selenak: (Cat and Books by Misbegotten)
[personal profile] selenak
Aka a 2022 novel set in the Appalachians during the late 1990s and early 2000s with the euphemistically called "Opiod Crisis" very much a main theme, and simultanously a modern adaptation of David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. The last Copperfield adaptation I had seen or read was the Iannucci movie starring Dev Patel in the title role which emphasized the humor and vitality of the novel and succeeded splendidly, but had to cut down the darker elements in order to do so, with the breathneck speed of a two hours mvie based on a many hundred pages novel helping with that. Demon Copperhead took the reverse approach; it's all the darkness magnified - helped by the fact this is also a many hundred pages novel - but nearly no humor. Both adaptations emphasize the social injustice of the various systems they're depicting. Both had to do some considerable flashing out when it comes to Dickens's first person narrator. No one has ever argued that David is the most interesting character in David Copperfield. As long as he's still a child, this isn't noticable because David going from coddled and much beloved kid to abused and exploited kid makes for a powerful emotional arc. (BTW, I was fascinated to learn back when I was reading Claire Tomalin's Dickens biography that Dickens was influenced by Jane Eyre in this; Charlotte Bronte's novel convinced him to go for a first person narration - which he hadn't tried before - and the two abused and outraged child narrators who describe what scares and elates them incredibly vividly do have a lot on common.) But once he's an adult, it often feels like he's telling other people's stories (very well, I hasten to add) in which he's only on the periphery, except for his love life. The movie solved this by giving David - who is autobiographically inspired anyway - some more of Dickens`s on life and qualities. Demon Copperhead solves it by a) putting most of the part of the Dickens plot when David is already an adult to when Damon/Demon is still a teenager (he only becomes a legal adult near the end), b) by making Damon as a narrator a whole lot angrier than David, and c) by letting him fall to what is nearly everyone else's problem as well, addiction.

Spoilers ensue about both novels )

In conclusion: this was a compelling novel but tough to read due to the subject and the unrelenting grimness. I'm not saying you should treat the horrible neglect and exploitation of children and the way a rotten health system allowed half the population to become addicts irreverently, but tone wise, this is more Hard Times than David Copperfield, and sometimes I wished for some breathing space in between the horrors. But I am glad to have read it.
rydra_wong: Lee Miller photo showing two women wearing metal fire masks in England during WWII. (Default)
[personal profile] rydra_wong
A whole world of games not playable on Mac has opened up to me, and it's Steam summer sale time!

Please rec me your favourite games, bearing in mind that I have very limited reflexes/co-ordination.

(I'm not completely ruling out games involving them, but the threshold for entry has to be very very low. I am currently enjoying Refunct because it allows me to try some simple platforming in a very chill and pleasant environment with no time pressure and no penalties for taking several hundred tries to get a jump.)
china_shop: Two Chinese men (the Envoy and Kunlun) in historical dress sit facing each other. Blue background with a pink heart sketched in it. (Guardian - bb!Envoy/Kunlun heart)
[personal profile] china_shop
I wrote a self-indulgent Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan treat for [community profile] idproquo and a post-canon Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan domestic-fluff flashfic for the [community profile] fan_flashworks Amnesty round. Thanks to [personal profile] trobadora for beta on both of them! <3

Title: Sunshine and Honey (4126 words) [Mature]
Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV 2018)
Relationships: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan
Additional Tags: Ye Olde Haixing Era, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Outdoor Sex, Feeding, Finger Sucking, Oral Fixation, First Kiss (for one of them), First time (for one of them), Treat
Summary:

They were halfway to the Allied Forces’ southern boundary when the sun came out. Shen Wei pulled back his hood and looked around, conscious of the breeze on his bare face. The heavy clouds were finally breaking up.

Meanwhile, Kunlun had dropped his bag and flopped onto his back on the grassy slope. “Let’s rest here a while.”


Title: Pages for You (1762 words) [Teen and Up]
Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV 2018)
Relationships: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan
Additional Tags: Post-Canon, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Established Relationship, Domestic Fluff, Fade to Black, Community: fan_flashworks
Summary:

Over the course of the evening, an impulse had taken root, and now Shen Wei submitted to it. He switched on his desk lamp, laid out several large sheets of paper and quietly ground some ink. If Zhao Yunlan wanted to read of their time together through the eyes of a Dixingren soldier, who better than Shen Wei to write an account—to show Zhao Yunlan exactly how much his arrival had meant to the war effort and to Shen Wei himself.

Me-and-media update

Jul. 5th, 2025 03:06 pm
china_shop: Close-up of Zhao Yunlan grinning (Default)
[personal profile] china_shop
Previous poll review
In the Routine poll, 84.2% of respondents voted for tooth-brushing, 50.9% for locking up and switching things off around the house, and 33.3% for tending to pets. Night-time routines taking more than half an hour got 24.6%, and "sometimes it takes me an hour or more" got 7%. *high fives*

In ticky-boxes, hugs won with 75.4%, followed by "how stressful it is to ask tradespeople to change things they've done" with 57.9% and "sitting on a mountain ledge in the moonlight, listening to owls" with 56.1%. Thank you for your votes! <3

Reading
Incandescent by Emily Tesh, read by Zara Ramm, who sounds exactly like Emma Thompson. I spent the middle third of this being unsure what the plot was (or if there even was a plot; "is this a cosy magic-school story?" I asked nobody in particular). Things stirred ominously under the surface, but the tension relied on the reader being more worried about them than the mostly oblivious POV character -- which was interesting. Overall, I enjoyed it very much.

The Book of Three by Lloyd Alexander (Chronicles of Prydain). A few more chapters. I'm past halfway and it still feels like setup, which I guess is a function of it being the first book of five.

A tiny bit more of Neurotribes. I'm bored with the case studies/anecdotes and ready for some theory.

Two more chapters of Guardian by priest.

My Whimsy binge stalled after bouncing off three different narrators for The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club. None of them hit the humour right. I suppose I'm going to have to read in text, but Prydain first (and I still haven't finished my reread of Werecockroach, note to self).

Kdramas
I finished Our Unwritten Seoul and enjoyed it very much. It's about 30yo identical twins, one who works in a corporate office in Seoul, and one who lives in their hometown and does a series of temporary and part-time jobs. The office worker is miserable from being bullied at work, so they decide to swap lives. Contains some pretty good (in my inexpert opinion) disability rep, and
I approved of both the morals (spoilers) 1) if you bottle things up and don't let people see your vulnerability, you can't feel their love; and 2) love isn't about winning or losing, or whether you're a burden; it's about being on the same team, staying together, and supporting each other as you win or lose. <3 <3 <3 (I was so happy when Ho-su stopped pushing Mi-ji away, and with the ending when they used sign language sometimes. <3 <3 <3)


I cancelled my VIKI subscription earlier this week because I wasn't using it, so of course I immediately started watching My Dearest Nemesis, as recced by [personal profile] adore. It has a bit of a "based on a webtoon" feel, but I'm fine with that, and it's a neat twist on the Obnoxious Repressed Chaebol Exec trope. (The leading man is leading a double life: he's a closet fanboy, but his family and position require him to present as a 100% bland, respectable businessman.) I'm obsessed!

Note to self: check out First Night with the Duke next. And maybe renew your VIKI subscription.

Other TV
Poker Face and Murderbot continue to be enjoyable (we're an episode behind on each of them). I found the second half of Andor season 2 a lot more engaging than the first half (and might like the first half more on the rewatch; yet to be determined). Another episode each of Étoile and Krapopolis. The Old Guard 2 on Netflix.
Tiny spoiler for the very end. Andrew was disgusted that, at the end, as [redacted] leave the secret archive full of ancient texts, they turn out the light but leave candles burning. "What about the ancient books?!" LOL!


A rewatch of French film Rosalie Blum, which I love.

Guardian/Fandom
The continuing delights of read-alongs and polls.

Audio entertainment
A little bit of Heather Cox Richardson's Letters from an American (US constitutional-law context for current developments), a little bit of Midnight Burger (audiodrama), most of the first season of Eight Days of Diana Wynne Jones (which I'm enjoying despite not being familiar with DWJ's earlier books).

Writing/making things
I wrote a flashfic for the [community profile] fan_flashworks amnesty round and am poking at a couple of WIPs. My brain seems to be in recovery mode. My only current deadline is the [community profile] fan_flashworks Science round.

Life/health/mental state things
My thumbs/hands/wrists are not in great shape. My body is working hard to metabolise ambient stress. (*hugs to everyone*) I'm feeling a little under siege by winter and ~the state of things~, but I saw my sister for the first time in weeks (she's had a cold), a friend came over for lunch on Thursday, and last night our tv-watching friend joined us for Rosalie Blum.

Good things
Chocolate. Andrew and Halle. Fandom and all of you. Polls. Kdramas. Books. Podcasts. Eminem. Writing when it happens. AO3 (*clutches*). Love, kindness, and diversity.

Poll #33324 Crowd-sourcing randomness
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 36


Crowd-sourcing randomness

View Answers

heads
7 (19.4%)

tails
8 (22.2%)

edge
9 (25.0%)

zero-g (the coin never falls)
14 (38.9%)

ticky-box full of grumbly cats in search of treats
24 (66.7%)

ticky-box full of being protective of your blorbos
18 (50.0%)

ticky-box full of surviving AO3 outages
25 (69.4%)

ticky-box full of soft, bright-green moss nestled at the base of a tree, glittering with beads of dew
22 (61.1%)

ticky-box full of hugs
27 (75.0%)

Murderbot 1x09

Jul. 4th, 2025 04:01 pm
petra: Cartoon of an overexcited airline steward with the text: You're always playing Yellow Car. (Cabin Pressure - Yellow Car)
[personal profile] petra
Spoilers )
petra: Text on a blue background: "The only way to go on is to go on." (DWJ - The only way to go on)
[personal profile] petra
I am deeply ashamed of my country.

Time to go have a party with a group of queer people who are similarly appalled, because we can't do anything but keep on going as our authentic, pissed-off selves.
oursin: Photograph of small impressionistic metal figurine seated reading a book (Reader)
[personal profile] oursin

What I read

Finished The Islands of Sorrow and it is a bit slight, definitely one for the Simon Raven completist I would say - a number of the tales feel like outtakes from the later novels.

Decided not for me: Someone You Can Build a Nest In.

Started Val McDermid, The Grave Tattoo (2006), a non-series mystery. Alas, I was not grabbed - in terms of present-day people encounter Historical Mystery, this did not ping my buttons - a) could not quite believe that a woman studying at a somewhat grotty-sounding post-92 uni in an unglam part of London would have even considered doing a PhD on Wordsworth (do people anywhere even do this anymore) let alone be publishing a book on him b)a histmyst involving Daffodil Boy and a not so much entirely lost but *concealed unpublished in The Archives* manuscript of Epic Poem, cannot be doing with. (Suspect foul libel upon generations of archivists at Dove Cottage, just saying.) Gave up.

Read in anticipation of book group next week, Anthony Powell, The Kindly Ones (1962).

Margery Sharp, Britannia Mews (1946) (query, was there around then a subgenre of books doing Victoria to now via single person or family?). Not a top Sharp, and I am not sure whether she is doing an early instance of Ace Representation, or just a Stunning Example of Victorian Womanhood (who is, credit is due, no mimsy).

Because I discovered it was Quite A Long Time since I had last read it, Helen Wright, A Matter of Oaths (1988).

Also finished first book for essay review, v good.

Finally came down to a price I consider eligible, JD Robb, Bonded in Death (In Death #60) (2025). (We think there were points where she could have done with a Brit-picker.)

On the go

Barbara Hambly, Murder in the Trembling Lands (Benjamin January #21) (2025). (Am now earwormed by 'The Battle of New Orleans' which was in the pop charts in my youth.)

Up next

Very probably, Zen Cho, Behind Frenemy Lines, which I had forgotten was just about due.

***

O Peter Bradshaw, nevairr evairr change:

David Cronenberg’s new film is a contorted sphinx without a secret, an eroticised necrophiliac meditation on grief, longing and loss that returns this director to his now very familiar Ballardian fetishes.

tielan: Maria & Steve walking in sync (in sync)
[personal profile] tielan
Writing has been difficult. I only wrote 10,000 words this month and I don't think too much of that was new. I've been having trouble rewriting the novel. Feeling very didactic right now.

the bit where fiction is about the real world, too )

And yes, it's hard to focus on writing sometimes when my train of thought just wants to scatter.

Maybe with a (more or less) clear weekend, I can get some focused writing done? IDEK. I hate rewriting.

--

Also, I'm tired.

a few things at the end of the week

Jul. 4th, 2025 08:51 am
tielan: four lemming toys at the grand canyon (travel)
[personal profile] tielan
Working this Saturday - about 4 hours. I get time off in lieu, which is better than nothing but also...kind of annoying. I didn't have that much on anyway, and can spend the day in my room, crafting and waiting for a ping of notifications.

Project Manager acknowledged the holiday. Still haven't received notification that my contract is being renewed though, but I can't imagine they have anyone else positioned to do my job yet...

All my holiday tours are paid for. Once I have the renewal of work contract, I shall go ahead and book/check my places to stay.

--

B2's strata management (HOA, but less about aesthetics more about practicalities) is wanting another payment for the 'collective kitty' for works around the building. I am personally of the opinion that this is being driven by a retiree who has invested in an apartment in the building and doesn't really care if the works are too expensive for the owner-occupiers, because she can just raise the rent on her renters and unless they want to be kicked out.

Anyway, that stresses B2 out and she comes and stresses on us...

(I tend to hide out in the study when that happens, I love B2, but she is very loud and present and I'm not always up for that. B1 seems to enjoy her being here...except when B2 is stressing on B1.)

And she won't accept assistance from the parentals (which I understand, because financial assistance to the parental generation tends to mean they feel they have a right to have a say in your life which...even I - living pretty much in a way they don't criticise as much - don't want that).

--

Will try to join in with [community profile] sunshine_revival but I feel...out of it. I'm not involved in any of the fandoms that most people are involved in, and my characters and pairings are all out of joint (mostly thx to TPTB, who never seem to see in my favourites what I see in them).

I have adjusted my sign-ups and profiles and stuff to state that I'm against AI. But even putting those statements out there feels like waving a flag telling people to kick me, I'm so used to having my fannish preferences weaponised.

Whoam, whoam, like a wounded maggit

Jul. 3rd, 2025 09:30 pm
oursin: Cartoon hedgehog going aaargh (Hedgehog goes aaargh)
[personal profile] oursin

Well, in further conferencing misadventures, woke up around 5 am with what I came to realise was a crashing migraine - it is so long since I have had one of these as opposed to 'headache from lying orkard' - took medication, and after some little while must have gone to sleep, because I woke up to discover it was nearly 9.30, and I had slept well past the alarm I had set in anticipation of the 9.00 first conference session. But feeling a lot better.

I was only just in time to grab some breakfast before they started clearing it up.

The day's papers were perhaps a bit less geared towards my own specific interests - and I was sorry to miss the ones I did - but still that there Dr [personal profile] oursin managed the occasional intervention. There were also some good conversations had.

So the conference, as a conference, was generally judged a success, if somewhat exhausting.

I managed to get the train from the University to Birmingham New Street with no great difficulty.

However, the train I was booked on was somewhat delayed (though not greatly, not cancelled, and no issues of taking buses as in various announcements) and I initially positioned myself at the wrong bit of the platform and had to scurry along through densely packed waiting passengers.

Journey okay, with free snacks, though onboard wifi somewhat recalcitrant.

At Euston, the taxi rank was closed!!!!

Fortunately one can usually grab a cab in the Euston Road very expeditious, and I did.

So I am now home and more or less unpacked.

Given that Mercury is, I recollect, the deity of travellers, is Mercury in retrograde?

(no subject)

Jul. 3rd, 2025 09:29 pm
oursin: Brush the Wandering Hedgehog by the fire (Default)
[personal profile] oursin
Happy birthday, [personal profile] stardyst!

Feet

Jul. 3rd, 2025 08:01 pm
lexin: (Default)
[personal profile] lexin
My doctors have been in touch and I have an appointment with Scary Mary next week. So they will be looking at my feet.

The weird thing is that the podiatrist's poking at my big toe was completely painless. That is not a good sign.
maggie33: (strumiłło mandale 3)
[personal profile] maggie33
We have a heatwave here, but a short one thankfully. It should be back to normal 23°C tomorrow. I spent the whole day today eating ice cream, drinking water and watching cute things to distract myself from that exhausting heat.

Seeing new pics from Q3 of Only Friends Dream On shooting helped, too. But wow, Aou, have mercy on me. There is hot enough here as it is, even without you being all bad boy DJ in a see-through shirt. 😊


The Ex-Morning

7th episode aired today, and surprisingly for me I’m enjoying this drama more and more with each new episode.


More with spoilers here.Mix’s cameo as a vet! And he looked gorgeous, I can’t wait for Only Friends Dream On.

Also, wow, they made me sympathize with Phi. Yeah, what Tam did was shitty. I knew he had to have a reason for breaking up with Phi by sms, and then blocking him everywhere and not talking to him for years. But his reason absolutely doesn’t justify his behavior IMO. Couldn’t he just talk with Phi honestly? I fricking hate ‘I’m breaking up with you for your own good’ trope.

Speaking of cameos – I really, really hope we’ll get Boom’s cameo in the last episodes as a current or future boyfriend of Aou’s character. GMMTV lately loves to do that with their fixed ships, if only one half of a ship is in a drama. Till now we had Force’s cameo in Only Boo, Sea’s cameo in Sweet Tooth Good Dentist, and New’s in Break Up Service.


The Next Prince

I’m getting bored. I thought I would love this drama, but something is not working for me. Prince/his loyal bodyguard is my kind of ship, I feel like I should love Khanin/Charan, and yet I basically lost all interest in them. I blame the script, it’s just not good. Pacing is bad, too. For a long time I felt like almost nothing really was happening story wise. Also where is Ava? She disappeared completely lately.

I still am very much invested in Ramil/Paytai, their relationship is my kind of complicated and angsty and hot, and for them I will watch it to the end. But yeah, for me this drama definitely didn’t live up to my expectations.



I also started MilkLove’s new GL drama Whale Store xoxo. Two episodes aired for now and I liked them. Milk looks so beautiful that I spent the first half of the 1st episode just staring and sighing ‘she’s soooo gorgeous’ in an awed voice. Heh... The drama itself is cute and enjoyable, and perfect for relaxing on Wednesday evenings.



And yay, I did manage to finish something, too, finally. Two dramas, actually. One was the 2nd season of Tengu no Daidokoro. I loved it. It was as good and beautiful, and touching as the 1st season. And all the food porn made me so hungry at the most inopportune times, like for instance after 9 p.m. 😊



I also watched a short kdrama on Netflix called Mercy For None. I did enjoy it, but it was very brutal, dark and bloody, so it took me a while to watch all of it, even though it has only 7 episodes. It got a bit repetitive in the second half, but it satisfied my love for complicated and obsessive sibling relationships. And the fights were excellent.

It’s about an ex-gangster Nam Gi Jun who left the underworld in dramatic circumstances 11 years ago. And now he returns to uncover the truth about the mysterious death of his beloved younger brother (who in present time was the second in command in Gi Jun’s former gang). And to ruthlessly take revenge on people responsible.

I haven’t seen So Ji Sub, who plays Gi Jun, in anything before. And he is very good here. Very charismatic in that tortured, brooding and silent type of way. And it was great to see Lee Jun Hyuk playing someone so different from his green flag character in Love Scout. Here he guest stars in a few episodes as Gi Jun’s younger brother Gi Seok.

July 4th weekend

Jul. 3rd, 2025 12:39 pm
libitina: Wei Yingluo from Story of Yanxi Palace in full fancy costume holding a gaiwan and sipping tea (Default)
[personal profile] libitina
Sorry I'm not more interesting, but to see about motivating myself to not just be a lump all weekend, here's some things I might want to get done

listy list )

2 Old 2 Guard

Jul. 2nd, 2025 07:08 pm
petra: Barbara Gordon smiling knowingly (Default)
[personal profile] petra
Tl;dr: I liked it a lot.

Spoilers )

current reading (spolsky 1/?)

Jul. 2nd, 2025 03:56 pm
thistleingrey: (Default)
[personal profile] thistleingrey
In almost two months, I've read about 15% of Bernard Spolsky's The Languages of the Jews (slowness is a me-issue). By the 15% point, the book has summarized contemporary usage of Hebrew in Israel, then begun examining historical usage of Hebrew from earliest to more recent. So far, Spolsky tries to assert rather than tuck away his assumptions, which I appreciate. I've read some work by philologists and historical linguists on other language families, and a historical treatment by a sociolinguist who's aware of his strengths is a lovely thing.

a couple of the book's assumptions and something cool it does with them )

Life advice

Jul. 2nd, 2025 04:35 pm
petra: A blonde woman with both hands over her face (Britta - Twohanded facepalm)
[personal profile] petra
Do not allow ants in your pants. They might bite you on the genitals, which would Really, Really Hurt. They do not make you fidgety; they make you miserable.

Dear NFE Writer!

Jul. 2nd, 2025 01:49 pm
edenfalling: stylized black-and-white line art of a sunset over water (Default)
[personal profile] edenfalling
Note: I am repurposing my stock Yuletide letter here, which is why some of the sections may seem slightly off-topic for a single fandom exchange.

Hi, and thank you in advance for writing a story for me! I'm pretty easy to please -- unless you write context-free porn, I'll be thrilled just to get a response to one of my prompts. *grin* But I realize that's not terribly helpful, so here's the (very!) long version. (I am sorry for the tl;dr, but I like to talk about things I love and I figure more details are better than fewer.)

---------------

General Information )

Okay. On to specific prompts.

---------------

Jadis & the Gods of the Narnian World )

---------------

The Secret Life of Lasaraleen's Pet Monkey )

---------------

Arthuriana & Morgan Le Fay )

---------------

Telmarine Aeneid )

---------------

Journey to an Alternate Charn )

---------------------------------------------

And that is that.

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issenllo

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