subject. "You have a daughter, you said?"

"Yeah, married my high school sweetheart before I realized I was gay—big mistake for both of us," oh good, he was single, "but it brought us Anya." He started showing Charles pictures on his phone of an elfin dark-haired nine-year-old.

"Oh, look, she has your chin!"

"Yeah, poor thing…"

Mama Lehnsherr gasped and started slapping at Erik's arm.

"What? Mama, what?" Erik cried in alarm, but she was laughing, pointing at the Jumbotron.

"Look, Erik, we're on the KissCam! Or, no, your new friend and his sweetheart are in the center—"

So they were, Charles saw. Saxophone music swelled through the speakers, and all through the stadium people were laughing and cheering in anticipation. Charles had to admit to being charmed by the idea of being on the KissCam; it was delightfully silly and romantic. He turned to Sabah—

Who was on his phone again, turned entirely away from Charles with his finger in his other ear.

Fine. Actually? More than fine.

"Shall we?" Charles said, turning to Erik on his other side.

Erik's eyes widened. Then he smiled, that wild-looking show of teeth that Charles had instantly found endearing, and leaned in. Their mouths met in a warm, firm press that felt shocking and new and yet strangely familiar, as if some deep unconscious part of him had been expecting this, waiting for this. For Erik.

Charles was dimly aware of applause and catcalls, of a surge of laughter throughout the stadium as Sabah turned around and began sputtering in outrage, but he didn't care. As far as he was concerned, the date was over—and something else, something much better, was about to begin.

[mermaidsirennikita]

Book Roundup April/May 2019

This spring has been exceptionally difficult and busy for me on both a personal and professional level.  I really haven’t had the time to read as I’d like--so I’m combining April and May.  With that being said, there were some good books within the past couple of months--Wicked Saints by Emily A. Duncan was DEFINITELY a huge highlight.

Call Me Evie by J.P. Pomare.  2/5.  Kate is held in a remote cabin by Ben--who holds her captive while claiming to protect her from the fallout of something terrible that she did.  The trouble is that Kate can’t remember the night that terrible thing happened.  As she struggles to piece together her memories, what Bill tells her isn’t matching up--and she must reconcile who she is with what she did.  I’m sure that lots of people would love this book, but the pacing was thrown off for me by all of the flashbacks.  It’s not you, it’s me.

Wicked Saints by Emily A. Duncan.  5/5.  Nadya is a Kalyazi cleric, and as such she can commune with--and draw supernatural power from--a pantheon of gods.  She’s spent her life in a monastery; however, a looming threat finally materializes in the form of Tranavian invaders, heretics that send Nadya on the run.  Falling in with Malachiasz, a Tranavian defector, she sets out to end the war she only way she knows how: by killing the Tranavian king.  Meanwhile, Serefin, the heir to the throne, is summoned home from the front--only to discover that he’s in more danger at home than abroad.  This is a wonderfully atmospheric and delightful novel.  Emily never holds back--you get monsters, you get royal politics, you get alcoholic princes and questions of theology.  And there is a romance that I’m absolutely obsessed with, which is always major for me.  I loved this book to death, and there is one bit at the very end that just got at my soul.  I can’t wait for the next installment!

Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens.  3/5.  Kya is a young child when her mother walks out on the family; it isn’t long before her brother and father follow suit, leaving Kya as the borderline-feral Marsh Girl.  At first, she’s dependent on the kindness of strangers.  But gradually--with the help of friends and Tate, a boy who will become her first love--she becomes independent, if never truly accepted by the nearby townspeople.  Her way of life is shattered when a young man shows up dead--and she is accused of murder.  On the plus side, this book was very engaging, and some the descriptions were at times beautiful.  If you’re from the South, some things will indeed ring true.  It’s not perfect, but it is engaging, and a fun if predictable read... until the last third or so, when everything kind of collapses and the book’s flaws are emphasized in a big way.  I really, really disliked how much Owens went in on the “untouched wild beauty” thing with Kya.  It felt very fetishistic.  She’s this beautiful poor white girl living feral in the marsh... learning everything she knows from black people, by the way.  And all the men love her and want to have sex with her.  I’m honestly just torn about this one; I feel like I would have given it a lower rating if not for how much I did enjoy the first chunk.

The Bride Test by Helen Hoang.  4/5.  Khai is accomplished and handsome; however, he’s never had a girlfriend.  On the autism spectrum, he’s convinced himself that he’s incapable of love.  His mother has other ideas--and while visiting her homeland in Vietnam, she meets Esme.  She offers the single mother a golden opportunity: visit America for the summer and convince Khai to marry her.  If he refuses, she can go home, no strings attached.  It’s too much for Esme to possibly turn down--but making Khai fall in love with her is a much more difficult task than she first imagined.  This wasn’t quite up to par with Hoang’s debut (the delightful Kiss Quotient) but I did really, really like it.  Her trademark humor is there, as is her sensitivity and knack for sweet romance.  Khai and Esme’s story is just kind of lovely.  (And sexy.)  I did feel like the ending was a bit rushed--I wanted more.  But I’d recommend it any day, and can’t wait for Hoang’s next book.

Little Darlings by Melanie Golding.  2/5.  Following the birth of her twins, Morgan and Riley, young mother Lauren is exhausted.  Therefore, few believe her when she says that she saw a woman slip into her hospital room and attempt to replace her babies with strange creatures.  A month later, the boys briefly go missing in the park--and when they’re found, Lauren insists that the things that have been returned to her are not her children.  This may have been a bad fit for me--I love magical realism and changelings, but the overwhelming depressing darkness of this book was just... not even vaguely enjoyable.  And it did help put me off of having children for a looong time, if ever.  I couldn’t focus on the writing quality; it was just so dour.

From Scratch by Tembi Locke.  5/5.  This memoir tracks the first few years following the death of Tembi’s husband, Saro, following a long battle with cancer.  As she visits his Sicilian family each summer with their daughter, she flashes back to the early days of their courtship and marriage--as well as her in-law’s initial struggles over the fact that their Italian chef son married an African-American actress.  “From Scratch” is LOVINGLY written and painfully beautiful.  It made me want to be more open to falling in love, as cheesy as that sounds--what Tembi and Saro shared was clearly worth all of the pain she’d feel after seeing him slowly deteriorate and ultimately losing him... which is saying something.  Locke also has a talent for writing in general, but especially about food.  I appreciated her human examination of the prejudice she faced; it’s really obviously on her to decide whether or not to reconcile with people who treated her with clear racism, but...  She also clearly loves and is loved by her mother-in-law now.  The honest complexity in that relationship is refreshing.  I don’t usually love memoirs, but this one was fantastic.

The Unlikely Adventures of the Chergill Sisters by Balli Kaur Jaswal.  4/5.  Rajni, Jezmeen, and Shirina aren’t estranged, exactly, but they don’t have much in common either.  But after their mother’s death, it’s revealed that she charged them with a journey through their ancestral homeland of India.  With each sister carrying secret struggles, they unite in an attempt to fulfill their mother’s wishes--and come to terms with their relationships with not only her, but each other.  Balli Kaur Jaswal is so good.  And even if I didn’t love this quite as much as Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows, it’s still quite good.  She’s a rare author who can blend genuinely funny moments with high drama (that is often socially aware).  There is one subplot that I didn’t super love due to its implications, but otherwise I really enjoyed the book and the sisters.

Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors by Sonali Dev.  3/5.  Trisha Raje is a successful surgeon--who is nonetheless alienated by her blue-blooded family due to her history.  When she meets DJ Caine, a high-profile chef in the running to cook for the prestigious fundraisers supporting her brother’s political campaign, it’s dislike at first sight.  He can’t stand her snobbish bossiness; she finds his assumptions about her frustrating and demeaning.  But even if DJ didn’t need the job, they can’t avoid each other--because Trisha is the only person who can save DJ’s terminally ill sister.  So: Dev says that this is very loosely inspired by Pride and Prejudice, but as the title suggests it’s VERY inspired by Pride and Prejudice.  Points for the genders being swapped here--though DJ does stand in part for Darcy, he’s the Lizzie of this story--and Dev does a great job of bringing cultural backgrounds and social issues into the forefront without beating us over the head with it.  But for whatever reason, I never really clicked with Trisha and DJ’s romance, and the Wickham side of this was... not great.  Still, it’s a fun read and it made me very hungry.  Not bad for a day by the pool!

[orange-you-say]

Your obsession with trans people is borderline fetish-like and quite frankly it's disgusting. You seem to focus only on the fact they they're trans and not the actual person as a whole. I'm trans and there's more to me then just being trans, stop putting that aspect of peoples lives on a golden pedestal. It's creepy and disrespectful.

I can’t decide if you’re someone who’s just unaware of why I post what I do, or perfectly aware of what I’m doing and trying to guilt me into stopping, but just in case allow me to explain:When people first started suggesting Ticker was a trans woman, it was an absolute shitshow. Transhobes came out in droves to insist that she was actually a man, or that she wasn’t trans, and used every scrap of evidence at their disposal to “prove” their points. Some of them went on to foolishly declare that they wouldn’t be involved with the Tumblr warframe community until we shut up about it. The logical response, to me then, was to yell as loud and as often as I can about it to discourage them from ever being involved in the Tumblr Warframe community again.

I won’t try to tell you that you’re wrong - you’re free to think of me as you will! But the reason it seems like I’m hyperfocusing on her being trans over any other aspect of her character is probably because she doesn’t have a lot of character yet. She’s a hot mess right now, and that’s a fair and valid criticism to have for her! She needs to be given more character to be considered good representation to be sure, but she’s a start, at least, and if her being trans is turned into a negative thing in the eyes of the devs, we’ll lose even the foot in the door she provides. I’d rather there be a portion of people who think I’m a bad person for hyping her up on this site than a loud minority saying bad things about her!

If you think the way I talk about Ticker is “fetishistic” or in some other way disrespectful you’re welcome to tell me exactly what I said that left that impression, and I’ll be careful to avoid that language in the future! But if you want me to stop talking about Ticker being a trans woman, that’s something I’m not about to compromise on. I’m certainly not the most qualified person to talk about trans issues, but I feel this is a case where if I stay silent on the issue I may as well just side with the transphobes.

Have a great day!

[ohmythatoikawaboy]

dasfreefree said: The person I was thinking of ended up moving URLs but her old blog doesn’t say to where. HOWEVER, given how this users talks about how much she hates the fandom (or more specifically, Western fandom. I’ve seen her glorify Japanese fandom to the point that it was borderline fetishist….so yikes), gushes over OiKage, and blatantly insults Hinata for no mature reason, I have a lot of reason to believe this is the same person. She’s gross and immature.

dasfreefree said: ALSO I’M LAUGHING because my mom’s name is Susan lmfao. But your sass here was brilliant

I’M. CRYING. I DIDN’T KNOW YOUR MOM’S NAME IS SUSAN, I’M SORRY x’D (disclaimer: this isn’t an attack to your mom; so much respect for your mom)

And that makes sense. This kind of people has to move often because people just get tired of that BS and they lose their reputation (if they ever have any).

(That’s... gross.)

[amorremanet]

Arthur/moody, lucius/moody, lupin/snape?

the brutally honest ship opinions game

Arthur/Moody: ……okay, like, I have basically no positive feelings about Alastor Moody — I mean, I feel the same need to defend him from JKR’s ableist garbage that accidentally got me in too deep with Lockhart, but we are still talking about a guy who supports using Dementors on people and apparently dngaf about what someone’s done, just send ‘em all to fucking Azkaban (GOF ch. 30, the flashback of Moody we see in the first Pensieve scene)

who thinks that the best present you could give to a kid who’s lost his parents and just watched a classmate be murdered…… is going over a photo of the First War Order and telling him about how all of them died horribly and he doesn’t ever stop to think that this might not be the best idea (OOTP)

and who is legitimately less sensitive to other people’s needs and less dismissive of people who aren’t his exact model of “useful” than a literal fucking Death Eater one of the biggest points where Barty Crouch Jr. drops character in GOF is when he takes Neville to his office and gives him a pro-Herbology pep-talk, and goes, “so, hey, Longbottom, Professor Sprout said you’re super-good at this subject, why not pursue it,” because based on the actual canon about him? The real Alastor Moody would never do something like that.

Like, he might have the moment he has with Harry and Hermione, where he goes, “so, hey, both of you could be gr10 aurors if you wanted, you should think about it” because that, from Moody, would be a compliment, and Harry and Hermione more closely fit his own ideas of usefulness, but not so much the Neville moment)

—but seriously, do you hate him or something? Why else would you even dream of shipping him with Arthur Weasley? (okay, fine, I acquiesce that there is enough of a canonical basis for some people to roll with here, and I myself have made ships out of far less…… but seriously, why would you ship anybody with Arthur Weasley. Like…… wow, rude.)

Lucius/Moody: again, I’m not on the Alastor Moody fan-train or anything, but why would you even do this. Nobody deserves to be shipped with Lucius Malfoy, like? He’s not even an entertaining villain, he’s just pathetic. He’s a sad, pathetic fantasy-fascist who gets his kicks by bullying twelve-year-olds and torturing muggles who can’t defend themselves. He’s a complete waste of character space and forcing anyone to be in a ship with him is just unfathomably cruel

Lupin/Snape: meh, whatever. Like, it’s not my thing, but… *shrugs* meh?

Like, idk what you’re looking for here, nonny, but I’m guessing, based on the other two ships, that you’re looking for me to get cranky and ship-bashy and figured that Snu//pin was a good way to get there, since there are a lot of legitimate Problems with this ship in the text

But the thing is, I’m just under 900 years old (at least in fandom terms), and I remember the days back before HBP came out, when Snu//pin was the second-most popular Remus ship (after Wolfstar, to the surprise of no one), and was, in fact, so popular that it had its own private archive and got black-listed from most rarepair comms because it, “wasn’t really rare, just less popular than D//rarry, Wolfstar, Ro//mione, Dra//mione, H//inny, and J//ily”

—I mean, there was a short stretch before OOTP where I tried to make myself like it because there was a BNF whose art I loved, and she shipped Snu//pin, so I felt like I had to be missing something obvious and cool and because I was, like, twelve, I tried to make myself ship the thing. That didn’t work and I eventually just moved on, but one thing that I recall about the Snu//pin fandom that appears to still be more or less true, based on everything I’ve seen of the present-day Snu//pin fandom?

Is that they came out about the same as the Wolfstar fandom, in terms of how many shippers ignored or made excuses for #Problematic things about the ship vs. how many shippers work those things into the overall fabric of how they ship the thing, how many shippers LIKE the ship because of those Problematic parts and having the opportunity to explore them in fiction, how many shippers actively dive head-first into exploring those parts of the ships because that’s where they find the most engaging character interactions or whatever they’re into, etc.

For examples of what I mean when I say #Problematic things about the ships:

the fact that all three of them are self-loathing [human or werewolf] disasters who are often passively suicidal and either prone to acting out on those feelings (Sirius and Severus), or prone to repressing those feelings until they explode all over some innocent bystanders (Remus)

the fact that all three of them have suffered horrific abuse in their pasts — whether from their parents or other sources — and find ways to take it out on other people (Severus on his students, Sirius on Severus and Kreacher, and Remus on almost anyone who tries to get close to him, even as he makes it seem like he isn’t doing that)

Severus outing Remus as a werewolf because he’s upset and felt like punishing someone else for it, thereby leading to Remus tendering his resignation

the fact that Sirius assuming Remus had to be the spy would’ve been at least partially based on anti-werewolf prejudices, and Sirius still clearly had at least some of those prejudices on his own, because even if Peter totally manipulated them in his favor, there had to be something there for Peter to manipulate in the first place, so???

the fact that Remus doesn’t help shit anything, in any situation ever, with his habit of trying to weasel out of any Emotionally Difficult™ conversations and his tendency to mentally spin most situations so that everyone is going to leave him in the end anyway so it’s acceptable to shut down, close himself off, and pull stunts that more or less come down to, “totally up and bailing on everyone,” which is understandable, given his backstory, but dude, that doesn’t make it okay or helpful??

basically, “literally anything about the characters as individuals, or in terms of their interactions with each other — both past and present — that could potentially cause problems for either/both/any/all of them and potentially make the relationship unhealthy (or unhealthier than it already was, in the cases of Snu//pin and Snack because…… oh boy, let’s not even act like either of those — or any ship with Sev in it, for that matter — is ever going to be ‘healthy’ by any definition)”

So, like? Is Snupin #Problematic? Yes, definitely. Are some of its shippers prone to ship it in #Problematic ways? Oh, yes, absolutely (Hell, the BNF whose art I used to like even flat-out said things like, “Sirius would never be able to be there for Remus like Snape could” and… um? Even granted that this was pre-OOTP: ummm???)

But on the whole, Snu//pin shippers aren’t actually any worse about totally ignoring and/or excusing these elements of their ship than Wolfstar shippers are (and, actually, they might be doing better than a LOT of the present-day Wolfstar fandom, since I usually don’t see any more recently made Snu//pin that doesn’t grapple with at least some of the #Problematic elements of it — they don’t always do it well, but at least they’re trying, which counts for a lot, to me, because most people don’t even try — while most Wolfstar these days flat-out ignores all the #Problematic elements of Sirius and Remus as characters, and of their relationship, in the name of what often amounts to borderline-OOC caricatured fanon nonsense, so…)

(……Look, I love Wolfstar, and I have for longer than some people on this website have been alive. But I don’t love a lot of Wolfstar shippers, which has been the case since the beginning of my Wolfstar shipping

stayed the case when HBP came out and I was all, “Hey, guys? I don’t like this BS Remus/Tonks thing either, but can we NOT erase bisexuals or treat Tonks like garbage when we’re talking about it, it’s not her fault that Molly Weasley is a meddling nosy garbage buttinski who thinks it’s her job to play matchmaker to fully-grown adults who didn’t ask and don’t want her input,”

and is still the case as I’m over here, all like, “ugh, man, at least we used to have SOME people in this fandom who enjoyed reading Wolfstar angst, now it seems like nobody cares about anything unless it’s all fluff, all the time, with absolutely no room for anything else because god forbid you ever want to write about LGBTQ characters whose lives aren’t 5,000% perfect, that obviously must mean that you’re a gross fetishistic cishet and not, for example, a neurodivergent, mentally ill lesbian survivor who feels left out by the trend towards forcing every LGBTQ person to act like we’re happy, all the time, and to act like we’re only interested in fictional LGBTQ people who are perfectly 5,000% happy all the time

“and to decry any and all depictions of LGBTQ people being UNhappy as gross fetishistic straight people garbage even when they were actually created by and for LGBTQ people, only to be misappropriated by straight people, as if there’s no way you could possibly be LGBTQ and NOT feel ~used and maligned~ by depictions of LGBTQ people that are less than 5,000% perfectly happy, even when they are being created by other LGBTQ people, yeah? ……but yeah, no, clearly: the fact that I like angst obviously means that I am a straight person because no ~real~ LGBTQ person ever has any need for those ~gross negative feelings~ or fictional outlets for them, never mind how many LGBTQ people get excluded from our narratives and spaces by this bullshit bc lmao who cares amiright. ://”)

—anyway, my motto has been and remains, “It isn’t a question of WHAT you ship, it’s a question of HOW you ship it,” so hey. Snu//pin is not my thing (it’s not even as non-shippingly interesting to me as Sirius/Severus is, because I love how much those two hate each other while unwittingly being perfect foils for each other), but I don’t actually have any desire to ship-bash it and most Snu//pin shippers are okay with me because unless they’re actually doing anything that’s harmful to anyone else, it’s not my business what they ship

That said: “Snu//pin” is still one of the worst portmanteau ship names ever and it still sounds like a deadly virus or something, but *shrugs* Whatever, it’s not the shippers’ faults that their ship members’ names don’t smush up all that nicely

[algrenion]

idk how many folks here watch Soft White Underbelly on YouTube but something's bothering me about it so im just gonna ramble for a hot second

discussions of #tw child abuse #tw csa #tw pedophilia #tw addiction

so the people featured on SWU are absolutely fascinating and i think we need more projects like it, where real people can go to experience other real people, having open conversations about what would normally be considered taboo, without limitations

but i'm not gonna lie, there's something... uncomfortable (?) about the way that Mark Laita goes about some of these interviews... it feels borderline fetishistic at times, sort of teetering on the edge between journalism and exploitation porn

and though i'm not an expert, i am someone that has similar interests in the human condition and i guess ""dark"" subject matters, and i'm someone that has interviewed people in difficult living situations for projects in the past. I'm not saying i know better than Mark Laita. But it's something you need to be very delicate with in your approach, and i fear as i watch his videos that he may have forgotten this in the sheer volume of his body of work - you're not a therapist, you are a photographer or an artist or a journalist, and you need to consider carefully what your project's impact on these peoples' lives will be. You need to consider that you might reopen old and new wounds for your interviewee. You need to weigh the benefits to the collection of this "data" so to speak, against the impact it will have on the individual it is collected from.

on one hand i understand the need to ask difficult questions, but there is just something... off, about his approach sometimes. Especially in his interviews with sex offenders where i feel like his phrasing can be stunningly inappropriate. I believe he said at some point that when he interviewed a pedophile, he worded questions along the lines of "how many boys did you 'fool around' with" in order to build rapport with the man which is just unacceptable, reckless, and dangerous. To purposely downplay the severity of the crime in order to cozy up to your interviewee - a convicted child abuser - why? i don't care what your good intentions were in a situation like that, you are potentially undoing years of rehabilitation therapy for the sake of a 10 minute YouTube video. You have to consider that in such a serious discussion, you could be a line between this man reoffending or not. That might seem like a stretch. But knowing through the interviews themselves how these types of sex offenders operate, sometimes it only takes the most thinly veiled excuse for them to seize that opportunity - and in that interview alone, this man very clearly had little remorse for his victims.

I just feel like this kind of journalism needs to be kept in check, and broken down over and over, and discussed often because if it isn't, it is a field of art that could be rife with exploitation and terrible mistakes to be made.

If you ask me a good example of it done well (at least from what i've seen of it) is Syrmor's VR chats with people from all walks of life. It's a little silly, considering it's in VR and you end up talking to like, baby yoda about his family situation, or a penguin about his war crimes, but i do feel like he does the same kind of work without... making it weird? Without making it feel exploitative. He builds that rapport that Mark Laita wants to build, but more naturally, more kindly, with more empathy and less of a seeming "reward" to get out of it. They are just conversations, where I feel like SWU sometimes stops being a conversation and ends up being more like shining a flashlight in the faces of poor people. Syrmor comes across as more human. Which at the end of the day, is what these kinds of interviews are supposed to be all about.

Okay i've said my piece, just wanted to get that all off my chest. I do appreciate Soft White Underbelly and their featured guests regardless, the videos themselves and the people in them are fascinating, and sometimes amazing. I just have a few bones to pick with the process of how they are made. And that’s not even to say every video has that vibe, just some. 

I should add too that i think they facilitate some incredible and sometimes even life changing work and I hope they’ll continue with that, but i want them to keep themselves focused on that as a goal. On helping people.

[ofeliaseay4423-blog]

Check out Pets Crazy Bug Permits You Fire Folks In Cars Without Alerting Polices.

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If you're possessing headaches of a driverless vehicle apocalypse in 2015 all at once number from very early instances freak out on the M25, don't stress. The study evaluated vehicles aged 3 to eight years of ages, and found the 10 models that endured the fewest break downs. Self-driving cars and trucks, like normal autos, are actually a means to maintain performing this when loose temperature adjustment requirements that our team escape off autos. This needs to be capable of separating as well as acknowledging in between automobiles, bikes, folks, animals as well as other objects and also the street surface area, where the automobile resides in relationship to integrated maps and have the ability to react to a commonly unforeseeable atmosphere. And all completely free - for which Polytopia deserves to control your Android activity time for a really good lengthy while. This is one from the finest automobile movies ever before committed to movie if you're at all a cars and truck fetishist.

[abigailmcgarvie-blog]

A Motor vehicle Shipping Quote For Your Spending plan.

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Even more operational than the majority of the cars and trucks on this listing, the Emphasis Electric will not possess any person daydreaming concerning its appearances, yet that normalises the electrical auto in a manner that's crucial if they're ever before to come to be the planet's prevalent form of car. When they started prepping for jihad by going to a nearby fitness center, that is thought the physical fitness fanatic and also physical body builder may have additionally happened right into call with participants from the group. I enjoy a great contraries entice love story and also this is actually an ideal instance of shocking expectations ... with a snack. To generate a driverless auto will certainly demand a substantial volume from progression, and not merely for Apple; our authorities still have to create road infrastructure as well as regulations to the point where self-governing cars may be genuinely utilized in public. 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The JL Audio MBT-RX is a $50 Bluetooth receiver you may simply hardwire in to a car if your car already has a factory amp. The automobiles could not be actually even more different however they discussed the very same goal: going a lot faster in comparison to the other individuals. On the contrary, any individual buying a made use of luxury or functionality automobile should firmly take into consideration the CPO version from an automobile over an as-is previously owned cars and truck. A lot more notably, vehicles along with sensors as well as intellect would react faster compared to people to hurdles. On one palm, the majority of folks would certainly anticipate a driverless auto to decrease the effect in the event that of an inescapable mishap, however, the same folks would certainly differ coming from purchasing an automobile that might at times compromise their own lifestyles in major street circumstances. There is actually only one issue: the Seat Alhambra does all those traits - certainly, this is actually essentially the exact same cars and truck - however expenses considerably less. Next to him, I realized Sebastian, a friend of his, however I hardly recognized him. It needs to be capable of identifying as well as differentiating between cars and trucks, bikes, individuals, animals as well as various other items in addition to the street surface, where the car resides in association to built-in maps and also be able to respond to an often unforeseeable setting. Plus all totally free - for which Polytopia ought to have to dominate your Android game opportunity for an excellent long although. This is one from the greatest auto films ever before devoted to movie if you are actually at all an automobile fetishist.

[mermaidsirennikita]

March 2018 Book Roundup

I read a lot of books this month!  And two of them were actually five star reads, which I would recommend for completely different reasons.  Read A Girl Like That by Tanaz Bhathena if you want to be completely devastated.  Read To Kill A Kingdom by Alexandra Christo if you want a fantastic fairy tale romp with a good bit of blood.  But like, read both?  There was also one pretty big disappointment (that was still by no means a failure, this book just got hyped to hell) and a book I actually hated.  So like, a mixed bag!

The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton.  4/5.  In Orleans, beauty drives people--in part because they don’t naturally have it.  They’re born gray-skinned, red-eyed, and ugly; and this can only be changed with the help of a Belle, one of the lovely young women with the power to (temporarily) manipulate people’s physical appearances.  Camellia is making her Belle debut with her sisters--but only one can get the coveted spot of the queen’s favorite, working on the royal family.  Initially, Camellia is passed over; but when her winning sister mysteriously vacates the spot, she is thrust into the role of favorite and tasked with the seemingly impossible feat of healing the queen’s older daughter who’s been in a coma for years.  As it turns out, the fate of Orleans could very well hang in the balance.  On the surface, I thought that The Belles would be like a lot of those YA fantasy/dystopian books centered on looks that is basically a transparent riff on reality shows/21st century pop culture meets Harry Potter/The Hunger Games/What Have You.  In fact, the way the Belles work in their world is very much its own thing, and Clayton does a lovely job of weaving in these super sugary descriptions--obviously drawing from the French royal court of Marie Antoinette or Louis XIV--while never dropping this sense of mystery and dread.  Part of that mystery revolves around what the Belles really are, and to be honest I’m still not 100% sure about that--but this is the beginning of a series, and it’s incredibly intriguing.  Furthermore, the horror factor was much more present than I expected.  It’s a book that gets a lot out of the eeriness behind what people do for beauty--the only thing it needs to work on, for me, is fleshing out the characters a bit more.

Bygone Badass Broads by Mackenzi Lee.  3/5.  Lee expands on her popular Twitter series, telling the stories of women who have been scrubbed from history because they’re not white enough, not straight enough, not cis enough, or otherwise too transgressive in some other ways.  Basically, this is one of those books that lists dozens of rebellious or unusual women, and I tend to love that.  I wouldn’t say that this book is bad, but it also doesn’t rank super high in the subgenre.  Yes, Lee does a great job of digging up women that even I hadn’t heard of (and I say “even” because again, I read a lot of books like this) but the write-ups are so short (about three-ish pages on Nook each) that I didn’t get a lot out of them.  Which of course allows Lee to include more women, but I would have rather seen more about each woman and less women in general, especially as some were honestly--less impressive than others.  As important as lady publishers are, I feel like there’s less intrigue and yeah, importance overall to their stories compared to those about women like the Maribel sisters.  There were a couple of women included who were borderline legends as well, and I don’t know...  Maybe cut them in favor of the women who definitely did something?  Furthermore, there’s a huge imbalance in time periods, or at least it felt that way--I mean, it seemed like most of the ladies were from the nineteenth century and onward.  And that’s just a matter of personal taste--I’m more interested in history from ancient times to the eighteenth century.  Nineteenth century is where my interest begins to wane a bit!  But with that being said, it’s not a bad book and definitely a nice, quick read when you want to discover some interesting women written about in a chatty tone.

A Girl Like That by Tanaz Bhathena.  5/5.  For most of her life, Zarin--an Indian immigrant to Saudi Arabia--has been viewed as a bad girl.  She’s seen that way by the mentally ill aunt who raised her, subjected to abuse in part simply because she’s a “bastard orphan”.  Her uncle sympathizes but won’t actually help.  The girls at school and their mothers see her as a flirt and a bad influence.  The only person who seems to give Zarin a chance is Porus, the boy who worships the ground she walks on, no matter how careless she is about his feelings.  Now Porus and Zarin are dead in a car accident, and few know what actually lead up to it; in bits and pieces, from multiple perspectives, we learn the reality of Zarin’s life, and why she was far more than “a girl like that”.  First off, this book is absolutely heartbreaking.  Though you know from page one that Zarin and Porus are dead, you still fall in love with them and there’s this sense of dread throughout as you get closer and closer to their deaths.  Zarin is one of the best YA protagonists I’ve read about in a while--flawed but incredibly human, easy to relate to, and terribly wounded in a way that isn’t over the top.  And Porus isn’t a knight in shining armor, he’s a romantic boy in love with a girl who may or may not want him back, and the book doesn’t hesitate to call him out for his white knight-ing while not abandoning his inherent goodness (which is implied to be present because he had the influence of a good father, whereas the other, less good boys in the book are following the examples of shitty fathers).  It was great to read a YA contemporary novel that was set somewhere other than America, or even Europe.  The author has a background similar to Zarin’s, so she’s not talking out of her ass here.  And there’s a deep sympathy for almost every character in the book--even when they’re horrible, they aren’t mindless villains.  There are cultural and religious elements at play, and none of them are good or bad without cause.  As a warning, rape and abuse (sexual and otherwise) are themes throughout the book, as is depression, suicidal ideation, and more.  It’s not an easy read.  But it should absolutely be read.

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn.  4/5.  Anna is an agoraphobe and classic cinema fan, spending her days talking to fellow agoraphobes on a message board and her nights watching movies--and spying on her neighbors.  She hasn’t left her home in ten months, doesn’t live with her husband and daughter anymore, and seems beyond hope when her new neighbor Jane visits and breathes new life into her boring routine.  No sooner has Anna made a friend, however, than she sees something horrible happen in Jane’s home.  The issue?  Everyone--including the police--say that it didn’t happen.  This book is a clear Rear Window tribute, and acknowledges as much--in fact, Anna’s obsession with classic thrillers, along with her alcoholism and psych meds, probably contribute to her status as an unreliable narrator.  And I love an unreliable narrator.  Anna is flawed without losing my sympathy (another favorite character type) and while I can’t say that this is the most original thriller I’ve read, it’s entertaining and well-done and even a bit emotional.  Definitely satisfying.

Rosemarked by Livia Blackburne.  2/5.  Zivah is a healer, struck down by the same plague she’s been treating people for--the rose plague.  It will shorten her life but kill her slowly, isolating her in a little cottage (think shades of leprosy, but not as gross, of course). Dineas has survived the same plague, leaving him immune, and has escaped the Amparans who tortured him to the point of breaking.  His desire to liberate his people brings him to Zivah, who wants to make the remainder of her life mean something--and together the two unite on a mission to steal from the capital.  I think.  Honestly, this book was so boring that I wasn’t really absorbing much of the plot.  In theory, it’s such a cool idea: a slow-burn romance between a warrior and a dying healer that has them acting as spies.  But it’s told in alternating perspectives, and Dineas and Zivah are both so bland that I couldn’t really tell the difference between the two of them. There was a lot of summary without much urgency.  Also: the romance is clearly meant to be a big part of the story.  However, Dineas and Zivah lack chemistry, and this issue is only exacerbated by the fact that... for reasons... which I didn’t totally get... Dineas keeps having his memory taken away?  Willingly?  “For the mission”.  So Zivah is supposedly falling in love with amnesiac Dineas, who isn’t even really Dineas completely--or is he???  God, it made no sense.

Awayland by Ramona Ausubel.  3/5.  A collection of short stories capturing the feelings of dreaminess and wanderlust, often with a dose of magical realism.  This book is very difficult for me to describe, in part because it’s just kind of weird?  Definitely well-written if you like pretty, sometimes purple prose.  There were a few stories I really liked, some that simply baffled me, and in general I loved the sense of the different lands the author described.  However, one story made me particularly uncomfortable in the almost fetishistic way that it described Africa, and I can’t help but feel how... deliberately vague... it seems to be.  And I’m not sure what to think about that.

To Kill A Kingdom by Alexandra Christo.  5/5.  Princess Lira has seventeen hearts in her bedroom.  The daughter of the siren Sea Queen, Lira waits for the day that she takes her mother’s throne, building a fearsome reputation by taking the still-beating hearts of princes.  Prince Elian isn’t so dissimilar--however, he sails the seas killing sirens, and his reputation has made him a prize for the sirens.  After killing one of her mother’s subjects, Lira is punished with a human form.  The only way she can return to her true body--and remain her mother’s heir--is to get Elian’s heart--without any of her powers.  This Little Mermaid retelling is dark--focusing a good bit on the effects of abusive parenting--and bloody, starring a monster princess and a prince who isn’t so nice either.  Yes, it’s a story of two people who are mortal enemies hating each other until they maybe don’t so much.  Yes, it’s full of the various lands Elias and Lira visit and all of their royal families.  Yes, it was one of the most fun and engaging books I’ve read in a long time, and certainly one of the best fairy tale retellings I’ve read.  READ IT.

Blood Water Paint by Joy McCullough.  3/5.  A verse-driven retelling of Artemisia Gentileschi’s rape and its aftermath, interspersed with stories of the women who would inspire some of her most famous works.  Let me tell you this upfront: I feel that other people would enjoy this book much more than I did.  It’s written in a lovely way--the stories of Judith and Susanna are told by Artemisia’s mother, almost as bedtime stories, which is... a bit weird, but cool--and it is an incredibly important, if brutal, story.  It’s also, at face value, pretty accurate: Artemisia was the daughter of a mediocre painter who she learned from and surpassed; she was raped by Agostino Tassi after an initial romance; she was tortured in court to prove that she wasn’t lying about her rape.  The story does skirt over the fact that Artemisia wanted to marry her rapist, and his refusal to marry her drove her to seek justice--not the rape on its own.  And that bothered me, the lack of real confrontation of that fact.  Because it renders Artemisia an “imperfect victim”, and few rape survivors ARE perfect victims.  Certainly, few in the seventeenth century fit a twenty-first century idea of what rape survivors are like.  And that was a huge issue with the book in general.  Artemisia--and her mother, to an extent--thought and sounded like twenty-first century women.  Artemisia approached painting like a twenty-first century artist.  As someone who has studied Italian painting of this era, and how Italian women painters were treated and acted, it just... didn’t sit well for me.  Sure, the whole book was stylized, but you can have a stylized story without losing authenticity.  Again, this will probably be a fantastic book for people who don’t share my background with the story.  But it didn’t work for me.

The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw.  1/5.  Two centuries ago, the people of Sparrow drowned the three Swan sisters, all accused witches.  Ever since then, the sisters have returned every summer, possessing innocent girls until the solstice to seduce and drown boys.  Penny Talbot is familiar with the legend, and therefore hasn’t let herself get attached to the local boys.  Bo isn’t local--but he does have a connection to the sisters.  As they zero in on a boy she’s growing increasingly concerned for, Penny hunts for an answer to what the sisters really want and how she can stop them.  This was so bad.  So bad.  Bad because the idea was really cool--ghost witch sisters, possession, seduction, drowning--and there were some really interesting descriptions.  Basically, some of the bits that were just about the Swan sisters’ past were cool.  Some of them.  Until the end.  The rest was basically a hodge-podge of incredibly predictable “twists”, chemistry-less instalove, and a total inability to write people as people.  They made ridiculously stupid choices, experienced inexplicable emotional reactions, and in general just felt fake.  This should have been SO cool.  But it just made me want to write the opposite thing in order to prove a point.  (Also: it is set in OREGON.  Near Portland.  In our time, or at least a time where stereos are a thing.  I know that shady shit can happen anywhere and especially in small towns, but fuck.  Around 3 or more young boys from this town drown EVERY SUMMER, and not only is the town able to sustain itself but the FBI hasn’t gotten involved?  These all seem to be young white boys, in Oregon, just drowning.  Literally if this had been set in a made-up town in a made-up time, this would have been much more believable.)

The Merry Spinster by Mallory Ortzberg.  3/5.  A collection of short, spooky retellings of not only fairy tales, but classic children’s stories like “The Velveteen Rabbit”.  Overall, I’d recommend this book if you’re in the mood for something lyrical yet genuinely grim--but be warned, it can be a bit self-important sometimes.  A few of the creepier bits felt almost too self-aware; like, “this is scary because these are children’s characters acting really weird, oooh”.  Some of the stories I could have done without.  Standouts include “The Daughter Cells” (The Little Mermaid), “The Six Boy-Coffins” (The Six Swans, also the best story in the collection), “The Rabbit” (The Velveteen Rabbit) , and “Cast Your Bread Upon The Water” (Johnny Croy and His Mermaid Bride).  

The Radical Element ed. Jessica Spotswood.  2/5.  An anthology of short stories about young women who are “radical” in some what, from the nineteenth to twentieth century. Because really, for a historical fiction anthology, this is pretty limited in time periods and locations--it’s nineteenth and twentieth century America, barely stretching a century. Which is something I found irritating about the last anthology edited by Spotswood that I read (A Tyranny of Petticoats) but I liked that more because there were more stories for me to connect with.  Honestly, many of these read very young to me, so regardless of the writing quality I didn’t like most of them.  The only one that really stood out to me was Anna-Marie McLemore’s “Glamour”.  But this isn’t a bad anthology, in my opinion--I just think I’ve outgrown much of these stories.  

Sometimes I Lie by Alice Feeney.  2/5.  Amber is in a coma.  She can sense everything around her, hear everything people say, but can’t move her body, even to open her eyes.  She remembers nothing--only that her husband doesn’t love her anymore, and she believes that he had something to do with the “accident” that people refer to.  Alternating between Amber’s present in the coma, the days leading up to the accident, and a series of diary entries, the truth slowly unravels--or maybe.  Because sometimes Amber lies.  Basically, this had all of the plot elements it needed to have... But it moved at what felt like a glacial pace, and I couldn’t get into anything because the voices were dull.  Also: Amber has no control over her bodily functions while in a coma, and is sure to remind us of this every possible moment.  Furthermore, there is such a thing as too many twists, and to a degree, this book went there.

Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi.  3/5.  The land of Orisha was once full of magic--and Zelie’s mother was one of those who had it.  Until, that is, magic disappeared.  King Saran conducted a raid that killed all--or supposedly all--magic users, including Zelie’s mother.  Years later, Zelie and her brother Tzain embark on a quest to restore magic, aided by the runaway Princess Amari, and pursued by Amari’s brother Inan, who is determined to inherit his father’s ruthless legacy.  So...  This book.  I wanted so badly for it to be at least a four star read for me.  It’s been intensely hyped up, with the movie rights being sold ages ago.  Is it worth the hype?  For me, obviously not.  The hype oversold it.  Because Children of Blood and Bone is an enjoyable read with a ton of potential--but it’s also one of those books that was so clearly written by a debut author.  And I hate to say that, because I want to be a debut author someday; but there is a standard we need to hold ourselves and others to, and to me, this book needed some editing.  It was very overlong, with some parts dragging because I wanted to get back to the action.  The character beats sometimes felt rushed, comparatively--especially when it came to, you guessed it, the two central romances.  One of them was MADE FOR ME, but though I liked the pairing I wished that there had been more a realistic buildup.  The interesting thing about Children of Blood and Bone is that Adeyemi--who as I understand it is Nigerian-American, raised in America--based it off of West African culture.  As a white American, I obviously cannot speak to the authenticity of the usage of Yoruba, but I have seen a couple of Nigerian reviewers claim some issue with it, and that does make me wonder.  I do know that Adeyemi used, again, Yoruba in her book as well as several real place names.  This bugged me a bit.  Orisha is a fictional world--why refer to real African cities and a real language?  Obviously, most of the dialogue is in English, but Adeyemi could have referred to an imagined language as many fantasy novelists do.  To me, this all felt like... I don’t know, Jon Snow saying that he’d learned French from a tutor, or Gandalf saying that he was from Belfast.  It was a worldbuilding issue that knocked me out of the story.  For that matter, the fact that the catlike animals were referred to as “leonaires” (leopards), and so on... it seemed kind of weak.  There were a ton of very usual beats here--rebellious princess, young characters doomed from the first page, evil king who is evil because he is evil and had a dead love that is the sort of root of all of his problems...  It seems like I’m critiquing the fuck out of this book, but it had such a great idea and was so set up to be great that I don’t know.  I’m just disappointed, and it all could have been much better because the bones were there.  All that said, I’m probably going to read the second book because I was invested in the characters and do want to see what happens next.  But if the next book isn’t better, I probably won’t read beyond that.

In Search of Us by Ava Dellaira.  3/5.  Angie has never known her father; the biracial child of a white mother, she has never known the black side of her family, as her father apparently died before she was born along with his brother.  After discovering that her uncle is actually alive, Angie embarks on a trip to LA with her ex-boyfriend to seek the truth about her father.  In a parallel story, we see the journey of her mother, Marilyn, as a teenager being pushed by her mother to support them through a modeling career she doesn’t want.  After meeting James, Marilyn sees the opportunity for a new life--the question is how she’ll come to be the single mother of a daughter she keeps secrets from.  This book is really lovely and sweet in a lot of ways--the writing is quite pretty.  Marilyn’s story is, to be honest, much more compelling than Angie’s simply because she has a more dramatic arc.  Angie is essentially on a trip to uncover something you can probably guess fairly early on, and though her struggles are totally understandable, it is kind of difficult to watch her treat her very sweet ex like shit and kind of take advantage of his feelings.  Marilyn has this struggle of attempting to escape her mother’s impossible dreams, while engaging in genuinely sweet and sad romance.  The issue for me was that nobody quite as accessible as Marilyn, and while I appreciated the message the book was sending, it seemed a bit heavy-handed and abrupt towards the end.  Tacked on for points, to be frank.  Also, there was one sex scene that seemed... while not physically impossible, very unlikely.  But overall, if you want to read something sort of gentle and sad with good romance AND mother-daughter elements, I’d recommend it.

The Flight Attendant by Chris Bohjalian.  3/5.  Flight attendant Cassie is something of a train wreck, using her career to facilitate a habit of heavy partying and one night stands.  In Dubai, she has a one-nighter with a man named Alex, only to wake up to find him brutally murdered in the bed they shared.  Unable to remember the entirety of the previous night’s events and terrified of what will happen to her, Cassie sneaks out of the hotel room and finds herself embroiled in an international scandal.  The book follows not only Cassie’s perspective, but that of the mysterious Elena, who seems to be keeping tabs on Cassie.  This is definitely a gripping book, and I sped through it.  Honestly, much of the interest had to do with just how odd and intriguing a flight attendant’s life can be, and it was certainly a great profession for the main character of a thriller--Cassie was constantly jet-setting.  The issue was that she was also a total idiot, to the point that sometimes her stupidity felt less like a character trait and more like a plot device.  But I could have gotten over that.  What bumped this down from a 4 to a 3-star rating was the ending--the big twist wasn’t something I called, but it also wasn’t very thrilling.  You pretty much knew what was going on before the end.  And of course, everything was tied up in a very... borderline sexist way?  But it’s not the worst thriller I’ve read; I mean, it wasn’t even the worst one I read this month.