#Dan Simmons you old so and so

[camembertlythere]

Reading The Terror and just reached this hysterical passage re: The Creature

'It can't climb the mainmast, thought Blanky. [...] At least it can't climb the mainmast. Nothing that size can climb. No white bear --if it is a white bear-- has experience climbing.

The thing began climbing the attenuated mainmast.'

[frodolives]

me deciding to finally read this during a crippling heatwave is such a good idea #unimmersiveexperience

[sideprince]

Harry Potter Fancasting - Worst Edition

Dreamcast this, ideal for the role that, yeah yeah. What about the worst possible Harry Potter fancast you can think of? I mean worst. "Who in their right mind????" worst. "I’m burning my books and moving to the moon" levels bad. Ready? No? Too bad.

The Golden Trio

Harry Potter:

Josh Gad. He's got a youthful charm and uhhhhh can pull off a pair of glasses. Plus, he's done children's movies before.

Hermione Granger:

Leslie Jones. She's smart, she takes no shit, she can pass for an 11 year old if you squint. This is Hollywood.

Ron Weasley:

Ed Sheeran. He can act. Probably. Only one way to find out.

Hogwarts Teachers:

Dumbledore:

Al Pacino. He's old, he's grey, he's uhhhh *checks notes* "quirky." Think about it. De Niro could play Grindelwald. You'd pay to see that. You wouldn't like it, but you'd still pay.

McGonagall:

Oh please, you'd love it (I refuse to admit she's no longer with us).

Alastor Moody:

Tracy Morgan. He's unpredictable, he's unhinged, he gives zero fucks. Sounds like Moody to me.

Severus Snape:

Dan Savage. Throw on a wig and some black contacts I guess. Or don't. This is casting, I don't work in wardrobe. (Am I throwing shade at Fabio Snape art? How dare you accuse me of such a thing.)

Marauders generation

James Potter:

So there's a resemblance to Josh Gad.

Lily Evans/Potter:

Lindsay Lohan. She has red hair ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Remus Lupin:

Bryan Cranston. Because Lupin has a dark side I guess. But give it another ten years so he ages even more.

Sirius Black:

Gene Simmons. He's badass, he's got long dark hair, he looks like he could ride a motorcycle. He and Ed Sheeran can take acting lessons together (which we could film and sell as a side project/spin-off TV show... hmmmmm).

Peter Pettigrew:

Manny Jacinto. Plot twist! You'd never see it coming. A man that pretty could do no wrong!

And finally:

Voldemort

Ben Stiller. He'd have no nose but would be all ears.

[hesbuckcompton-baby]

20, 36, 47 for the book asks? 🥰

thank you, killy!! <3

20. Where and how do you find new books to read?

There's a few people I follow online who post some good recommendations but mostly I like to browse book shops myself - my camera roll is absolutely FULL of photos I take of books I want to read whenever I go to Waterstones. Unfortunately I DO judge a book by it's cover - if your book's ugly I'm literally just not picking it up unless I already like the author I'm SORRY (I'm not)

Also one of my uni tutors likes to email me book recs shoutout to her thank you queen <3

36. Your absolute most favourite character(s) from any book you've ever read

Fang Runin - The Poppy War trilogy by R.F. Kuang

Literal insane person who has never done a single morally excusable thing in her LIFE and yet??? that's my girl. I love her SO much. she's absolutely batshit but that's why she's the best. let women be crazy!!!

Inej Ghafa - Six of Crows duology by Leigh Bardugo

Six of Crows was the book that got me out of a 3-year reading slump after I finished my English GCSEs and GODDDD does Inej have my heart to this DAY

Jon Snow - A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R.R. Martin

HBO the things you did to my boy??? unforgivable. that's my little guy, I don't care that his chapters aren't the most interesting of the series (Sansa you have my heart), that's Literally My Son. hugging his siblings one more time would literally fix him I'm clawing at the walls of my prison cell

47. What are the last 3 books you read?

Percy Jackson and The Lightning Thief - Rick Riordan (catching up on the books ik would've changed my life as an 11 year old)

The Dragon Republic - R.F. Kuang

The Terror - Dan Simmons (decent but NOT anywhere near as good as the show. so long for what, Dan???)

[hetchdrive]

i love reading your thoughts on just watching the terror for the first time. would love to hear more if you're willing to share

Sure I can talk a little bit more about this, it's going to be rattling around in my brain for a while.

I'm fascinated by the theme of god in this story. The way that Hodgson (I think? Honestly I only have about six people's names solidly nailed down) goes to Goodsir the night after they eat Hickey's lover to talk about eucharist and "papists" and wanting to live more than he wants to be a moral person made me begin considering Hickey as a god because of the way his cannibalism vs Crozier's refusal of it parallels him to Crozier and his lover to Fitzjames. If Crozier is symbolically god to Fitzjames in the scene where he dies then Hickey is symbolically a god, as well. Which makes his behavior in his final scene a revelation of what this story views the nature of god to be. Hickey-as-god reveals the nature of god within this story to be selfish, egotistical, cruel. People are objects or food or fuel to god. There's no possibility of connection there, no empathy or love. When Crozier says to Hickey that he must be lonely I couldn't help but think about a quote that was referenced in the book House Of Leaves:

“Why did god create a dual universe? So he might say ‘Be not like me. I am alone.' And it might be heard.”

Hickey as a malicious god and the nature of god as uncaring of humanity really amplifies all the the things Crozier says early on about nature not caring about their plans and how the place they're in wants them dead. It also makes the line "God wants you to live" sting for me. It's very bittersweet-- on the one hand it feels like it's Fitzjames way of saying he wants Crozier to live and he wants to give Crozier something sustaining once he's spiritually gone from him, but on the other hand, if the cruel, malicious god of this story is invested in Crozier, what does that say about him? If Crozier is Hickey's only equal, god's only equal, the thing created so that god can say "you are not like me; I am alone" then what does that make Crozier?

Thematically this is a predictor of Crozier's choice not to return to England and his old life. He is forced to carry on, outliving everyone he was determined to protect; he is alone and will always be. It's a kind of annihilation to be the favored of god.

I once went to an art exhibit about Guillermo del Toro. One of the items there was a bust of Edgar Allan Poe on which he had written a quote and signed for Dan Simmons, author of The Terror book, on the occasion of publishing another book (Drood, which is about Charles Dickens). The quote was:

Helgeland asks: Dickens and Wilkie. What are they doing out there in the dark, I wonder? Del Toro replies: Looking for themselves. Wilkie looking at Dickens, Dickens looking at the dark.

I feel like this resonates with Crozier and Fitzjames' relationship. Why did either of them go to the arctic? If Sophia is to be believed, Crozier went in part because he's not suited to settling down and will always be waiting and watching for a ship. Fitzjames by his own admission went in search of glory for no other reason than because that's what he does, but he realizes out there that he doesn't know who he is and wants to become someone new. Fitzjames finds purpose at the end of his life in the idea of giving himself to Crozier. Crozier's purpose at the end of the story is to be left alone in a world that hates him as a monument to an uncaring god-which-is-nature. Fitzjames looking at Crozier, Crozier looking at the dark.

[thisworldisablackhole]

Endymion, by Dan Simmons - 4.2/5

This book surprised the hell out of me. The general consensus online and amongst people I know who have read Hyperion, is that Endymion and The Rise of Endymion are not as good. A majority of people don't even bother reading them. Those people are missing out, and I don't put that lightly. Luckily for me, I bought all 4 books in the Cantos without looking up any ratings or reviews, so my choice became; read all of them, or waste your money. I was hesitant to start this one, and it did honestly have a bit of a rough start, but I was head over heels for it by the mid way point.

Endymion is a masterclass in world building, if nothing else. It takes place 274 years after the fall of the Hegemony, and the destruction of the TechnoCore and it's network of farcaster portals which connected the web worlds with instantaneous travel. Simmons did an amazing job at evolving his universe over this enormous gap in time. Planets became isolated from each other, terraforming projects failed and mother nature returned these worlds back to their natural state, billions died of starvation and war, or simply by getting stuck on the wrong side of a portal after the fall. During this dark age, The Church harvested the cruciform parasites from the labyrinth of Hyperion and harnessed the power of immortality to colonize former web worlds and essentially create their own version of a religious hegemony. The irony here is that despite harvesting the cruciforms which were created by the TechnoCore, the Church admonishes artificial intelligence and has banned the manufacture or use of AI tech. This distrust of AI permeates culture so much that there are even points during the story where the main characters straight up decline vital help or knowledge from the Consul's old ship and comlog device, claiming it's useless and essentially telling it to shut up. A small but humorous detail. With the power of immortality in hand, the Church was also able to create a new kind of space craft which was unconstrained by the limits of the human body's ability to withstand extreme g-forces. These new space crafts could travel anywhere almost just as fast as they could have by using a farcaster portal, with the understanding that the occupants of the craft would die immediately, and be resurrected upon arrival to their destination. It's truly fascinating stuff, and it proves that Simmons' unique and borderline outlandish ideas didn't die with The Fall of Hyperion. He clearly had some juice left in the tank for this one.

The book has some great characters too, just maybe not who you would suspect. The main character, for example, is simply a vessel for us to watch the story unfold. Raul is a typical commoner-thrust-into-heroism type character with seemingly little in the way of personality or flaws, save for a smidge of overconfidence. This is not to say he is unlikeable, he is just a little too perfect and predictable to be interesting. Aenea was not that interesting either, apart from the fact that she is the hybrid child of a human and AI cybrid, who can contact the assumed-dead TechnoCore through her mind and activate old farcaster portals on the River Tethys.

Who are the good characters, you ask? A. Bettik and Father Captain Frederico de Soya. A. Bettik is an android servant who Raul recruited from under the care of Martin Silenus to aid in his quest to protect Aenea. He is cool, calm, collected, largely impassive, and sports an unintentionally humorous deadpan delivery. Despite his cold android personality, I was constantly surprised by his displays of courage and humanity. He was the rock that held the group together, and I honestly almost cried when he lost his arm and almost died near the end of the book. Father de Soya on the other hand is the Pax officer and Catholic priest who is tasked with capturing Aenea. Throughout the journey, he displays surprising complexity as he undergoes a hundred deaths and resurrections that slowly drives him mad. Despite being solely responsible for Aenea's capture, de Soya is not the bad guy. Yes, he is faithful and obedient to the Church, but he's also smart enough to know when the truth is being manipulated, and can make decisions based on his own judgement. He ends up being possibly the best written character in the entire series.

The main story arc of Endymion is essentially just an interplanetary manhunt. It's a much simpler and more linear tale than Hyperion, but I'd argue that it's also more fun. Being taken on a wild ride down the River Tethys, revisiting all of these planets and finding out how much they have changed since The Fall, all the while being relentlessly pursued by someone who is dying over and over and over again to fulfill his duty to the Church... it's all so fascinating and exciting. By the time I was 3/4 of the way through the book, I was finishing every single chapter with an audible string of "holy shit, oh my god, what the fuck". If you have read the two Hyperion books and were unsure of whether or not Endymion is worth your time, I promise you it is. If you love the world that Simmons created, then there is more than enough here to satisfy your thirst. Time for me to jump into the finale.

[its-surprising]

so recently i finished reading the terror (which was… something), and as i went to sleep that same day a fragment from one of the early chapters of the book came back to me (not in a dream fortunately, though that shit do be haunting me). as i was reading the book, i didn’t focus on small bits that i would usually stop on and research, as i really just wanted to reach the ending of this brick of a book, but something that caught my eye was a chapter of franklin’s talking about the search parties sent out to look for leads. i remember vividly that i read a fragment clearly stating that lt edward little before joining the franklin expedition actually sailed with crozier before (and james clark ross), and i remember that so vividly because i went and screamed about it to my friend, because…. THATS INSANE??? and for some reason i just left it at that and read the rest of the book, mostly thinking that i hallucinated that fragment entirely, or remembered it wrong actually. well i have came back now to the early chapters and found said fragment, and no. i was not wrong. the fragment (in chapter 9 franklin, page 139, of the 2018 edition of the book by transworld publishers) clearly reads “little, an old arctic hand, sir john understood, a man who had gone south with crozier and james ross eight years earlier“. since i am not a native english speaker i looked up a polish translation of the book, thinking that maybe my brain wasn’t braining properly, but turns out no, i'm not that dumb. but i digrees. i think if you type that fragment into google, word for word, in quotes there should pop up a version of probably illegal pdf version of the book. and i think i went a little insane with this, because a) my read of edward in both the book and the show was of a man who clearly never before was put in those kind of conditions, possibly tried his best, though failed miserably (there is a scene in the book also, where at the “go for broke” meeting he proposes going out into land and getting wood. as to be expected, the men in the room literally laugh at him. so he doesn’t seem to be experienced with the polar climates at all, as seem to be most of officers on the ships), b) i have done little research (pun intended) and checked up two things. first, the 1839 ross expedition’s list of officers that i managed to find. there is no little, and the only edward (also a lt) there is one with surname bird.

we know from ed’s little biographical dictionary that he became lieutenant in 1837, and unless he didn’t serve as an officer on the ross expedition, there is no mention of him anywhere that i could find.

from this tiny biography of edward’s voyages we also know that little’s closest ever ship to either arctic or antarctic was in 1842 to south america. which is not very close. attentive readers may have also noticed that when the ross expedition set out in 1839, edward little was busy on the board of britannia.

(also while doing this cool little research i have found out that edward possibly met franklin before joining the expedition, and according to lady franklin letters, her husband held little in high regards, which i found interesting)

so now i just really want to know, did dan simmons just straight up decided to make stuff up for fun or…... cuz if so, then he really do be writing fanfictions out there (or maybe someone is more informed then me, just a random person on the internet, in that case PLEASE HELP ME)

but i guess now in the terror universe edward little has served under crozier before (also with thomas jopson, who historically served under crozier), which is something for me to think about when i want to make myself really sad in the middle of the night. or maybe it’s just supposed to show how franklin has no idea who these people who serve under him are, that man is wasaay to old to be out there in the cold you know what im saying

[marlowe1-blog]

Book Review: Lost Souls by Poppy Z Brite

Still the most disturbing vampire novel

Recently Billy Martin, aka Poppy Z Brite, announced that he was back to writing. He sold a short story to a friend's anthology and he was writing another one. This was met with a great deal of excitement. For Generation X, Billy was the greatest. Then a few days later, dispirited and depressed, Billy wrote on his Patreon that he was no longer writing. He wrote a story for another editor and that editor rejected the story.

On Facebook, the outpouring of love and support for Billy was amazing. Billy has been through a lot and around Hurricane Katrina, he gave up on writing. HIs restaurant books were not selling and his publisher was demanding more horror. He was depressed from a great deal including gender dysmorphia (he still presented as female at the time) and eating disorders.

The support was either "We REALLY want to see you writing again, because you inspired us" or "take care of your mental health first".

Writing is a tough gig. It's hard to make money at it. It's hard to believe in yourself. It's almost impossible to sustain that belief over the years. The doubts set in. The rejections pile up. The occasional acceptance can feel false. Like ok, this editor is saying that my story is great and wants to pay me money. What's wrong with them? Most writers build up calluses, stop putting their self-worth in the next acceptance, struggle with the feelings that they suck. We read old stories that we thought brilliant and wince with embarrassment, but also take pride in how far we've come.

Billy didn't benefit from these experiences. He was an overnight sensation. Yes, he wrote a lot of garbage as a teenager like we all do and he had some disappointments and rejections, but he sold his stories to a zine when he was young and then when there were enough stories, got a collection published. Harlan Ellison read those stories and got very excited. So did Dan Simmons.

Then came Lost Souls. Billy was in his early 20s when he wrote this book. Most writers are writing trunk stories and embarrassing manuscripts at that time. Billy wrote the nastiest vampire book of its time, inspiring horror writers - especially splatterpunk and extreme horror writers - ever since.

Unfortunately for modern readers who might love to see anything new from Billy, Billy had to deal with all the self-doubt and struggles afterwards. On Livejournal, I criticized a media tie-in book he wrote for the Crow series and he was pissed. We both apologized for the incident (or at very least the nasty feelings from the incident) years later and we're friends now - well online friends - but it was very confusing at the time.

I was a nobody. I mean I'm still a nobody with a few books published through Dybbuk Press and some stories in anthologies. But back then I was even more of a nobody. I had maybe Teddy Bear Cannibal Massacre published and as far as my stories were concerned, I had sold a few of them and made maybe $20 total. That's $20 spread out over 4-5 markets.

So why was anything I said getting under the skin of the guy who wrote Lost Souls?

T-Nightingale at Devientart

When I revise this for Substack, the above is going to be seriously edited down.

Anyhow, Lost Souls came at a strange time. Anne Rice had written two amazing vampire books, one pretty good vampire book that got real dumb in the last third (Seriously Queen of the Damned has a woman thousands of years old deciding to create world peace by killing all the men? REALLY? That bullshit wouldn't fly in an Introduction to Women's Studies class). Francis Ford Coppola turned Dracula into a comedy. Vampires were more popular than ever, but defanged.

When Molochi, Twig and Zillah come to the French Quarter looking for absinthe and fucks they are fucking intense. Christian, the bartender and the one vampire that might walk through an Anne Rice novel, doesn't like these vampires, but they are fellow vampires. What are you going to do.

Within a few pages, the vampires are revealing their identity to a vampire groupy and Zillah is fucking her in the backroom. Mardis Gras is over and that girl is doomed.

Because in the world of Poppy Z Brite, vampires aren't made by other vampires. You don't become a vampire by drinking vampire blood. You don't kiss your new master and then sink your teeth into his new cut. No. Vampires are born.

Vampires are born by eating their way out of their mothers.

Later on Christian fucks a goth boy who wants to become a vampire. Christian drains him and feels bad about it, but it's not Christian's fault if the normies don't understand vampires.

This scene sets the tone for a book that has zero chill. Nothing, the sad goth boy (and vampire who doesn't realize that he's a vampire) would be a parody of teen angst in another book. Then there's Steve and Ghost, semi-adult band members who have a tangled history and a lot of heartbreak between them. They run the band that gives the book its name but they are also messy characters. Steve is borderline abusive to his girlfriend while Ghost protects Steve.

They are the nicest characters

Nothing is a big fan.

An aside: the writing style is fucking poetry. Seriously check this out

The, last dying days of summer, fall coming on fast. A cold night, the first of the season, a change from the usual bland Maryland climate. COLD, thought the boy; his mind felt numb. The trees he could see through his bedroom window were tall charcoal sticks, shivering, afraid of the wind or only trying to stand against it. Every tree was alone out there. The animals were alone, each in its hole, its thin fur, and anything that got hit on the road tonight would die alone. Before morning, he thought, its blood would freeze in the cracks of the asphalt.

That was later an issue with Billy's writing as Billy did not like editors telling him to change his sentences.

Ok. More tomorrow. I need to actually talk about the book itself past the prologue, but I also have a paper to finish (800 more words to go) and I need to wake up early tomorrow for jury duty.

Fuck Jury Duty.

[basilone]

I was tagged by the lovely @luckynumber4 a little while ago, ty! 💚 Tagging @mercurygray, @shoshiwrites, @junojelli, @arethosedustyjumpwings (the usual suspects ahem) in this one too, and if any of you wanna do it then consider yourselves tagged by me!

Tag game!

Three ships: let's stick to this fandom and go with Ron/Chuck, Lieb/Tab, and Harry/Kitty.

First ship: I don't rightly remember my first-ever fandom ship because, let's face it, I'm a fandom old. So I'm going to out myself as a very, very brief Ron/Lip shipper in this fandom (which lasted until I watched Points).

Last song: Eivør & Danish National Symphony Orchestra - God of War / Memories of Mother

Currently reading: Dan Simmons - The Terror, David M. Glantz - When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler, Grady Hendrix - The Southern Book Club's Guide To Slaying Vampires, and Jacqueline Harpman - I Who Have Never Known Men.

Currently watching: I'm on the last scraps of SAS Rogue Heroes, have a few eps of The Fall of the House of Usher left, and I should hop back onto The Last Kingdom too.

Currently consuming: water, nothing more.

Currently craving: the weekend, please, I neeeeeed it.

Current obsession: these five sentence fics I'm doing have me in a chokehold, it's been a while since I've written this much!

Currently up to: no good. 😏 Hatching plans.

[croziers-compass]

Compliment: I love the way you write in general, your dedication to accuracy in historical stuff while still having it be interesting cause I do that sm too, and you generally have some of the best takes on Terror stuff and interest in a lot relating to it.

One thing I want to know about you: How did you get into the Terror?

Oh thank you very much! That is incredibly kind and considerate of you! I enjoy immersion. Mostly I actually write for myself but simply let it leak out into the world. I'm learning to release insecurity and worry about the way others may perceive my work. It's less about others but more for myself. However, if someone else derives joy from that then I would not ever know how I can impact someone else without releasing it out to the world. As for the last question, I first read and wrote some materials about the Franklin Expedition back in 2014 when they rediscovered the Erebus. (Information you probably did not wish for nor need but I possess an immaculately large collection of books on anthropophagy which is one of my guilty pleasures. I have an incredible berth of knowledge on the subject.) Exposure to the Franklin expedition snowballed for an unhealthy quantity of years and repicked up pace off and on like something you cannot truly kill and cannot be laid to rest properly. It kept rising out of its grave to grasp at me at random intervals. And then I obtained the book by Dan Simmons earlier this year since it was circulating on tumblr and I was intrigued because I did not know they did a TV series (I am not very in the loop with modern media like TV or Movies. I'm old fashioned for not even being 30 years old). I couldn't afford to watch the series but knew these men quite well and was very intrigued by it and immediately reignited. I had read the book in my first frenzy but I realised that I hadn't retained too much of the information as it was within the book itself. Mostly because my mind merged much of the actual events we were aware of and the events of the book like I was stitching a tapestry together to weave a coherent story in my own mind. Finally just this year I grasped the TV Series fully and broke and obtained it and indulged it. Which was a wild experience as I had all the prior contexts and informations which added some depth and experience to the contents I had priorly engaged and invested in. This is actually one of my only times I have ever truly entered a fandom on this website or divulged my interest in fandoms in any respect in full force. So it has been a wild experience thus far!

[patricia-von-arundel]

I've started a class on US history ( particularly around the colonization ) and it's fascinating! Do you have any period you would recommend to look more into?

You picked an interesting time to ask me about US history, through absolutely no fault of your own! (I haven't studied US history since high school, and my AP US History teacher has spent the last 20 or so years in jail for, uh... having relationships with little boys that were 100% NOT OKAY. And I recently found out he's out of prison and has been attempting to track down some of the boys involved [who are all now in their 30s and 40s]. I only know because one is one of my old roommates, and he was dating my best friend, and... well. I saw his name on the list and was just like "okay, this has to be a parole violation of some sort. Also, dude, what the actual fuck?! Several of the boys you hurt later committed suicide. One was found dead by his little sister and her best friend. They were nine. Nine years old. You are a fucking monster. Jesus christ.")

Aside from that... I'm not super well-versed in US history as a whole, but I have enjoyed some books dealing with it, so okay if I mention those? I particularly loved A People's History of the United States (Howard Zinn) and Lies My Teacher Told Me (James Loewen), both of which were seminal in presenting less "whitewashed" versions of US history. I've also enjoyed in recent years The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson (about the disapora of Black Americans from the Southeast into the Midwest during the 20th century), The American West and Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, both by Dee Brown (classics of the expansion of settlers into the West in the 19th century, the "cowboy" years), and White Trash by Nancy Isenberg (looking at class in America). Other good, popular writers of US history: David McCullough, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Ron Chernow, Candice Millard. There's some awesome fiction that tackles US history in interesting ways - my favorites are A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith), The Little Friend (Donna Tartt), Forever (Pete Hamill), The Jungle (Upton Sinclair), and basically anything by Steinbeck.

I find the great migration periods particularly interesting, especially the Asian arrivals in the West in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Early Hollywood is fascinating. There's a wonderful book about it called Silent Stars by Jeanine Basinger. The US also has some honest really good classics in True Crime, especially Truman Capote's In Cold Blood and Norman Mailer's The Executioner's Song. (Truman Capote is also interesting in that he was a very good friend of Harper Lee, who wrote To Kill a Mockingbird.) There were some writers in the mid-20th century who took travel writing and turned it on its head: try Travels with Charley (Steinbeck again!), On the Road (Jack Kerouac - not my personal style, but I understand why it's an American classic!), and Roughing It (Mark Twain). (Honestly, all of Twain's stuff is great, and fucking hilarious. Twain and Wodehouse - in England - had no business being as brilliantly hilarious as they were.)

Also, a weirder rec?

Stephen King's 11/22/63.

Just trust me. And yes, it's that Stephen King.

Again: trust me.

(Other fictional creepiness built around or dealing with North American history [I say North American because I'm including Canada and Mexico]: Alma Katsu's The Hunger, Dan Simmons' The Terror, Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Mexican Gothic [and I just got her Velvet was the Night, but haven't read it yet!], Toni Morrison's Beloved, basically anything by Cormac McCarthy. [Content warning, some of these are a little stomach-churning to get through. Reader beware!] I've also recently been recommended S. Craig Zahler's Westerns, but haven't read them yet, so be warned there that he's the guy who wrote Bone Tomahawk! If you know... you know. If you don't... not recommended viewing while eating. 🤷‍♀️ And speaking of Westerns, Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove is absolutely wonderful. And not stomach-churning!)

Hope that helps! If there are any specific periods that catch your interest, I can dig into recommendations for further reading/watching. US history isn't always my personal cup of tea, but my mother's been writing books and articles about it for 30 years, so I can always ask for recs! 😁

[black-aliss]

Fo the end-of-year book ask: 3, 4, 6, 19

3. Top five books? The Gone World, Tom Sweterlitsch Hyperion, Dan Simmons Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester Century Rain, Alastair Reynolds (but this is an odd one, I liked its first half) 4. Newly discovered authors you love? Yes! I suspect I'll be lifelong fans of Dan Simmons and Tom Sweterlitsch. 6. Books you never got around to reading? Sort of, I had The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F. Hamilton picked out. But I got sidetracked and now I'm working on another very long book. 19. Library? Heh. We don't have libraries here! Well we do, but they're very rare and filled with very old, falling apart books, since nobody wants to donate their books. So not an option for me.

[the-firebird69]

Air Supply - Even The Nights Are Better

This song is from Arthur the movie really it's the other way around they use the song in the movie that I always associated with that movie it's a heart-wrenching song for me of course and for a lot of other people I'll have to say they're around with Dave and the family a lot longer than I was but still I have much better memory

And all sorts of things happens to you guys and yeah so long story short I was thinking you could make and you'll find these guys I'm pretty sure you guys and one I think is Dan and really one of the weirdest thing about this band it sounds like they have that on helium and I was thinking you could make a musical and include Arthur with this song and then the musical would switch into other songs of theirs and they're from different movies and they're utterly earth-shattering and what they really mean and you can put that into the musical and this would be a worldwide production it would be copied and it'll be produced everywhere because of what it means he knows how important it is he'll take people who are brave people who are kind of reaching the end of the line and they don't have solutions and a stupid enough to think that this won't hurt them

Zues Hera

Oh my God great one Chris great one Jesus Christ kid take that off there

Garth

Yeah we're going to have to go ahead and make this musical cuz he said that and yeah that's kind of a response and he knows it so we have to do it

Keep in mind that he's more or less the one who started the idea

Donald Trump

Sawyer slimeball I think we should do the thing that musical because it has meaning and we need it now

Bg

We can't stand this we have to do it and have these guys do it and I'll show up too and they'll be in trouble lol just like Good times old times and all that good stuff

Tommy f

He said it at the good old days that's our Cafe and he couldn't remember the name and it does it with other stuff but okay but still that's embarrassing he saw it and said oh yeah these are the good old days and Carly Simon came up and everyone said yeah we know about it I said holy s*** it's every single woman here including me lol and he said rats that's some bad ones it's probably the money s*** until you think about it this way a whole bunch of women fighting each other for real instead of this b**** fest and yeah because the castle and all that crap it's a good idea probably won't kill all of us it might but who cares we just need it the family jewels Gene Simmons doesn't know it at all because his wife is attractive and everybody knows it and he doesn't know that either probably got it slammed in the door quite a few times it does heal and he said I need to stopped right now on this talk they said I can't understand you you're speaking too slowly. So we are going to think about the musical and 15 Simmons is one of us they'll be pretty good cuz it needs to be some kind of adults on there which is weird to say isn't it

Previous CIA director

Now she runs a great ice cream shop and snack shop and really it's a sandwich shop too it's a little boutique in a fair town southern town

Zues Hera

We don't want him on the staff just a consult and he says terrific he always says that doesn't want to get killed or anything what a wonderful idea I do excerpts from the movie even the video it's just stupendous people are thinking of certain things and the songs were made after mostly with the movies are about if you see the video it's kind of about the subject matter too it is intense what he said is if you read the code it's intense you start to kind of fall apart because it's so so bad I started thinking about something where are these ships getting their air up there when they're sitting there for 4 years and I start to wonder I wonder if they're doing it up there he said we need to look for signs and will and Bill might have them so I actually did and we are going to war with these macaronis and we think his plans are gone and hers. I'm up for making a musical we do that kind of thing and really it's not a bad idea and we have a recording company and studios we would use to get the musical going there's a lot of stuff you have to do musically they have to see it and perform it and play it and we need a band and a string band I mean this is a major production and a great idea I want to do it and he's pleased to request it for me and we went through hell that was a disaster out there and Aaron you're a dick

Gene Simmons put the fire ax away Aaron yeah you f**

And we started shooting each other

..

He is kind of one of us and yeah it turned out to be stupid but we need to do this musical and we would help each other always see that just for a toast or something but what an idea and he says it might be Dave who's the singer and it might be and he says it sounds like helium and so it makes sense and these guys aren't doing it so that's a helpful message to them they do need it

Aaron miank

I think it's not a bad idea what a pain in the ass this whole damn thing is you guys are way out I don't freaking mind way off base and your nuts yeah they got hurts and your jerks and can't do this oh yeah yeah I want to nope and swing better a million times and nothing happens I like his idea. I want to do this idea. And I want to bring back the other video musical the hills are alive and Broadway will come alive I mean these two are huge Air supply may have been there before so he's going to look it up but still there's a lot to add to it a lot of lot of props and things he wants to use all props and not videos which might be kind of hard except for when you're doing a motion scene I guess you can use pictures she says but still you know what he means you want to have real props make a car that they're in and you can see them driving I got to tell you it's really what it's like and it's not hard for us and it's magic people want to see that we can do things not that we're the leaders who are crabby and b***** like them and we're one of the gang the sitting there staring at stuff not knowing what it is it isn't right

Cammilla

Olympus

[fkyumerica]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lzswt008xHk john travolta/donald trump, joe bien/mary sue in the suit

kirstie alley

john travolta did the same thing, showed it by dancing with princess diana

83 and 7

38 and 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpjCvzmsugw there are only 4 grandma plastic surgery types, and 4-8 moms

and 7 men

to look like the same person

and the name

egg it

they did it, goodbye we live at the beach

scream

john travolta is gene simmons, ozzy

and the luitenet at boot camp in full metal jacket

rotc all had sex with him, then angela was in thirteen after having two more of his kids

i had to finish two papers this morning

and finished the second one 6 minutes before the assignment due time

i hate how people let out blow

sloooooooooooooooooowwwww it doooooooooooooooooooownnn for meeeeeeeeeeee

its usually meth, comet bleach, and they cut out the bottom of the can for it and put it on top, how much is left, i dunno sponge

squeeze it in there, syringe, in their arm already

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xLQ1ZGhk8zw here is the family time line, and she comes from the front to the end with another new kid she just had again. 19ft tall, then back here again, fat

they say it

alix has the afro, and keri ann/stephanie behind her

denica/penny/keri ann

her daughter

angela in pink feathers, jessica/mallory behind her

the two girls in thirteen are them

then they all came out as old women again

in the end of the video

and im the guy with the personality, did it, inbred with a infant, child, his mom again

make me an actor, so his mom had to be a famous president first lady

he is ronald reagan

and elvis, tom

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsrnXh4YiTw his son with her vinnie being arrested as devin/adam bell/matt/mark

actual footage of wayde/prince phillip

and his daughter who was strong enough to mate with him, mary sue

so she chose her granddaughter

and she abandoned it and it was bill/david

alix's son, alix/princess diana

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5sTISPZHNs this was it after she gave birth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2KYgvF6Ft0 then this gone with the wind and in prison

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeVvHnJKhdE then she was marsha brady on porn shows, alden would make her eye contacts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jegdyR3W080 he took her first

then dan then wayde then dan again

she was screaming for one

in her backyard, mated her inbred infant in a adult suit with her after

corbin house, then the infant was vinnie/devin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxJ8sXYrmro this is her

skin dick

increase

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEJg81ntjTU the men stood outside that did it, the women were crucified

they want you to know, thats her

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZx9DMz3Jrg keri anne on the horse knifed by her in the stomach to breed with her newborn

or throw it

alix in hospital bed

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRXeTF4gzu0 then she got to know kei anne after, it is keri anne in the video

she might be matilda/alix

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIvmP43Whic same weird bra family waiting for the same guy

and the guy thats whats the who fun

does em

tom cruise

plain

cant let in the steam, other people not them, cant mate outside the family

cant let a microphone touch em, animals feel like that now see them as animals

the ones who like inbreeding will just throw stuff

not cheer

jen married don i couldent tell it was the same guy

was it?

dated different name guys

they robbed me of my money to build a big party house and invited me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVu1BwnU8_c same boring face

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbD8qbcXjgw they were all tied up with wayde and they were untied

and anne marie had to look just like her on the right

just sit there its not me. thats my daughter!

no one is in trouble

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6OmvBNvMMs its your personal right to eat some berries in the woods 15:05

thats her daughter princess anne in the bikini

married ronald reagan

had those two daughters next to her

each have a skin penis

neither are police but dressed to fuck her

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=te9Jly0vGxU if they had a bed of girl wives it looked like this

and a group of naked black women, all date the same guy they inbred from

same with those girls

each a different one sad quiet smile

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W36XK6wRmM when they drop them off is when they do it

old man

slide off

bye in a house

don on a ladder

jack and rose

wtf

she gave the big show an erection, and is their daughter together

jen and don had alix in gladiator, married it to him too old man

and if our kids fucked

and she fucked chris

say it like it to her

what is slang

what does it mean

oh k i blew their blow jo

whoa wtf they are like 50 now they fuck kids?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ct70a9r3kvM 2:13 then they all give birth to the same guys kids at once facing at each other and it all spirals out to look like some giant octopus thing to hide what they did

and others crawl in for the fun

and guys do it to say come on girls cheat with us

4:47 mission and video after white old man is him too

not leon

and whores kri anne back and forth from one block over to across dix 6 blocks all day everyday

radio signals nonstop

randy orton/wayde

alix shes dead? they make each area a dead area and build graveyards to move

there you go

fetus of a infant

the inbred men, their sons, they send chimpanzees to rape women

that are in their family

carlton is alix's family

planet of the apes star

stadium, they have a group of their kids left in the locker room

then flood it

ship on top

and they all leave

mary sue the who

and robbie abdo "sweetly." is elvis presley/don/david/roy, married with children was them

turns into tom?

them again

[stephaniejuhnay]

Community questions for you. Did you have a favorite ship/crackship on the show? Do you think Jeff & Annie will be together in the movie?

I love Jeff/Annie but would also be okay if they didn’t make that The Thing in the movie. The show never really centered any romantic pairing and I really appreciated it for that. The heart of the show was always the found family dynamics and how each of them bounces off the other or the group as a whole. And they also never tricked me into believing in a romance that ultimately led nowhere like another show I know. 😂😂 but yeah, I wouldn’t mind seeing it at all, would love it, but if the movie was just abt getting these guys back together for some good old fashioned antics and hijinks, I would gladly leave that out if there wasn’t room for it or if it didn’t serve the story. (But Dan, like….come on man. I need to know what happened after their final scene in S6…👀😂)

As far as crackships, idk if this really is one but Dean Spreck and Dean Pelton always tickled me and I would’ve loved to have seen that explored just for the train wreck it would’ve been. Also, and this is a deep cut, but Annie and Simmons from 1x09. Dan had plans to build this love/hate thing between them in the episode and wanted to bring him back to explore that, but it never happened, and I’m so sad abt it bc I think it would’ve been fantastic and hilarious.

[thedarling]

Frontiers.

12:36 p.m. In between tax entries for work and I'm helping my son with his study guide on 'colonialism for 8-year-olds'. I am having to suck my teeth so hard at this bare-bones data... Finally got to the part on Christopher Columbus and Hernán Cortés and I couldn't stand it anymore. None of what I said was on the study guide for the last half hour, but the travesties speak for themselves. History is seldom cute or pretty but it's real, and I'm not going to lie to my kid.

7:06 p.m. Reviewing Ab's study guide specific to the Northwest Passage made me nostalgic for Dan Simmons's The Terror. I appreciate a little historic fiction tinged with monster spooks. I was just telling a friend about my fascination and admiration for The Legend of Sleepy Hollow from a young age: Outsider comes into a sleepy New England town, attempts to seduce all of the women including the daughter of a wealthy business owner, then, when the Stranger tries to wise up to the locals who have their own specific beefs with him, the nebulous "spirit" of the town chases his dumbass out - and/or straight up kills him (the story doesn't confirm which). I feel like it's a cautionary tale that fits so well with the argument of colonialism. Frontiers are perilous. Do not fuck with the locals and/or discredit their fair warnings, because you will get fucked (see the HMS Terror and the HMS Erebus).