#The Keltiad

[haveyoureadthisscifibook]

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[rosheendubh]

Retaking the Ascendency…

—credit to the unknown artist of Faenor as the basis of this art-manip…Chiss are basically a cross of LotR Elves, with Targaryens and Valeryons with an Edo/Neo-Feudal era Japanese cultural and societal aesthetic…

…just noticing, if one squints hard enough, that *could be* the Paatatus chimera ring (paralleling the Keltoi symbol of the Tetraskele and the ouroboros of the Red and White Dragons of the Mabonigion…correlation with Keltoi medic/OFC protagonist…)…

[agardenandlibrary]

Queen Aoife was dying. For a hundred years and near half that again longer than any other had before, or ever would after — she had ruled Keltia, with an iron hand and a stiff back and a mind that could work at computer speed; had given the realm four sons, four princes to follow her; had seen the father of those sons dead long since, in a battle far from his home; had gone on alone, to make Keltia stronger than the kingdom had ever been in all the centuries of its existence; had lived to see the name of Keltia respected and feared and honored far beyond the Pale of its protection, a power among the stars. Now she was dying at last, and knew that she was dying, and was more than content that it should be so.

The Silver Branch by Patricia Kennealy

[chicagosavant]

Thrawn and ar’Alani (you’re going to tell me these two aren’t shagging in dark-hideaways all through her command ship?? Whatev’s—only the purposely denying can’t see this. Zahn writes a smile onto Thrawn’s face. That never happens. Except Ziara/Ar’alani. Maybe Thalias, too—I can buy that…). But these two are OTPs all the way…

“…Why don’t you come to the Irizi homestead with me?”

“To your *homestead* [to meet the parents???]?” Thrawn echoed. “Are strangers even allowed?” A muscle in his check twitched. “Especially strangers from rival families?”

“I don’t know and I don’t care,” Ziara said. “I am blood and I am an honored member of the fleet who just helped save eight-thousand lives. I don’t know how far all of that will take me, but I’d rather like to find out. You game to find out with me?“

“I don’t know, “Thrawn said hesitantly “I don’t want you to get in trouble on my behalf.“

“I’m not worried about it,” Ziara said. “Did I mention that my grandfather was an amazingly passionate art collector?”

Thrawn smiled. “If I haven’t mentioned it recently, Ziara, you have a knack for seeking out and exploiting your opponents’ weaknesses. Very well. Shall we once again charge headlong into danger?”

“We shall,” Zara said. “Besides, we just survived an encounter with a malicious gas giant planet. Really, how bad could my family be?“

—

Excerpt from ‘Thrawn: Chaos Rising’…

—so, even in my non-canon AU spoof SpaceRockOpera crossover of StarWars/TTT, Firefly-Serenity/and the Keltiad, my OFC, after she and Thrawn have their wicked way with each other (enemies to friends dynamic…), she points him back to Ziara. —I’ve toyed with, and am warming to part of my AU narrative arc, having Ar’alani and Thrawn completely professional and never pursuing intimacy in the years they served the Defense Fleet together. And in the night before he’s enters exile, with no more consequences compromising career paths, they consummate their affection. And 7-10 years later, we’re discovering Un’hee, who’d been taken away from Ziara once her psionic navigating abilities had been discovered. Then, as part of Blue Sun Corp’s research with enhanced super-soldiers like River Tam with psionic abilities, collaborating with Black Sun Syndicate and the Virathi/Coroniad/Grysk commanding the multiple strands of this stage across a Wormhole and distant parts of the MilkyWay, amid other confrontations, it’s the Firefly crew that rescues Un’hee, whilst River Tam with my OFC (biokinetically gifted Keltoi medic, teaming with Luke Skywalker) following some unholy uses of an ancient bioquantum-valent protogenome that enables real time mutagenesis and tissue regeneration (in hybrid Reaver-clones…Vong-V-V-V-Vong…we see where this is going, but no reborn Palpatine and it’s NOT called Project Necromancer…), and reunites Un’hee with her mother. And, with Thrawn back in the picture advancing the interests of The Empire of the Hand, with Ziara leading the Chiss branch of military/space fleet, leaving Thrawn to put 2 and 2 together. Recalling that baby-making sex (as it’s termed when it’s a rollicking—swooning-no-blood-left-brain kind’a sex…) night from a decade before…

—anyone game for writing this plot-bunny? Does anyone even know what the Keltiad is (of the 5 folks who actually know that fandom on this hell-site—and if you do, tell me it wouldn’t make an awesome crossover concept merged with the Firefly and Star Wars aesthetic😜)…

[longsightmyth]

Me, whispering: got another one for you ms kennealy-morrison

(Celts in spaaaaaaaace)

[marblesarelost]

I just went through my book wish list and put it on Bookshop.

(I'm not buying anything TODAY because I have to move in ....FML SEVEN WEEKS?... and I am not stupid enough to buy MORE BOOKS just to have to pack them up and move them. Not to mention some of them are on backorder or preorder and I don't want them going to the wrong address because I am moving in seven weeks.)

BEFORE adding a bunch more?

Um

It was over $300.

AFTER adding a bunch more?

I don't know how much it is, and I'm honestly afraid to add it all up.

WELP

Just added all to my cart.

YEAH

It's under a grand!

.....barely....

But a lot of these books are REALLY IMPORTANT -- Jared Sexton, Heather Cox Richardson, stuff about how we really are facing a civil war coming, stuff about how shitty it is to be poor in America (not that I don't KNOW that shit),and then there's the books I just fucking WANT: the Wolf Hall books by Hilary Mantel, the Shigeru Mizuki Japanese history mangas, new copies of the Paks original trilogy and the expansion of the world as well (I didn't like those as much as the original Paks books, but I liked them well enough, and also Sergeant Stammel -- gods bless him), Gaiman's Norse Mythology and American Gods and Stardust and a new copy of the Graveyard Book, and the Chronicles of Prydain which I really do need to read, and then there's the James Clavell** books that I legit HAVE to have and the Tolkien, again, I have to have them because somehow I do not have copies of the big Four and the Silmarillion and yes I AM getting the illustrated Hobbit and the illustrated Silmarillion separately because ILLUSTRATIONS BY TOLKIEN, DAMMIT

(** Yes, I'm aware that Clavell's work is very problematic. That being said, my mother once told me, when learning that at the time I was reading Shogun and really liking it, that Shogun was the only book she ever saw my father, my actual father, read.

Now I know for a fact, solid and cold, that Daddy liked Stephen King. He read a lot of King after he and my mom divorced. He's who turned me into a Constant Reader -- okay given that I read Pet Sematary when I was eight at my grandma's house -- by giving me The Eyes of the Dragon when I was young; by handing me IT and Christine and The Shining and The Stand when I was older.

All that being said, there is something very special to me about reading and enjoying and loving books that my father read and loved. It makes me feel that we are still sharing, still reaching out to one another, beyond the Boundaries of Death's Country.

Not to mention, King Rat is....horribly problematic. Horribly so. Yet there is something in it that reaches to me. Here is greed, here is horror, here is the worst that man can be to man. Yet here is generosity, here is quiet stoic heroism, here is mercy, here is hope.

Clavell's work is problematic, yes. Lots of work is. But there is something to be learned from it. Do I think every work has something to be learned from? Not really. Some is just shit, and that's the honest truth. But some, we can learn something from.)

and FML I still need to find the complete Keltiad -- the Aeron books and the Arthur books, Blackmantle was a horrible revenge fantasy -- (And just for the record, I KNEW her, I KNEW Patricia, she invited me to her HOUSE if I were ever in NYC, she named me her War-Badger, I counted her as a FRIEND, I MOURNED her when she passed, and I STILL think Blackmantle was a HORRIBLE revenge fantasy) and the complete Belgariad along with Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara the Sorceress --

....FUCK.

(If you're wondering why I didn't mention the Malloreon, it's because I read the first book and hated it)

...I'd love to have the complete Foxfire series...

...guess I'm gonna have to hit up AbeBooks or something too...

RIP the cash I was gonna set aside just for me I guess....

[beatrixiv]

Written by Jim Morrison girlfriend lead singer of THE DOORS

Serge Gainzburg, Jane Birken was there a Coffee House Jam Session in France… of all the coffeehouses in the world, how did you get here… “Le Patch Azure” in Saint Moritz, France The Greek GetAway Haircut!

[libriamore]

Every time I read something related to the Mabinogion/ Cuchulainn cycle I feel like I’m rewiring my brain

[wishesofeternity]

I FOUND THEM

I FOUND THEM

I FUCKING FOUND THEM

[rj-anderson]

What was the first urban fantasy book you ever read? For me it was this one — Emma Bull’s weird, haunting, Minneapolis rock-and-roll-with-faeries novel WAR FOR THE OAKS. . As a child and teen I’d read plenty of portal fantasy and epic high fantasy, and even a bit of space fantasy (Patricia Kennealy’s KELTIAD). But the idea of combining fantastical creatures and faery folk with a modern American cityscape, not in a humorous fish-out-of-water way but as beings who’ve already learned to live and thrive in the human world, was new to me. So new, in fact, that I wasn’t sure at first whether I liked it. . What I definitely did like, though, was Emma Bull’s vivid, evocative writing style, as well as the charming and mischievous character of the Phouka (even though physically he’s a dead ringer for Prince, right down to the paisley-print jeans — it was written in 1987, after all). And I certainly found the idea of an epic battle between the Seelie and Unseelie Courts taking place in downtown Minneapolis, without most humans even being aware of it, fascinating. I devoured the book in a matter of hours, and have re-read it a couple of times since. . I’m still hit-and-miss on the idea of urban fantasy in general. I’ve read a fair number that were just *too* focused on the urban, gritty element for my taste — fey folk wearing leather jackets and hanging about in nightclubs isn’t what I really crave when I’m reading fantasy, and part of me always wants to get out of the city and back to fairyland (or at least a land that seems more suited to fairies) as soon as possible. Still, there’s no question that WAR FOR THE OAKS featured a number of ideas and elements that have since become staples of modern fairy fantasy, and had a powerful influence on later authors including Holly Black, Melissa Marr, and myself. And that’s why it’s one of the #booksthatmademe. https://www.instagram.com/p/CAJpg2gAi6B/?igshid=14x53meipah8h

[haveyoureadthisscifibook]

vote yes if you have finished the entire book.

vote no if you have not finished the entire book.

(faq · submit a book)

[rosheendubh]

The method behind the beauty of these covers (Napoleon and Beauty and the Beast as inspiration—need I say more?)…oh, the hand pose, described as ‘intimate’??

[agardenandlibrary]

RIP Budic and Lasairían, you tried

[chicagosavant]

...what the Admiral wants, the Admiral gets...

[longsightmyth]

"Quick oh shit we have to let them know it's sci-fi!"

"PAINT IN A (one)(single) SPACESHIP"

(I had no idea this edition existed I feel like a bad fan)

[battlestar-royco]

if anyone wants to scream with me about battlestar galactica please do. this post is inspired by @longsightmyth because we’re both breaking our backs holding up the fandoms for our respective current obsessions (hers being the keltiad)