#cowboy life is just that srs i guess

[lethologicaee]

due in four days. spent nine hours on the CLOUDS today. someone put me out of my misery

[annarellix]

A Tale of Two Princes by Eric Geron

Edward Dinnissen leads a charmed life. He’s the Crown Prince of Canada, gets the royal treatment at his exclusive private school, and resides in a ritzy mansion. He thrives off being the perfect prince as he prepares for the Investiture Ceremony on his eighteenth birthday, the final step in his role as heir—and Canada’s future king. But this closeted Crown Prince has just one tiny problem: he’s unsure how to tell his parents, his beloved country, and his adoring fans that he’s gay.

Billy Boone should be happy with the simple life. His family’s ranch is his favorite place in the world, he loves his small town, and his boyfriend is the cutest guy at Little Timber High. So why does it feel like something’s still missing? Maybe it has to do with the fact that this out-and-proud cowboy feels destined for something more . . .

When Edward and Billy meet by chance in New York City, they discover that they are long-lost twins, and their lives are forever changed. Together, will these twin princes—“twinces”—be able to take on high school, coming out, and coronations? Or will this royal reunion quickly become a royal train wreck?

The Author: Eric Geron (pronounced: jur-ON) is the New York Times bestselling author of The Hocus Pocus Spell Book, Poultrygeist, and Bye Bye, Binary, along with numerous other titles, including the New York Times bestselling Descendants novelization under the name Rico Green. He earned his creative writing degree from the University of Miami and spent many years at Disney as an editor of New York Times bestselling books. He currently resides in New York City. You can find him on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok @EricGeron and on his website at ericgeron.com.

SOCIAL LINKS: Author Website: http://www.ericgeron.com/ Twitter: @ericgeron Instagram: @ericgeron

BUY LINKS: Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/a-tale-of-two-princes-eric-geron/17303731?ean=9781335425928 IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781335425928 B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-tale-of-two-princes-eric-geron/1139818443?ean=9781335425928 Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Tale-Two-Princes-Eric-Geron/dp/1335425926/ref=sr_1_1?crid=UZDE2OJQW6AF&keywords=a+tale+of+two+princes&qid=1672864767&sprefix=a+tale+of+two+princes%2Caps%2C98&sr=8-1

EXCERPT: Chapter One

EDWARD “Handsome and charming? How is Canada’s perfect royal son possibly still single?” Travis Romano, Dean of Admissions at The Juilliard School here in New York, gives me a meaty handshake. A gigantic grin plasters his face and his green eyes crinkle at the corners. He shifts his stance as if hoping the photographers will be able to capture a few good shots of this moment. It’s the same irk-some question I’ve been dodging since the day I went from “Royal Tot” to “Royally Hot.” The clanging of crystal quiets as a hush falls around the dean. A Silicon Valley tech guru sets down her glass of Bor-deaux to lovingly place her hand on her husband’s arm. The president’s son gives me a cheeky grin. Everyone within a three-metre radius is now silent, impatiently waiting to hear how I’ll respond. For a moment, I imagine telling everyone the truth: “Guess what? I’m gay! And I don’t want to marry a woman and one day have babies to continue the royal bloodline.” But I’ll never say that. It’s too important to my parents—and all of Canada—that I follow in their footsteps. And as next in line to the Maple Crown, it’s too important that I be a good king for my people one day. EDWARD “Handsome and charming? How is Canada’s perfect royal son possibly still single?” Travis Romano, Dean of Admissions at The Juilliard School here in New York, gives me a meaty handshake. A gigantic grin plasters his face and his green eyes crinkle at the corners. He shifts his stance as if hoping the photographers will be able to capture a few good shots of this moment. It’s the same irk-some question I’ve been dodging since the day I went from “Royal Tot” to “Royally Hot.” The clanging of crystal quiets as a hush falls around the dean. A Silicon Valley tech guru sets down her glass of Bor-deaux to lovingly place her hand on her husband’s arm. The president’s son gives me a cheeky grin. Everyone within a three-metre radius is now silent, impatiently waiting to hear how I’ll respond. For a moment, I imagine telling everyone the truth: “Guess what? I’m gay! And I don’t want to marry a woman and one day have babies to continue the royal bloodline.” But I’ll never say that. It’s too important to my parents—and all of Canada—that I follow in their footsteps. And as next in line to the Maple Crown, it’s too important that I be a good king for my people one day. So, I’ll never find true love. That’s the cost of my destiny, and I’ve accepted it. Besides, I’m already married—to tradition. MAPLE CROWN RULE 57: Never discuss matters of the heart. To cover my nervousness, I flash my signature sugar-sweet smile—one befitting the Crown Prince of Canada—at the attentive crowd on the dance floor, letting them drink in the seconds. Over the Juilliard violinists playing softly in the back-ground, I answer the dean’s question about how I’m possibly still single with one deadpan word: “Midterms.” Some people chuckle while others begin a chorus of aaaaaaw. The platinum maple leaf brooch on my jacket lapel sits heavy on top of my heart. It identifies me as the Crown Prince of Canada, but it’s also the lock of the box I’m trapped in-side. The truth is, I’m single because I’m a closeted gay guy…and I’m a closeted gay guy because I’m the Crown Prince of Canada. I keep smiling at the crowd, even though the many faces staring back feel overwhelming. I’ve been gone from the public eye for almost a year, so of course everyone is excited to see the “reclusive” Crown Prince return to the limelight. They don’t have to know that “reclusive” actually means I’ve been grounded this whole time, and all because of how poorly I acted at my seventeenth birthday party. In the fallout, Mum and Dad grounded me for the rest of my junior year, then ordered I be sent away to New York City for my senior year. I’ve been here for six months, cooped up between my family’s private Upper East Side residence and a stuffy private school. Sure, there was public scrutiny over my parents shipping me off to New York, but they passed it off as an opportunity to strengthen their tight bonds with Canada’s closest neighbour to the south. No need for anyone to know I had been grounded and sent here as punishment. Luckily, all my efforts to be a model prisoner have paid off, and my parents have just decided I don’t have to be grounded for the rest of my senior year. Tonight they’re giving me the chance to prove I really can be a model Crown Prince. And of course, I promised Mum and Dad I would be on my abso-lute best behaviour. After all, the Investiture Ceremony is in a couple of weeks, which means I have to prove that I’m fully prepared to be heir to the Maple Crown, aka the Canadian Crown. I know I’m ready. I’ve been training for it since I was a child. But I still need to convince the 38,346,809 people of Canada—and the rest of the world too. No pressure, right? Dean Romano claps me on the back, wagging his finger at me with a cloying smile. “Well, we look forward to the day you find the perfect girl.” The rest of the group applauds po-litely and clinks their glasses. I sigh inwardly. Since forever, Mum and Dad have said the same exact thing to me whenever the topic of the future queen has come up. I want to tell my rapt audience that I’m only seventeen years old, and therefore in no rush to marry anyone, obviously. But I’m used to near-total strangers interrogating me about my love life, so I wink at the dean and then add, “I promise that you’ll be the first to know.” MAPLE CROWN RULE 16: Maintain civility in social settings. The semicircle of men and women—okay, mostly women—tightens around me, countless sequined arms and shimmer-ing bare shoulders swarming me like voracious sea creatures. My Adam’s apple presses against my stiff collar. “Who knows?” I add, my sultry smile fighting a twitch as I reach up to loosen my tie. “Maybe I’ll meet someone special here tonight.” MAPLE CROWN RULE 46: Make everyone feel heard Charity balls are a royal pain in the derrière, but also an unfortunate requirement, along with cutting ribbons and giv-ing speeches. With the Dinnissen monarchy still so new, my parents work tirelessly to endear themselves to the Canadian public, which is still forming opinions on our family as its new fledging figureheads—and as soon as I graduate in June and return home to Canada, the full weight of that responsibility will fall upon my shoulders as well. Though I suppose I can’t be too upset with my parents, or as the British press has dubbed them, Canada’s “Maple Syrup Sweeties.” Tonight, they’re off at some admirable conference with our prime minister. Actual important stuff that doesn’t in-volve schmoozing with politicians and celebrities. Well, maybe still some schmoozing—Mum always books her reflexologist before traveling with the PM. Then again, I can’t complain about standing in for them tonight. I’m still just so glad my time of captivity is finally over. “To Prince Edward finding true love!” Dean Romano’s wife, Rebecca, lifts her crystal champagne flute toward the chandelier, and everyone echoes her words, then drains their glasses. I manage to keep smiling. Her toast is yet another painful reminder of something I’ll never have…true love. But that’s the trade-off that comes with getting to be king one day. It’s more exhausting than I remembered to keep pretending I’m something I’m not. I really need to get a breath of fresh air. Excusing myself, I turn away and scan for the back doors of the Grand Ballroom—combing through a choppy ocean of barons, dignitaries, dukes, and celebrities. All resplendent in sheer gowns and sleek black ties. All elated to speak to me. But I don’t care about any of them. I only care about one per-son. Where the hell is Neel, anyway? To think I call him my best friend. And where the hell is the exit? Gord Lauzon, Canadian secretary to Dad and my personal adviser since I was a child, is laughing up a storm with a group of people against the ballroom’s gilded wall. Like always, Gord looks sharp in a luxury suit and tie, his head freshly shaved and gleaming white. He was Granny’s ex–private secretary who now controls the press office, acts as the vital channel of com-munication between my parents and the Canadian govern-ment, and manages my day-to-day. Gord also works as liaison to the Institution—or “Firm”—that keeps the Royal Family running like one big business. He was delighted my ground-ing presented him with a chance to ratchet up his royal lessons. That is, after he got over the sour taste it left in his mouth. He meets my eyes through his bold-framed glasses. After six months of him being my New York City babysitter, aka my parents’ eyes on me, I can tell he’s checking in. He subtly extends his arm, pressing fingertip to thumb, our signal for asking if everything is copacetic. I doubt anything foul will happen in this historic hotel’s grand old ballroom, other than me breaking a heart or two, so I return the gesture and he nods in understanding. Though, if I’m being honest, I could use his help to point out the exit door. I check my timepiece and realize I’ve only been here for an hour. I used to be so good at wowing the crowds at these fundraisers. I’ve got to get back on top of my game. That is, after I take that much-needed brief break. “Well, if it isn’t Canada’s Golden Child,” says a sly voice in my ear. Suddenly, I’m being suffocated by a thick cloud of vanilla perfume as I turn to take in the full lips and chiseled cheek-bones of Sephora’s latest global ambassador, aka Lady Sofia Marchand, aka Fi, aka my frenemy since childhood. In an exquisite seafoam-blue couture gown with enough tulle to make Cinderella jealous, she looks every bit an ethereal fairy tale goddess. Click! The event photographer trips the shutter of his camera be-fore I can even utter a greeting. Seamlessly, Fi throws her head back in laughter as if I’ve just showed her the most hilarious GIF in the world. Instinctively, I tighten my core, relax my shoulders, and flex my chest. MAPLE CROWN RULE 13: Have a royal presence. Gord once told me that the best way to have perfect posture was to pretend someone was pulling a string right up through the top of my head, like a puppet. I was five. That’s me, all these years later: Perfect Puppet Prince Eddie, aching mouth unhinged, grin and all. And Lady Sofia knows just how to pull my strings. With British aristocracy on her mum’s side and descending from French nobles on her Canadian dad’s side, Fi’s been one of my Crown-approved acquaintances since we were kids at Ash-wood Elementary in Ottawa. For years, we’ve attended the same polo and equestrian summer camp, the same celebrity birthday parties, and the same VIP meet-and-greets backstage at sold-out concerts. It’s painstakingly evident that our par-ents are hoping for a romantic spark, but Fi and I are less like maple syrup in milk and more like oil and water. I thought we might be rid of each other when I moved south of the border for my senior year, but no such luck. Her parents put her into St. Aubyn’s Prep as soon as they heard I would be attending, which she didn’t seem to mind. Click! “Well if it isn’t New York’s hottest crown-chaser,” I mut-ter out the corner of my mouth. “Given how elusive you are, it’s no wonder I haven’t caught it yet.” Fi laughs—cackling this time. “It’s only a matter of time.” She perches one hand on my shoulder while lightly clasping it with the other, her front leg shifting to elegantly eclipse her back leg. She’s all fair skin tinged pink, peachy cheeks, silver-highlighted collarbones, and smoky cat eye. Click! Behind the photographer a few yards away, I spy a huddle of girls my age clamouring for my attention, hopping and waving their arms about. I’ll have to deal with them soon, I’m sure. MAPLE CROWN RULE 52: Every person is important. That includes the fangirls. Ça va. Beside me, Fi drops her sculpted arms and shoulders back, puffing out her chest. “What’s it been, nearly a year since you’ve hit the social scene? Glad your ’rents finally let you off the short leash.” I smile very sweetly, keeping my eyes trained ahead. “As am I.” Click! “I can’t wait to get even more photos with you at the gala on Thursday night,” Fi continues. “I assume you’ll be there.” “Wouldn’t miss it.” The photographer lowers his camera and nods, as if to say he’s captured enough. Bien. Fi faces me and talks through her smile. “My work here is done. It’s been real, loser. See you in school!” Then she turns to the photographer. “Make sure you tag me—that’s Sofia with an f.” She scoffs to herself. “As if he doesn’t already know that.” MAPLE CROWN RULE 101: No personal social media accounts. So, that’s a thing, albeit fairly new. My Royal Family has general verified accounts instead, of course. At my last check, the @CanadianRoyals had 20.6 million followers. And pho-tos of me happen to get the most likes. I look past Fi, lingering despite her goodbyes, and inad-vertently lock pupils with one of the girls in the huddle, who takes the fleeting eye contact for an invitation. Gathering her black gown, she rushes forward. Her gaggle of friends follows with hungry expressions, flocking my way in a V-formation. A crushing weight settles on my chest. Although the pressure of being a royal is ever-present, at least when I was grounded I didn’t have to deal with this level of people-pleasing. Nodding toward the girls, Fi scrunches up her delicate nose. “Good luck with that.” She flashes the crowd an enchant-ing smile, flips her long ombré hair, and strides down a non-existent red carpet while all heads turn her way and another photographer flails for her attention. Well. That’s Lady Sofia for you, je ne sais quoi and all. “Your Royal Highness!” says the girl in the black gown, who appears to be squatting in what I suppose is her attempt at a perfunctory curtsy. “Sir, may I get a photo with you, too?” I freeze, trying with all my might not to roll my eyes. Members of the Royal Family must always be gracious. “Of course, mademoiselle!” Growing up with a French-speaking nanny clearly rubbed off on me—along with remedial French lessons at school. “Thank you!” she squeals, then turns to her posse and mouths, Mademoiselle! She angles her phone overhead, and I see my brow wrinkling on-screen. MAPLE CROWN RULE 102: No selfies Another recent rule. My grandmother and the family matri-arch, the queen of England, managed to officially deem self-ies as unfit for royalty. Too common. Too vain. I agree with some of the Maple Crown Rules inspired by Granny’s original ones (the Buckingham Crown Rules). But a lot of the tradi-tional values that any Royal Family thrives on are woefully backward. C’est comme ça. I gesture at the event photographer still hovering nearby. “Shall we have him take the photo? I trust my friend here will do a fine job capturing your beauty.” “Oh, of course, sir!” The girl titters abashedly and tucks her phone into a sequin clutch. We assume the position while her friends look on, capturing every moment behind their screens. Others move in to watch too, unwittingly revealing the exit behind the photographer. He snaps a few shots and then walks over, showing us the photos. I smile in approval, then I rely on an old standby and wave to an invisible friend across the packed ballroom. “I’m terri-bly sorry,” I tell the growing cluster of waiting girls. “I must step out for a brief moment. I’ll be back very soon! I promise.” MAPLE CROWN RULE 18: Depart at the right moment Technically I also broke the rule Royals don’t apologize, but I can typically let that one slide. I am Canadian, after all. Flashing one last dashing smile, I make my escape. The good ol’ Flash-and-Dash. Works every time. I spin on my heel and bump into a table, sending plates and glasses chattering like teeth (how unlike me!), then course-correct, making my way toward the exit. In my periphery, Gord excuses himself from his coterie of raucous socialites and follows, a long shadow tethered to my every stride, while I search for that pesky in-visible friend who conveniently can’t seem to stay in one place, weaving in and out and greeting the crème de la crème as I go. “How are you?” I call to a NASA astronaut. I wave at a Scot-tish minister. “Hello there! Smart-looking kilt!” “Salut! Comment va votre famille?” I ask the French ambassa-dor. I crank my megawatt smile up to an eleven for the prime minister of Japan. “Sumimasen,” I say. MAPLE CROWN RULE 36: Royals should speak multiple languages. For everyone else, I use my nod/twinkle-in-eye combo that’s friendly, but also too intimidating for anyone to do more than reply with a wave, smile, or nod. Otherwise, they’d be on me like flies on maple syrup. I reach the exit, soar through a series of doors, and maneuver past the black-and-white-clad waitstaff wheeling out carts of teacups. Everybody is so busy, they don’t even notice me in all the hubbub. I push a swinging aluminum traffic door, stepping past the bustling kitchen, and take a flight of steps down to a door leading to a break room reeking of what I can only assume is the smell of old coffee where I know no one will find me. It’s empty, except for a guy my age in a worker’s uniform sitting at a rickety little table, gazing at his phone. I drop into a folding chair at a table in front of him, loosen my tie some more, and let out a whoosh of air. I’m safe. For now. “Oh!” he says with a start, nervously pushing back his bangs. “Can I help you? Are you lost?” “I’m fine. It’s okay that I’m in here, right?” I ask. His glimmering eyes dart around. “Umm, normally they’d make me kick guests out for…reasons.” He suddenly notices my maple leaf brooch, and blushes. “But it’s cool! I won’t tell. Your Royal Highness, sir,” he adds hastily. I almost begin to disclose why I’m hiding out in the first place. But then I remember. MAPLE CROWN RULE 77: Only share what is necessary. It’s technically: Only share with your subjects what is necessary, but I’ve truncated it. I don’t have subjects. At least, not yet. I nod. “Perfect. Thanks.” “D-do you want some privacy?” he stammers. He stands up to leave, and his phone falls from his hand. It skitters across the warped linoleum, coming to a rest at the tip of my shiny black patent leather shoes. I pick it up and hand it back to him. “No, no, it’s fine. Stay. I just needed a tiny break. I’ll be out in a jiffy.” I give the break room a cursory scan, eyes sweeping cabinets, a sink, a small white fridge. “Do you have any food? I’m famished.” One of his eyebrows quirks in bewilderment. “Oh, you didn’t get a chance to eat?” “At a charity event like this one? Too much schmoozing. Not enough eating. As it goes.” He lets out a little laugh. “Let me see what we have.” He vanishes up into the stairwell, then comes trundling back down a minute later with a tray of miniature desserts: everything from frozen mochi and mint sorbet to macarons and bonbons with gold leafing on top. “Super!” I pinch up a pink mochi and pop it in my mouth. “Have one.” He hesitates, but after darting a glance at the door, he selects a pale green one. “Staff isn’t supposed to eat these,” he says, but he bites down on it anyway. “Look at us,” I remark. “Me trespassing in employee break rooms and you eating forbidden mochi. We’re breaking all the rules.” We both laugh. “So, you work here? Aren’t you in high school like me?” “Yeah. But I just work nights. I’m saving up for college. My uncle got me the job. He’s a cook here.” I take another mochi. Double chocolate. A favourite. “Do you cook too?” “I try.” He laughs, running his hand through his shiny black hair. “What about you?” Best not to share how all of my meals are prepared for me at the risk of sounding elitist. Instead, I grin. “Can you keep a secret? I’ve been working on a chocolate chip cookie recipe that puts Pierre on Park’s to shame.” I pass it off as a joke, but I actually spent all winter experimenting on just that recipe—along with original recipes for fresh new takes on profiteroles, cream puffs, and croquembouches. The guy laughs again, briefly covering his mouth. “I bet.” “I’m serious.” I select a bonbon from the tray. “It’s rather ag-onizing being a foodie when you’re the next leader of a coun-try whose biggest culinary claim to fame is gourmet poutine.” His expression turns contemplative. “Hey, didn’t Canada invent the Twinkie?” “I rest my case.” The guy chuckles and combs his fingers through his hair once more, then locks eyes with me. “I never expected to meet a royal, let alone, well, you. Sorry, you just seem so…normal.” Reddening, he adds, “Oh. Sorry. I didn’t… It’s just, you seem so chill. It’s like hanging out with…a friend from school.” He tucks a strand behind his ear, his eyes downcast, his cheeks practically puce. “Don’t worry about it. I get it.” I swallow. I don’t know why, but my throat has decided to go bone-dry. “It’s easy to talk to you too. Do you get that a lot?” Silence falls. My stomach drops as soon as the words escape my lips. Do I sound like I’m coming onto him? What am I babbling about to this stranger? But much to my relief, a smile washes across his face like sunlight. I’m wondering what to say next when— Slam! The break room door bursts open, and I hear the voice of my best friend. “Edward! There you are!” The worker and I jump with a start, stepping away from one another as if we were just caught hiding a dead body. In struts Neel Singh, aforementioned best friend who also happens to be the son of Zubin Singh, Indian ambassador to Canada. Let me tell you about Neel. People think I’m charming, but Neel can get them eating out of the palm of his manicured hand in seconds—including my parents, who bizarrely enough think him being in New York with me is a good thing. He grew up all over the world, but stayed in Ottawa long enough for us to become best friends, a relationship which fully crystallized after we built a snowman with a creatively placed carrot. Thank goodness it melted before my parents or Gord saw it. And now, he’s in New York for his senior year too. Only Neel could con-vince his parents that he should move to another country for his last year of high school. I guess he griped enough about being separated from his best friend that they eventually caved. But in this moment, with the worker’s eyes still locked on mine, I’m kind of wishing Neel’s parents had kept him in Ottawa. I fold my arms across my chest. “Oh, now you decide to show up. Where were you forever ago when I was looking for you, mon chum?” Neel glances at the worker, whose name I wish I knew—que c’est gênant—then back at me, grinning. “Oh, you’ve made a new friend?” “Shut up,” I growl so low that only Neel can hear me. He knows my secret and I trust him to keep it, but sometimes what he says in front of others makes me sweat. He ignores me and walks across the break room. “Hi. I’m Neel. It’s so nice to meet you.” He pumps my new friend’s hand, lingering for far too long. He has a knack for being overly friendly. And there’s no denying Neel looks suave in his tailored black suit, crisp white button-up that contrasts nicely against the warm bronze undertones of his brown skin, and bow tie that perfectly matches his silk pocket square. Probably a look he “borrowed” from the runway he walked in Milan. The perks of being incredibly wealthy and good-looking. “Nice to meet you too.” The guy looks from Neel to me, flashes a timid smile, and scurries from the room before I can utter salut. Neel shoots me a knowing smirk then starts washing his hands at the sink. He ditched me all night, only showing up to barge in and scare off my new friend. This is low, even for him. “Can you believe they had no vegetarian options?” he asks incredulously. “Meat pies for as far as the eye could see.” “Seriously, where have you been? I needed you,” I say. “And how did you find me?” He dries his hands on a dish rag then snatches up a bonbon. “I have my sources,” he says through a mouthful. I glare. I could murder him. Use industrial-strength kitchen cleaner to hide the evidence. “Fine.” Neel sticks his thumb into a vanilla mochi, then jerks it in the direction of the door. Right on cue, Gord sets foot into the break room, looking less than pleased. “Your Royal Highness.” Rolling my eyes at Neel, I give Gord the signal that all is well. But as Neel rests a hand on my forearm, I’m no longer sure. He’s got that look in his eye. “I’m bored of the ball, so I’m thinking we leave before the raffle and silent auction.  Besides—” he beams his radiant smile “—there’s a private shindig taking place now at Beauty and Essex—no nonsense this time. Say you’ll come? Great! Let’s go.” Neel hooks his arm in mine and twists in the direction of the door. He may have made the Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia list, but right now, he’s number 1 on my naughty list. I plant my feet. “Sounds sweet, but I’d rather not end up grounded again.” Neel grips my face, pleading. “Please? Pretty please with maple sugar on top?” I pry his fingers off. “Tempting,” I say, “but I’m afraid I’m immune to your charms, my friend.” He grins impishly. “I’ll do your AP Chem lab homework,” he says in singsong. He knows that’s my Achilles’ heel. I sigh. “You better not make me regret this.” Gord clears his throat. “Sir.” He slowly shakes his head. Neel knots his fingers together pleadingly. “But I’ll have him home by midnight, G!” I raise an eyebrow. “Who are you, my fairy godmother?” With Neel, “midnight” means 4:30 a.m. Neel’s dad still lives in Ottawa, his mum’s in India, and he has no chaperone here, so he’s pretty much a free agent. The notion of “curfew” is not something he’s well acquainted with. While Neel’s par-ents are barely even aware of his zip code, mine like to be in the know, even with being busy running and continuing to establish a somewhat new form of monarchy. Hence, Gord, who I’m practically closer with than my own father. Gord picks a piece of invisible lint off my jacket. “I don’t advise it, sir. Your parents gave me direct orders—your name is not ending up in the tabloids.” He straightens my brooch. “Again,” he adds tartly. It’s true. Dad did say leading up to this event that if I had one more bad run-in with the press, he was going to revoke my going-out privileges for good. Neel gasps and clutches his chest. “What happened last time was not his fault.” Gord turns on Neel. “You mean when His Royal Highness was photographed setting off fireworks for his birthday party on a yacht in the Ottawa River? A little stunt that burned down half the trees on the waterfront? You’re both lucky it didn’t launch a media blitz.” I feel myself blushing. “I didn’t know it was illegal to set off fireworks from a yacht, pour l’amour du Christ!” At this response, Gord clenches his jaw. I know what that means. This conversation is over. Neel knows it too. He screws up his mouth in defeat, and sighs. “Bye, bharˉa.” His nickname for me, “brother” in Pun-jabi, never fails to pull at my heartstrings. I clap a hand on his shoulder. “Have fun for both of us?” Neel eases back into his radiant smile, eyes playful again. He winks. “Oh, I always do.” “Prince Edward! Prince Edward! Over here!” Paparazzi surround us, cameras flashing, as we step out into the Manhattan night. A frigid breeze buffets down the ave-nue, fluttering awnings. My chauffeur holds open the door to my black town car as I duck inside, exchanging the icy air for blissful artificial warmth. Camera lenses take aim, yards from the tinted windows. Good luck getting a decent shot. The paparazzi here truly are as ubiquitous as rats on subway tracks. Not that I’ve ever taken the subway. Gord buckles into the passenger seat, and the chauffeur pulls the car onto 59th while the paparazzi give chase, shouting my name. Before kicking me out of Rideau Hall, Mum and Dad never failed to remind me that the paparazzi in New York would be documenting my every folly, unlike in Canada where the industry isn’t quite so rabid and boundaries are better re-spected (other than the Daily Maple, the source for most Royals- related reports and rumours). Going out and about, acting like a delinquent in New York would not only mean my family would find out about it, but the rest of the world as well. Given Mum and Dad’s own distaste for paparazzi, they must have felt pretty desperate to have sent me here, but it’s been quite ef-fective. That, and being under Gord’s constant supervision. We cross the intersection, leaving Central Park behind us, its naked treetops illuminated by city lights. From the front seat, Gord turns up the radio volume and soft classical music plays. He knows it’s one of the few things that relaxes me. I lean back, take a deep breath, and pull out my phone. A million Google alerts pop up. What? Of course I have a Google alert for my own name. I need to know what people are saying about me after my reentry into the party scene. It’s mostly just gossipy tabloid stories, an occasional fashion mag-azine editorial, and the inevitable message board comments perpetuating age-old rumours and adding to tired conspiracy theories. When it comes to the relatively new Canadian mon-archy, people love trying to spill royal Earl Grey tea. Just before I was born, Mum and Dad fled across the pond to Canada in hopes of escaping the scrutiny of the English press. Waking up to a new disparaging headline every day about Mum being a lowly commoner from Canada was un-tenable for them—not to mention being baited and badgered by slimy photographers wherever they set foot. My parents had even been prepared to leave the Royal Family and relinquish their official titles—anything to help put an ocean between them and the snaky British tabloids. A while back, there was a movement to one day replace Granny with a homegrown Canadian Royal Family, but noth-ing came of it. Our current situation was the result of an agreement with the Canadian prime minister at the time. Apparently, he recognized that Canadian love for the Royal Family was good for business. (Our official merch alone con-tributes greatly to Canada’s bottom line.) The fact Dad was born on Canadian soil before growing up in England made him a natural fit for Canadian king. On my phone, I’m idly poking around popular royal hashtags and notice that someone has reposted, for the zillionth time, that old and super famous long-range paparazzi photo of my parents arriving home at Rideau Hall with bundled-up newborn me. It was the first time the paparazzi had caught a glimpse of The Canadian Royal Baby. Given my mum’s ner-vousness about paparazzi, my parents had hidden out at the super private Hôpital Royal Jolee in Montreal for the birth, far from where anyone expected them to go. It’s one of the only photos of me as a child to have gotten out. To no one’s surprise, it was from a wily and out-of-town photographer who wasn’t afraid of being blacklisted. Since that day, my parents have held an iron grip on our private lives, only slightly loosening up the photography ban when I en-tered high school a little over three years ago. (Hello, People magazine cover shoot!) Despite her secretly difficult pregnancy, Mum appears healthy, rested, and as much a fashion icon as ever in the photo, step-ping out of a town car in a formfitting dress with the traditional maple leaf tartan pattern. Dad cradles me in a blanket woven with the same fabric. I’ve seen this photo so many times that I know it by heart. I tap back to my notifications. Many of the alerts swirl around the topic of me at tonight’s ball, with a few official photos starting to surface, most showing me on the red carpet, hands in pockets. The one of me with Fi is already trending. Just as she’d hoped. I let out a sigh. It does little to release the familiar feeling of pressure and expectation building in my heart and chest. The whole world is watching, commenting on my every move. I have to uphold the royal Dinnissen glory, or our Canada goose is cooked, because there’s a lot to live up to as Crown Prince, aka Prince Royal. Mum and Dad had the perfect modern-day fairy tale love story: prince meets born-and-bred Cana-dian commoner and falls in love. People have always eaten up and adored their story, even with its darker, nearly-stripped-of-their-titles side to it. Suddenly, the heat in the car has become stifling. I crack the window for some fresh air. As much as I love the perks of being Crown Prince, sometimes I want to throw all the rules out the window. But when ever I get that urge, I remember the fiasco that was my seventeenth birthday party. I’ve learned my lesson. And what choice do I have? I’m trapped. Gord is always telling me that it’s much easier for Canada to get rid of our monarchy than to further change it. I can hear Gord reciting Maple Crown Rule 1, drilling it into my brain like he has my entire life: Duty to the Crown above all else. I open the faceless alias Instagram account, aka Finsta, that I secretly made for myself—mostly to drool over slow-mo videos of people frosting cakes or pulling gooey, piping-hot cookies apart, and to read baking “top tips” from my favourite maître pâtissiers, or master pastry chef—Chef Pierre—who regularly unveils his latest innovative desserts at his culinary school in Paris that end up on the menu of his world-renowned bakery-café here in New York. Of course, there are also the gay couple accounts I peruse, with varying arrays of cutesy, saccharine selfies. I want what they have. As I scroll, I can’t help daydreaming about going back to the break room, letting the cute guy pull me up onto one of those rickety little tables, his lips parting as we press against each other… I can never tell a soul, let alone the world, about my petit secret. I am absolutely certain that if I were to come out, the powers that be would find a way to strip me of my title. I can’t let that happen. Do I sometimes wish I could have a normal life that allows me to settle down with a nice guy? Yes, I do. But not more than I want that crown. Besides, it would break my par-ents’ hearts if their only son didn’t succeed them on the throne. Sure, my family has had their own fair share of secrets. Hell, here are more secrets than rules (and if you couldn’t tell by now, we have a lot of rules). My Royal Family tree isn’t with-out its rotten apples—or rotten maple leaves, to keep things on brand. But I may just be the worst. A blight, the one to petrify the family tree so that not a single leaf remains cling-ing to its ancient branches. It’s bad enough that the Firm and current conservative government share a little-known penchant for wanting to streamline the Royal Family, meaning the three of us could be stripped of our titles at any moment. Selfishly, abdicating the throne would alleviate me of the immense weight to remain in the closet. But I couldn’t do that to my parents, even if I could find a good way out, and there isn’t one—out of the closet or out of the monarchy. After the stunt I pulled at my last birthday, Mum and Dad have felt like the three of us are in danger of losing our position in Canada and being sent to live out the rest of our days in a drafty, for-gotten castle in Cornwall. But my parents won’t have to worry about the monarchy dissipating to the Chinook winds. I was raised to be Crown Prince of Canada, destined to fulfill my royal birthright. Even if it does mean no love life. To bear a crown of power is to be alone, right? I press my nose to the cold window glass, hearing ambu-lance sirens blaring in the distance. Normally, traditions im-posed on the heir to the throne wouldn’t be a huge problem. Except, well… UNSPOKEN MAPLE CROWN RULE: Don’t be gay, eh? DAILY MAPLE ONLINE THE ROYAL ROUNDUP March 2, 06:23 a.m. ET PRINCE EDWARD SIZZLES BACK INTO THE SPOTLIGHT by Omar Scooby Welcome back, Eddie! After ten months of skirting the spotlight following his seventeenth birthday debacle, the Crown Prince of Canada slides back into the social scene with a rare appearance at a star-studded gala. Entering the ballroom last night at the Plaza Hotel, the Crown Prince of Canada was a sight to behold—wowing in a tailored suit and titillating partygoers with his wit, charm, and majestic magnetism. The world has truly missed seeing that hundred-watt smile. The Daily Maple spoke to an insider about what it’s like for him, being a teen heartthrob. When asked about any details surrounding the highly anticipated Investiture Ceremony, our close-to-the-royal-family insider went mum. What has the prince got up his hemmed silken sleeves? We hope to find out and see a whole lot more of him—and his winning smile—in the coming days.

RELATED STORIES King Frederick Speaks to Prime Minister of Singapore Queen Daphnée Promises to Lower Housing Costs Canadian Prime Minister: Hottest Politician Alive?

Excerpted from A Tale of Two Princes. Copyright © 2023 by Eric Geron. Published by Inkyard Press.

[satanisnotapogostick]

sam playlist liner notes

1. jesse got trapped in a coal mine – goodnight, texas

dean picking sam up from stanford in the pilot: jesse getting trapped in the coal mine

(he never DID marry his girl)

2. me and bobby mcgee – kris kristofferson

to me, me and bobby mcgee is about when sam runs away from dean and hangs out with meg before she outs herself as a demon

3. dorothy - mewithoutYou

“one turned into sr. Margaret, and I said "if you can change your shape that easily can you take the form of my dead father?”… then last night I was somewhere near virginia rebuking satan with ironic faithfulness. and satan turned to me: have you thought much about that cry?"

lucifer AND john themes???? yes.

4. life during wartime – talking heads

this song is sam adjusting to being a hunter and being at war, where he’ll stay for the rest of his life <3

5. this is how we do things in the country – slim cessna’s auto club

ok so this song is about sam killing madison. when you murder the girl you’re sweet on but it’s righteous and everyone thanks you for it. this is how it’s always been! this is how we do things in the country! (and also getting amy killed, a little bit, but that hasn’t happened yet. this is still early seasons)

6. clampdown – the clamp

“the voices in your head are calling. stop wasting your time, there's nothing coming, only a fool would think someone could save you… but you grow up and you calm down, and you're working for the clampdown.”

damn maybe we’re not the good guys. anyway!!

7. smith & jones forever – silver jews

smith & jones (salmondean) together!! forever!!

8. everything you did – steely dan

oh bro you slutted around with a demon and let satan out. what have you done

9. tortoises all the way down - mewithoutYou

“everybody knows, son. everybody knows what you've done!!”

just crazyass guilt song

10. up jumped the devil – nick cave

the tiger. he destroyed his cage. yes. YES. the tiger is out.

11. (ghost) riders in the sky – marty robbins

“then cowboy change your ways today or with us you will ride. tryin’ to catch the devil herd across these endless skies”

just s5 endless chase vibes

12. needle in the hay – elliott smith

demon blood detox time baby

13. emperor – mark lanegan

“why can’t I get right? all these demons to enslave me. who’s left to fight? oh, just the emperor.” the emperor being lucifer. obviously.

14. skating away (on the thin ice of a new day) – jethro tull

they have the horseman rings!! sam’s about to jump into the cage!! your world is about to end, but it’s okay!! you’ve done it!!

15. the passenger – iggy pop

and lol now he’s possessed by lucifer

16. the mercy seat – nick cave

okay now we’re at stull and he’s REALLY going to the gallows (jumping in)

17. when you die - MGMT

I imagine this song happening during the fall itself from stull into the cage. honestly this is a weaker entry but like. haha tfw you die

18. fifteen feet of pure white snow – nick cave

thee cage song.

“I waved to my neighbot, my neighbor waved to me. but my neighbor is my enemy. I kept waving my arms til I could not see, under fifteen feet of pure white snow. is anyone out there please? it’s too quiet in here and I’ve beginning to freeze. I’ve got icicles hanging from my knees, under fifteen feet of pure white snow”

you’ve even got icy temperature themes!

19. loverman – nick cave

yeah <3

“there’s a devil waiting outside your door (how much longer?) there’s a devil waiting outside your door and he’s bucking and braying and pawing at the floor and he’s howling with pain and crawling up the walls…. loverman!!! till the bitter end!!! while empires burn down forever and ever and ever and ever amen”

nick cave count: 4

20. satan it’s you – jett screams

@polishnatural recommendation. cellmates (and bunk buddies) with the devil in hell type vibes

21. relax, take it easy - mika

the war has already been won and nothing that happens in here has any effect on the real world. why not relax into the simplicity of it all!! (sometimes it’s just better when things are bad type vibes)

22. don’t lose your temper - xtc

we’re out of the cage! and starting strong with a mocking song bc he already lost his temper and grew mild and that’s why he’s too tired to fight. so this is the only hallucifer era song on the playlist

23. first wave intact – secret machines

war metaphors. extended wars. unwinnable wars.

“I wonder what you're waiting for. I wonder what you're working for. I wonder what you're living for. I wonder what you're dying for”

same king

24. mexican war streets - mewithoutYou

“but how long before our tails are caught by our "free" thought?” INDEED

“nature had another plan (& failed to run it by me!) nature had another plan, some other surrogate self to live in the sediment of so many somebody elses' innumerable lives and you were right: it's not a person who dies but worlds die inside us”

SO TRUE. we’re fully breaking into late seasons here

mwY count: 3

25. screen shot - swans

these are all sam’s meditation mantras. he’s offering a course: how to become okay with really horrible situations that you are also complicit in. “love! now! breathe! now! love! now! breathe! now!”

26. god’s away on business – tom waits

IT WASN’T GOD IN YOUR HEAD SAM

27. when the lights come on – they might be giants

when the lights come on (when lucifer brings you back to life)

28. light’s on

TWO songs about sam’s resurrection at lucifer’s hands??? yeah ;)

“the lights are on, you don’t know just who your friends are. the lights are on, and it’s light you’ll never know”

29. devil’s resting place – laura marling

I mean. yeah. his time in the cage with the devil coming back to haunt him

30. failure - swans

see my edit that I won’t link bc I can’t find. but anyway yeah. this guy fails a lot

31. last song about satan – slim cessna’s auto club

ding dong the devil is dead!!

32. president – max frost

@girlkingsam recommendation. late seasons sam vibes for sure. plus this song can be read as being about hell politics which is fun. I don’t give a damn who’s president (of hell)!

33. the road goes on forever – the highwayen

cycles of violence, etc. the road goes on forever, nothing ever (really) changes. (also yes sonny is dean and sherry is sam. I guess)

34. careers in combat – parquet courts

the namesake of my little fanfiction.

“there are no more summer lifeguard jobs, there are no more art museums to guard. the lab is out of white lab coats cause there are no more slides and microscopes. but there are still careers in combat my son!!!”

king of hell ending please please you’re nothing. anyway he’s been at war his whole life and war is his legacy. anyway.

[jemfisch]

⌠ MASON GOODING, 21, CISMALE, HE/HIM ⌡ welcome back to gallagher academy, JEREMY “JEM” FISCHMAN II! according to their records, they’re a SECOND YEAR year, specializing in ADVANCED ENCRYPTION & “MACGUYVER” SURVIVAL SKILLS AND NAVIGATION; and they DID NOT go to a spy prep high school. when i see them walking around in the halls, i usually see a flash of (old hip hop blaring from headphones, a broken crtv with the cords ripped out and repurposed, the smell of spray paint graffiti, brightly colored shirts with 80s patterns). when it’s the (cancer)’s birthday on 06/23/99, they always request their ICE CREAM SANDWICHES from the school’s chefs. looks like they’re well on their way to graduation. ⌿ kati, 24, she/her, est ⍀ @gallagherintro

STATS / PINTEREST / CONNECTIONS / CLASSES

INSPIRATION

fox mulder (the x files)

hogarth hughes (the iron giant)

will turner (pirates of the carribean)

robin hood

george weasley (harry potter)

aladdin

spike spiegel (cowboy bebop)

mark watney (the martian)

BACKGROUND + CLICK FOR BIO

his parents were high school sweethearts and married just before they attended college at harvard together, securing careers at the kennedy space center. 

jeremy fischman sr dies under mysterious circumstances in a lab accident and ellen is twenty-eight and left alone to raise baby jem. things only go downhill from here. jeremy was the love of her life and she becomes obsessed with his disappearance and all kinds of conspiracy theories, blows a bunch of her money. it doesn’t take long for her to be fired, savings blown on expensive equipment or sunk into internet hoaxes

they move to a rough neighborhood in gainesville where jem grows up. he likes jem, not jeremy, jeremy is his father. he’s never experienced the perfect life his parents used to live, the white picket fence, the shiny space shuttles. he’s only got this, and honestly, he doesn’t hate it. 

the neighborhood’s rough, but there’s a lot of fun characters, and his mom is practically his best friend – aside from his next-door neighbor, NOAH WARD.

jem’s mom does odd hacking jobs from the comfort of their home. some of them are shadier than others, she makes connections with a lot of private investigators in town and looks into people’s cheating husbands and tracks down birth parents and missing people. she does pro bono work too, a kindhearted woman, she can never say no to those in need, even if she’s not so fortunate herself. as jem gets older, he learns everything that he knows from her

every summer vacation growing up, jem and his mom would pack their bags and make home in a camper van, traveling across the country. in some ways, this was great mother-son bonding, but this wasn’t why they did it. his mom never gave up looking for the truth about her husband,  but hacking into secure, top-secret government databases is nothing like hacking into the gainesville city hall, it’s hard work, and they travel around the country methodically so that their signal cannot be traced. every summer they get close, but never close enough.

when noah moves away for college, jem stays home. he’s not comfortable leaving his mom. 

he keeps up with hacking jobs and keeping up with looking for his dad on the side. he doesn’t think they’ll ever find him, his mom holds out hope but jem is eighteen years old and a bit more jaded now, he figures the guy’s just really dead and well, the conspiracy of it all matters less and less when he knows that either way, he’s still grown up without him. 

a lot of jem’s social life is online, whether it’s friends from hacking forums or via soundcloud.

when he’s not hacking, he’s making music. his passions of technology and music mix and he creates his own beats and soundcloud, mashing together songs, and even putting together a popular meme track or two used on tiktok. 

it’s actually a bit lucrative, but that’s not why he does it. doesn’t even really use his name, catch him on soundcloud…username? uncutjems.

every time he and his mom get close to finding his dad, there’s just more to do, and it’s almost like someone KNOWS what they’re doing. 

jem’s right about that – he is being watched. since noah’s admission to gallagher, recruiters have been aware of the boy who taught her everything she knew. 

when gallagher makes the choice to start allowing male students, an agent shows up at his door offering him a once in a lifetime chance at a free education. 

jem doesn’t have any strong ambition to go into espionage, per say, but he won’t say no to advanced classes taught by some of the world’s brightest minds – and a chance to reunite with his best friend. however, he hasn’t stopped trying to get into the government’s records and still has ambitions of going into music production.

PERSONALITY. 

INTUITIVE. jem has a natural intuition about things and he trusts himself and his own opinions about things. i suppose you could perceive this as confidence, but honestly he’s just really SMART, good at absorbing facts even subconsciously and putting things together about people or situations. in a sense, he has a habit of being correct – he definitely comes off as intelligent, even though his grades in school have never been very good. he just has different priorities. 

LOYAL. make a friend out of jem and you have a friend for life, he’ll take your secrets to the grade and he’s pretty trustworthy. he’s the type of guy that gets along with pretty much everyone but he has a few select, close friends because he is somewhat intentional about the company that he keeps. he’s friendly and kind, but he keeps his inner circle of people he trusts close and somewhat exclusive. 

PROTECTIVE. kind of has papa bear energy, you know ? maybe the dad friend of your friend group, but in a laid back way, he might not seem like he’s the type to spring into action but call someone close to him a rude name and you’ll see his fist coming at your face. he’s protective but not possessive, i guess is how i would describe it, but i think he gives pretty good advice as well because he’s really hoping the best for ppl. 

MALINGERING. jem is kind of a SLACKER! at least, that’s what teachers have called him in the past, he simply does not dream of labor. he’s just kind of doing his own thing, will fake sick to skip a class, whatever else, even though he likes producing music he doesn’t really have a great ambition for anything, spy or otherwise. as long as he has a good computer setup, then he’s fucking chilling. 

MOODY. he’s laid back to the umpteenth degree when it comes to work or obligations, but he does have sort of mood swings, i guess he’s the sort of person that you would describe as grumpy at times ? definitely NOT a morning person and when he’s in an off mood, he can be hard to interact with or snap out of. 

DISORGANIZED. the sort of person to throw his stuff across the bed or leave piles of clothes on the floor to deal with later, maybe he���s not your favorite roommate for this reason. he has a habit of losing things that he just set down or whatever, things like that. 

HEADCANONS.

tbh you can think of him like...beca in pitch perfect ! he’s here bc he was offered a free education and he’s cool with that, but he’d rather be pursuing a future in music. a damn good hacker, though, and the gallagher recruiters are hoping that with some ‘ambition’ he’ll want to work for the government someday. 

played baseball throughout middle and high school and he’s fairly athletic – he can get pretty competitive when he plays, it kind of brings out a side in him that most people don’t expect to see because he’s fairly chilled out most of the time 

a boss with a slingshot. there is no reason for this, but he had one as a kid and he used to chase squirrels away from the bird feeders outside their home. he has great eyesight and his aim is great, but it’s literally the only weapon he’s proficient in

he’s not tiktok famous for his face, but he has two tiktok famous songs...he’s made like 12k in record deals for selling the rights, it’s just the kind of shit that he does goofing around in music software and he has a good ear for what is going to be catchy

he’s NOT a morning person, definitely a late night kind of guy, will stay up until all hours just fucking around on the computer and then he’ll sleep until 1 or 2pm, at least. getting up for morning classes is a struggle for them and he has slept through them on occasion.

funky sweaters, crazy socks, fun-patterned shirts, he dresses a bit like a circus tent at times, but you can’t say that he doesn’t have style – he dresses well, but it’s like he’s stepped out of a 90s cartoon or something

if he makes u a playlist he either wants to be ur friend so fucking bad or he’s head over heels in love with u

really likes making new things with old technology, he loves taking the macguyver courses and learning new things and he’s actually built his own computer and a lot of his own musical instruments 

usually has a couple bandaids because he’s a bit accident prone or can lose his focus when working in the lab. when he gets in his own head while working on a project, he literally cannot hear anything else – sort of selective hearing

likes fucking around with spray paint, if he can, he’s got a bit of an artistic streak and he doodles stickers on sticker paper sometimes. you can probably catch his tag around campus or even stuck to the latops of his close friends, it’s just a little man with a tv for a head. 

WANTED CONNECTIONS.

HACKING JOBS – if you STILL need a hacker for any of your wild backstory connections, jem is a great bet. he’s been doing paid jobs for people professionally since he could type, and he’s sort of an ace at getting in and out without leaving a trace...and he’s no gossip. so, your secrets would be safe with him. 

SMOKING BUDDIES – people that he can smoke up with, talk about life, talk about the bullshit of gallagher, but also people he can laugh with that don’t make him feel stressed or concerned about the future. 

MUSIC MAKING BUDDIES – if your character makes music, maybe they can collaborate on something...we’re about to drop the hottest mixtape of all time right here at gallagher academy i will teach myself garageband for this shit...jk but maybe

EX ON BAD TERMS – someone he dated last year...i’m imagining it was their first year and things were really great for the first semester, but shit fell apart second semester along with the school. maybe all the drama on campus caused distance, maybe he wasn’t there for them when they needed it, or maybe they got jealous of the way he always prioritizes noah ? a combination of things, we can hash out the details since i know some of you had some pretty angsty things going on second sem, and maybe it’s awkward now because it feels like there’s unfinished biz. 

EX ON GOOD TERMS / LOVERS TO FRIENDS – maybe someone that was a rebound and things didn’t really work and they saw that, maybe he wasn’t over his ex or whatever but they were able to stay friends ? it’s up to you how your muse feels about it but i want an ex that jem also has no hard feels about and actually is maybe sort of protective of them and cares a lot about them finding happiness, they bonded hardcore. 

EX-FLING – idk maybe they were hooking up for a while and then one of them started seeing someone else or one of them caught feels so they don’t hook up any more but it was super fun when they did !! also down for it to have been like a summer fling and once the summer ended. 

BROS – idk i would like for him to have a squad or something for him to just fuck around with <3 but it’s wholesome and they respect women

ONLINE FRIEND (ANONYMOUS) – he spent a lot of time on forums online and stuff so i’d love for him to have an online friend !! maybe cute if they just know each other by their screen names rn and we can do a bunch of text chats and maybe they both know they go to gallagher but they simply. haven’t met idk

ONLINE FRIENDS – also friends he met online that aren’t anonymous they could’ve met through any number of forums but probably have similar interests like music or hacking so they’re long time homies , someone he’s known almost as long as noah

ONE NIGHT STAND – self explanatory. maybe they’re super good friends and now it’s kind of awkward now and they want to get back to a place of normalcy but it’s simply not normal, maybe they fucked things up by breakin the tension on like. halloween or some shit. 

FRIENDZONED – someone jem accidentally friendzoned and maybe he doesn’t even realize it himself but they had a thing for him and he really just didn’t realize it bc he can’t tell unless you spell it out for him.

CLASS RIVALS – someone who tries really hard and cares about class a bunch vs. jem who doesn’t give a fuck but he keeps making the grade without really trying, so they’re ? bitter about it ? and so the two really do not hit it off because of that and they go back and forth , i just rly want a classroom rivalry. maybe even this rivalry and them nagging him actually motivates to try in the class just to piss them off 

 ENEMY – this person shared a secret with jem and then it somehow got out on the gossip blog idk ! they think jem told and now they hate him. 

anything pls let’s chat !

[heir-of-the-founders]

I dont give a fuck anymore jesus christ i need yall to see this

Asdfghjkl its so hard to explain the amount of fucking hypocrisy in this video jesus.

Dont let the cleanliness fool you. Its a shithole.

The gym doesnt have an ac system but we can afford a giant (and by giant i mean ive never seen one this size before) touchscreen tv next to the auditorium and to have the 30 (that's not an exaggeration) tvs playing the fucking school news 7 times an hour every hour (they gloat about it but also gloat that we're the most watched student news in the state)(like no dip dumb dumb you play it 4800 times a damn day) and decals on the stairs and to completely revamp the auditorium.

They also cant be bothered to actually clean the fucking music wing. Theres these weird box couch things in there. Someone spilled a drink behind one. It took them a month AND being notified by other teachers bc students literally cant get a hold of janitorial at all ever. Fuck, freshman year a bird got inside and fucking died on the stairwell. Took 2 hours for the bird to be gone and 2 fucking weeks for the blood to be cleaned up. There was literally fucking blood on the windows and floor. Someone put notebook paper down so we didnt get blood on our shoes.

Oh! And when the band teacher mr swenson left he got replaced with henson and instead of giving him a new plaque they literally just taped an h over the sw with printer paper.

The head of the school board for my county literally got caught using the school credit card to go to hooters and buy alchohol but i guess nobody reported him bc that was freshman year and im a sr now and hes still head of the board.

Also, a few years ago (maybe it was only last yr i dont remember) during the march for our lives thing, a girl was organizing a protest and the hicks (for the people who dont know, those are the people that like,, kin the south. They literally wear plaid button ups and tuck their shirts into their too high jeans with giant belt buckles and wear cowboy boots and have confederate flags on their trucks, its ridiculous) the hicks literally kicked her and pushed her and spit on her in the halls for so long and it was so bad that she ended up not coming to school for like two weeks. But nobody got in trouble even though we have cameras literally everywhere.

My math teacher doesnt have a math degree. Well, shes not my math teacher anymore but like. She admitted to our class that she has no idea what shes doing. She yells at kids when they correct her. I literally transferred from algebra 2 to the algebra 2/ trigonometry mixed course in the middle of the year because it was taught by a different teacher and it made more fucking sense.

My english teacher sophomore year didnt have an english degree. He had a math degree. He also taught statistics. But that course was dropped when he retired jr yr. We literally didnt even read anything the whole thing was bullshit. He also had us say ubuntu (taken from wiki- Ubuntu (Zulu pronunciation: [ùɓúntʼù]) is a Nguni Bantu term meaning "humanity." It is often translated as "I am because we are," ) every day before class. it was weird.

Also the theater heads (the special ed teacher and 2 sports coaches) would like constantly yell at the theater kids to not bring any food or drink into the theater bc of like mice and shit but would then eat a pizza and drink coffee

Oh! Speaking of mice. The STEM classroom had this weird ass ceiling where it was like a platform of tiles hanging from the real ceiling and like it wasnt over the whole thing and we had a mouse problem in the school and sometimes the mice would get up there and sometimes you could hear them crawling around in the middle of class. There were also just like. Mouse traps. All over a lot of rooms.

One of the english rooms had a window thats inside and faces under a stairwell.

Oh and all that glass? Yeah, theres more and none of its bulletproof.

The pe teacher has a record of calling students whores and telling them theyre not going anywhere in life in front of the entire class bc the student didnt bring pe clothes. Its happened to both of my sisters and also a few friends. Ive seen it happen too. Amongst other things. Also, her office connects to the girls changing room and theres a window into it? And like the window is kinda covered up but with this weird material that has holes all over it. I dunno its just really creepy.

And like i guess last year the special ed teacher (one of the theater heads) got caught cheating on her husband (the freshman spanish teacher) with the (recently) retired freshman american history teacher. Mr s (the husband) and mr b (the side hoe) had rooms across from eachother. And now mrs s lives in Florida and mr s is just. Gone.

The excel head (like the head of the gifted kids program i guess?) Broke one of the 3d printers bc she was messing with it and then blamed it on a student and got the entire excel programs 3d printer privileges revoked. They even caught it in camera and she didnt get in trouble.

Sophomore year everyone called the science teacher daddy to the point that he just left.

The school has 3 elevators (required by law) and theyre kinda fucked up but i didnt realise it until i started using them regularly. First, there is a single thing in one if the elevators that says the last time they were inspected was 2014. Theres the main building elevator, the freshman building elevator, and the okd elevator, which is the only one that goes to the 3rd floor.

The old elevator is like. Really old. Like. Its manual. And you can touch the walls of the elevator shaft when yr moving. Also like. One half of the elevator just. Isnt covered. You also need a key to operate it and they dont give the keys out to the students so you either need to talk to the nurse before hand (and she always forgets) or try to find a janitor. Which. Only way to the 3rd floor. Elevator wise anyway. Which sucked wheb i had win time (like a mandatory study hall where you sign up for different teachers every day depending on 'What I Need', hence the name) on the 3rd floor bc sometimes mandatory stuff was scheduled up there. Which. Yay.

And the freshman building elevator fuckin,, it fuckin shakes. Like. Just. Its like turbulence. Its terrifying and ive genuinely thought i was about to die a few times.

People also use the elevators to vape bc the only one you need an adult for is the old one. This is evident by the smell.

Thats all that i can think of atm bc its 3am and i might delete this later but yea fuck my school

[mst3kproject]

The Choppers

It’s teenage crime spree time!  With Arch Hall Sr. writing and producing, Arch Hall Jr. starring, and Bruno VeSoto supporting, the result is sure to be MST3K-worthy. All it’s missing is Ray Dennis Steckler, but I guess one can’t have everything.

America’s youth is its greatest resource, and those youth are in danger of growing up into criminals.  Witness our antagonists here: Cruiser, Torch, Ben, Flip, and Snooper. They drive around in a truck full of chickens, taking apart random cars and selling the pieces to Moose, a grouchy and unscrupulous junkyard owner.  The cops are baffled, but sooner or later the young thugs are bound to make a fatal mistake – and theirs comes when they girl they decide to sexually harass turns out to be the secretary of an insurance investigator.  At around the same time, Moose gets tired of their attitude and decides to turn them in.  Looks like the Choppers have chopped their last, uh… chop, I guess.

I’m sure you all want to know whether Arch Hall Jr. sings in this movie.  He does, but not until forty-five minutes in when I really had begun to hope I’d escaped him.  The piece is actually kind of catchy although not particularly memorable, but I may be in a forgiving mood because the first musical number in the movie was so much worse.  It’s performed by an elderly guy who works at Moose’s junkyard, and not only is he a bad singer, but what starts out sounding like a boy scout campfire ditty turns out to be a mournful country song about his divorce.  It made me long for the comparatively sweet strains of I Love You Vickie.

The photography here is notably terrible.  Almost the entire movie takes place outdoors in harsh desert sunshine because I think they didn’t actually have any lights.  Indoor scenes are kind of dim and night scenes are completely indecipherable – although I think somebody didn’t believe a practically pitch-black screen was enough to convince us it was night, because there are also lots of loud cricket noises.  There’s a bit where the Choppers vandalize a guy’s car because he took their parking spot and it’s almost impossible to see anyone’s faces or tell who’s talking.

The acting is sort of indifferently bad. Arch Hall Jr. is Arch Hall Jr., where everything he says sounds kind of stagey and dumb, and nobody else is much better.  The twenty-somethings playing the young criminals use hip slang in a way that suggests they have no idea what these words actually mean.  Arch Hall Sr. continues to believe he can build his son into a teen heartthrob, and so he shows us things like Cruiser’s pasty chest and belly as he lounges by a pool.

You say you didn’t need that screencap? Well, I didn’t need the shot it came from.

Most of the screen time in the movie is spent on the Choppers as they take apart cars, play or listen to bad music, argue with each other, and harass women.  The supposed heroes aren’t on screen nearly so much, but that’s okay because they are stunningly un-likeable.  There are a couple of bland cops, but the ones who are really our protagonists are inept insurance investigator Tom Hart and his nagging girlfriend Liz.  Tom comes across as an oblivious dope, while Liz constantly whines that she’s tired of fighting crime and wants to go home and eat.

Tom never redeems himself, but Liz gets a couple of moments.  She’s the one who notices that feathers keep turning up at the crime scenes, and when she recognizes Cruiser’s car at a drive-in she is able to keep him staring at her boobs long enough for her to memorize the license plate number. Naturally at the climax, she is not present and Tom, who did pretty much nothing all movie, gets all the credit for catching the gang.  The movie doesn’t make anything out of this because it doesn’t see anything wrong with it.

Which of course brings us to the fact that The Choppers hates women something fierce. There are only two we can actually be said to meet: Cruiser’s empty-headed girlfriend Gypsy (I know a bot who would be righteously angry at this name choice) is there to hang around in a bathing suit and be dumb.  The movie can’t decide how much she does or doesn’t know about his criminal hobbies – she seems to help vandalize the car in the parking lot, but then becomes the damsel in distress at the final shootout.  Liz nags, mocks, and generally treats Tom terribly, and at the end her competence is treated as his accomplishment.

Several of the five boys have backstories that depend on absent fathers – Cruiser’s was killed in WWII, Torch’s is an alcoholic, and Snooper has had a series of uninterested stepfathers.  The implication is that a single mother cannot possibly raise a boy.  He needs a father to turn him into a man (this is as near as stated aloud when a reporter attempts to interview Torch’s drunken father on the radio).  The only moment involving a woman that doesn’t reek of misogyny is when the boys harass a waitress and she blows them off.

If we’re gonna talk about fathers and sons… this is another movie Arch Hall Sr. made to try to build up his son’s career, and another movie in which the two of them are at odds.  They never actually meet in The Choppers, but the reporter played by Hall Sr. comments on how intelligent and talented the boys are and how much they could have accomplished if they’d only had the chance to live up to their potential.  Once again, it’s really, really tempting to try to do some psychoanalysis here, as if Arch Hall Sr. was using his films to tell the world how disappointed he was with his son.  I don’t know these people, of course, but that’s definitely the impression I get.

The main theme in The Choppers is one I’ve already dealt with, the idea that a boy without a father will become a criminal, stuck forever in the stage of life where rule-breaking is fun and consequences are things that happen to other people.  There seems to be a level on which the boys have adopted Moose as a sort of substitute father – he has encouraged and taught them in their criminal endeavours, and while he and they argue and threaten each other, they are honestly shocked by his eventual betrayal.  In the end, Moose abandons them just as their biological fathers have done.

There also seems to be some attempt to talk about class. All the Choppers seem to come from underprivileged backgrounds except for Cruiser, who has a backyard pool and a fancy car.  This puts him in the same category as Paula from The Violent Years, in that we’re given no good reason why he does this besides what his says to the reporter at the end: “we had a ball.”  Like Paula, Cruiser is the leader of the gang, but unlike her, he does not participate in the actual crimes.  Instead, Cruiser and his fancy car serve as lookouts – his upper-class origin allows him to be in charge without having to get his hands dirty, and there are signs that the rest of the boys resent this.  When they are all cornered at the end, it’s Cruiser who suggests giving up while Torch prefers to go down fighting.  Unlike the others, he’s not sufficiently invested in this to die for it.

What the movie is trying to say here is that money is not a substitute for good parenting, and privileged boys can still fall into crime if their fathers aren’t there for them.  What it manages to imply is that even in crime being rich gives you a head start and can make you a leader regardless of actual leadership qualities.

So this movie is really, really bad, and doesn’t deal very well with its thematic material – but that’s not to say there’s no entertainment value to be found here.  It’s never funny when it tries to be, of course. There’s an attempt at a running joke with Snooper wondering if he’d be more attractive to women if he wore contact lenses, which will make you shudder if you know what contact lenses were like in the 50’s and early 60’s.  The humour that works in The Choppers is naturally the unintentional kind, to be found in the bad acting and the unwieldy chicken truck.

My favourite moment is when Cruiser, talking on a candy-striped walkie-talkie the size of a dachshund, tells his cronies to give the police “the farmer routine”.  Flip and Snooper immediately pull a couple of cowboy hats out of fucking nowhere and put them on, and I almost did a real-life spit take.  This feels like the kind of thing that would have fascinated the Best Brains.  I can imagine Joel, Crow, and Tom whipping their own Stetsons out from under the theatre seats to wear for the rest of the scene (Servo would have needed help with his) and every subsequent appearance of a cop being greeted with, “quick, put on your cowboy hats!”  It would definitely be the stinger.

Talking about having a favourite Arch Hall Jr. movie is like talking about having a favourite kind of turd to eat, but insofar as the statement means anything, The Choppers is my second-favourite of his movies I’ve seen so far.  It’s less misogynistic than Eegah! (not a high bar) and doesn’t have nearly as much crappy music as Wild Guitar (accomplished by simply having less music).  My favourite Arch Hall Jr. movie is The Sadist, which I actually don’t consider bad enough for this blog.  In The Sadist Hall Jr. played a serial killer, and he was pretty terrifying.  If he’d had more roles like that (with directors who were not his father and could actually coach good performances out of him) he might have been a decent character actor.

[stevecanmakeanythingnerdy]

Battle #30

Dave Clark Five: 5 by 5 ( Side 1 )

Vs.

Tex Ritter: Comin’ After Jinny ( Side 1 )

Dave Clark Five: 5 by 5 ( Side 1 )

The Dave Clark Five were an English rock and roll band formed in Tottenham in 1957. In January 1964 they had their first UK top ten single, "Glad All Over", which knocked the Beatles' "I Want to Hold Your Hand" off the top of the UK Singles Chart. In fact, often the DC5 as they became known, were compared to The Beatles. They were the second group of the British Invasion to appear on The Ed Sullivan Show in the United States (for two weeks in March 1964 following the Beatles' three weeks the previous month). They eventually appeared 18 times on his show. *ahem* more than any other British Invasion group. Back in those days, that was Thee show to be on if you wanted to make a splash. Dave Clark, who formed the group, was very clever. He struck business deals that allowed him to not only produce the band's recordings but also gave him control of the master recordings. At the time not really a big deal, but pioneering in later years as the music industry grew into a corporate monster. To this day he still retains the rights. Genius. Another aspect that makes the DC5 unique is that they did not follow the psychedelic music trend that was so popular amongst peers at the time. The Dave Clark Five officially disbanded in 1970,while still successfully charting in the UK. This album is the U. S. Release version from 1967. That’s another thing, in those days bands would relentlessly record and tour. Often putting out multiple albums in one single year. The DC5 put out 11 (yes eleven) studio albums from 1964-1967. That’s almost an average of 3 per year?!? Talk about a hit machine! This is why I make a strong argument that DC5 were perhaps not better charting than The Beatles, but certainly more efficient. The first track is “Nineteen Days”. It may be one of their later slabs of wax, but it’s just as soulful. High pitched bitchin’ beats get the countdown on for moving those butts. Mid tempo 60s and I think under 2 minutes! “Something I’ve always wanted” follows and has a definite blues feel. It’s another quick one too and this time with harmonica. In fact, harmonica takes full on lead on the next track, “Little Bit Strong”. Some great, nasty distortion groove too. Dave and his Clark five don’t mess around. They blast right on through. Hell, if they recorded 11 albums in 4 years then they probably know how to rip through a song with little fanfare. “Bernedette” is next and of course there’s a song about a girl. It’s a requirement for a crooner to appear. Very minimal instrumentation, just lovey dovey emos. “Sitting here Baby” is the last tune and a ditty and done in the gold old rock ‘n’ roll style. Great bass solo too. Some vocal scat even. Swing beat makes it sweet. I do feel this album suffers a little as compared to earlier recordings simply because of the barrage. Did I mention 11 (!) albums in 4 years??!?!!?! Oh yeah, and the total run time from start to finish is 11 minutes. It probably took more time to set up one of the mics than it did to record this whole album!

Tex Ritter: Comin’ After Jinny ( Side 1 )

Woodward Maurice "Tex" Ritter was an American country music singer and actor popular from the mid-1930s into the 1960s, and the patriarch of the Ritter acting family (son John and grandsons Jason and Tyler). He is a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame. In fact, he became one of the founding members of the Country Music Association in Nashville, Tennessee and spearheaded the effort to build the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. Eventually he was Inducted in 1964. An early pioneer of country music, Ritter soon became interested in show business. He started out doing radio and eventually broadway plays. Also recording songs about cowboy life for Decca Records. He moved on to movies in the 30s and his recording career took off as well. His career continued through the 40s, 50s and 60s and In 1970, Ritter surprised many people by entering Tennessee's Republican primary election for United States Senate! Despite high name recognition, he lost overwhelmingly to United States Representative Bill Brock, who then defeated the incumbent Senator Albert Gore, Sr. in the general election. He passed shortly thereafter in 1974. This release is posthumous dated to 1976. The first song, “Comin’ After Jinny” is very Johnny Cash like. Definitely some slide guitar and pretty lackadaisical as far as country tempo goes. The whole song centers around the storyline of a younger boy coming after his girl. Through colorful description you eventually catch on that his girl is his actual baby child (perhaps granddaughter) and the boy is a younger baby. Ok, it’s clever. You got me, good one, Tex! The next song is titled “Looking Back” and it’s a remorseful tune about nostalgia and love gone wrong. Real cowboy campfire story stuff. “He Who Is Without Sin, Let Him Judge Me” is third in line. This one has a storyline about a guy who steals food for his starving family and is sentenced to prison. The character then goes person by person in the jury and calls them out for their sins. Are you getting it yet? Tex likes to tell tales. “Wand’rin Star” has gang vocals and is a slow cow-poke tune. Even the quiver in his voice makes it more real. This genre is really not my cup of tea, but I will say, Tex is pretty good at what he does. “The Girl Who Carries a Torch for Me” is the last cut. I’ll give you a minute to think about what possible puns might apply...a clue...think patriotic...got it? If you guessed that it’s a tune about the Statue of Liberty, then congratulations! You win! It’s clever stuff, but there was too much talking for me. Convo-core? Spoken word Country? Meh... it’s like your trucker grandpa made a record or something. Worth a listen, but I probably won’t do it again.

Today we witnessed the Dave Clark go 5 x 5. They burned 82 calories over 5 songs and 11 minutes. That’s an average of 16.40 calories burned per song and 7.46 calories burned per minute. DC5 earns 11 (there’s that number again) out of 15 possible stars. Tex Ritter spent his time comin’ after Jinny and burned 95 calories over 14 minutes and 5 songs. Tex burned 19 calories per song and 6.79 calories per minute. He managed to earn 8 out of 15 possible stars. Looks like the DC went 5 x 5 and 1 x WON!

Dave Clark Five: “Nineteen Days”

#Randomrecordworkoutseasonsix

#Randomrecordworkout

[daddygraves]

Inktober Day 13. Foolish

Credit to @elletromil  and @zombiisheep for the fic idea.

This fic takes place in an alternate crack universe, (hence the theme, foolish) where Roxy came with Eggsy and Merlin to the Statesman, and Whiskey is the steretypical yeehaw drunk uncle, Tequila the debauchery aficionado and Merlin and Ginger are the platonic besties and mum and dad of all of them. Which I guess makes Champ the grandpa!

Here goes, a full 24hours late! So much for ‘a few hundred words’. @iffy-kanoknit @melisjevisje

•••••••••••••

Eggsy was never into cowboys as a kid.

Like any boy whose dad was a soldier, he'd been starry-eyed over plastic toy guns and figurines of macho, muscled marines. His poor mum had to positively wrestle off his favourite, threadbare camo-print shirt off him each day before bed. And even then, he'd sneak it out of the washing basket and yank it back on when she wasn't looking.

So cowboys weren't very high on his interest list, and naturally, Eggsy never expected to meet one. London was running kind of low on gunslinging, boot wearing Southerners, as it happened. And even when Eggsy pulled off his transformation from rough chav to sleek sav, he thought gentleman spies who saved the world from certain doom and got to kiss princesses were as far as it went.

But as he'd smugly announced to Richmond Valentine, while the megalomanic lay drowning in his own blood, this ain't that kind of movie bruv. Kingsman life was anything but normal, so when HQ got blown sky high by the Golden Circle last month, Eggsy, Merlin, and yesterday, Rox, had ended up becoming quite well acquainted with some cowboys- Statesman, as it turns out, were America's resident breed of spy. All named after alcohol, in typical Yankee fashion.

He's still not that big a fan of cowboys. Especially when said cowboys decide lassoing him and the not-dead object of his unrequited affections together is a perfectly reasonable course of action.

"I'm telling you, Merlin, I'm perfectly fine to be cleared for active duty!" Roxy argues, ponytail swinging wildly as she and the Scottish quartermaster spar yet again over a constant source of argument- her moon-booted leg.

"Lancelot," Merlin returns calmly, not even bothering to look up from his clipboard at Ginger's desk. "Yeh've been out of the infirmary for less than a week, which yeh wouldn't've been in if yeh'd stayed in hospital in London, like the doctor ordered. But no, yeh had to charge onto the first bloody plane t' Kentucky, and caused another stress fracture in yeh leg due t' the cabin pressure."

"Roxy, he's right, honey," Ginger sighs, tapping away at her own computer. She's champing at the bit to start the competition with Merlin- prior to the current argument, there'd been a text ping up on Eggsy's glasses from Roxy. Merlin + Ginger having a hacking competition at 2pm. Let's go?  Any form of distraction while they searched for the Golden Circle was more than welcome- even handlers need time off.

"What was I supposed to do, convalesce in my hospital bed while you go off and hunt down the people that destroyed Kingsman, and killed our colleagues?" the female agent retorts hotly, as both Merlin and Eggsy exclaim "Yes!" frustratedly.  Eggsy loves his best friend, he really does. But he and she both know she's fighting an uphill battle, even if he's the only one willing to admit it.

"What's all this here commotion?" Champ, Statesman's agent-in-chief, moseys into the room, twirling a cigar expertly between his fingers. Two figures follow him in- Agent Whiskey, moustachioed and booted, and Kingsman's own Harry Hart, shaven and suited.

The sight of Harry, living and breathing, walking around unhindered, still knocked the breath from Eggsy's lungs. Too recently, he'd still been wallowing in the swamp-like sludge of unresolved emotions concerning Harry's apparent death. The crushing guilt, the excruciating vice of grief, the sickening self-loathing for his own stupidity, the memory that their last interaction was an argument-

Even now, it made his stomach knot.

"Champ," Roxy acknowledges the silver-haired Southerner briskly. "Please-"

"I wouldn't bother if I were you, darlin," Whiskey drawls, leaning himself against the nearby whitewashed wall. The deep brown eyes beneath the brim of his hat survey the scene unfolding with vague amusement.

"Harry here has just spent the past minute finishin' convincin' Champ here that you ain't going anywhere. Not 'til that here leg," he flicks his eyes to the moon boot strapped over Roxy's grey paintsuit. "Be fully healed up."

But before Roxy can unleash her wrath on Harry, Eggsy chimes in, tearing his eyes from the elder Kingsman finally.

"Harry's right, Rox, s'what I've been tryna tell ya. Ya only just got here, ya not fully healed, all ya gonna do is f-"

"Of course you take his side!" Roxy snaps back at him, indignation and fury clear in her eyes. Oh shit- he should know by now when to pick his battles with her. Hurricane Roxy was not an experience Eggsy enjoyed.

"What's tha supposed to mean?" Eggsy retaliates uncertainly, sneaking a sideways glance at Harry, who is also regarding Roxy with apprehension.

"Oh don't play coy now, boys," Whiskey purrs, raising an eyebrow smugly. Suddenly, the room seems a little too airtight, and far too warm. "You don't think we didn't all see your cute lil' reunion in Harry's room?"

"And can I just say," Agent Tequila, who has so far been silent, sprawled in a chair in the corner, contributes. "Ya'll shoulda see your here face when I pulled up that curtain on Galahad Sr.'s room, when ya first got here." He flicks his chin in Eggsy's direction, before leaning back to fish around in his  jacket pockets for chewing tobacco.

Eggsy and Harry simultaneously erupt into indignant protests.

"What on earth-"

"Oh fuck off, all of ya-"

"Merely happy to see my protege-"

"I just found out he was alive, I fink my response was pretty appropriate-"

"He has a girlfriend-"

Not anymore, he didn't. Eggsy's gut gives a funny twist, but he quickly returns to the issue at hand. But with reflexes faster than the human eye, Whiskey's whip appears in the cowboy's hand. And Eggsy realises a second too late what's about to happen, as he and Harry stand side by side, still spluttering feeble excuses.

It all happens so quickly. The tight cord of the rope yanks the pair of men together instantaneously, so quickly the two bonk heads, and as they teeter on the spot momentarily, a previosuly unseen cupboard door is flicked open by Tequila. Eggsy and Harry only have a second to yowl in protest as a shove sends them toppling into the confines of a dark Statesman broom closet, and the secure click of a lock is heard on the other side.

There's a second of stunned silence. And then the pair of spies begin wriggling and hollering with all their might, bumping against all manner of cleaning items and the door.

"Pipe down in there, ya'll," Champ's voice filters through the light-light crack near the floor, as raucous laughter can be heard. "Merlin and Ginger be about to start the contest."

"Let us the fuck out!" Eggsy roars, as Harry adds peevishly "I second that motion."

"Short answer; no," Whiskey's tone can be heard now, and Eggsy can just picture the fucker inspecting his fingernails casually. "We're all sick to high heaven of ya'll's pining and lovelorn looks. I can't imagine what poor Merlin and Roxy here been having to endure, if we've only had just a taste of it these past few weeks."

The muffled sound of Merlin and Roxy agreeing  with enthusiastic despair only incenses Galahads Jr. and Sr. more.

*******************************************************************************************

There's dead silence in the room, punctuated only by the furious clatter of computer keys being slammed by speedy fingers. Merlin and Ginger are hunchbacks over their keyboards, as the Statesman and Roxy look on nervously.

"How long d'you think it'll take them to give up and just admit it?" Roxy wonders aloud, as muted shouts and thumps still sound against the securely locked door.

"A good while yet, I should think," Champ chuckles, leaning his elbows on the back of Ginger's chair as he squints at the computer screen.

"Don't worry Ginger, ya'll gonna make mincemeat of this Scottish chap."

"Ha," Merlin mutters under his breath, face lit with almost evil glee as he determinedly chips his way through NASA's firewall.

**********************************************************************************************

So no only has Eggsy found himself buddy-buddy with a bunch of cowboys, where his best friend turns up less than a month after an entire mansion fell on her, with nothing but a broken leg to show for it. He finds himself face to face with a very not dead Harry fucking Hart, quite literally, shoved into a very cramped, dark cupboard, where a bottle of cleaning fluid is slowly leaking into his bespoke. Fan-fucking-tastic.

His shoulder's starting to get sore from ramming it against the sturdy, unmoving door. But nothing could compare to the sheer shattering feeling of when he'd found Harry alive, in that white padded room, and no trace of recognition had flitted across the slightly lined face of his former mentor.

Yep. Eggsy's in love with Harry. Of course he fucking is, as if shit couldn't get more complicated. Especially since he has, or used to have,  a fucking girlfriend. But more on that later.

"Eggsy, enough."

"No!" Eggsy shouts at Harry utterly focused on ramming the door down with every ounce of strength he had left in him. He couldn't stay in here with Harry, he couldn't, it was too difficult-

"Eggsy, you are going to hurt yourself." Harry's tone is somehow so much calmer than it had been just moment earlier. "An injury would mean you were off the assignment, which we cannot afford. Please, stop."

Eggsy pauses, considering Harry's words. Giving the door one final whack, having no effect, he leans back against some very uncomfortable shelving. Which is hard to do, considering every movement he makes brings Harry with him, due to the sheer lack of space.

"They'll give it up eventually," Harry reassures him. But the elder spy seems ever so careful not to reveal any particular inclination or otherwise towards Eggsy.

Hmm.

*******************************************************************************************

"Ya'll want some dinner?" Tequila declares to the small gathering some hours later, still huddled around the computers. "This shit is takin' ages, makes a man work up an appetite."

"You've literally done nothing, Tequila," Ginger exclaims, but there's no bite in her words. "Do you want to swap with me and have a crack at finding NASA's correspondence with aliens?"

"Naw, I'm fine," Tequila brushes her off, getting to his feet. "They'd delete all that shit anyways."

"Ya'll want KFC?"

There's a chorus of 'yeah', and the youngest Statesman saunters out.

Champ exhales quietly, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "He's got smarts when he's on a mission, but that kid's brains wouldn't amount t' a hill o' beans."

"Funny that," Merlin interjects, completely focused on the task at hand. "Ginger's tech skills amount to about the same."

"Oh I cannot wait to wipe the floor with you, Merlin," the woman shoots back in good humour. "After the files I had to extract from the Pentagon last year, this is a goddamn cakewalk."

*******************************************************************************************

"Merlin." Harry's voice is loud enough within the tight confines of the cupboard that Eggsy is sure the tech whiz would've heard them.

"Not now, 'Arry. I'm busy. Stop texting me with your glasses, I'm tryin' to win a bottle of whisky."

"Merlin," Harry draws out the 'i', sounding almost whiney. "You wouldn't leave your oldest friend locked in a cupboard, would you?"

"I'm sure he would, given the amount of whinging you saddle him with about Eggsy." Whiskey japes.

What?

"Oi," Eggsy cries, straightening and staring Harry down accusingly. The older man has the decency to look slightly guilty, under the limited light the door frame provided. "Why're ya whinging 'bout me for?"

"It's not whinging," Harry protests somewhat feebly, staring at the ground, but Eggsy's right pissed off now.

"If anything, it's me who should be doing the whingin', eh? I'm the one you left behind, to go play the hero here!"

Harry's face changes, and Eggsy can just tell the taller man's hackles are finally up. Good. Let him suffer for a bit too.

"If you'd simply done as I asked, Eggsy, and completed all the tests, as instructed, we wouldn't've had a row. But to suggest I had your father stuffed, inside my house?!-"

Eggsy doesn't give a shit that he's interrupting, and that will only add fuel to Harry's already dangerous tone. "I said tha' shit in anger, bruv! Ya called me back with that cab like a dog on a fuckin' leash. And what 'bout ya sayin' that everything ya did for me was 'bout my dad anyways?"

He's sailing into dangerously emotional territory here, but Eggsy has really lost all his fucks to give. "Didn't I mean anything t' you?"

"You could not be further from the truth."

Harry's icy tone makes Eggsy revert to sulky silence.

"This is utterly fucking ridiculous," Harry sighs a short while later, rubbing his temples with both hands. His elbow nearly catches Eggsy in the face, and the slow sounds of enthusiasm and can be heard outside in the room, cheering Merlin and Ginger on. There's also the smell of fried chicken, wafting deliciously into the cupboard, and Eggsy's stomach lets out a rumble.

"Do you remember our breakfast, the day before your final test?" Harry asks suddenly, looking at Eggsy with interest. All anger has melted from his chestnut eyes.

"'Course I do," Eggsy mumbles, over the growing hubub outside. That morning was one of the few precious memories he had with Harry, and not one he was likely to forget.

"M'so sorry, Harry. 'Bout your house. It's all my fault."

"Nonsense, Eggsy," Harry placates him, even as the younger man protests.

"All ya furniture, Mr Pickle,-"

"Houses and antique furniture, even butterflies," Harry argues patiently, yet determinedly. "Theyre are all replaceable,. Mr Pickle is ingrained firmly into my memory, too. Even if he isn't sitting in my lavatory, he will always be in my heart."

There's silence again, apart from cheering, as both men consider Harry's words. "Now what I truly couldn't bear, would be being locked inside that awful padded room for the rest of my days, with no one to rescue me. As terrible as it sounds, without everything we've lost, you never would have found me again. So in a way, I must be grateful for all these tragedies. Because without them, I may never have remembered."

"The thought of not remembering such a large portion of my life- Kingsman, Melrin, you-" an unconscious shudder wracks Harry, jostling Eggsy in the small space. "It's unimaginable."

"But even if I didn't know you, during my period of amnesia..." Harry's voice trails off, and Eggsy meets his gaze again. "I wanted to."

Was there some hidden message behind Harry's words, that's flying right over Eggsy's head?

Maybe his should just come out with it. His conscience is nudging him every so gently, trying to build a scrap of confidence within him. When was Eggsy ever going to get the chance to tell Harry how he felt, in a private, dark cupboard, ever again?

Harry's arm knocks something, which makes a metallic souding rattle. Fumbling around in the dark corner of the cupboard, he suddenly cautiously brandishes a crowbar, of all things.

"Finally."

But as Harry squeezes his arm past to begin his assault on the cupboard door, something makes Eggsy catch the elder spy's muscular arm in hand.

"Harry, wait!"

The taller of the two freezes, looking to Eggsy questioningly.

"Yes?"

It all just comes out in a fumbling, mad rush, like water out of a spilt jug.

"Look this is really fuckin' awkward an' weird an- oh fuck it, I'm in love wif' ya and I don't know what-"

"What?" Harry's face is a beacon of astonishment. "What on earth?!- Your girlfriend?- you have-"

"No actually, I don't." Eggsy's breathing is shallow, and his palms are shaking, but he clenches them into fists. If he doesn't get this all out and over with now, he never will. He'll never be able to move on if he doesn't shoot straight and sharp, and tell this stupid, oblivious man how arse over tits for him Eggsy is. "We broke up, like we shouldve done months ago. Because she was only ever a distraction, as bad as that sounds, cos' you were dead, an' I was tryin' to get over you-"

Harry immediately tries to interject with urgency, and Eggsy is suddenly glad the chaos outside over the hacking race means no one can hear them.

"No. Shut up, ok, shut up. I'm trying to tell ya how I feel, I've been in love with ya since ya bailed me out of Holborn, if I dont say this now I'll never get the courage to do it again, because ya a tall, gorgeous fucking spy, who's literally sex on legs, I know ya don't love me back, this'll be real awkward once we bust open that door,  but I get it it's all good, I'll leave you be, cos ya in love w me dad or somethin-"

"Don't you dare".

Harry Hart, chest heaving, spits, and shocks Eggsy into silence with nothing but a burning look. Something that vaguely sounds like a squeak leaves Eggsy's chest, and he's abruptly aware of how close they have been, this whole time in the matchbox of a cupboard, chests touching.

"Don't you dare go and leave me again, Gary Eggsy Unwin. Because, if you would ever let me finish, I am not in love with your father."

Eggsy's bewilderment is clearly plastered upon his face, because Harry sighs heavily, and with frustration, ignoring the apparent stadium full of football fans hollering outside. He lays those massive, elegant hands of his on Eggsy's shoulders for emphasis.

"I am hopelessly and utterly in love with you, you gigantic pillock".

Oh my God. This had to be a dream, Eggsy thinks faintly, as this beautiful ray of numbness fills his brain. He was dreaming, he must be, as a slow smile slides across his face.

"Is this the bit where we kiss, then?"

******************************************************************************************

"Go, Merlin, go!" Roxy screeches, hands pressed to her mouth in tights fists of anticipation, as Merlin and Ginger thunder down the home stretch of their race, hands a blur of slamming keys.

"Geddim', Ginger!" Champ howls, Tequila and Whiskey echoing the sentiments of encouragement, as both quartermasters clatter away, slit-eyed and teeth-gritting.

"Yes!" The choppy bob shoves her roller chair away from the desk, arms raised in victory, and is immediately drawn into a jumping circle of victory by her Statesman colleagues, whooping and hooting. Merlin graciously bows his head, Roxy placing a comforting arm on his shoulder, as the two amusedly observe the scene of celebration. Until a lightbulb goes off in the resident Lancelot's head.

"Time to let them out I think," she utters, and in a few short steps, arrives at the cupboard door, and flicks the latch open.

Galahad Jr. and Sr. emerge from the confines of the dark cupboard, with just as much grace as they entered it. But this time, their embrace, which makes both men topple to the floor humiliatingly, seems utterly consensual.

And now it's Roxy and Merlin's turn to join the celebrations, as their best friends pick themselves off the floor, but link hands, smiling a little bashfully.

"You owe me a hundred quid, Ginger!" Merlin announces with relish, reclining in his chair.

"Not 'til I get my bottle of this supposedly amazing scotch whiskey, minus the e, for kicking your ass in hacking."

[junker-town]

Actually, Marshawn Lynch would make an amazing college speaker

Photo by Steven Ryan/Getty Images

The former Seahawks RB has always given smart advice, if you listen to what he says.

A lot of NFL fans would be thrilled to have a chance to listen to a speech from running back Marshawn Lynch. Well, that’s exactly what Princeton University seniors are getting for their annual Class Day. On Feb. 25, the school announced Lynch as the speaker, while citing his work off the field in both social justice and community service work.

A week later, several Princeton students wrote an op-ed in the school newspaper criticizing the decision:

We wish to express our thoughts on the choice of the Class Day speaker for 2020 and propose improvements that could be made to the speaker selection process. As seniors, we had been looking forward to the speaker announcement for months. Many of us were disappointed when we saw that this year’s speaker was to be Marshawn Lynch, mainly because we did not feel included in the process by which this speaker was nominated and finally selected.

The letter goes on to mention there were many Princeton students who didn’t know who Lynch was, and that they didn’t feel included in the selection process. They were also critical of Lynch’s famous “I’m just here so I won’t get fined” answer he gave to every question at Super Bowl 49 media day. But Lynch’s persona goes way beyond that.

While it may be true Lynch doesn’t have a specific connection to Princeton, or he hasn’t always been the most talkative with reporters, he’s given some great life advice that would benefit graduating seniors. Let’s take a look at the wisdom of Beast Mode over the years.

Be smart with your money

In late December, the 33-year-old Lynch came out of retirement and signed a contract with the Seahawks to help them during their playoff run. After Seattle’s loss to the Packers in the Divisional Round, he gave a quick lesson to the younger players:

Marshawn Lynch goes on at length about his advice for young players. The gist: “Take care of your chicken.” Chicken = money pic.twitter.com/dydj7NB0d8

— Joe Fann (@Joe_Fann) January 13, 2020

It’s a vulnerable time for a lot of these young dudes. They need to be taking care of their chicken right, you feel me? If it was me, or if I had an opportunity to let these little young (players) know something, I’d say ‘take care of your money, African, cause that (expletive) don’t last forever.’ Now I’ve been on the other side of retirement and it’s good when you get over there and you can do what the (expletive) you want to, so I’ll tell y’all right now while y’all in it, take care of your bread so when you’re done, you go ahead and take care of yourself.

Lynch’s point here is simple: spend your money wisely, because you can’t play football forever. The money you earn from the sport won’t always be the same, either. Being financially smart with your money is good advice, whether you’re an NFL player or not. That will go a long way when you retire.

The former kid out of Oakland grew up to be an NFL star, and he wasn’t even known to have spent much of his career earnings.

Make sure your body and mind stay healthy, too

In the same postgame speech, Lynch went on to talk about the value of both physical and mental health:

So while y’all at it right now, take care of y’all’s bodies, take care of y’all’s chicken, take care of y’all’s mentals. Because look, we ain’t lasting that long. I had a couple players that I played with that they’re no longer here. They’re no longer. So start taking care of y’all mentals, y’all bodies and y’all chicken, so when you’re ready to walk away, you walk away and you can be able to do what you want to do.

This is important for NFL players, who take a beating throughout their careers, but it’s also a message for everyone. Take care of your body, mind, and spirit. Keeping all three of those healthy is crucial to living your best life.

Give back to others in need

Throughout his career, Lynch has been considered a great teammate who doesn’t hesitate to help those in need. As a broke high school student, he took his offensive line to Sizzler after his last game as a senior. He has given extravagant gifts to NFL teammates, too.

The generosity also extends to strangers. He once gave $500 to a McDonald’s employee who liked Lynch’s shoes.

“If you’re serious about getting those shoes, here’s some money to help you get ‘em,” Lynch told the employee. “My job is to continue to see you grow.”

His work with his Fam 1st Family Foundation in his hometown of Oakland, California, has impacted young people for years.

“We’re just trying to empower our inner-city youth,” Lynch explained in a 2014 SB Nation profile of his foundation. “Not just in our community, but communities around the world. We take the approach with ... our foundation with just giving the best opportunity, putting our best foot forward with trying to give back to our community, to give opportunities to these kids that they don’t have. Just the opportunity for them to see us is really big.”

When he was with the Raiders in 2018, the foundation sponsored a concert that required attendees to be registered to vote to attend. The same year, he hosted 25 kids in London when his team played Seattle at Wembley Stadium. The Raiders nominated him for the Walter Payton Man of the Year Award in 2018, which is given to players who are active in community service off the field.

Be there emotionally for others

Lynch places value on the little things, like greeting Seahawks defensive coordinator Ken Norton, Jr. at the airport after he lost a loved one:

Little known: When Ken Norton Jr. returned to Seattle last yr. after father's death 1 player met him at airport to support - Marshawn Lynch.

— Armando Salguero (@ArmandoSalguero) January 28, 2015

The gesture apparently made the coach cry, according to an ESPN profile on Lynch from 2018.

“He wanted to go sit with Ken and comfort him until he got on the airplane,” said Sherman Smith, Lynch’s position coach at the time. “That’s the kind of guy he was. He was always thinking about other people. He left our meeting and went to the airport, and Ken Norton, Jr. would tell you how much that meant to him that Marshawn would do that.”

Lynch also stayed behind in Dallas with Ricardo Lockette after the former Seahawks receiver suffered a career-ending neck injury. The injury happened during a road game against the Cowboys in 2015. Lynch didn’t go back to Seattle with the rest of the team, choosing to comfort Lockette instead.

“We were in there with Ricardo and everything was in a sad mode,” Earl Lockette, Sr., Ricardo’s dad, said via the Seattle Times. “A nurse comes up and says, ‘We don’t know much about football, Mr. Lockette, but there’s a guy outside who says he needs to be in here. He says he plays with Ricardo, and his name is Marshawn Lynch.’ I go to the lobby, and Marshawn has his bags. He said, ‘I knew it was more than what they told me when I saw him go down. I knew it was more severe than that and I could not leave him here.’

Lynch’s actions are a great example of how a little compassion for others can go a long way.

That’s why Lynch is *exactly* the type of speaker to have for a graduating class.

It is true that Lynch hasn’t said much to reporters in the past. He replied with “thank you for asking” to each question he was asked after a game in 2014. He told Deion Sanders that he’s “‘bout that action, boss” when explaining why he doesn’t like talking to the media.

But it’s clear Lynch actually does have a lot to say when you listen closely.

I understand why some Princeton students are perhaps confused by the choice to have Lynch as the Class Day speaker, but don’t knock Lynch until you hear his message. My guess is he’ll give you some pretty sage advice you can use in the future.

[wgwhite]

David Brin’s ‘Uplift Trilogy’, A review – Or: ‘You had me at intelligent Chimpanzees fighting alien Birds’

How long would it take you to read a book about spacefaring Dolphins, and Chimpanzees at war with giant birds? A week, maybe two? It took me eight months.

But that’s because I’m a slow reader.

Some time last year I picked up David Brin’s ‘The Postman‘. I was in full swing of my post-apoc one man hype train and I was choo-choosing a classic that I’d heard good things about. I loved it, and David Brin went straight to my ‘keep an eye on this chap’ list. I then picked up ‘Sundiver’, also by Brin, and the good scientist-come-author had cemented his place on my ‘I’m watching you’ list.

I was about a third way through Sundiver when Christmas reared its jolly head. My girlfriend’s parents had gotten me (on top of a bitching Superman onesie) the Uplift Trilogy. So, Sundiver, Startide Rising, and The Uplift War all rolled into a mammoth 1205 page monster. It’s big. I’ve seen smaller toddlers. This thing could kill a pensioner.

I’m not sure how to approach this review really. There were aspects I liked of all three books, and things I didn’t like. I mean…Startide Rising and The Uplift War are Hugo and Locus & Nebula award winning, whilst Sundiver (my favourite of the three) received no awards.

The scope and the concept are fantastically large. Brin does a spectacular job of making his universe feel dauntingly huge, and then–somehow–manages to make it feel claustrophobic too!

The concept, whilst simple at its core, is built brilliantly and remains, throughout the whole series, as the central conflict. That concept? Uplift. Uplift is the act of dragging an animal kicking and screaming into intelligence whether they want it or not. Because misery loves company, and why be content with only arrogant humans when we can surround ourself with a Noah’s Ark of wise-crakin’ know-it-alls?

In Brin’s universe the only way for a species to achieve sapience is to be ‘Uplifted’ by an intelligent species. The Uplifted species become Clients (read: slaves) to their Patrons (read: masters) for a few millennia until they get to spread the joy of intelligence to their very own Clients (read: salves)! Humans (the Wolfling Clan) are special because we don’t have a Patron race. We allegedly stumbled and fumbled our way into intelligence by evolution–a process thought impossible–so every other race in the five galaxies hates us. The rest are indifferent. Only a handful actually like us. Sounds about right, I only like a handful of humans myself. The leading theory in-universe is that we were half Uplifted and our would be Patrons cut and ran. Can’t blame ’em really.

The stories themselves are also pretty basic at their core (the best ones always are).

Sundiver details a mission to the Sun (hence the name) where funky lifeforms have been discovered. Our hero, Jacob Demwa: a marine biologist/ astronaut/ political mastermind/ Private eye/ human swiss army knife, finds himself caught in a mysterious conspiracy to debunk humanities’ competence on the Galactic stage.

Startide Rising focuses on a mostly Dolphin crew hiding out in the waters of an alien world whilst a huge, intergalactic war wages overhead. What are the powerful galactics fighting over? The Streaker, the Dolphin crewed ship. They made a discovery and now everyone wants a piece’a that sweet, sweet sushi. The crew need to work out a way to escape the star system in one piece, whilst keeping their findings close to chest…close to fin?

The Uplift War takes place towards the end of Startide Rising and then just after. This time we’re on the planet Garth during an invasion of the terrifying, brutal, Gubru. A race of super intimidating bird folk…We’re sans Dolphin this time, as Garth is a human/ Chimp planet. All across the five galaxies, war is waging over the Streaker’s mysterious discovery. Earth and her colonies are under siege, and the Gubru, religious fanatics, decided to roost on good ol’ Garth…Bloody Dolphins ruining everything.

There’s no suggested reading order (if you get all three books separately that is, and are a shameless anarchist) but in a chronological sense the order is as seen above. The stories, however, are all so independent, and the concepts so throughly explored in each book, that you could, in theory, read them whichever way you’d ruddy well like (in theory I could scream whilst I’m on the bus, but I don’t…some things are just wrong). Sundiver takes place a good century before the events of the next two, but only affects Startide Rising in the sense that one of the protagonists is a mentee of Jacob Demwa, the protagonist of Sundiver. So he’s mentioned maybe twice? If you read Uplift War before Startide you’ll hear mention of Streaker and a bunch a cowboy Dolphins, but it doesn’t affect the plot of Uplift War. Startide does provide some context though, as you’ll understand why Garth is under siege. I’d recommend reading them in order, because why not?

I enjoyed Sundiver immensely, even with Demwa’s almost God like abilities. It’s a fun read from a (at the time) new author with really big ideas. The concept of Uplift is fascinating, and I found the creatures living in earth’s sun to be really well imagined. I’d hoped, however, that Brin would focus more on the life forms in the sun and less on the crime/ mystery plot. But that’s Brin’s business. Good book, very enjoyable read.

Startide Rising I didn’t enjoy quite as much as Sundiver, but it’s still a solid read. It’s tense in all the right places, tragic and exciting. Brin imagines the nature of intelligent (neo)Dolphins very well, and does his best to flaunt them. To that end we only have four or five human characters against a whole crew of Dolphins (and one Chimp–what a lad). Truthfully, I fond my suspension of disbelief wavering somewhat; there were moments that made me put the book down, but there were also plenty of moments where I couldn’t stop reading, too. For me though, Startide Rising shows Brin’s ambition. The novel is saturated with perspective characters, all of whom have complicated names, a lot of the time it’s a struggle to remember who’s who.

An issue that’s made significantly worse in The Uplift War.

My least favourite of the three, The Uplift War has long, confusing names like Uthacalthing, Athaclena and Prathachulthorn. Only two of these names belong to aliens, the other is human. Bet’cha can’t guess which one. I kinda just made a noise when Prathachulthorn reared it’s ugly head…It really destroyed my flow.

The saving grace of this book is Fiben. Your classic anti-hero action type who just happens to be a Neo-Chimpanzee. I lived for his chapters, and (surprisingly) the Gubru chapters. With the exception of perhaps Unthacalhing, I found a lot of the other perspective characters borderline boring. None more so than Athaclena. A member of the Tymbrimi, Earth’s closest (read: only) allies, the Tymbrimi are galactic pranksters, hilarious rogues. Yet Brin decided not to show us your typical Tymbrimi prankster, instead we got Athaclena. She’s brash, stubborn and almost completely humourless. I don’t understand the purpose of introducing a race of jokers if the only two you show us are considered ‘boring’ to their own people!

I didn’t dislike The Uplift War, not at all. I only felt it was…flat compared to the other two books. It fizzled. I can’t recall a climatic scene, only a slow pattering away, and then the end. A shame really.

There are more books in this series, and I might get around to them one day. But for now I need smaller books. I need books that don’t double the weight of my bag every time I head out for the day.

* * *

David Brin is a multi-award winning novelist and scientist. He’s a ruddy good author, so check him out!

Links to his website: www.davidbrin.com

Link to the Uplift Trilogy on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Uplift-Complete-Original-Trilogy-Omnibus-ebook/dp/B009EA355E/ref=sr_1_2?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1438893373&sr=1-2&keywords=Uplift