#and the author is so clever

[angst-fairy]

OOOO I have a series of unfortunate events, it's hilarious!!

Imagine how much better the world would be if the harry potter books were never written

[thejasontoddarchives]

This is the core of Jason’s character.

Again they try to hammer in that Jason is brash, arrogant, and reckless; that he jumps before thinking. However you can’t really attribute reckless behavior to arrogance or carelessness when he only ever becomes instinctive during very specific instances. The few times he’s “stepped out of line” or just threw himself into an unknown/dangerous situation it was always to protect someone from predators and sickos. Otherwise, keep in mind the number of times he’s been praised for his intelligence and judgment; for being meticulous, calm, and cooperative.

Batman #424 (1988)

[just-trying-my-best-everyday]

I'm so tired of going "wow that's so dumb" while watching the adaptation of a really clever book.

[phoenixcatch7]

I was reading a fic - character gets isekai'd to a world they're pretty overpowered for - and the author described it as a like, invasive species, and that's what I shall be calling all my crossover fix it fics from now on lmao

[kikuism]

i read poor things and really enjoyed it, such a fun time. now i'm even more curious about the movie and what i will think of it

[wyllzel]

i'm about 15% of my way thru the wicked novel but honestly... it very much insists upon itself 🫤 not very inclined to finish it...

[rxttenfish]

see, people will often talk about more complex meanings in narratives and what was actually being intended by the author, but the thing is, sometimes you read the entire damn thing and you legitimately cant tell if theyre trying to make some kind of comment or narrative choice, or if the author themself just fucked up and didnt realize what theyre doing.

[damnation-if]

1500 Followers!

wow! i can safely say that i never expected to gain this many followers... it’s a little intimidating but i hope you’re all having fun! like last time, i’m not really in a position to do any giveaways or anything but. if you have asks you’d like to send or... questions for any of the characters, feel free to send them in! and thank you all so much <3 i appreciate you all!

[kolbietheaggrievedwriter]

I should be in bed (and I'm going now!), but I just binged a couple chapters of A Guide for Background Characters to Survive in a Manga and my god do I love a protagonist who will dip out the SECOND he spots trouble 🤣🤣

An enemy he trounced a while back showed up to take revenge via ambushing him and his class, and she was like "it won't be so easy this time" & he was like "you wanna bet?" & then turned invisible & ran away immediately 😭😭😭 The class wasn't even surprised! They're used to it by now lmao I stan this man. Major respect.

[fictionadventurer]

Top 5 books read this year, please?

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion Vol. 1-7 by Beth Brower: These books are just so much fun. They sit perfectly in my sweet spot of historical light fiction, and there's so much humor and heart and so many good characters. Maybe they're not the best books I've read this year, but they may be the only ones tempting me to buy copies for my shelf.

Washington Square and Daisy Miller by Henry James: Two short, sad, delicately-drawn novellas that may have added another author to my list of favorite classic writers.

Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin: This book started my obsession with Lincoln's Cabinet. I can't in good conscience put it lower (despite a minor qualm that prevents me from seeking out the full version). I'm also going to cheat and include Destiny of the Republic by Candace Millard, which provided me my other history niche of this year about President Garfield and his assassination. And My Dear President for all the fascinating letters offering new insight into the lives of American presidents and their wives.

The Heir of Redclyffe by Charlotte Yonge: Despite some serious issues with the story, this one had some of my favorite characters of the year, and they're going to stick with me for a long time.

Desire and The Good Comrade by Una Lucy Silsberrad: Maybe objectively not the best or even my favorites--I have problems with the plot of both--but I love how she writes Edwardian women trying to make their way in the world and their relationships with men who make them rethink the way they approach the world, and she's another entry on the list of favorite authors discovered this year.

[nordic-language-love]

This month's bonus book is super long and it seems the reason for that is because the author spends like a paragraph doing world-building or unnecessarily over-explaining reactions between each line of dialogue -_-

[fluentisonus]

also

[onewomancitadel]

I haven't even listened to the music but I do have a strange fondness for Charli XCX's new album cover

because the relative lack of artistic effort is inversely proportional to the fact that you know somebody did make it, because it's not actually something even worth machine generating (and text itself it really struggles with). Maybe all those postmodern artists actually knew what they were talking about, because I doubt machine is ever going to output an empty canvas.

Like, something lesser or resisting form is actually indicative of a human agent, contrary to maximalist Escher nightmares. It's sort of similar to how machine generated prose is always overwrought borderline purple prose and actually inefficient in construction. Writers who value minimalist prose can't be imitated. (To be fair, neither can any author really be meaningfully imitated, but I'm talking about style here; it's a total giveaway). I think it's interesting because inherent to the issue is the idea that there is 'one' way to produce art, which there isn't, which a lot of people greatly misunderstand - well, yeah there is, it involves a human agent (I'm even excluding animals here, sorry, I hear the objections and I'm not expanding) - but also what it tends to output means you can look at something like 'Brat' and pretty much definitively say a human did it. Because it's bad. And consequently I like it.

I probably should've just sent this thought to my best friend instead of writing a Tumblr post about it, so I'll just do that and send this post to her. Hahahaha.

[thequietabsolute]

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce Homo [1888.]

[aeondeug]

something that sticks out to me with kaz is his fondness for stage magic type tricks and escape artistry. it reminds me of things like how the start of the adventures of cavalier and clay there's a big portion about how the one boy admires harry houdini and aspires to be like him. that to be able to be like him was the dream of every jewish boy on the block. or figures like hershel of ostropol who plays tricks and can't ever be truly caught and who succeeds via clever schemes.

kaz isn't filled with the aspirational dreams of being like harry houdini though. and he's not a fun folklore hero you'd find in a children's picture book. he's very grim and he's exceptionally brutal. he's very driven, yes, but his motivation is revenge.

this isn't really a complete thought. it's only a half thought. but it is one that i've been thinking of while reading this book. maybe it will develop into a more cogent and purposeful thing at some point.

[lesbian4lqg]

one thing i really appreciate about svsss is that with anyone else in shen yuans role?

the system's lbh mood ring points (satisfaction, heartbreak, etc) would be considered an invasion of privacy more than the whole transmigration thing already is or at least a source of valuable insight but instead

its shen yuan. if anything the mood ring reveals make him more confused