#eleanor reads comics

[whitmore]

i’ve seen the “no one ever came looking for me. but you would have, courtney” panels before (out of context) and they still make me deranged to this day. i love when characterizations of courtney put her loyalty forefront i love when it’s recognized by other characters in text— something about issue 1 setting the audience up to believe that courtney doesn’t have her priorities straight and issue 2 sending an immediate reminder that her priorities are always her people above herself and that she would go to lengths that other people would not for her friends and loved ones. but you would have, courtney. she makes me self-liquify and implode

[zal-cryptid]

Hey i have a question for the author have they read The Mouse and His Child it's really cute

I have read it, and I concur! Perhaps I'll add it to Maria’s reading list!

[tickldpnk8]

Excellent breakdown! You’re convincing me I need to read/listen to the audiobooks. (Because audiobooks Are reading)

One thing I’ve loved about this series are just the small little details in art and in dialog that you pick up when you reread it. I admit that I wasn’t at first a fan of Dreamling because it felt so out of character for comic!Hob to me. Because he does come across as a bit of a womanizer and a selfish man. And while I love Ferdie’s take on him, I just still saw those attributes the most. (I’ve since become a big Dreamling fan in part because of the excellent fic writers out there who are able to write such convincing portrayals.)

But I love the nuance you’ve teased out of the panels here. I certainly didn’t pick up on how Hob referred to Jim/Peggy, although I did assume they were the same person he later married. And Hob’s such a womanizer that I think it really colored my interpretation of their story…rather than allowing Jim/Peggy to influence my interpretation of Hob.

Hob Gadling - A Queer Romantic?

I have been listening to The World's End chapters of The Sandman on Audible lately and just finished Hob's Leviathan. I didn't pay this story much attention when I first read the comic, as I tended to read through the stories quickly and put more focus into the stories where Dream had a larger role. But one of the reasons I like listening to the Audible book is because it allows me to absorb each story more thoroughly and take my time thinking about each one and the (usually multiple) meanings behind them.

Hob Gadling is a character that fandom has fallen in love with. I think this is clear to anyone that takes even a partial glance at Sandman fandom. This isn't a criticism - Ferdie's performance as Hob in the Netflix show has done wonders for Hob's character. He has made his version of Hob very easy to fall in love with!

But the truth is that in The Sandman comics, Hob is a minor character who we only get to know very little about. The story Hob's Leviathan appears in The Worlds End Sandman book. We only meet him twice before this, once in The Doll's House, where we are introduced to him in Men of Good Fortune, and again in Season of Mists when Dream comes to let him know that he may miss their next meeting. In both these issues, Hob is introduced via the narrator, and therefore I like to think that we are given a fairly honest representation of the kind of person he is. We watch him grow and learn throughout the centuries in MoGF, but one of the major takeaways from this I believe is that he tends to always be on the wrong side of history. He makes bad choices and can be a bit narrow minded. He is rude and selfish and also rather self-absorbed. I actually think that the performance of the voice actor who plays Hob in the Audible book emphasises these character flaws making him even more unlikeable in many ways, though I am aware that this could just be my own experience and opinion.

But Hob's Leviathan takes a different view of Hob. Literally. The narrator of this story is a young boy of 16 called Jim. Jim met Hob on a ship travelling from Bombay to Liverpool in 1914. Jim was working on the ship as a cabin boy and Hob had bought his passage back to England - though it is revealled at the end of the story that Hob actually owned the ship they were travelling on. It is clear that at this point in time, Hob is extremely wealthy.

Jim attends to Hob throughout the journey, and grows very fond of him. In Jim's tale, Hob is a good man, who is kind and thoughtful and cares about others. He saves the life of a stowaway (who turns out to be another immortal). He is shown to be patient, and funny, and very intelligent. Jim waxes poetic about how smart Hob is, and how much he impressed him. It is particularly clear in the Audible book that Jim is taken with Hob, to the point that it could arguably be a crush.

It is fascinating how much more likeable Hob is when narrated from the viewpoint of someone with a crush on him, whether this story is exaggerated through rose tinted glasses is of course something to consider. All the tales in World's End are just that, tales. There is a constant undercurrent of exaggeration and make believe to them where even the other patrons of the inn question elements to each of the stories. We are not supposed to take these stories as absolute fact, rather they are supposed to reveal to us more about the narrators as well as their own experiences existing in this magical and strange world.

When it is revealled that Jim is actually a girl called Peggy in disguise so they can get work on the ships, the quite obvious crush makes more sense to a heteronormative audience, but what I particularly like about this story is its queer potential. See in the comic, it isn't really clarified if Jim goes by Jim because they feel more themselves as a boy, rather than a girl, or if they are disguising themself as a boy just to get work as a means to an end. I would argue that the latter is the more obvious interpretation. Jim tells the other World's End patrons that they are getting too old to keep up the disguise and will eventually have to stop working in shipping, and that when that happens, they will take on a new name, a new identity and do something else, but that for now, the patrons can keep calling them Jim.

*for a lack of clarity around the point in the comic, I am going to use gender neutral pronouns for Jim going forward*

Now from Hob's POV, he figured out that Jim was a girl, and they talk about it briefly along with the sea serpent they saw. I think that at this point, Hob is impressively progressive compared to the previous times we have met him. Now whether or not this is biased storytelling from someone who has a crush on him remains to be seen, but if we take Jim's word as truth, not only is 1914 Hob a fair and honest man who is willing to pay the way of a stowaway and fully respect the secrets of a young girl disguised as a boy so they can work on ships, but he's also totally comfortable flirting with them.

I like that he calls Jim the "handsome cabin boy". I like that this version of Hob, whether real or an exaggeration skewed by Jim's feelings for him, respects Jim's identity. Jim may be a girl in disguise, but Hob doesnt call her pretty, he calls him handsome.

It's all just a bit subtly queer and I like that for Hob (But then I would do, I'm a Dreamling shipper HA)

When Jim finishes their story, they state that they didn't see Hob again after that, but the comics later do give us a possible outcome to Jim's story...

We next see Hob in The Kindly Ones where he is mourning the death of his girlfriend Audrey. He briefly reveals that Audrey was the first person he had loved since Peggy, who was his lover until her death during the Blitz. Whilst it isn't made clear that Hob's lover Peggy is the same Jim that we meet in World's End, it is a bit too much of a coincidence. The timing adds up. If Jim was 16 in 1914, they'd be in their early 40s during the Blitz. Hob remains forever in his early 30s so I'd say its a safe bet that Jim eventually found Hob again and they were together. Hob loved them enough that he wasn't with anyone again until Audrey in the 80s. That's 50 years worth of mourning. A long time not to be with anyone, even for an immortal.

It's funny because we know so little about Hob, but one thing that I have seen commented on here a lot is that comic Hob is deemed to be as Straight as an arrow. Now I admit that the voice actor in the Audible book plays him very straight, but that is still only one interpretation.

All this is to say that I am fascinated with how the Netflix show will adapt this, since Hob in the show already comes across much kinder and more selfless than his comic counterpart. He already has an entire fandom viewing him as queer, and the comics certainly don't outright shut down such interpretations. There are moments in the comics that you have to wonder on. He does call Jim handsome rather than pretty, and when he talks to Audrey's grave he mentions his wives and loves as separate groups. He talks about finding it easy to get sex if you want it, and he talks about it in generally gender neutral terms. In Sunday Mourning Gwen reveals that she thought he was gay when she first met him, though her reasonings were that he knew so many dead people (a dark reminder that these comics were published at the height of the Aids epidemic). He reacts very badly to the news of Morpheus' death. He states on several occassions just how much he liked Morpheus, and he is one of the few people to wake up from the Wake with tears running down his cheeks. I would arguably state that its between Hob and Matthew as to who had the worst reaction to Morpheus' death, showing just how much both Hob and Matthew cared about him, and placing Hob on par with Matthew in the comics is a big deal. He seriously considers accepting Death's gift when she offers it, simply because Morpheus is dead. He doesn't, because at the end of the day, its just not in his nature to do so, and given he then dreams of Morpheus, I like to think that it was a test, that he passed.

When it comes to how the show will adapt all this, I genuinely think it will take a new approach with Jim/Peggy. I think they will be either a trans man, or at least non binary. But I think having Jim be a trans man is the better option. In the comics, Jim's tale is only very subtly queer, Jim clearly likes being Jim, but it seems like its a means to an end, a convenience in order to get work on the ships, rather than being something that is core to Jim's feelings on their gender. Besides, if we assume that Jim is indeed the Peggy Hob talks about in The Kindly Ones, then we know that Jim goes back to being Peggy when they get older and apparently continues living as a woman whilst they are with Hob, otherwise I doubt Hob would have referred to one of his greatest loves by a name they themselves rejected and only used she/her pronouns when talking about them. Nevertheless there is no reason for the show to take this approach, and if they DO decide that Jim should be a trans man, then their relationship with Hob is canonically a queer one. Trans men are men and if one of Hob's greatest loves is a trans man, then Hob is a queer man himself. I genuinely believe the show will take this route and I can't wait to see it.

Going back to my point about narrators bias, if MoGF, SoM, tKO, and TW are all narrated by a neutral third party, then this must be the true Hob. A not overly likeable rather selfish man. He has his good points, and he has certainly grown and changed over the centuries, and carries a lot of guilt for his past mistakes, but he is still quite self absorbed. Jim paints a picture of a rose tinted Hob that is far more the dreamy romantic older gentleman that took a young person under his wing. Which is fair enough.

The show is of course its own adaptation, with changes from the comics as it sees fit, but I do feel it's my duty to remind you that the show also has a narrator guiding the audience through its many stories. Dream of the Endless, Lord Morpheus, King of Nightmares and Prince of Stories himself. Take from that whatever you will.

;-)

[pathologicalreid]

wrapped around your finger | s.r.

in which you come home to find spencer in peak girl dad form

who? spencer reid x fem!reader category: fluff content warnings: mom!reader, girldad!spencer, nail polish, this is technically the family from cryptic, but you don't need to read cryptic to know what's going on word count: 578 a/n: this is for the anon who asked for dad!spencer! i always have some dad!spencer on retainer for when the people are in need! it's nothing crazy, but i was cleaning up my desk and found a sticky note that said spencer would definitely let his daughter paint his nails.

A little voice carries itself from down the hallway, and you follow the sound of it. The carefully chosen words of your four-year-old daughter make you wonder who she could possibly be speaking to. Slowly, you walk down the hallway, trying not to alert anyone to your presence.

On your way, you peek into the nursery, your younger daughter sleeping soundly in her crib as you pass her, finally ending up at the doorway of Eleanor’s room, “Do you like the color?” She asks gently, holding her father’s hand in hers and inspecting his fingers.

“I love the color, thank you,” Spencer says politely, “You know, purple is my favorite color.”

The smile that blooms on her face is so bright, it makes you wish you’d never left the house in the first place. “Mommy told me!”

Nothing in all of the parenting books you’ve read prepared you for your firstborn to stop calling you mama. The switch had caught you off-guard, and you found yourself mourning the little girl she had been while simultaneously prideful of the personality that she was developing.

You’d have to keep better track of it with Olivia, though you and Spencer hadn’t come to a consensus on whether or not you were done after two kids. The sight in front of you might just be enough to convince you to go for a third.

Her princess tiara slides forward on her head as she focuses on painting Spencer’s nails, your husband sitting in a chair that’s comically small for him as her small hands deftly apply the lacquer.

Catching sight of you in his periphery, Spencer gives a soft smile in greeting, not wanting to alarm Eleanor of your appearance. “You’re really good at painting nails,” he observes, reaching his free hand up to adjust her crown.

“I wanna do it forever and ever,” she responds giddily, putting the brush back into the bottle. You notice the way Spencer reached over to seal the nail polish bottle, preventing a tragedy before it strikes.

Spencer hums in response, “If that’s what you want, lovebug.”

She smiles, spinning around in her PJs until she sees you, “Mommy!” She squeaks excitedly, running over to you and giggling when you pick her up.

“Hello, Princess Nellie,” you greet her, hugging her tightly before setting her back down. Listening to see if the ruckus woke up the baby, you walk further into the bedroom when you hear no stirring from the room next door.

She smiles, pointing at Spencer with a proud look on her face, “I painted daddy’s nails.”

“I see that,” you took in the sight before you, Spencer’s nails had indeed been painted, along with all of the skin surrounding them. “They look great honey,” you tell her, sitting down on the edge of her bed.

Nellie looks up at you expectantly, “Daddy said I can’t paint Livvy’s nails.”

You smile slightly at the pout on her face, “That’s right, she’s too little to have her nails painted.” Though you have to admit, you’ve been imagining mini spa nights with your daughters from the moment you found out you were having another girl.

Her eyes go wide as saucers, “Oh! Then it’s a good thing I have daddy.” She beams over at her father, and he looks at her with an equal amount of adoration in his eyes.

Grinning over at Spencer, you nod in agreement with her, “Yeah, it is a good thing.”

[rhyrhy]

Venom in the veins 🕸️

Spider!Ellie x Fem Villain reader

✦ Synopsis: When trust is broken, and alliances shift. Your local friendly neighborhood spiderwoman! is forced to choose between her love and loyalty!

✦ Warnings: enemies to lovers to enemies..? Angst, violence, death/grief , language, romantic tension, familial issues. 5k words.

A/n: thank you to @s0phi3w4lt3n , because their lovely brain is helping make this possible. This is chapters 1-2. (3-7 will be separate posts!) + Ellie’s suit desc is based off this beautiful art!

October 5th

I guess I finally understand what it means to wear the weight of something bigger than yourself.

Nobody tells you how lonely this gets. They say it’s a responsibility. A privilege. But nobody warns you about the nights when your body’s so sore you can’t move, or when you have to smile at people who would hate you if they knew the whole truth.

And the worst part? I should’ve seen it coming.

I should’ve known the second I woke up with a spider bite the size of a penny and a bad feeling in my gut.

But I was just a dumb kid clinging to Joel’s leg in the ER, sure I was about to drop dead…

Being a hero wasn’t as simple as they made it look in the comics she read. It wasn’t just about the mask—it was about juggling the power, the responsibility, and the weight of knowing that, at any moment, everything could come crashing down.

And in the end? It was always a game of masks. Who’s hiding behind them, and who’s fooling who?

Ellie wasn’t the best at keeping secrets.

Especially not when she had a spider bite the , wrapped in white gauze and held together with SpongeBob bandages that did little to ease her nerves. Her pain tolerance wasn’t exactly low, but weren’t black widows deadly? She could still feel the long-gone venom burning in her bloodstream—or maybe she just thought she did.

“Joel, I’m too young to die!” A younger Ellie whined, tears streaming down her cheeks as she clung to his leg.

“You aren’t dying. They said you’ll be sore at most.” He sighed, patting her head.

“Dramatic” wasn’t the word he’d use to describe the distraught figure clinging to him like she truly believed her life depended on it. Eleanor “Ellie” Anna Williams, at the ripe age of twelve, gave her adoptive father more wrinkles than he could count.

This time, it wasn’t a scraped knee from wobbly attempts at skateboarding, or a burn on her forearm from trying to make him breakfast. It was a spider bite. She didn’t get a good look when she flung her head after the sting set in, but she was almost certain what that eight-legged creature was that had crept onto her hand while she doodled on her notebook in science class.

She rambled about it the whole way from the school’s nursing office to the emergency room. Not even the radio could drown out the frantic girl, who loved all things nature—as long as it wasn’t trying to kill her. She’d just learned to use a training bra. She couldn’t die now.

“I’m not?” she said, her green watery eyes looking up at him.

“No. Weren’t you listening to what the nice lady said? The one in blue scrubs?”

To be honest, she wasn’t. However, she did remember the woman he was referring to—and the way she made her heart race. Even now, as a young adult, Ellie would bring her up when questioned about her gay awakening.

“You’re goin’ to be fine kiddo” He bent down to her level, his Texan accent dragging out his “n”s.

Comforting her had become something Joel mastered over the years. Trying to navigate Ellie’s spectrum between smart mouth and nervous breakdowns wasn’t easy for a man in his early thirties. But he’d found a way to wedge himself somewhere right in the middle—right where she needed him.

If there was one thing Ellie learned quickly, it was that Joel knew best. With legs full of scars and scrapes and a pair of worn-out Converse that Joel begged her to throw away, Eleanor—who preferred just ‘Ellie’—skated into her high school years.

Going from Little Orphan Annie, which she hated when assholes at school called her that, to your average teenager in the big city of Seattle, everything was completely normal.

Except it wasn’t. At all.

In fact, nothing about Ellie was normal. But the unusual started small—extremely small—and Ellie didn’t know any better. At first, she thought it was just the weed she smoked with Jesse still messing with her system.

Because ever since that fateful day in seventh grade, weird, borderline supernatural things had started happening.

She couldn’t tell you exactly how it all started—at least, not without cringing through the many, many journals she kept as a teenager—but somewhere in the mess of scribbled notes and half-finished sketches, there was an entry about a joke gone wrong.

One night, on a dare to see how long she could hold a handstand, Ellie found herself upside down—only she wasn’t just balancing. She was walking. On her ceiling.

The next morning, she convinced herself it was just some weird, half-awake dream. But when she tried it again—yeah, no. She wasn’t dreaming.

“Holy shit!” she blurted out, stumbling back to the ground.

“Language!” Joel’s voice rang out from the living room, blissfully unaware of the very sticky situation unfolding just a few feet away.

Ellie swallowed, staring at her feet. “Holy shit…” she whispered again, this time to herself.

For a while, she tried to ignore it. Between figuring out her sexuality and preparing for an upcoming science fair, she had enough on her plate. So when weird things happened—like catching something mid-fall way too fast or feeling vibrations through the walls—she brushed it off.

But the signs were getting harder to ignore. Especially when she asked Riley if she could hear that sound—

—and Riley just stared at her.

“Hear what?” Riley asked, setting up their volcano project.

“That—” Ellie waved her hand vaguely. “You seriously don’t hear it?”

Riley squinted. “Williams, I love you, but you have absolutely lost it.”

Ellie would’ve argued back, but the sound was coming from three tables down.

“Booger-eater James?” Riley snorted, nodding toward the kid hunched over a glass box of spiders. Not sure how that was science experiment. “He’s just standing there. With his creepy crawlers. I pray for him once we hit eleventh grade—he’s never getting a girlfriend.”

Panic set in—sudden and overwhelming—as her mind spiraled. Was this some weird side effect of the bite? Or was it something worse? She thought about her biological family, about the things she didn’t know, about the one thing she did worry about when it came to her health.

These were crazy person signs, right? Or worse—crazy person genes running through her blood. Torn between telling a school counselor or just locking herself in the bathroom to cry, Ellie excused herself from Riley and approached the table. But the closer she got, the louder the sound became. A crawling, chittering hum that made her stomach flip.

There was no way she was communicating with something that had more than two eyes and eight legs. An arachnid, for crying out loud.

Don’t get her wrong, Ellie loved science. But people who claimed this kind of stuff? They got laughed out of programs. Stripped of titles, accreditations. Blacklisted. Snow White talking to animals was one thing. A teenage girl talking to spiders? That was an entirely different planet.

But the more she thought about it… the more it made sense.

The heightened senses. The weird reflexes. And that bite mark—the one she was so sure would scar? It was completely gone the next morning when her bandage fell off in the shower.

What started as a sneaking suspicion was quickly turning into a daunting realization.

Ellie tried to ignore it. She really, really did.

For the next few weeks, she chalked it up to stress, exhaustion, anything that made more sense than the alternative. But the signs weren’t stopping. If anything, they were getting worse.

The way her body moved before she even had time to think. The way she could feel things that weren’t there—like the vibrations of footsteps before someone entered a room. The way her grip had changed—how she accidentally shattered a glass one night at dinner, how the basketball stuck to her hand a second too long in gym class.

She stopped journaling about it. She stopped mentioning it to Riley. But she couldn’t stop thinking about it. this was so , so much worse than the time she wasn’t allowed to leave the dinner table until she finished her brussels sprouts.

And that was how she found herself standing in front of her bedroom window one night, hoodie zipped up, black Converse laced tight.

Sneaking out wasn’t new to her. She’d done it before. Skating out to meet Jesse, tagging walls in alleyways. But this?

This wasn’t just sneaking out.

That night, she got her first real taste of herself without the skintight suit she now wears like a badge.

Little did she know at the time, how important that near miss would be.

“Glad nobody saw that.” An embarrassed Ellie giggled to herself, standing to her feet after stumbling for the hundredth time.

Parkour always seemed a little odd to her—she preferred her guitar or a late-night reading session, but those seemed to lay still on her bookshelf nowadays. I mean, who wanted to potentially hurt themselves running along buildings, jumping from concrete to concrete, brick to brick? Short answer: she did.

Long answer: the stairwell right behind her apartment building, leading to the city’s rooftops. Mariano’s, her favorite pizza joint that always closed way too early in her opinion, the old library that closed down only to be replaced a few doors down, and the laundromat. Dusting off her jeans, she’d do this for what felt like hours.

The back and forth would make normal civilians sick—feet swollen to hell. But for Ellie, after a fight with Joel about curfew or an unnecessarily long school day, as soon as the sun set, this was her heaven.

She wasn’t normal. She’d established that a long time ago. But it’s not like she could exactly tell people she could do these kinds of things. They’d look at her the way Riley did. A FYI, she was so right about James—after graduation, he still never got a girlfriend.

Ellie, on the other hand, had quite a few up until graduation.

A shared kiss with Riley, a faded stick-and-poke cat the girl in her art class gave her, and her unforgettable first time with the first girl she could truly say she loved: Dina.

To say “fair share” was a bit of an understatement. It was more about quality than quantity. Her building real connections, some still lingering around. Some took the high road, choosing to stay the bitter ex. But Ellie didn’t see it like that. She appreciated the good and the bad, even if she did have to get a real tattoo over that stick-and-poke cat.

But times like these, where she let her feet carry her across the city, were when she was allowed to forget about all that, leave it in the past where it belonged, and focus on the future. But even with her tassel turned, she always found herself in that alleyway, climbing up that same fire escape to get to the roof.

The city lights below flickered like distant stars. So many people, but none of them knew her name. Maybe that was for the best. In this city, the only person Ellie needed to be was herself.

The wind against her skin felt sharper tonight, like she could almost taste the city’s pulse. A distant car honked, but she didn’t hear it the same way anymore. It was all part of the rhythm, the energy that seemed to flow through her, the way the rooftops called her to them.

For now, the rooftops were hers. But she knew, deep down, that wouldn’t last forever. Heroes, villains—one day, someone would come looking for her. And maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing. Maybe.

Freshly graduated, Ellie was hanging out with friends at her favorite pizza joint, the smell of pepperoni filling the air, and the sound of laughter ringing in her ears. It was one of those normal, relaxed nights. nothing out of the ordinary. Or at least, it didn’t seem that way at first.

But when a hooded figure paced back and forth in front of their table for the fourth time, Ellie couldn’t help but feel a cold chill run down her spine. Her green eyes snapped to the sound, hands slowly lowering the slice of pizza she’d been about to take a bite of.

“That young man stole my purse!” A woman’s voice broke through the hum of the restaurant, her trembling hands pointing toward the culprit.

Ellie’s green gaze snapped to the man now hurrying down the sidewalk, his steps quick, his movements too frantic. The adrenaline surged through her as she pushed her chair back and stood, catching a glimpse of her reflection in the glass door. She didn’t wear her mask yet, but the sensation of needing to act was unmistakable.

She couldn’t just let it go.

The man was fast, but he wasn’t fast enough. Ellie darted into the street, weaving between pedestrians like a blur, the sound of her footsteps muffled by the city’s noise. When she reached him, she tackled him with everything she had, the force knocking the purse out of his hand and sending him stumbling backward.

He didn’t stick around to fight back. In a flash, he bolted, disappearing into the shadows before Ellie could react.

She stood there, chest heaving as she clutched the purse in her hands. The woman, now catching up to her, approached with wide eyes.

“You got it back!” The woman gasped, her voice thick with relief.

Ellie smiled awkwardly, handing the purse back to her. “I… I guess I did.” Heart still racing.

Before she could say more, the woman pulled her into a tight hug. Ellie froze, not knowing what to do. She had no idea this small act of kindness would cause a strange warmth to spread through her chest.

“Thank you,” the woman whispered. “I don’t know what I would’ve done…”

Ellie gently pulled back, her heart still racing. She was pretty sure she was just a regular girl, with no superpowers or any big secret to her name. But in that moment, the feeling of doing the right thing—of helping someone in need—felt bigger than anything she’d ever experienced. Maybe she was crazy. But a little bit of crazy could do good.

And Ellie? She loved justice.

“Bullshit. No way you tackled him like that.” Abby’s voice rang out, interrupting Ellie’s storytelling.

“Alright, maybe I exaggerated a little bit, but I’m telling you, I kicked ass.” Ellie laughed, holding the door open for the tall blonde.

“Uh huh. Sure, Williams.” Abby huffed, walking past her into the bookstore. The familiar chime of the doorbell rang out above them, a small sound that felt like a second home.

Ellie inhaled deeply, taking in the comforting smell of ink and crisp pages being turned. She loved it here, more than the silly pictures of cats online, which, in the Williams world, meant a lot.

Abby, tall and always a step ahead in the teasing department, fell into step beside her. One of the few friends Ellie could confide in. Even if that came with endless ribbing. Ellie could admit that she’d told the “first save” story a million times, but it was one of the few she could tell without giving herself away—without breaking her promise. The promise she made to herself when she officially earned her title as ‘hero.’

But here, in the bookstore, she could nerd out all she wanted. No secrets to hide, no need to pretend. She could throw in the subtle bragging without fear of it getting back to the wrong people.

Ellie wasn’t a huge talker. She preferred humming to herself or getting lost in her own thoughts. As she scrolled past the comic book section, her fingers brushing against the glossy covers of vibrant colors and bubble letters, she was suddenly back in time. A place of nostalgia. Staying up way past her bedtime, reading comics under the covers with a trusty red flashlight.

When the small tv in the corner of the store caught her attention. A new report, crime in the city’s streets. detailing the latest wave of crime sweeping through the city. From petty purse snatching to stolen identities—and sometimes, even lives. It was all too familiar.

“This just in: Another robbery in the city’s streets. Police are still on the lookout for the suspect,” the newscaster announced.

She hated it, the fear in people’s eyes. The feeling of a warm blanket being ripped off all because a few people probably weren’t hugged enough as kids. If anybody knew a rough childhood, it was Ellie, and what she didn’t do was use that and take it out on the world. The last thing she expected years from this moment is trying to be understanding with the one who did.

If anyone knew a rough childhood, it was Ellie. But she didn’t use that as an excuse to lash out at the world.

In fact, the last thing she ever expected, years from this moment, was to try and understand the person behind the violence.

“Jesus, this city’s falling apart,” Abby muttered, her eyes still glued to the screen. “Where are the cops when you need them?”

It made her sick. The injustice. The feeling of helplessness.

“Sometimes, people just need to learn the world doesn’t owe them anything,”

Abby looked over at her, but Ellie kept her eyes on the chaos. The sirens were already wailing in the distance, but they’d never get there in time—not when the damage had already been done. And when the cops finally showed up. Just yellow police, tape and tears.

“Scary, huh?” Abby said, standing beside her, arms crossed. She shot a glance at the scene before turning back to Ellie. “Where are the cops when you need them?”

Ellie scoffed, rolling her eyes. “Yeah, they always show up too late. After the damage’s already done. It’s like they just don’t care enough to stop it before it gets out of hand. Makes you wonder if anyone’s actually doing anything about it.”

Abby sighed in agreement. “Someone should.”

Ellie’s mind wandered then, as it often did in moments like this. She’d seen it all too many times—the heroes who talked big but never seemed to get things done. But the ones who really caught her attention were the ones who operated in the shadows. The ones who didn’t care about fame or recognition.

Her thoughts drifted to The Phantom—a mysterious figure who’d been cleaning up the streets for years. Nobody knew their true identity, and that was the way they liked it. No flashy costumes, no headlines, just quiet, effective justice. They worked in the shadows, out of sight, but the results spoke for themselves.

“Maybe someone like that could show up,” Ellie murmured. “Someone who teaches people the lesson that their actions have consequences. Not just words, but real, lasting consequences.”

Abby raised an eyebrow, casting her a sideways glance. “Wait, are you seriously saying you’d want to be like them? A shadowy figure, handing out justice however you see fit?”

“Maybe. I mean, someone has to.”

And someone did. She did, she had to. things quickly escalated from saving purses to kittens out of trees you name it Ellie was there.

So what about the fabric hung deep in her closet. The one she mentions hundreds of times in her journals throughout the years.

Well, It wasn’t like she had a fancy suit. No, Ellie had to make do. Her costume came from a combination of chance and necessity. Absolutely one of those “it just happened” moments that ended up being so much more.

It started with a hand-me-down.

After one night where she barely managed to escape with a bruised arm and a scraped knee, Ellie found herself on the edge of the city. In a forgotten corner of a local alley, tucked behind an old, unused storage unit, Ellie found a discarded suit. It was a mix of gray, black, and green fabric—more rugged than sleek, a little worn out, but something about it screamed potential. Her hand reached out for it, like she could feel the joy she’d bring with it on her skin.

fit like a second skin. It didn’t stand out too much, which was good; Ellie didn’t want to draw attention, not yet. The colors worked too—gray for blending in, black for stealth, and green because… well, why not? It matched her eyes.

One afternoon, Ellie had found herself standing outside a local store, looking out over the city, when a voice caught her attention. It was a soft voice, one that belonged to a little girl.

“How’d you get up there? You move like a spider.”

Ellie smiled beneath her mask, thinking about the first time she made the jump to scale a building. She was very clumsy, but she’d learned quickly. It was funny, she hadn’t really thought much about it until now. A spider… That’s what had started this whole thing.

The bite she thought would kill her.

“What’s your name, hero?” the little girl asked, her wide eyes.

Ellie hesitated. A name?… A spider? This was a loaded question. But That’s what they called her, wasn’t it? She was just some kid trying to do right by the world.

“Spider… uh… girl… woman!” She blurted out, almost embarrassed. Hoping it sounded cool, so in the moment, she went with it.

“Spider Woman. Yeah, that’s it.”

She didn’t mind the title. It was fitting, simple.

Spider-woman. Silly, right? It sounded like something out of the DC Comics stacked in her room. And she loved it.

The name was sung like gospel on the news, printed in bold ink for those who still bothered with newspapers.

On one channel, a reporter stood in front of a cityscape, microphone in hand.

“The masked vigilante, called ‘Spider-Woman’ by the public, continues to stir-up debate. Some call her a hero, while others question if she’s just another masked threat. We hit the streets of Seattle to hear what the people really have to say.”

Cop, off duty: “Look, I don’t make the rules, but I do enforce them. Vigilante or not, she’s got a record, and that means trouble.”

Masked kid in a homemade costume: “She’s like, a ninja or something! I think she’s cool!”

Teen girl with dyed hair: “She’s kind of badass, not gonna lie.” She shrugged.

younger woman with a toddler: “Are you kidding? She’s the only one out here actually doing something! You ever had a gun in your face? ‘Cause I have. If she’s around, I know I’m making it home.”

The tv Cuts back to the news anchor at the desk, straightening their papers.

“You heard it here folks! Love her or hate her, one thing’s for sure. she’s out there. And she’s just getting started.” The news reporter finished.

But every hero had their villain.

And Ellie? She was crushing on hers.

With Brown hair tied back, wheels skimming smoothly across the pavement. No suit today, just a hoodie and jeans, her usual off-duty attire. As a creature of habit, she skated her way to the bookstore like clockwork, the same route.

Had she finished the last two comics she bought? Absolutely. A little faster than intended. But a five-minute ride was nothing for a girl who spent most of her nights swinging across the city, trying to do right by the world. In her own way.

The streets of downtown Seattle buzzed with life, familiar shop signs blurring past her periphery—the record store with the neon “Vinyl Lives” sign, the café that always smelled like burnt coffee, and the corner thrift shop with racks of clothes spilling onto the sidewalk.

Then—“Shit—!”

Ellie barely had time to swerve, nearly colliding with someone standing dead center in her path.

“Sorry!” she called over her shoulder, skidding to a halt a few feet away.

The person barely reacted. Headphones on, phone in hand, just a slight jerk of the shoulder to let her pass. like they’d done it a thousand times.

Ellie shot them one last glance, catching just a flicker of their face. The shape of their eyes, the calm in their posture despite the near collision. No sense of surprise, Weird. Most people flinched.

Shaking it off, she kicked forward again, hitting the sidewalk with a small exhale. Board tucked under her arm, she pulled open the door to the bookstore, the familiar jingle of the bell bringing an easy grin to her face.

“Like clockwork. You are so predictable, Williams,” Josh, the store clerk, greeted from behind the counter.

“What can I say?” Ellie shrugged, stepping inside. “When you’re a comic book connoisseur—”

“—It becomes a lifestyle,” Josh finished, smirking. “Indeed you are.”

Ellie chuckled, already making her way toward the shelves, completely unaware that the person she nearly crashed into was about to become a permanent part of her life.

She just didn’t know it yet. And neither did you.

Just few moments before …

“What an idiot,” a deep voice muttered, entering the back alley. Away from prying eyes.

You rolled your eyes, arms crossed as you leaned against the brick wall beside him. “She was skating. God, do you ever lighten—”

His hand landed on your shoulder, fingers pressing just enough to remind you. Not a threat. Not yet.

Your mouth shut. Swallowing your retort.

He exhaled through his nose, slow and measured. Thinking. Shit. Your gut told you to argue, to roll your shoulders back and step away. But you didn’t.

She wasn’t. You knew that. But your world didn’t allow second guesses.

Unlike Ellie, there were no scraped knees followed by fatherly reassurances. No kissing boo-boos, no gentle words. Hell, in your world, mistakes didn’t just hurt. They burned.

And the man towering over you now, eyes sharp as a blade’s, wasn’t the type to let things slide. The city dubbed him Red Hand, a name spoken in hushed whispers.

But you just settled for—

“Will you relax, old man? I get it.” You scoffed, swatting his hand away.

Old man. Boss. Everything but Dad. He didn’t deserve that title. Maybe once, when you were too young to know better. But now? Now, you couldn’t remember the last time you saw anything close to affection in his eyes. Sure, you’d hear a gruff, “You did good, kid,” now and then—but only after running his errands. Only when you were useful.

That’s how this started. You don’t grow a hatred for the world overnight. It’s molded into you when you’re most likely to sponge it all up. Seeing people for what they really are, learning early that it’s survival, not love.

Your real parents? Nothing but a shadow of the past. A blanket. A half-hearted note. A promise that you’d be “taken care of.” Not loved. Not held. Just… handled.

And he did. In his way. He didn’t mark your growth on a doorframe. He didn’t pack lunches with little notes that said, “Have a great day, love you.”

No, that was too soft. The Red Hand was feared. With just a snap of his fingers, his problems were taken care of—no questions asked.

At first, you weren’t sure who they were—the ones who carried out his orders, the ones who came and went like shadows. Or why he always denied your late-night tea parties with Mr. Bear.

One eye missing. Fur worn and faded from too many hugs. The first toy he’d ever bought you. Well, stolen. But it was a gift nonetheless.

You used to crack your bedroom door open at night, small fingers barely making a sound as you peeked through the gap. Trying to make out the hushed conversations happening just a few feet away.

Never catching much. But it was whispered for a reason. And even as a kid, you knew better than to ask.

Then came second grade. You walked through the door with puffy eyes and a fresh bruise on your cheek. He barely looked up from his paper as he slid an ice pack across the table.

“And did you hit them back?”

Your small legs dangled off the couch as you shook your head. “No…”

The paper rustled as he set it down, finally looking at you. “C’mere, kid. Let me show you something.”

And he did. With careful, practiced movements, he taught you where to aim. How to make it count. Jabs, punches.

“Those little shits won’t bug you too much after this.”

You learned quickly. Not just how to hit, but when. Where. How to read a room. How to never show weakness.

Because in his world? Weakness was a death sentence.

So no, there were no bedtime stories. No reassurances whispered into your hair. Just lessons. And you learned them all. After all, it paid to be useful. Even if that meant the occasional run to the principal’s office

The city doesn’t care. People don’t care. They’re too busy fighting to stay on top. So why bother trying to be something else? Why bother saving anyone when they’ll just let you down? He’d shown you what the world truly was. A place where you had to take what you wanted.

A place where you had to survive, no matter the cost.

You’d stopped asking questions a long time ago. Why did they leave? Why did he allow you to stay? What was that gnawing feeling deep in your gut? You’d stopped wondering about what could be, what should be. This was it. This was all there was.

And as Ellie’s world spun with hope, with the promise of doing right, yours had long since given up. Because in your world, saving lives wasn’t enough. The world didn’t reward you for being a hero. No. It rewarded you for knowing when to stop asking, when to take what you were given.

Dressed in black, learning what was most important: to keep moving.

To be continued …..

Line dividers | 2 | 3

Ellie m.list

Taglist @0h-basic

[apricitystudies]

what i read in 2024: best of, part one

(previous editions) bold = favourite

class, race, gender, & sexuality

the crisis over american manhood is really code for something else

slash and burn: is private equity out of control?

my elusive pain: living with the enduring pain of postcolonial trauma (france)

socialism for the rich

from tuxedos to tattoos, eleanor medhurst's unsuitable traces a hidden history of lesbian fashion

the political economy of race in singapore

how two single moms escaped an alleged sex-trafficking ring and ultimately saved each other

politics & current affairs

'in my books, it's murder' (australia/afghanistan)

south korea's long history of martial law – and impeachments

"between the hammer and the anvil"

in this police youth program, a trail of sexual abuse across the u.s.

how do 11 people go to jail for one murder? (uk)

cycle of despair (australia)

'lavender': the ai machine directing israel's bombing spree in gaza

utopia brasileira

other

one thing after another: a reading list for lovers & makers of lists

toormina video (comic)

the eugenicist of unesco

inside the surprisingly secretive world of crisp flavours

friend or faux?

your body, your self, your surgeon, his instagram

we all want to live in the golden girls house — don't we?

"he actually believes he is khalid": the amazing 30-year odyssey of a counterfeit saudi prince

the trees that miss the mammoths

what the us invasion did to iraqi archaeology

[bluedelliquanti]

Before I go on vacation, I present my list of my top books for 2024.

COMICS:

Roaming by Jillian Tamaki & Mariko Tamaki

Bunt! by Ngozi Ukazu & Mad Rupert

Ukazu and Rupert are a powerhouse team, and as an art school adjunct, this already funny GN is even funnier (albeit in a way that necessitates a skull emoji in the educator groupchat)

Tiffany’s Griffon by Magnolia Porter Siddell & Maddi Gonzalez

Phobos and Deimos by J Dalton

Delicious in Dungeon by Ryoko Kui

It's a tough task to reach a satisfying conclusion to a series that was as strong as Dungeon, but I think Kui accomplished it!

Fool Night by Kasumi Yasuda

King in Limbo by Ai Tanaka

Over the last year I've been drawn towards comic series that work with a retro, fixed-width inking style, and King especially informed some recent experiments of mine.

PROSE:

Twins by Bari Wood & Jack Geasland

When I learned Wood was responsible for the book that became Dead Ringers, I knew I had to try it. This is the one that wins my "Oh, shit! Wow!! Okay!!!" award for the year (distinctions previously awarded to Cyteen and Manhunt).

The Bezzle by Cory Doctorow

DS9: A Stitch in Time by Andrew J. Robinson

Those of you who read my journal comic from last August might recall that I met Robinson at a Trek convention! I'd learned from reading these books that Stitch was considered a white whale among collectors, and now I absolutely understand why. If you're a DS9 fan and you want to try any book from the original run of novels, try this one. By which I mean, try the far easier-to-find audiobook version.

Translation State by Ann Leckie

A Woman of the Iron People by Eleanor Arnason

Fellow SBCF participant Erin Roseberry had shared this title as an inspiration for their comic, The Maker of Grave-Goods, and I was especially interested in trying a book by a Twin Cities author. What a serendipitous find!

Arboreality by Rebecca Campbell

For the third year in a row, a book nominated for the Le Guin Prize makes the list.

Always Coming Home by Ursula K. Le Guin

This is another book I always told myself I'd try someday, and was it ever worth it! I spent some time talking about my experience with this story (and its accompanying materials that fill out the world) in my talk with Evan Dahm on his show.

See you in the new year! I've packed some thick books for a long flight, so I'm starting my 2025 reading pile right away!

Reruns of my previous two lists, 2023, and 2022, below the cut.

2023

COMICS:

Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou by Hitoshi Ashinano

Out of Style by Devi Putri Megwati

Skip and Loafer by Misaki Takamatsu

The Harrowing of Hell by Evan Dahm

The Infinity Particle by Wendy Xu

Esteban by Matthieu Bonhomme

I covered my ShortBox reccs back in October, but since then I also picked up Pearl Hunting by Hana Chatani when it came to itch.io and adored it.

PROSE: 

So yes, maybe I'm cheating by including Moby Dick since I'm not all the way finished, but Whale Weekly really did end up being a great tool for getting me to crack open my gorgeous Evan Dahm-illustrated copy I've had for a while.

My favorite book of the year is Roadside Picnic by Arkady & Boris Strugatsky. I genuinely did read it the first week of January, but after having it recommended to me for years, I'm thrilled it didn't disappoint. Maybe I am someone who likes Russian novels after all???

Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

Such Nice People by Sandra Scoppettone

Cyteen by C.J. Cherryh (I jokingly placed these three in the "READ 👏 FEMALE 👏 AUTHORS 👏" category because they don't have anything in common other than describing some of the most upsetting/bizarre scenarios I've read this year. Cyteen especially! Wowee!!!)

Brother Alive by Zain Khalid

Glory by Vladimir Nabokov

A Different Trek by David K. Seitz, which I mentioned as my vacation book for the Star Trek convention, but it's given me some great suggestions for more books, both fiction and otherwise. Also, I read... 11 more DS9 books this year. 

2022

COMICS:

Fullmetal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa

Vattu by Evan Dahm

The Well by Choo and Jake Wyatt

Wash Day Diaries by Robyn Smith and Jamila Rowser

Some ShortBox Comics Fair entries that are graphic novella length and are really good include Food School by Jade Armstrong and The God of Arepo by Reimena Yee et al.

PROSE:

Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters

The Murders of Molly Southbourne by Tade Thompson

How to Blow Up a Pipeline by Andreas Malm

Manhunt by Gretchen Felker-Martin

Dead Collections by Isaac Fellman

Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers

The Past is Red by Catherynne M. Valente

edit: oh my god I can't believe I forgot Perfume by Patrick Süskind

Honorable mentions from the pile of DS9 novelizations include Revenant by Alex White (for successfully pulling off a Sara Paretsky-style mystery in space) and Dominion War: Call to Arms by Diane Carey (for absolutely unhinged adjective choices).

[yeoldenews]

where does the nickname "tiger" come from? like in this post.. [ /780098883070181376/mama-gave-me-half-a-dozen-american-beauties-that/ ] i feel like i've seen it on here before. is it a Thing? do you know where she got the name from?

I honestly don't know what the origin was. If I had to guess I'd say Eleanor's (Tiger's) older brother Jack was likely responsible as he is the first one to use it regularly.

Eleanor isn't called Tiger/Tige in any letters until Spring 1898 (the letters start in 1895), so I'm thinking the nickname probably popped up somewhere around that time. Jack actually refers to her as "Tige" first, before switching to "Tiger" in 1899 - after that the two are used interchangeably.

When first reading the letters, I assumed "Tige" was a reference to the talking dog of the same name in Buster Brown comics (as seen here), but Buster Brown wasn't created until 1902, so Eleanor's nickname pre-dates that by at least four years.

The nicknames seem to have spread even outside the family, as Will and Jack's friends use them as well.

"Best regards to you father, mother, Ick, Tiger and Jno. Brown."

Quite often Eleanor is referred to as just "the tiger" which can lead to some very fun sentences such as: "We went to the theater to please the tiger."

Eleanor's cousin Rachel mentions her family coming across a tiger skin rug in a store while on a trip to Portland, Oregon in 1901, and says they were considering buying it as a present for Eleanor's eventual wedding. I don't know whether they went through with it or not.

Interestingly, one of Eleanor's sons became an ecologist who specialized in studying the effects of war (especially chemical and nuclear weapons) on the environment. He did an in depth study after the war in Vietnam and Cambodia looking into the environmental impacts of Agent Orange, which also happened to include studying the tiger population.

[elbdot]

A NEW COMIC UPDATE IS AVAILABLE ON PATREON!!

Hey everybody! :D I got great news! EAA WILL RETURN NEXT WEEK ON WEBTOONS AND TUMBLR!! But Patrons can already read the next update ahead of time! I've got two new updates in store and aside from early access, Patrons can get a look at my working progress, references I create myself for updates and where the adventure will lead to next! (Like TRAUMA! YAY!)

Also naturally your pledge will support a bunch of other projects, as I'm translating my book manuscript, create a custom trading card set and make new illustrations and videos :D

Thank you for your support and SEE Y'ALL NEXT WEEK!!

[sforzesco]

lmao the rival dynasts are fighting and they're fucking it up for everyone else at a record pace

this tweet made me laugh, and I frequently make political comparisons between these specific groups of people, so now it's finally a comic

regarding the OctavianOctaviaAntony Uniteam Alliance

Octavia Minor and the Transition from Republic to Empire, Katrina Moore

in the red panel, which is an obvious anachronistic soup of events happening all at once: we have on the left: messalla corvinus

Alternative Memoirs: Tales from the ‘Other Side’ of the Civil War, Kathryn Welch

and then octavia (in despair & weaponizing that sacrosanctity to turn rome against antony), some kids (the two closest to antony are the twins, but tbh you can just kind of. pick whoever from the soccer team of kids antony had)

octavian and antony's back and forth is referencing suetonius augustus 68 and 69 (specifically: Antony also writes to Augustus [...] "What has made such a change in you? Because I lie with the queen? She is my wife. Am I just beginning this, or was it nine years ago? What then of you — do you lie only with Drusilla? Good luck to you if when you read this letter you have not been with Tertulla or Terentilla or Rufilla or Salvia Titisenia, or all of them. Does it matter where or with whom you take your pleasure?") and also the whole. thing. about antony's will. that sure was something.

the herod comment from kleopatra is referencing all of this

Mark Antony: A Biography, Eleanor Huzar

AND FINALLY. the art in the inset panels are from The Roses of Heliogabalus, Lawrence Alma-Tadema

⭐ places I’m at! bsky / pixiv / pillowfort /cohost / cara.app / tip jar!

[whitmore]

just started reading stargirl: lost children n it’s cute i also like the references. i get very uncertain when media is very self-referential or dependent on understanding niche jokes in order to derive enjoyment from it but it feels more subtle here and more as a side than an entree if that makes sense. also the art is stunning

[redgoldsparks]

February Reading and Reviews by Maia Kobabe

I post my reviews throughout the month on Storygraph and Goodreads, and do roundups here and on patreon. Reviews below the cut. You might notice the layout image looks different! I have switched to using the Storygraph wrap up :)

The Baker and The Bard by Fern Haught

A sweet, slight fantasy story focused on friendship. A baker and her friend, an aspiring bard, go on a little adventure into the forest looking for a specific type of mushroom. On the way they encounter some misunderstood magical creatures, a nonbinary fey, and only the smallest amounts of danger and conflict. The gentleness of the story makes it appropriate for, and I believe aimed at, a fairly young audience, definitely middle grade or early reader rather than YA. 

I Shall Never Fall in Love by Hari Conner 

This is a witty, well-written queer romance set in the mid-1800s, England. The story borrows heavily from Emma while still feeling like its own fresh tale, especially because of the inclusion of characters of color, queer characters, and a gender-nonconforming love interest. I was rooting for Eleanor and George all the way; both rooting for them to get together and also rooting for them to find the space to know themselves and express that authentically around the people they love! The art in this book is stunning, with beautiful colors, and so much thoughtful historical research went into the design of the houses, costumes, and world of these characters. Highly recommend, especially if you're a Jane Austen fan. 

Conversations with People Who Hate Me written and read by Dylan Marron 

I picked this book up after loving Dylan Marron's podcast The Redemption of Jar Jar Binks, a 6 episode miniseries that I find myself thinking about all the time. Unfortunately, I do think having listened to that already dented my experience of this book, because I already knew a chunk of the story from the podcast which made listening to the book feel a bit repetitive. However! I still finished and overall enjoyed Conversations with People Who Hate Me, which is about Marron's podcast of the same name, in which he called up folks who had left hateful comments on his youtube videos or facebook and just had a conversation with them. What prompted them to leave a hateful comment? What kind of values impacted how they saw the world? Might they change their mind if they had more evidence? Did they ever expect Dylan Marron to actually see their comment? (The answer to this last was almost always "no.") This is an interesting political moment to think about this project of deliberate, compassionate connection, and Marron is thoughtful about the privilege that allowed him the emotional bandwidth to pursue it.

You and Me, On Repeat by Mary Shyne

Time loop fans, rejoice! Mary Shyne has crafted a clever, gorgeous treasure box of a story. Part coming-of-age, part romance, part sci-fi, all heart. I was drawn in from the very first page, hooked with the stylish art and the intriguing premise. I fell so hard for Chris and Alicia and all of the stupidly teenage and deeply human choices that lead them into a pocket dimension of space-time. Who hasn't wanted a redo option on one of the most important days of their life? What would you do if trapped in a time loop of your high school graduation day? I left the book rooting for these two! I had the pleasure of reading this book early :) It's available for preorder now, or grab it from a bookstore in May 2025! 

You Are a Sacred Place: Visual Poems for Living in Climate Crisis by Madeleine Jubilee Saito

Saito reached a hand into some of my very own darkest climate crisis-induced depressive thoughts and drew me gently back into the light. We are all part of this natural world, and we are meant to be here, and it is good that we are here. Those things can be hard to remember sometimes, but these delicate comics underline their truth. I also got to read this early - It comes out March 25, 2025, so you can reorder it now or find it in bookstores soon.

Hey Mary! by Andrew Wheeler and Rye Hickman

Saints and stories come to vivid life in this compassionate story of a young man learning to balance his sexuality and his faith. For any readers out there trying to find space in their Catholicism for their queerness, I hope this book can light the way. Another one I got to read ahead of it's release! It's out on April 15, so you can preorder or book for it in bookstores and libraries soon.

Akane-Banashi vol 1 by Yuki Suenaga, illustrated by Takamasa Moue translated by Stephan Paul

As a child, Akane watched her father fail out of a program dedicated to training rakugo, traditional Japanese storytellers. Now in high school, she is pursuing the same career under the same teacher. This book has a lot of familiar series-set up elements- a rival older student, a series of fellow trainees, a reluctant mentor- but unfortunate didn't deeply capture me. I'm unsure if I'll continue on with this series.

She Loves to Cook and She Loves to Eat vol 4 by Sakaomi Yuzaki translated by Caleb Cook

THIS SERIES IS SO FREAKING CUTE! I love how it's diving into some of complicated and logistical realities of being queer in Japan. I also love how supportive the friend group is. Yuri fans you need to pick this up! 

Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino 

Adina is born in 1977 to a human mother on Earth; but she is not totally of this world. Some part of her is also an alien, attuned to a planet with a collective consciousness, far away in the stars. Through a lonely childhood in Philadelphia, Adina faxes notes and observations on human life to her far away family. She grows up as the child of a single, working class mother, with few friends, but a fierce commitment to live as her own singular self. I really enjoyed the light-handed prose, the short slice-of-life chapters, and the insightful look at what it feels like to grow up an outsider. Adina reminded me of myself; she reminded me of many of my other oddball, queer, trans, or asexual friends who have always felt out of step with the lives of those around us. It reminded me, yet again, that there is perhaps nothing more human than feeling like an alien among one's peers. 

The Lesson by Cadwell Turnbull read by Janina Edwards and Ron Butler 

Set on St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands, this debut sci-fi novel wrestles with some big and weighty concepts. We are introduced to two families, neighbors, with their own interwoven concerns: a married couple struggling with relationship, a woman questioning her sexuality, a teen questioning her faith, a man yearning for more ambitious career and travel options in middle age. Then an alien ship arrives above the island and the book jumps forward 5 years in time to show how a powerful controlling presence has impacted the lives of everyone on the island. The Ynaa offered advanced medicines and technology to humans in exchange for staying for a time to do an unspecified type of research. But the co-existence is not peaceful: the Ynaa lash out with extreme violence over minor provocations. This tense situation cannot last. There was much to enjoy in this novel, and the audiobook was very well read by two narrators. I did think the final act suffered from some pacing issues, and a second time jump near the end worked much less well for me than the big time jump near the beginning. It was interesting to read this after having read Turnbull's second novel No Gods, No Masters which contains similar themes but with a much more complex story structure and much larger cast. 

The Guy She Was Interested In Wasn’t A Guy At All vol 2 by Sumiko Arai

I'm obsessed with these little rock-n-roll lesbians. This series gives me some similar vibes as Nana except sweeter, sillier, and hopefully heading in a much less tragic direction! The art is to die for, I spent so long just looking at every page in awe. Makes me want to draw more comics!

Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo and Me by Ellen Forney

This comic has been on my TBR for a decade and I'm so glad I finally picked it up! Forney's cartooning is so clear, articulate and accessible; it really opened up a window for me into the experience of being bipolar. I loved the many creative visual metaphors, the inclusion of sketchbook pages, and the self-compassionate tone. I can see what this book set such an early high standard in the genre of comics memoirs! 

Lone Women by Victor Lavalle read by Joniece Abbott-Pratt

In the opening scene, Adelaide Henry is spreading gasoline through the rooms of her childhood home in a farming valley in California in 1915, and over the bodies of her murdered parents. She leaves California with a rucksack and a steamer trunk, bound for Montana, where a woman alone can claim a plot of land. If she lives on it for at least three years and establishes a farm, she'll become the owner of the parcel. But can she really survive the harsh coming winter, the white supremacy of the nearby town, and the deadly family curse she's carrying? I really enjoyed the audiobook of this novel, but found myself pondering whether or not I felt like it fit into the horror genre, which is the primary genre tag on goodreads. Can a horror book have a happy ending? Is it horror is I don't feel like the narrative voice is trying to horrify me, rather show how marginalized woman can survive, even against extreme odds, by banding together? If I was shelving it I'd more likely to put this in historical fiction. 

The Deep by Rivers Solomon, read by Daveed Diggs 

Yetu is the historian for her underwater society, a group of deep sea merfolk who live in the depths of the Atlantic. She carries all of the memories, beautiful and painful, of their ancestors- pregnant women tossed overboard from ships during the years of slave trading. It is a great honor and a terrible burden to carry these memories, and Yetu thinks it might kill her to carry them alone. When an opportunity comes to leave the memories and her people behind, Yetu takes it. But who is she without her past and her people? I listened to this 4 hour novella on audio and enjoyed it a lot of a mythical alternate history. 

The Hundred Years War on Palestine by Rashid Khalidi

"His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine..." -Lord Arthur Balfour, 1917, statement made on behalf of the British cabinet (page 24)

"For in Palestine we do not propose even to go through the form of consulting the wishes of the present inhabitants of the country... The Four Great Powers are committed to Zionism." -Lord Arthur Balfour, 1919, confidential memo to the British cabinet (page 37)

"'If you wish to colonize a land in which people are already living," [Ze'ev] Jabotinsky wrote in 1925, "you must find a garrison for the land, or find a benefactor who will provide a garrison on your behalf... Zionism is a colonizing venture, and therefore, it stands or falls on the question of armed forces.'" (page 51)

"In a cover letter to [President Woodrow] Wilson, the commissioners presciently warned that 'if the American government decided to support the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine, they are committing the American people to the use of force in that area, since only by force can a Jewish state in Palestine be established or maintained.' The commission thereby accurately predicted the course of the subsequent century." (page 51-52)

This is an extremely well written, clear, concise book. The author draws extensively from primary source documents going back to 1895. His grandparents, his parents, and his immediate family lived through many of the events he outlines; he personally knew Yassar 'Arafat, long time leader of the PLO; he was an advisor to the negotiations between Israel and the PLO which began in Madrid in 1991 and ran (unsuccessfully) into 1993; he lived in Beirut through weeks of Israel bombardment in 1982; he and his father worked for the United Nations in the 1960s and sat through Security Council meetings on the Arab-Israeli conflict, including a meeting in which an intentional US political delay allowed Israel to make a preemptive attack on Syria. These personal anecdotes enliven what is overall a very grim history of broken treaties, broken promises, and conflict. I pulled the quotes because I want to be able to return to them later, to remind myself how clear it has been since the beginning that Britain and the US considered the Palestinian people necessary and acceptable sacrifices. 

[obsessiveagony2point0]

The Past

Charles reminds Hob of someone from a long time ago.

—-•—-•—-•—-•—-

Hob isn’t used to being asked about his past, with Dream being the only exception.

But now, with Edwin and Charles in his life, he was often asked on a daily basis.

Edwin was far more interested in comparing Hob’s experiences to what was written down. It was easier for him to answer those questions since it felt like teaching his History classes. The difference here being these boys knew he was almost 700 years old and his students did not.

A lot of the time, Edwin asked questions about the 1900s, around the time he had died. He’d missed out on not only growing up, but he’d been locked away in hell for nearly 100 years. He was curious, and Hob granted him that curiosity.

It was Charles who asked the harder questions.

A lot of the time, those questions had to do with experiences he should have died from but couldn’t. It was…a bit difficult bringing those memories up, but when Hob spoke about the 1600s where he was homeless and was freezing to what should have been death, he saw Charles’ expression change.

He’d given the boy a hug that day.

He’d asked if Hob had ever been in relationships with mortal people, which led Hob on a very strange and embarrassing yet sad path of all his past relationships. Which meant he spoke about his Eleanor and his once small family.

Then, one day, Charles asked about him.

They were in the kitchen; Hob cooking, Charles flipping through a comic, when suddenly Charles asked, “What was your son like?”

The room went deadly silent.

Hob stared at the eggs, not realizing they were burning until the smell hit him and he immediately moved the pan from the burner and turned it off.

“I-I’m sorry, we don’t have to talk about it.”

“No, no. It’s alright.” He turned to Charles, who looked like a beaten puppy. “I told you both you could ask anything you wanted and I meant it.”

Charles looked hesitant. “Yea…but…”

“It’s fine, Charles.” Hob gave a small, sad, yet reassuring smile before he leaned back against the counter, staring at the ceiling. “What was Robyn like…”

He looked back at Charles, who stared at him with big brown eyes, his face concerned and worried. Memories of Robyn flashed in his head, the face of a young boy who just wanted to make everyone happy and safe.

Hob reached a hand out, placing it on Charles’ head. “Actually…he was a lot like you.”

Charles opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by Edwin appearing through the wall. “Charles, we have a case. You can read your cartoon drawings later.”

“They’re comics, Ed. Comics.”

Edwin rolled his eyes and disappeared back into the wall.

Charles moved to follow, but stopped and turned to Hob. “See ya later, Hob.”

“Hopefully not in another week again.”

Charles chuckled. “Hopefully not, but you know Edwin.”

“I know.” Hob smiled. “Just…be safe. As best you both can.”

The ghost boy smiled back. “We will.” And with that, he vanished.

Hob stood there a moment longer, still smiling.

Yes…he was so very much like Robyn…

—-•—-•—-•—-•—-

Just really had to get this out of my system. I like the idea of Charles and Edwin of doing things that remind Dream and Hob of Robyn and Orpheus.

Twitter/X•AO3•Pillowfort •Linktree•Bluesky•Ko-fi

[gwenllian-in-the-abbey]

hi! so i started reading when christ and his saints slept (your recommendation, it's great btw) and wow george really dropped the ball on the dance cause what is this going on. like older sister against brother?? why would that work George??

i've seen tb make arguments that the usurpation set women's rights back for centuries, and that seems kind of silly cause the rule of (bloody) mary i still led to the rule of elizabeth i. personally, i think the issue of women's rights has more to do with the lack of queen dowagers and regents which are more common in real history but less in asoiaf who use their power of being mothers of the king to advocate for women, and lay the groundwork (e.g. margaret beaufort, nurbanu sultan, anne of austria, etc)

but, also what are the greens meant to do because if viserys did not settle inheritance for his sons (through heiresses) whilst he lived there's no reason why rhaenyra would do it when she's queen.

for me the greens have three options : take the throne through conquest, ask for a great council (they have vhagar they can make demands), or three literally die.

like as much as i am green supporter if i was rhaenyra and i peacefully ascended to the throne and my half-siblings who are brothers with sons of their own well, they just have to die ottoman style, because allowing them cadet branches undermines her own and in the end you get a house bourbon supplanting house valois situation (something catherine de medici committed war crimes to prevent); you can't let them leave because well 6 dragons outside of targaryen control — you might as well be asking for trouble ; send them to the citadel —well two are married to each other, one has vhagar with clear anger issues, the other has tessarion and can just leave when he wants and, not even talking about the kids with their own dragons.

the truth is the greens can't just sit and do nothing. if viserys doesn't want the trouble of his sons ,and wants rhaenyra has queen then simply don't remarry or do you your duty to the sons that you have sired.

reading christ and when his saints slepts its actually comical how house targaryen don't have mistresses and they began to have them when the dragons are dead

this was a long rant but the greens don't have much options especailly cause their living in an environment where sons inherit before daughters. i would ask how would you make the story more compelling and logical causing reading penman the dance is not.

also, big can of your writing ofcir and akab are holding me down since hotd has been feeding us crap.

Anon I've had this reply sitting in my drafts and should have answered ages ago, so my apologies for the late reply!

I'm so glad you're reading When Christ and His Saints Slept. It's my go-to recommendation for historical fiction about the Anarchy, and Penman in general is just my absolute favorite historical fiction writer. I hope you continue the series that follows Matilda's son, Henry II, his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, and their brood of children.

You're right that the greens didn't have many options if they wanted to stay alive. The show has downplayed that aspect this season but Alicent's sons and grandsons would always be a challenge to Rhaenyra and Jace's rule. You only need a basic understanding of the world to see that they were in an impossible position. Ultimately, Viserys is the one who destabilized his succession and deserves a lot more blame than the show is willing to give him.

As for the matter of powerful women, queens regnant, and women's rights, irl history is full of powerful queen consorts like Eleanor who exercised power, defended garrisons, negotiated peace, and sometimes, as in Eleanor's case, even rebelled against their own husbands. In the Anarchy, Stephen's wife, Matilda of Boulogne, was a force to be reckoned with, besieging Dover castle and making a treaty for Stephen with the king of Scotland. When he was captured in battle, Matilda raised an army, and when her army captured Empress Matilda's half-brother, Robert of Gloucester, who was one of her biggest supporters, Matilda of Boulogne negotiated a hostage exchange and secured Stephen's release. And this isn't even a Westeros problem because we see politically powerful women who are not queens regnant in-world-- Cersei as regent for her children, Catelyn, who was basically running the war effort before Robb set her aside, and even book!Alicent, who exercised a good deal of power. In fact, somewhat ironically, show!Alicent was well set up to exercise even more power than her book counterpart. It's clear Aegon actually listened to her and valued her counsel, even seeking out her advice and guidance. Having the ear of the king is no small thing, and if she'd done anything other than belittle him she could have ended up as his most trusted advisor. Look how easily Larys moved in! But the show instead had Alicent alienate Aegon and then treated her disempowerment as if it were a function of her gender rather than a result of her inability to provide useful counsel.

So no, a lack of queens regnant is not keeping Westerosi women out of powerful positions, and you're right anon, in that HotD seems to have decided that powerful women didn't exist as consorts, dowagers, and regents even though that's not true irl or in Westeros. As for women's rights, unfortunately having a queen regnant historically has done very little for women as a whole. Royal women tended to align their interests with other royals or nobles rather than with women as a whole, that is, solidarity is formed along class lines more often than it is formed along gendered lines. We see this even in our world today, where companies with women as CEOs in fact tend to hire fewer women in lower management positions. Rhaenyra being denied the throne doesn't mean much for the average Westerosi woman, but civil wars caused by an unstable succession can make everyone's lives demonstrably worse.

[assassin-artist]

Asking the same question on two fronts here. What did you think of the "I'm so lonely" speech they gave Conquest in the show and if she heard it at all, what does Eleanor think of it?

Not gonna answer the Eleanor half of this question right now bc I have another ask about it, and I'm compiling all the questions about the finale and that have comic spoilers in them to post in one big post (so I can hide the spoilers). So that'll be out eventually. I'll talk about my own thoughts on Conquest and his monologue though (:

Rambling below the cut as always. I talk about his personality from the comics, but I don't mention any story spoilers. Just a warning in case people want to avoid any mention of the comics at all.

First and foremost I'd like to say that I love Conquest (: I liked him a lot in the comics when he was just seen as purely a killing machine who didn't have any other facets to his character, so I was super surprised to watch the finale and see that they fleshed him out a lot more by going into his personality and inner thoughts. I loved the added characterization. The monologue was crazy, in a good way.

I think it's a fascinating change. Not only was his monologue new to me, but also the little heart bubble scene in space, too.

I've seen a few posts where people talked about a hypothetical Conquest reformation, or headcanons for if he had a human partner, and they always talk about how he would struggle to be gentle because he's so used to never holding back... but I actually have to strongly disagree on that. Largely in part to the blood heart in space scene. It was funny (especially how surprised/confused Mark was for it lmfao), but I also thought it was him 'proving' what he would later say about how he's capable of so much more. Such a big man with immense strength in his body the likes of which nobody on Earth will ever be able to achieve, with a metal arm that we don't know if he's capable of feeling through or not, but we see him being gentle and delicate enough to mold a freezing bubble into a specific shape. He uses both his flesh and blood hand and his metal prosthetic to do so, neither of which he seems to struggle with at all. He's just being a bit goofy and enjoying his time messing with Mark before he gets back into the fight, but it also shows that he has such an immense amount of discipline over his strength. Showing us that he's capable of holding back, of moving slowly and being gentle despite his reputation of being a hurricane or a killing machine. Sorry if I'm just reading way too into something that doesn't matter that much, I thought that scene was neat..

It's interesting to see that he only tells his true feelings of isolation and yearning for companionship to someone who he fully believes is going to be dead soon. He even leans down and whispers it in his ear to make extra sure nobody else could possibly hear it. Like he thinks the only time he can ever be honest about how miserable his life is, is when the person who knows of his secret won't live long enough to tell anyone else. We can see that Viltrumites are clearly very similar to humans in a lot of ways, both physically (despite significantly different strength and durability levels, they still have the same organs and body shape) but also mentally and emotionally. Viltrumites are capable of feeling the full range of emotions that we do as human beings, and it's fascinating that they prove this by showing us that even the seemingly heartless, sociopathic, bloodthirsty killing machine Conquest... actually has his own thoughts about his status as a weapon to be used. Negative thoughts, at that. He doesn't want to be just a tool that gets pointed at the Empire's enemies, with no regard to what he wants out of his own life. So much so that I think violence is the only way he really knows how to connect to others at this point, like all the conversations he has with Mark in the midst of their battle. Picking him back up when he falls, giving him encouragement - yes all of these are because he wants the fight to continue, but I think it's also because the fight is the only time he can 'act friendly' with someone.

I've always been more drawn to morally grey characters like Cecil, or to characters who fit the "made to be a living weapon" trope like Conquest. I love seeing how him being made into a weapon has affected him mentally and socially. Considering how Viltrumites age slower as they get older, with his appearance that means he's got to be, what, several thousand years old? I wonder how much of it was spent in isolation, both physically when he's away on jobs to other worlds where there's no one to speak to, and emotionally because even when he is back on his homeworld or on the Viltrumite warship with his own people, they still don't speak to or interact with him outside of giving him orders. His line of "they send me from planet to planet" made me think that he's always on missions, as if his people are in a hurry to get rid of him. Out of sight, out of mind and all that.

It's clear that Viltrumites are all raised in a harsh environment full of propaganda for their great Empire, and I'm sure any hint of disobedience is punished severely to squash it out of any other Viltrumite, too. Nolan mentions this with Cecil briefly when he says that they don't have "disobedient kids" on his homeworld (to which Cecil rightfully says it's a good thing Mark is more human than Viltrumite lol). This all leads me to believe that the idea of Conquest being something other than what he's been told to become - this mindless animal who lives only to kill and torment others - has genuinely never even crossed his mind. Why would he ever think about disobeying? Betraying the Empire? He doesn't give a shit about them, it's not like loyalty is what's driving him to stay - he just doesn't realize he could leave it. It's never registered in his mind as a possibility at all. It's all very tragic, I think.

I'm not the kind of person to disregard when a character does horrible things just because I like them, though. I just absolutely love it when you get to see why the character turned out the way they are, what drove them to be like that. In the comics we don't learn more about him or his motivations, he's just a mindless beast because it's what the story needed at the time. In the show, he's a mindless beast because it's the only thing he can be with the circumstances he's in. Something something, that one quote about how if a person is only ever treated like a monster, then they'll realize that a monster is the only thing they can be. I think that encapsulates Conquest's inner turmoil pretty well.

However, that isn't to say I think he's just some innocent old man who wants to knit sweaters and shit. Like I said, I try not to disregard when characters do terrible things - and we all know Conquest has done some horrifically evil deeds in the name of the Viltrum Empire. He clearly enjoys fighting and bloodlust, and although I believe that one of the main reasons he enjoys taunting his enemies so much is because it's one of the only times he gets to interact with others outside of being given a command, it's still obvious that he's a guy who likes the violence of it all. Which is why, at the end of the day, I think he's never going to get a reformation like Nolan is getting.

It's not because I think he's incapable of changing, or that he can't put his penchant for violence to better uses - it's just that I don't think the show would ever go in that direction with his character. Something about "out with the old, in with the new", and Conquest is very much 'the old' in this scenario.

Although I have a small bit of hope of being surprised with what they do with him, since they've already changed him quite a bit from his comics personality... I guess we'll find out eventually!

[doggojin]

now after your reading your comics i imagined the same situation with eleanor. like.

she still can read your mind but because of all the infestation in her head she can no longed understand its meaning. she only can understand that you're devastated and completely broken mentally and THATS what infestation wants.

you also can't do any harm to her because you still want to believe that eleanor is a live and because of that you're the easiest to capture and destroy

When it was only Nex and her left (in the lil alternate timeline), she'd sing him a song in his head, and kept doing that until she just couldn't anymore and Nex would try to bring her back by singing it to her but... to no avail.