#i can’t tell if it’s hard to read

[coatedinhoney]

story post is live but like why does it look better on desktop compared to my phone?

[cocktopic]

recommending orv to people who don’t like isekai is so hard bc i have to be like no trust me it gets philosophical and such and they’ll be like in what way. and i have to say well that’s a spoiler. so they’ll be like so when does it happen. and i have to say in the last 50ish chapters. but it’s especially great and stands out in a reread. and they’ll be like “so you want me to read 2.6 million words?” and i have to be like well. yes.

[thechosenthree]

[touchlikethesun]

i’m trying to break out of it but, when it comes to their relationship dynamics, so far no fic has managed to top the one skiing au where bokuto and akaashi try and convince kuroo and tsukki to be in a poly relationship that i followed religiously back in 2015, like. (almost) no other fic has managed to tap into what i find so appealing about that group’s whole dynamic, their humour their earnestness their chaos as four, the way akaashi and tsukki balance kuroo and bokuto’s energy (except everyone knows the real trouble is tsukki and bokuto), and like the individual dynamics are incredible too, every pairing just worked so well, even ones i wouldn’t have considered before like kuroo and akaashi. like how in 100k words did this author manage to develop every relationship just so damn well??? there should be way too many moving parts, at least one of the dynamics should have fell flat or fell to the background but none of them did ughhhhh oh my god it’s so good i just need like. a dozen more fics exactly like it rippppp like i’m watching s2 (again yes ik) and all i can think about when i see the four of them interact is “wow that author really nailed their dynamics, what they wrote is exactly how those four would be in 10 years time” god fanfiction is incredible

[moash]

i don’t want to do discourse about moash’s character, but i do want to talk about how the suicide baiting is used in the narrative

when moash confronts kaladin in roshone’s basement, this is expected to be the classic darth vader “luke, join me” moment, right? you’re expecting moash to say something like, join the dark side we can offer you more than the heroes can etc. but he doesn’t!!! to have moash stand there and say, “you can’t join us on the cool kid team, and since life sucks forever and you can’t join us where everything is awesome, you should kill yourself,” is wild!!! it throws you off!!! and it’s specifically so much harder for a hero to rebuff than “join me.” because “join me” is weak in this scenario, what can they really offer kaladin? nothing. it would be really abundantly easy to say no to. and from the writer’s perspective, join me is very Done, right? telling kaladin to kill himself and throwing back all of this personal information that kaladin told him in confidence when they were friends is a really cruel and unexpected twist that makes you feel the stakes so much more than if he’d just given kaladin the whole dark side spiel and called it a day.

it’s made even more interesting later on when you realize that moash is defying direct orders from odium to do this. odium DOES want moash to be giving the classic dark side spiel, and this is moash refusing to do that. and the reason he’s refusing to do that is because he hates what and where he is, and he loves kaladin, and he doesn’t want kaladin to be here, but the only other option in his broken mind is that kaladin dies. and when you learn all that and look back on the scene, it’s doubly interesting because now everything he’s saying about how life is worthless is him pushing all his own suicidal thoughts on kaladin. it’s moash who wants to kill himself, but he can’t.

to me this is all really fascinating for the peek into moash’s mental state, but also from a writing perspective as a novel twist on the villainous “join me” speech. it’s truly jarring to read the first time and succeeds on like every level as a piece of writing, personally, imo.

[pergaminaa]

Dorian is the kind of boyfriend who spoils in every way imaginable because he just loves Manon so much????

Like, he knows how hard she is on herself and how she just works constantly (trying to get the approval of a grandmother who would never utter a word of kindness at her yet she keep pushing herself)

Dorian knows he can’t stop her, so he tries what he can while she works herself to the point of exhaustion.

He loves cooking. And he especially loves of when he cooks for Manon (because often times she doesn’t turn him down and actually eats the food he makes)

When he wants to order food he doesn’t even ask if she wants anything because her answer would be ‘no’ and he doesn’t work with that.

He also loves baking!!! Tho Manon is not into sweet things but he still makes cookies (which she loves because the way Dorian makes them is ‘unique’ and they’re about the only cookies she’ll eat ever)

Dorian makes sure Manon stops working at some point during the night and just… relax. He made a small rule: she has until he finishes cooking dinner to finish work, because from that point on she is his to spoil. It starts with food, then a hot bath followed by either reading in bed or watching a movie (they take turns picking) he just focuses these few hours on Manon and makes sure she’s relaxed and that she goes to sleep at a reasonable hour

He hates it when her grandmother calls in the evening. After these phone calls Manon is usually feeling bad and she ends up staying in the office well into the morning. No matter what he says or does, she doesn’t leave the room. She doesn’t eat, doesn’t sleep and just power through whatever shit her grandmother said to her. It usually takes 2-3 days of her being like this until she crashes from exhaustion.

Speaking of, Manon is terrible at being sick. For all her life, her grandmother has drilled into her that sickness is a weakness and weakness is not acceptable in a Blackbeak. When she was younger, any time she got sick, her grandmother didn’t want to know about it. She’d isolate her in her room, ordering her to stay there and not come out until she is recovered because she doesn’t want to deal with her or her sickness (doesn’t have the time for it) so Manon grew up brushing sickness aside and carrying on like nothing is wrong. Dorian learned that nothing he says will change her mind, and unfortunately he has to wait it out. She either gets better in her own (rare) or get worse to the point of passing out and that’s when he interferes. It’s still something they’re working through, but the fact remains: Manon doesn’t let sickness stop her, not unless she’s actually unconscious.

One time she got a cold and recovered, except for the cough which stayed persistent for well over a month. She thought nothing of it, it would clear out on its own. But it didn’t, Dorian could have sworn it got worse. It got to the point where Manon was having difficulty breathing to get her to finally see a doctor. Turns out she had contracted an infection and it took her about three weeks of hospitalization to get over it.

Dorian really hates her grandmother but he also knows that she’s her only family and the sole parental figure she had her whole life. She won’t cut her off or stop talking to her.

So he decided to be the opposite of that; whatever damage the old woman did, he will be there, offering his unconditional love and support because Manon deserves the world and none of the unnecessary harshness her grandmother keeps subjecting her to

[rise-to-it]

the post about how we can’t explain WHY Eugenides is the perfect unreliable narrator without spoiling the books did just remind me that I once convinced my friend to read the books and then she wanted multiple of them at once to read on a trip, so I created a carefully secured paper book cover to hide the title of the third book from her

[luna-the-cretar]

You’d think that, between Gideon and Kremy, Gideon would be the easier one to get a read on (in terms of feelings towards certain situations and party members), but no. I can read Kremy like a motherfucking book. The way he spins lies and half-truths like a spiderweb; the way his tone will shift subtly depending on who he’s talking to, what they’re talking about, his feelings on the situation/subject/towards the person, etc; all of it. Kremy is so fucking easy to read for someone who’s supposed to be a silver-tongued conman.

But Gideon? His tone doesn’t shift all that much. He generally has a happy, confused, or entertained tone in his voice, with the exception of when he’s angry, frustrated, or upset.

Idk, maybe it’s harder for me to read Gideon because I listen to the podcast (it’s just easier for me since I can listen while driving or working), so I have to rely on tone shifts and other verbal cues. That, or maybe it’s because all of my past blorbos have been emotionally constipated men, who would only express their actual feelings about a situation based on tonal shifts, body language, and reading into what they’re saying.

[katzenkarussell]

Sada visiting Area 0 21/07/XX

[figofswords]

somebody rec me some good books. and they do actually have to be good. don’t rec me something just because it’s gay or it’s popular, it has to also still be good. like both the story and the writing have to be good none of this good concept bad writing or good writing horrible story. fantasy or soft scifi preferred, especially if it’s nontraditional fantasy. I am bored and sick of the internet and I want to get back into reading more but I’m kinda meh about most of what’s on my shelf

*edit: when I say “soft scifi” I don’t mean cozy I mean not hard scifi, as in stories that are more fantastical than grounded in hard science. for example the Martian is considered hard scifi, so not that. Star Wars would be closer to a soft scifi bc it’s all bullshit on the science end and it’s more about the vibes

[blueskittlesart]

i am trying so so so hard to wait and watch nimona with my friends but i keep seeing gifs and. idk if i can willingly let myself cry that hard in front of other people

[simgerale]

me after attempting to get back into sims and realizing i had a lot more to do than play the game

[demigodofhoolemere]

Me through most of Boom: Wow, this is a really solid dramatic episode.

Me when Moffat needlessly sprinkles in anti-faith sentiments without specifying that it’s blind faith in bad things that the Doctor doesn’t like, which makes it come off like the Doctor is just against religion generally:

[random-weird]

“He gripped me tighter around the waist and pulled me to him. “No,” he said into my ear. “No, Lucy. That’s not the way it’s going to be.”

- Jonathan Stroud, The Screaming Staircase

[geryone]

Listening to the audiobook for Know My Name by Chanel Miller & I keep having to pause it so I can cry

[aroace-shumika]

past valk shnz are not lovers they are worse (but also a qpr)