#i wanted to be sailor venus so bad | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

livingformintyoongi · 9 days ago

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✨💫The WIP Fairy is visiting your blog and wants you to share your WIPS! Share whatever you like! All of them or one of them, just the title or a brief synopsis. Put them out into the world to manifest some writing inspiration 📝🤍 then send this ask to your writer moots!💫✨

AH! Loved the idea jsskjskasj I finally find an excuse to throw all the randoms bits I have scattered around my library that I've been trying to finish (I'm a very scattered person, in case you haven't noticed).

Somebody I F*cked Once | Yoongi (Part of BOTN series)

"Which one suits me better? The red or the white? Be honest." You held both shirts up to your chest, giving him a few seconds to carefully consider his answer.

"You look better with nothing on," he chuckled softly, watching as you rolled your eyes. His hands slid to your waist, gently caressing your skin. "Sorry, but you're making it hard for me to focus."

"Why?" you asked, frowning as you set both shirts aside, making sure to lay them flat.

"I don’t know. Maybe because you're sitting on my lap wearing just my favorite bra?" he raised his eyebrows, his hands traveling to your lower back as he carefully pulled you closer. Once you were near enough, he cupped your cheeks and kissed you lazily.

"I'm also wearing black pants," you laughed against his lips, running your hands through his mint-colored hair, which you loved so much. "And don’t forget my super sexy Sailor Venus socks."

"Oh, damn. I don’t know how I could’ve missed the socks," he gave you that gummy smile you adored, brushing his nose against yours.

"I don’t know, Yoonie. Your eyesight is going bad—you’re clearly aging poorly," you teased, getting off his lap and finally choosing the white shirt. Yoongi kept his eyes on you the entire time you were getting dressed.

"Okay... I think I’m ready," you smiled, bending down to pick up your pajamas and put them back in their place. You almost screamed when you felt Yoongi’s hand slap your butt.

"Min Yoongi!" you exclaimed, turning to face him with a frown, narrowing your eyes at his shit-eating grin.

"You bent over. Not my fault," he shrugged, lying on his side while giving you an innocent look.

You raised your leg and lightly kicked his arm, grinning triumphantly as he groaned in complaint. "Soomin!"

"Sorry, I thought you were asking to test Sailor Venus's super strength," you snickered, grabbing your bag and boots.

Echoes of Love | Taehyung (in edition, soon published)

"Are you feeling better?" Jiwon murmured, holding a bottle of water up to his face. She would be lying if she said she didn’t feel sorry for seeing him in such a sorry state, with wet cheeks, a red nose, and dry lips. It was probably the worst she’d ever seen him, even worse than when Joohyun had left him. But she had no idea what to do or say to cheer him up. Knowing herself, she’d probably make things worse if she opened her mouth.

"Yeah..." he replied quietly, his brown eyes fixed on an empty spot on the floor. He seemed lost, absorbed in his own world, trapped in memories that caused him so much pain and heaviness it felt like he couldn’t bear them much longer. That, Jiwon thought, had been Taehyung's greatest muse: his pain.

"I’m sorry you have to go through all of this, I... I didn’t want to cause you more trouble. I know you hate listening to people complain and all that, but... I don’t have anyone else..."

"Shut up, you’re just making things worse," he murmured with sarcasm, trying to lighten the tense atmosphere a little. Contrary to what Taehyung thought, Jiwon actually cared about how he felt, she cared about listening to him, being there for him. "Now, why don’t you start from the beginning? How did you meet her?"

Taehyung stayed silent for a few seconds, one of his hands running through his hair, which had lost its once elegant form a long time ago. He licked his lips, feeling them dry. When he looked up, Jiwon’s eyes were already fixed on him, observing him with an intensity that revealed just how vulnerable he felt.

"I... I met her five years ago... there were almost seven months left until the next exhibition and I was struggling to create new art... and then she..."

"Did you make her your muse?" Jiwon tilted her head, sitting down next to him on the step. Her friend’s nervous behavior was starting to unsettle her. Even she didn’t know why. She knew him like the back of her hand, she knew he would never harm a girl, at least not consciously. So why was it so hard for him to speak?

"Yeah..." he murmured, covering his face with both hands. He closed his eyes, letting the memories of his time with Soomin flood back: her laughter, her eyes, her lips, her skin against his. Each memory grew more vivid, like a cold stream of water. He could hear the melody she played on the piano the first time they worked together, or remember the first time he saw her smile... Everything overwhelmed his mind like a cascade of moments he couldn’t stop. "She... she was like a breath of fresh air. I’d never met anyone so beautiful... and I’m not just talking about her looks, although she was that too. I’m talking about... her." He sighed, looking at Jiwon, whose eyes reflected the desolation he was feeling. "Her essence, her soul... whatever you want to call it. That’s what made her beautiful, Jiwon, and I don’t think I’ll find that in anyone else... I don’t want to."

Jiwon hugged her knees, still looking at her friend. She thought she understood what he was saying, at least to some extent. She had seen it reflected in his works, the way he portrayed her. It couldn’t be a coincidence that in each one, Soomin appeared as an ephemeral, ethereal being.

"So, then? Why did you let her go?" she murmured, studying his profile intently. She knew Taehyung was rambling, avoiding the topic. If she didn’t press him, he wouldn’t face it, and the last thing he needed right now was to keep avoiding reality.

Jiwon watched Taehyung for a long moment, feeling how the air between them thickened. She could see the internal struggle in his eyes, the way his shoulders sagged as if the weight of his sadness was crushing him. She decided not to interrupt him, though his words hung heavily in the air. The silence between them became thick, but Jiwon didn’t want to rush her friend. She knew that only when he was ready, the words would come. But when Taehyung finally looked at her, his dark eyes were empty, filled with a sadness that Jiwon couldn’t fully understand, but she felt it as if it were her own.

‘It was her who left me, Jiwon...’

Goodnight N Go | Kim Taehyung (Part of the BOTN series)

“You never come to see me unless it’s for public opinion,” you clarified softly, taking one of the snacks you had served a few minutes ago. It had sounded worse than you had planned, in fact, you even sounded a bit resentful.

“Of course…” he swallowed hard as he saw your gaze settle on his. It was just as soft as always, he knew that; he couldn’t see any malice in them, even if he wanted to. Still, he felt his throat tighten when he realized you were challenging him to contradict you, and worse yet, he couldn’t do it, because you were right. He only spent time with you when cameras were involved, when they needed the journalists to see their perfect relationship. Nausea flooded him almost instantly. It was truly disgusting—why did you keep putting up with this?

“Don’t torment yourself so much, Tae,” you smiled gently, picking up your glass again, but this time, you didn’t take a sip, you just stared at the burgundy liquid inside. “Our relationship was fake from the start, remember? We both agreed that it would only be a public relationship, and we’d each carry on with our love lives as if nothing had changed.” Your heart squeezed at that reality check. You’d never promised exclusivity, you had asked him not to. How could you demand that from Taehyung, who was deeply in love with Joohyun? They loved each other, and you were simply… their curtain.

“Still, it doesn’t feel right. It feels almost like… I don’t know, like I’m using you for my own benefit.”

“That’s what this is about,” you cut him off quickly, not wanting to hear him torment himself over it, “We’re using each other to avoid a scandal that could affect my solo career and yours with Bring on the Night, so don’t feel guilty.”

“Y/N, I…” Taehyung tried to take your hand across the table, accidentally knocking over your glass in the process. You both gasped as the wine spilled directly onto your clothes, staining part of your shirt and skirt. You nearly panicked when the fabric started to become translucent. “Shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to… it wasn’t my intention,” he quickly moved toward you, grabbing a handful of napkins to clean the stain from your shirt.

Your cheeks flushed the moment Taehyung’s hands began rubbing the pink stain. “Uhm, Taehyung?” He only responded with a confirming sound, too focused on cleaning the stain. “Your hands are touching…” you lowered your voice with each word that left your mouth. Taehyung’s gaze stopped on yours, noticing how your cheeks were completely red. It was only then that he realized where exactly he was touching.

Now, both of you were completely flushed, unsure of where to look, what to say, or what to do. “Shit, I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize,” he pulled away from you as quickly as he could, awkwardly leaving the napkin on the table. He hadn’t noticed that your shirt had become translucent until that moment.

He wanted the ground to swallow him up right then and there and never spit him out again.

“I… I’ll go change, I’ll be back soon,” you murmured, standing up from your chair to walk—no, run—to your room.

Under The Shadows | Kim Taehyung (Part of the Four Kingdoms series)

"Did you know?" You looked at Jiwon, the knot in your throat tightening with each passing second, the pressure in your chest growing more unbearable. Everyone knew. Everyone but you. "All this time... I trusted you, followed each of your advice thinking you wanted the best for me."

"I do!" he quickly replied, moving closer to take your shoulders. Everyone in the room held their breath, what else could they say anyway? "I've always wanted the best for you, Your Highness, my intention was never to hurt you, I—"

"But you did," you murmured, pulling away from his grasp. They knew, they knew you were in the castle, they knew you wanted to kill Taehyung, and they also knew you would never do it. They knew everything. They had been manipulating every little detail of your life just to bring you here. They erased your damn memory, assigned you to one of their guards, made you Taehyung's servant... and it was all part of their plan. "You betrayed me, you all did..." You bit the inside of your lip, feeling a metallic taste flood your mouth, but you didn’t care, it didn’t even hurt. "I-I thought you were honest with me... I really thought... I thought I had finally found a place where I could be myself... where I didn’t have to spend hours locked in a tower with no human contact."

"And you don't have to anymore, Y/N, you're free here," Taehyung, who had barely been able to look at you since you entered the grand hall, took a few steps toward you. Having him close always made you nervous, every time you were near him you felt an inner warmth you had never felt with anyone in the past, or at least that's what you thought until a few minutes ago. Obviously, you felt this way because of him, it wasn’t just some sort of love at first sight, you had spent months talking with him, months in which he had been taking care of you, showering you with love like no one ever had, how was he able to pretend he didn’t know you? Months pretending you were just a new face, that he knew things about you by chance. He wasn’t any better than the others in this room.

"Don't come near me," you wrapped your arms around yourself, feeling the cold of your fingers spreading through your arms. A strand of your hair fell over your face as you looked down, its pale color, as white as snow, shining brightly in the sunlight coming through the windows. Every part of you began to tremble, to the point of being unable to stand. Your chest hurt, and your throat felt dry and tight. Panic was starting to take over your body. It was too much for you. "No... please, don’t come near me again..."

Jungkook, the only person in the room who had truly been honest with you, rushed to your side, trying to steady you as your legs gave way. He was halfway there when a spike of ice shot up from the floor, its tip pointing directly at his brow, sharp enough to pierce his skull, fast enough to have ended his life in that instant. "What...?"

Your hands were firmly placed on the floor, your gaze fixed on them. They looked different, they didn’t seem like yours. They were still small, still looked weak, but their color, your nails, looked different. The veins in your hands – and probably throughout your body – glowed a bright white, your skin was much paler than usual, and your nails had grown, sharpened, and their translucent blue color made them appear to be made of ice.

"Her hair!" you heard Soyeon scream. With your still trembling hand, you took a strand of your hair, the same one you had brushed this morning, the one that was supposed to be dark brown, now white. You noticed that as you touched your hair, the pads of your fingers began to cover themselves with a whitish frost, covering most of your fingers.

"Your Highness!" Jiwon rushed toward you, but before he could reach you, you stood up with the little strength you had left and ran toward the door leading to the main hallway. Your entire body felt heavy, alien to you, it was hard to run this way, but you had to do it, you didn’t know what else you were capable of in this unstable state.

Name in process… | Jeon Jungkook

Synopsis: Have you ever loved someone so intensely that just the simple act of exchanging glances with them makes your whole body tremble, your breath quicken, and your heart stop? Have you ever had the chance to meet someone with whom you’ve had such an overwhelming connection that it feels like all the books you’ve read about love finally make sense? You were sure that most people would say yes, that there was someone, a long time ago, who made them feel that suffocating sensation; but just as you were sure everyone had experienced this, you also knew that all those relationships never lasted, perhaps they never even started in the first place. It was simply that—a fleeting experience, a feeling that would remain deep within their hearts, with the hope that someday, they would feel that same love again in the future, and that it would have a happy ending, like in fairy tales.

Sadly for all those people, including yourself, fairy tales were simply that—fairy tales. Fantastical stories that make you feel they’re real, but in the end, they’re just stories.

That’s how you remembered your relationship with Jungkook. Something unreal, fantastic, like a fairy tale. It was fleeting, but full of emotions so strong that they still followed you to this day; full of memories you could still vividly relive through your dreams. He was, is, and probably always will be the only man you ever truly loved, and you were so painfully aware of that fact that, no matter how hard you tried, no relationship you ever had came even close to what you had with him.

I have more, but I feel it's already too collapsed KSKKDDKKASJD sorry.

I said I could invite some of my moots to do the same, so I'm going for my two favs of favs, my protégés, the loves of my life @thunderg and @kookiewithluv.

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everoutoftouch · 1 month ago

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Tagged by @fictionalred thank you!!

Ah I’m always bad at coming up with my favorite things on the spot, haha. Let’s see…

Tagging @automated-exchanges @clawless92 @prettymuchgone @agentalysswolf @vixen-ink @lev-1athan @ember-des-meeres

And anyone else who wants to just tag me! :)

Gifs of characters below the read more:

I’m on mobile so it’ll only let me upload ten so I’m deleting Sailor Pluto and Sailor Venus from the gifs ah sorry! I tried to get into my old computer but I can’t remember the password :/

Dana Scully:

Claire Fisher:

Yuko Ichihara:

Nana Osaki:

Striga:

Sypha Belnades:

Nadja:

Camille Preaker:

Willow Rosenberg:

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princesscolumbia · 3 months ago

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Half Moon

With a title like that, it's either gonna be something Sailor Moon or She-ra related. 😏

Welcome to this craziness! This was the result of a vote over on the Storytellers' Speakeasy, a server run by myself and AnneOminous (writer of "The Phoenix," if you haven't read it, shame on you, go do it now...oh look at that! A reboot of that very fanfic on Ranma Reboot Day!). It is just minutes before midnight in Arizona on 10/5/2024, so it still counts as getting it out on the day of!

Half Moon - Ranma ½/Sailor Moon/Star Trek - Archive of Our Own

Captain Ranma Saotome of the USS Invincible is commanding her ship on her first assignment as captain when she gets a chance to do something most people don't, a chance to see how her life could have been if things had gone differently.

Preview below the cut:

Earth, Japan, Crystal Tokyo, Old Nerima, Amaterasu’s Fire Bar

“Y’know,” drolled Lt. Hiroshi Nakamura over the beer he was nursing, “I’m beginning to suspect that you don’t normally come here in that ballerina outfit.”

Lt. Daisuke Hito smirked as he eyed the rather statuesque form standing between the two Starfleet officers with zero effort to hide the infamous ‘male gaze,’ “Not that we’re complaining, of course.”

Sailor Venus, a.k.a. Princess Ranma Saotome, rolled her eyes as she blushed, “I have my reasons, okay? I... I just wanna have a beer for old time’s sake.” The two men exchanged slightly confused glances and Ranma sighed, scrubbing her gloved fingers through her hair, “Sorry, ain’t fair to you, I know. Just...” she quaffed back nearly half the pint she was holding before she took a breath and continued, “My Hiro and Dai...passed away as old men nearly two centuries ago. They were, like, best bros to me, even with...” she gestured at herself, “All this, they were so chill with it and were just a pair of normal guys I could hang with and talk to. Even when they got married and got jobs and had kids, they made sure to make time for me, y’know? I didn’t realize how badly I’d missed ‘em ‘til you guys teleported in.”

48 hours ago, Ranma had been enjoying a sake at this very bar, doing her best to connect with ‘normal.’ She thought she might be making some headway in getting the regulars to treat her as just another girl when her communicator went off and she was summoned back to the castle. A ship had appeared in orbit, apparently through a hole in space, and the Senshi were needed just in case.

Ranma had roof-hopped back to Castle Venus, which might have been unusual if it weren’t for the fact that she trained the royal guards to do the same before they could be considered qualified to serve the royal houses.

There was a reason the royal guard was so small.

By the time she got back to the castle she called home, her mother was in a tizzy, ordering all sorts of accommodations for some apparent guests. During the time Ranma had been in transit, communication had been established and the captain of the ship...was her.

Ami, one of her best friends since Ranma had taken on the mantle of Venus, had shown a recording of the captain of the ship, speaking from the bridge.

Ranma had needed some time alone after seeing so many of her old friends, suddenly alive and well on a visiting starship.

She wasn’t there for the initial meeting, she left that honor to her mother. She was there when the crew began beaming down, and to her anxious delight, the helmsman and navigator she’d seen in the video were part of the first rotation. She’d done the next best thing to abducting them and dragged them to her favorite bar.

“Beamed in,” corrected Daisuke.

“Whatever,” grunted Ranma, “Point is I just wanted something... normal, y’know? All this ‘senshi’ shit and ‘princess’ crap...it wasn’t so bad for about three decades... but then we had whole generations of people who never knew the Senshi as anything but eternally long-lived superheroes that were here when their grandparents were in diapers and just gettin’ some sake became a whole production.”

Daisuke chugged back his beer as Hiroshi clapped a hand on Ranma’s shoulder in a ‘manly’ side-hug, “Naw, man, we get it. I think every Starfleet class has at least one member of some planet’s nobility, including the royal heir themselves on occasion. Most of ‘em want you to ignore their royalty status. Goin’ for pub crawls with the freshmen royals is practically a rite of passage. ‘Course, we can do that in San Francisco, which is used to all’a that ‘cause Fleet Command and the Academy are in ‘Frisco, but hey, it got us used to escorting nobles around.”

As Daisuke clacked his empty stein against the bar and signaled to the bartender for another round, he added, “Besides, you’re pretty much our best friend, even if you’ve got a couple centuries on her. And they still know you’re... Soldier Venus?” he offered hesitantly.

“Sailor Venus,” corrected Ranma.

“Right, they clearly know who you are, and they still serve you here, even if they’re giving you looks. I’m guessing you’re normally only ever on the town when you’re not in uniform?”

Ranma sighed and nodded, “Yeah, usually when the Senshi are in seifuku it means some shit’s about t’go down.”

“So, what’s the big deal?” asked Hiroshi as he set his empty mug next to the fresh one the bartender set down at their spot, “I mean, I’d say, ‘let your hair down, but...”

Ranma rolled her eyes and swept her long red hair out of her face. “Ma wants me to be a ‘pretty princess’ normally so she had me grow out my hair, but the danged thing never stays tied back when I go full Venus.”

“Exactly!” replied Hiroshi, “Just relax! Go back to the palace and change and come on back!”

Ranma snorted, “It’s a castle, and it doesn’t work like that. It’s a quick-change, power-up thing that I can turn off any time.”

“Right, so why not just do that, then?” said Daisuke, who’d taken to sipping his beer.

Ranma’s face turned bright red, red enough to be a color match for Rei’s seifuku in her Sailor Mars form, “I just... things have changed since... I just wanna pretend they hadn’t for a bit.” Then her face twisted into an annoyed grimace, “And if that hand moves even a millimeter lower, Hiro, I’m gonna break it."

Hiroshi yanked his hand away from Ranma’s hip like it was about to burn him. Rather than look contrite or guilty, he snapped his fingers and muttered a, “Darnit!” under his breath.

Ranma giggled, “Gods, I missed you two!”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Read the rest on Archive of Our Own

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beangusu · 1 year ago

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Please please please share your reinako fic recommendations! I absolutely adore all your art of them 💗

THANK U SO MUCH <3 AND OMG I HAVE SO MANY... u have unlocked my reinako fic floodgates but i will try to be normal and keep it to like 5-10 recs

just a warning, two of these have nsfw in them (In The Corner of Her Mind and Heartfelt Obligation) but are skippable!

In The Corner of Her Mind - this ones an oldie but i read it time and time again bc it breaks my heart in the BEST way possible especially since its set in the PGSM universe :'D if u want an amnesia reinako au fic, this one ticks all the boxes Point Not Taken - also a really old fic, but oh my god Victoria G's fics make me kick my feet and giggle and knowing they were a co-writer for the Carmilla web-series just makes so much sense bc i was obsessed with hollstein..... pls read their reinako fics they make me wanna throw up (affectionate) Through the Fire (Through Whatever, Come What May) - this one's not finished yet but the way the author writes the reinako dynamic is SO THEMMMM 🥰🥰 i adore when people write the reinako dynamic just right and this fic hits that spot for me red on my tongue (the red of your tongue) - i am so obsessed with fics that are abt present reinako finding out abt love affairs between silver millennium mars & venus which either cue their realization moment or push them to confess :3 this one has to be my fav out of all of YNK’s reinako fics, it made me tear up so bad at some parts like they are so Soulmates it makes me insane. pls read all of YNK's reinako fics after this i promise u wont regret it Heartfelt Obligation - ofc i had to link the mandatory princess/bodyguard au set in the silver millennium where they dislike each other at first but then slowly start catching feelings :33 it's incomplete but i love the silly banter and how they warm up to each other in this fic, its so cute 🥺 i like the burning sun (because i'm running with you) - small oneshot thats also so cute where they're just normal teens with crushes on each other,,, minako is so whipped for rei and rei is so stupid god bless

She's the tear in my heart, I'm on fire - the gay yearning in this one is so UNBELIEVEABLY off the charts it's so sweet and fills that slice of life highschool trope hole if u like that!! minako does get stoned in this one, not during the whole fic, but i figured i would warn anyways in case that makes anyone uncomfy Past Loves And Current Problems - ending this with this cute fic of minako finding out about greek mythology regarding mars and venus being lovers teehee ^_^ this fic also talks about ace's "curse" on venus from the codename sailor v manga AND I LOVE THAT i wish more fics talked abt that.... i have so so so many more i want to talk about and show everyone but i feel bad for this wall of text so i will leave that for a pt2/pt3 in the future mayb... i am filled with reinako brainrot and its never going away im so sorry u guys 💔

#imagine that image of a kitten thats like “full of soup” that's me except it says “full of reinako”#reinako #vio yells

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onetoothpig · 4 months ago

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It's got nothing to do with Puyo Puyo and everything to do with Sailor Moon! Here's a remix of the theme that plays in Sailor Jupiter and Sailor Venus' area in Sailor Moon SuperS: Fuwa Fuwa Panic, aka my favorite song on the soundtrack. I had a lot of fun making this, and I hope you have as much fun listening!

Notes and stuff are under the cut!

Arranger's Notes:

Oh boy, second music project in a row where I've set the panning of tracks to change! It's not a super big thing, as I've already fiddled around with things in LMMS that weren't panning (but were very similar) but I thought it was worth mentioning.

When I was making this remix, I wanted to try and spruce up the tune - the actual song sounds pretty empty. I couldn't quite make my usual string chords work there, though, and decided to ditch them altogether and add more single-tone stuff.

I had a drum track for a cover of a song with a similar beat to this laying around, so I just copypasted that into this and made some additions.

I used the GMGSx soundfont (aka stock MIDI soundfont) for the drums. I tried using other soundfonts, but they just didn't sound as nice, so I kept my good old default SF.

Other than that, I tried out a brand new soundfont in this remix! I love collecting these things.

goddammit bandai jupes is literally the senshi of thunder why does her special suck so bad in this game

@klugpuuo @fiery-is-in-pain @endtimeillusionist

#bishoujo senshi sailor moon #sailor moon #sailor jupiter #sailor venus #lita kino #makoto kino #minako aino #onetoothpig's musical monologue #music remix #snes games #sailor moon month

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themattress · 4 months ago

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Sailor Moon (Takeuchi): The Top 20 Villains

Ranked using my core tenets for villains, and done countdown style for dramatic effect.

Honorable Mention: Danburite - He's technically not from Sailor Moon, instead being the main antagonist of the prequel Codename Sailor V. Danburite is the leader of the Dark Agency, a worldwide criminal organization that is secretly a subsidiary of the Dark Kingdom. He's a fairly complex character: hating Sailor Venus for never returning his love yet also still loving her, being upset that she favored Kunzite over him yet still working directly under Kunzite, and manipulating her in a Tuxedo Mask-esque guise just to lower her guard so he can kill her...yet ultimately choosing to die himself and use his last words to encourage her to move past him, something he could never do in regards to her. All in all, a damn solid villain.

20. Pharaoh 90 - The ruler of the Death Busters, Pharaoh 90 is a demonic extraterrestrial being bent on destruction. He's definitely the least engaging of Chaos' incarnations, but I have to give him points for a pretty great final battle and even some pathos in his last moments where he gracefully accepts his death and returns back to the Tau Nebula, saying that he wants to die in his home. That sticks with me even when little else about him does.

19. Queen Metalia - While a step above Pharaoh 90, Metalia still isn't all that interesting. She's a big blob of evil that wants to plunge the world into darkness and corrupt all its inhabitants because she's evil. Also, her design in the Crystal anime is underwhelming. Nevertheless, she gets by on how much destruction she wreaks, being the one to destroy the Moon Kingdom of the Silver Millennium and nearly causing Usagi and Mamoru's deaths.

18. Sailor Lethe and Sailor Mnemosyne - The Sailor Moon manga has straight-up villains, tragic villains, and villains who aren't really villains and are just brainwashed. That's why Lethe and Mnemosyne stand out as true blue Anti-Villains: having joined Shadow Galactica of their own volition and even doing bad things, but having a backstory that justifies it, a deep love for one another, and conflicting feelings about their mission the more destructive it becomes. They would rank way higher if they had more screentime, but alas, they do not.

17. Safir - At the same placement as his Toei counterpart, Safir is the brooding young man in the background who develops the Black Moon Clan's droids and watches helplessly as his older brother Prince Demande descends into madness thanks to Wiseman and the Malefic Black Crystal. There is no redemption to be found here, however, as Safir blames Sailor Moon and her future self Neo-Queen Serenity for everything wrong in his life rather than take any responsibility for himself and his clan, which ultimately leads to him becoming forcibly mind controlled by Wiseman and then killed by his own brother. The lesson: misogyny kills!

16. Evil Endymion - Metalia and Beryl long resented that they were unable to corrupt Prince Endymion in the Silver Millennium despite doing so with everyone else on Earth. In the present day, they finally get what they wanted, and the result is a sinister, cold-hearted and unsettling presence. Seeing the heroic, chivalrous young man we've come to know and love become a manipulative, violent sociopath is arguably where the Dark Kingdom arc peaked.

15. Chaos - In terms of personality, there's nothing here. Chaos is the Ultimate Evil and that's all there is to it. But oh, how it coasts by on sheer concept! Turned evil because it is a lifeform that has perpetually failed to get out of the Galaxy Cauldron and become a star, Chaos seethes and longs for universal conquest. This desire is so great that even trapped in the Galaxy Cauldron as a being of pure dark energy, some of that energy is able to leak out, creating all the other major villains that Sailor Moon faces. It's an ingenious way to connect the story arcs, antagonists and series together, tying it all in a satisfying, truly epic bow.

14. Witches 5 - We had evil minions correlating to the Inner Senshi that challenged them and helped their character development before with the Shitennou and the Spectre Sisters, but I think Witches 5 is the peak version of this concept as a purely villainous force. They're all perfect dark foils to their respective heroic counterpart in terms of design, personality and powers, and face off against them not once but twice, the second time after having died!

13. Esmeraude - While the lone female leader of the Black Moon Clan is sadly the least consequential, she makes a stronger impression than Safir by actually fighting the Sailor Senshi on two separate occasions, and both times being a truly formidable adversary who almost kills them all. She also has a strong personality, being a haughty beauty who seeks to win Prince Demande's love and willing to do absolutely anything to achieve that desire.

12. Kaolinite - The Grand Magus of the Death Busters who commands Witches 5, Kaolinite brings a fun DnD aesthetic to the story while also being a fairly fleshed out character, especially in Crystal. Formerly Professor Tomoe's lab partner, Kaolinite now owes her life to the Daimon energy inside her and is obsessed with pleasing Pharaoh 90. Unfortunately, this puts her at odds with his actual number 2, Mistress 9, and seeing Kaolinite struggle even when the odds are against her makes her sympathetic despite being so unabashedly wicked.

11. Black Lady - When Wiseman corrupts Chibiusa, she becomes Black Lady, the self-styled Queen of Nemesis. Black Lady is a lot like Evil Endymion, but more nuanced as she doesn't do a complete personality flip due to the brainwashing. She still has the memories and feelings she held as Chibiusa, it's just that they've been twisted and perverted: her deep insecurities about living up to her mother and frustrations with Usagi manifesting as vindictive hatred of both, and her desire to keep hold of her father's affections turned into incestuous advances toward him. She may have breached the Top 10 had her resolution been stronger.

10. Queen Nehelenia - When part of Chaos leaked from the Galaxy Cauldron and into the dark side of the moon, it created a twisted mirror image of Queen Serenity: Queen Nehelenia. She's a fairy tale baddie based off the Queen from Snow White and the Wicked Fairy from Sleeping Beauty: a vain ruler who loves her beautiful image in the mirror and whose inner self is a hideous old hag, and a practitioner of dark magic who crashes a princess' birthday celebration and invokes a curse. Derivative? Absolutely. Effective at it? Also absolutely!

9. Crimson Rubeus - One of the most loathsome members of the Black Moon Clan, Rubeus operates by sending the Spectre Sisters out to fight and die for him so that he can swoop in and capture the Sailor Senshi they've rendered vulnerable and get all the credit from Prince Demande. He's a selfish creep and also a dirty coward, always feeling at the first sign of things going south for him. Despite that, he is perceptive enough to recognize that Wiseman may not have the clan's best interests at heart, and at least has the nobility to stand up to him over it even if that ends up getting him killed. If nothing else, Rubeus was loyal to the cause.

8. Queen Beryl - The main villain for much of the original Dark Kingdom arc, Beryl is interesting because in the Silver Millennium, she was more of a victim than anything. A jealous young woman who was misled and corrupted by Metalia. However, it’s a different story in the present day. The Silver Crystal granted her reincarnation and with it, a chance for redemption. A chance not to make the same mistake. But not only does she willfully re-release Metalia and then have the Shitennou re-brainwashed, but she takes things further by plotting to betray Metalia by keeping the Silver Crystal for herself and using its power to rule the universe with Endymion at her side. A case study in how corrosive envy and hate are.

7. Kunzite - While Jadeite, Nephrite and Zoisite of the Shitennou were thinly drawn beyond one basic characteristic (loyalty, passion and underhandedness respectively), Kunzite is a richer character. Despite being the leader of the Middle East branch of the Dark Kingdom, Kunzite is powerful enough to control a worldwide subsidiary in the Dark Agency, and reliable enough to be dispatched anywhere if necessary. He is arrogant and cold-hearted, allowing no personal connections in his life and focused solely on his mission. Yet then he becomes unbrainwashed and remembers being quite the opposite: devoted and dutiful, a protector not an offender, someone warm enough for even Sailor Venus to fall in love with. Tragically, when he tries to betray Queen Beryl he gets super-brainwashed and then killed in an epic struggle with the Sailor Senshi, but his cleansed spirit stays with Mamoru and plays a key role in helping to defeat Metalia for good. And through it all, he does it with such impeccable style.

6. Professor Tomoe - This villain is like unpeeling an onion, layer by layer. He seems like a good, caring father who is caught up in the Death Busters' shady business, with signs pointing him to being misled by Kaolinite. Then we learn he's actually Kaolinite's superior and not misled at all, but still trust he has his daughter's interests at heart since he's gone through such lengths for her. And in the end, we see that he is actually a complete psychopath who cares nothing for his daughter and only went so far for her so that he can make her into the thing he wants her to be: the first of a race of superbeings that he can rule over as a god. After he turns himself into a monster, Sailor Moon has to eliminate him, accepting that he is far beyond redemption. All in all, Professor Tomoe is effectively frightening and loathsome.

5. The Amazoness Quartet - I admit that I'm not that big a fan of Takeuchi's Dead Moon Circus, but even I can't deny that the Amazoness Quartet are spectacular villains. Remember how Chibiusa turned into Black Lady and then into Sailor Chibi Moon? The Amazoness Quartet is that without the Chibiusa part. What's more, they are preteens / early teens rather than adults, which means they rely far less on any sort of sex appeal and more on their raw cunning and deviousness. VesuVesu, CeleCele, PallaPalla, and JunJun...I love 'em all!

4. Sailor Galaxia - Usagi's final opponent is her perfect evil foil. Having grown up in a harsh, uncaring environment, Galaxia is as cynical as Usagi is hopeful, and instead of drawing strength from others, she sacrifices others to build up her strength. Chaos is easily able to manipulate her nihilistic psychopathy, but despite all of her attempts to break Usagi, she proves Galaxia wrong by never giving in and even saving her in the end. Before her (temporary) death, Galaxia realizes that someone like Sailor Moon was really what she wanted and needed in her life, and that even now an ideal like her seems so far out of reach.

3. Mistress 9 - If you want an example of pure evil done right, look no further than Mistress 9, the child and herald of Pharaoh 90. Like Pharaoh 90, Mistress 9 desires the destruction of Earth and its people, but she takes particular joy in causing it, relishing all the pain she inflicts on people...including people on her own side like Kaolinite. The way she uses Hotaru once Professor Tomoe sells her out to her control is especially despicable. When she finally turns into a hideous monster, it truly feels like the inside of her is finally showing on the outside.

2. Wiseman / Death Phantom - And if you want another example of pure evil done right, we have the best incarnation of Chaos in the series. Nemesis was an entire planet made up of leaked Chaos energy from the Galaxy Cauldron, awaiting only the proper catalyst to give it consciousness. That catalyst was Death Phantom, a psychopathic criminal sorcerer banished there by Neo-Queen Serenity. Melding his soul with the planet and magically puppeting his corpse under the identity of "Wiseman", Death Phantom will psychologically manipulate anyone to pursue his goal of taking over the universe and reshaping it into a void of nothing.

1. Prince Demande - Death Phantom's primary pawn? This guy. Prince Demande, leader of the Black Moon Clan. He starts out as a young man with a sensible conviction - an unnatural moon being ruling over humanity and forcing them into elongated lives in a utopian society is blasphemous, as she's basically playing God. Unfortunately, his methods go too far into extremism and terrorism, which attracts the attention of Death Phantom who, as Wiseman, lures him and his gang to Nemesis. There, exposure to the Malefic Black Crystal warps Demande....his motive shifts to envy of Neo-Queen Serenity, as now he decides that he deserves to play God and rule over Earth. And once he attacks Earth, the madman's motives shift again...now he wishes to rule with Neo-Queen Serenity at his side, as he has been overtaken with lustful feelings toward her and wants to force her into loving him. Despite being the worst of scum, Demande still has nuance: he cares for his comrades, especially his brother Safir. When forced to kill Safir, learning the truth about Wiseman and how he's been manipulated, and seeing the true power of the Silver Crystal he thought he could defeat, Demande's despair is palpable and pitiable. But then it brings him to trying to destroy the universe, taking everyone down with him just to prove he can be the master of his own fate, unbeholden to anyone or anything. So in the end, Demande epitomizes the tragic villain.

#Sailor Moon #Evil #Villains #Opinion #Comparison #This has been a PSA

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yukidragon · 1 year ago

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Can I suggest Alice’s magical girl name being ‘Cutie Bunny’? Kind of a play on Cutie Honey even if it’s really similar to Honey Bunny. It’s been kicking around in my head for the last few days (and screaming from growing up with anime like that)

Oh my gosh that is just so cute! I love it! It's absolutely adorable for a teeny powder poof of a girl who wants to fight for love and justice in sparkly dresses, but embarrassing for a woman in her mid-twenties going through her quarter life crisis.

I really want to draw it, but drawing isn't in the cards for me for who knows how long. I'm just going to have to brainstorm it.

Since Alice is albino and her features are all pale and nearly white, a very colorful outfit would suit her. I like to imagine her skirt being poofy, glittery, and covered in frills. Maybe with multiple shiny segments.

With a name like Cutie Bunny, her magical girl hair has to be a pair of long pigtails that look like bunny ears. It'd be a perfect reference to Sailor Moon, or maybe the episode where Sailor Venus pretends to be Sailor Moon and has to have her hair in the long pigtail style. After all, Alice's hair tends to get pretty curly, so it might be a more fuzzy bunny look.

Also, Cutie Bunny simply must have a magical wand with a bunny theme to it. One that shoots rainbows, hearts, and sparkles. Just the quintessential cutesy magical girl archetype.

Which makes Alice feel pretty embarrassed in the present. There's still recordings from the news and witnesses about her super energetic cutesy magical girl fights and speeches. She can't watch them without cringing so hard.

Even as a teen Alice would probably start feeling awkward about the cutesy look, wanting to be more mature, especially as she slowly grew more disillusioned with being a magical girl and found it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows. Things get serious and bad things happen to people that can't be undone even in the most sugary of magical girl shows.

Since Alice went through a pastel goth phase in her teens, she'd probably have a similar phase in her transformation, complete with a more "mature" superhero name. I'm not sure what, but I have a feeling people still call her Cutie Bunny since people are used to it, much to her chagrin. It gets even more awkward as an adult. Even with a mature costume, the name of Cutie Bunny is one she is never going to live down.

Of course, I imagine Jack would find it to be simply adorable, and he would have a lot of fun coming up with some cute bunny puns and jokes for his Cutie Bunny sunshine~

@channydraws @earthgirlaesthetic @sai-of-the-7-stars @cheriihoney @illary-kore @okamiliqueur

#Sunny Day Jack #Something's Wrong With Sunny Day Jack #SunnyDayJack #sdj #swwsdj #Headcanon Ramblings #Ask

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ecargmura · 6 months ago

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The Magical Girl And The Evil Lieutenant Used To Be Archenemies Episode 1 Review - Enemies To Lovers Magical Girl Romcom

Gosh, this is the longest anime title I’ve encountered so far—it’s even longer than Cherry Magic’s full title! For my sanity, I’ll be shortening the title as Maho Aku for future reviews. This anime is posthumously released after the author Cocoa Fujiwara’s death nine years ago. I’m glad that people were kind enough to let this become an anime.

This is the least magical girl-esque show I’ve seen from the genre so far. That’s not a bad thing, honestly. The story is about Byakuya Mimori, a girl who works part time to make money but her main gig is a magical girl. When confronting with the evil lieutenant Mira, he falls for her at first sight. Since then, their encounters have always been cute with Mira giving her sweets and Byakuya eating them. It feels like a rom-com with a magical girl setting.

This anime is surprisingly short—it’s only 12 minutes long. However, I was too invested in watching the show that I didn’t even realize it was only 12 minutes until someone pointed it out. Despite that, it was well-animated! The colors are so pretty! The animation was really good! Byakuya’s transformation is really well-done. I really like the bottom-to-top sequence it does since magical girl transformation usually focuses on getting the main outfit on first before focusing on everywhere else. I also liked how the transformation had Byakuya’s name singing in the background; it reminded me of 90’s Sailor Moon transformation, specifically Sailor Venus’s.

While it does seem like Mira and his organization seem like the villains of the story, I feel like Byakuya’s cat familiar is more or less the villain as he was the one who sort of forced her to become a magical girl by punching her until she said yes. The way it was handled felt like a parody of Kyubey from Puella Magi Madoka Magica. Now it makes me wonder where these familiars came from and why they’re forcing girls to become magical girls.

Byakuya is a girl who is delicate but very chill. Life is hard for her but she presses on. I do wonder how old she is. I do like that she doesn’t question Mira’s change in behavior towards her and just accepts his gifts. Mira, on the other hand, acts edgy due to his affiliation with the evil organization, but is a huge dork and a huge simp for Byakuya. I like that his crush on her stems from her being way too cute.

The voice acting is great! Byakuya is voiced by Mai Nakahara, who’s known for voicing characters like Juvia from Fairy Tail, Kashima from Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun and Estelle from Tales of Vesperia. Lately, she’s been voicing mom characters like the Yuzuki family’s mom from The Yuzuki Family’s Four Sons, so it’s nice to see her voicing a young kid again. Her voice is really nice to listen to because it’s so soft. Mira is voiced by Yuuki Ono, who is known for voicing Kagami from Kuroko’s Basketball, Kunigami from Blue Lock and Hori from Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun. It’s hilarious how Kashima and Hori are reunited in a completely different genre. The cat familiar is voiced by Shinichiro Miki, which is a hilarious choice for a magical girl mascot, but I welcome it. I love the gap!

I do wonder what’s going to happen in future episodes. Will it be cute moments between Mira and Byakuya or will there be actual plot aside from the romcom? Honestly, I like what I’m seeing so far, so I want to see more.

#the magical girl and the evil lieutenant used to be archenemies #mahoaku #byakuya mimori #mira #cat familiar #magical girl #mahou shoujo #review #anime #anime review #ecargmura #arum journal

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peachdues · 11 months ago

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i'm about to sound insane to you but i have a large collection of steady hands cardigans. i have the tanjiro, nezuko, shinobu, rengoku, daki, obanai, sailor moon, sailor venus, and sukuna (the black and red one). i want a gojo cardigan so bad but i haven't really vibed with the ones they've put out so far. but hehe we're matching with the nezuko cardigan.

Bestie you don’t sound insane at all — I’m at 3 cardigans, and I’m about to order at least two more!!

Also TWINSIES!!!

I agree about Gojo — honestly, I haven’t been the biggest fan personally of the JJK line? I love the beige Sukuna one (I haven’t seen the black and red one though so I must just be blind). I’m hoping they come out with more, soon!!

#🍑’s asks

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maestrozaverick · 8 days ago

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Zaverick Wondereviews Episode 40:

Sailor Moon (Season 1)

Studio: Toei Animation (Precure, Dragon Ball Daima, Ojamajo Doremi)

In memoriam Emi Shinohara (1963-2024)

Pros:

⭕️ The dub is really good (note I watched the Viz dub)

⭕️ The masters were very much the Japanese blu-ray masters and that alone got a major buy from me

⭕️ Writing and directing was good

⭕️ Mako and Minako I love you so much!

⭕️ Of the Four Heavenly Knights, Kunzite will always be my favorite

⭕️ Very happy they did not remove the gay

Cons:

❌ Minako’s backstory into how she became Sailor Venus is never explained in the anime unless you want to read the Sailor V prequel manga

❌ Some scenes contain flashing lights so be warned if you are prone to having seizures

Score: 7/10

Final Thoughts: Not a bad start to a classic

#sailor moon #zaverick wondereviews

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vanivenivici · 2 years ago

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Here's a fem!shuake ficlet because I have an oddly specific agenda to push:

One step into Sae’s palace, a gargantuan casino dripping in gold and neon, and the threshold is officially breached. It’s time for Akechi to see how the Phantom Thieves really operate for herself. It’s time for the real performance to begin, ringing false even down to the physical manifestation of her spirit. She’s not lurking in the dark today. It’s just another stage.

It’s been a while since she wore the seifuku. Shocking white material with matching red collar and pleated skirt. The opera-length gloves and tall grey boots with a red heel. The golden bows. The red mask. She’d forgotten how much she liked it.

She knows all the Thieves are watching. Every last eye is trained on her. They want to know the shape of her heart. It’s too bad for them, this is only the outer shell. She’s expertly hidden all the sharp points beneath a beautiful candy coating.

“Aw yeah! Time to fight evil by moonlight!” Futaba yells with an impish grin.

Ann giggles into her hand. “It’s really cute!” She’s a terrible actress, so she must mean it.

“I think it suits me rather well,” Akechi smiles. She scans the rest of the Thieves for their reactions, from Makoto’s tired smile to Ryuji’s slack-jawed ogling, and inevitably settles on Kurusu’s unreadable stare.

Kurusu pulls her hands out of her pants pockets just long enough to send Akechi a silent, red-gloved thumbs-up. What the fuck is that supposed to mean?

Well, it doesn’t matter. They don’t need to know how important it is to her. They don’t need to know how the Sailor Senshi are the pinnacle of strong, righteous heroes. Beautiful and powerful. Fighting with everything to win. Pristine like the light of the full moon. She couldn’t imagine such a hero looking like anything else.

But it’s “cute.” It’s “sexy” with a universal tolerance. If it’s a shallow caricature of perfection they want to see, it’s a shallow caricature of perfection they’ll find. It’s exactly what’s expected of the brilliant and demure Detective Princess. Her own feelings have no bearing at all.

“So, when you fight do you shout ‘Persona Prism Power!’ or what?” Futaba suddenly asks.

Of fucking course not, Akechi doesn’t say. “I’m afraid not.”

“Aww,” she pouts. “That would’ve been cool.”

She doesn’t understand Futaba at all. “Aha, sorry to disappoint you.”

“You should try it out. I bet it’ll give you a stat boost.”

Not a chance. “Thank you. I’ll keep that in mind.”

[Also I put way too much thought into this but the end card of her All-Out Attack would be the Sailor Venus pose. Twirl and all. Thank you.]

#Detective Princess seifuku supremacy #now I need to find an artist to throw money at #I hate the word “ficlet” but that's what this is I guess #even if I would personally call it a drabble. <500 words? that's a drabble baybee #anyway #i have like four of these mini fics up my sleeve but where do I put them #here? ao3? twitter? yeah no not twitter #also thanks to that one person who keeps yelling with me in my notes this is for you too x #femshuake #p5

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kira-quartz · 4 months ago

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Watched the Dark Kingdom musical today:

"I am the immortal Queen Beryl!" You're a heckin' Christmas tree. Last year I took a photo of you covered in tiny Ryo Bakura plushies and posted it with a bad "Deck the Halls" pun. (And it still gets notes occasionally!)

(Okay so she doesn't look like a Christmas tree yet in that scene but she WILL. I have Thoughts. Ideas, even. 😈)

I don't even ship Minako and Kunzite (like, at all), but Namikimichi no Koi is 🥹 (But now I'm imagining Classic!Kunzite as the "how do you do, fellow kids" meme XD)

Usagi grabbing at Kunzite- sorry, "Kun Saitou"'s sleeve during Saikyou no Couple Gundan is kind of funny to me considering that Yuuta Mochizuki was the next Tuxedo Mask, 😂

48:54 HOLY CRAPNOODLES BERYL. "If perhaps there was someone with a grudge against you, it would be nice if that very person could kill you..." You're not exactly being subtle there!! (AND you look like a Christmas tree under that disguise.)

50:38 There it is... the only acknowledgement of KunZoi in the entire continuity 😂

54:30 The original Sailor War!! Luna and Artemis got to join in, which I didn't remember from the album version. (Speaking of which, I'm not sure what to do with them in the save? Should I Simmify their human forms or just make them cattos? Maybe I'll do a poll...)

1:06:24 Nooo not a NnK reprise right before Kunzite kills Venus 😭 (it counts as a reprise if it's just an instrumental right? Am I using the right word?)

1:07:55 Aaashkrgubdksjgbdskfghrsdlrg 😭

1:11:52 "There's just one gentle person I want to see once more" AND IT'S HER 😭 aaaaaaajrngljzh they love her so much, she is Their Cornflake

1:25:05 The Shitennou randomly got into a fight during the curtain call?? Kunzite won, so I guess it was something like "winner gets to be in the next musical", XD. And I thought it was cute when Zoi and Jadeite helped him back up when he fell after doing that somersault, but then I rewatched it slowed down and they actually tripped him as he was about to land??? Zoi, how could you? 🤣

And now I have La Soldier stuck in my head. 😂

(This is the video I was watching, just so the timestamps match up.)

#sailor moon #sera myu #kira's sera myu thoughts

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meta-squash · 1 year ago

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Squash's Book Roundup 2023

Last year I read 67 books. This year my goal was 70, but I very quickly passed that, so in total I read 92 books this year. Honestly I have no idea how I did it, it just sort of happened. My other goal was to read an equal amount of fiction and nonfiction this year (usually fiction dominates), and I was successful in that as well. Another goal which I didn’t have at the outset but which kind of organically happened after the first month or so of reading was that I wanted to read mostly strange/experimental/transgressive/unusual fiction. My nonfiction choices were just whatever looked interesting or cool, but I also organically developed a goal of reading a wider spread of subjects/genres of nonfiction. A lot of the books I read this year were books I’d never heard of, but stumbled across at work. Also, finally more than 1/3 of what I read was published in the 21st century.

I’ll do superlatives and commentary at the end, so here is what I read in 2023:

-The Commitments by Roddy Doyle -A Simple Story: The Last Malambo by Leila Guerriero -The Hero With A Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell -Uzumaki by Junji Ito -Chroma by Derek Jarman -The Emerald Mile: The epic story of the fastest ride in history through the Grand Canyon by Kevin Fedarko -Venus by Suzan-Lori Parks -The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington -Sacred Sex: Erotic writings from the religions of the world by Robert Bates -The Virginia State Colony For Epileptics And The Feebleminded by Molly McCully Brown -A Spy In The House Of Love by Anais Nin -The Sober Truth: Debunking the bad science behind 12-step programs and the rehab industry by Lance Dodes -The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea by Yukio Mishima -The Aliens by Annie Baker -The Criminal Child And Other Essays by Jean Genet -Aimee and Jaguar: A Love Story, Berlin 1943 by Erica Fischer -The Master And Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov -The Mustache by Emmanuel Carriere -Maldoror by Comte de Lautreamont -Narrow Rooms by James Purdy -At Your Own Risk by Derek Jarman -Escape From Freedom by Erich Fromm -Countdown: A Subterranean Magazine #3 by Underground Press Syndicate Collective -Fabulosa! The story of Britain's secret gay language by Paul Baker -The Golden Spruce: A true story of myth, madness and greed by John Vaillant -Querelle de Roberval by Kevin Lambert -Fire The Bastards! by Jack Green -Closer by Dennis Cooper -The Woman In The Dunes by Kobo Abe -Opium: A Diary Of His Cure by Jean Cocteau -Worker-Student Action Committees France May '68 by Fredy Perlman and R. Gregoire -Capitalist Realism by Mark Fisher -The Sound Of Waves by Yukio Mishima -One Day In My Life by Bobby Sands -Corydon by Andre Gide -Noopiming by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson -Man Alive: A true story of violence, forgiveness and becoming a man by Thomas Page McBee -The Artist's Reality: Philosophies of Art by Mark Rothko -Damage by Josephine Hart -Schoolgirl by Osamu Dazai -The Passion According to G.H. by Clarice Lispector -The Sex Revolts: Gender, Rebellion and Rock n Roll by Simon Reynolds and Joy Press -The Traffic Power Structure by planka.nu -Bird Man: The many faces of Robert Straud by Jolene Babyak -Seven Dada Manifestos by Tristan Tzara

-The Journalist by Harry Mathews -Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber -Moscow To The End Of The Line by Venedikt Erofeev -Morvern Callar by Alan Warner -The Poetics Of Space by Gaston Bachelard -A Boy's Own Story by Edmund White -The Coming Insurrection by The Invisible Committee -Jesus' Son by Denis Johnson -Notes From The Sick Room by Steve Finbow -Artaud The Momo by Antonin Artaud -Doctor Rat by William Kotzwinkle -Recollections Of A Part-Time Lady by Minette -trans girl suicide museum by Hannah Baer -The 99% Invisible City by Roman Mars -Sweet Days Of Discipline by Fleur Jaeggy -Breath: The new science of a lost art by James Nestor -What We See When We Read by Peter Mendelsund -The Cardiff Tapes (1972) by Garth Evans -The Ark Sakura by Kobo Abe -Mad Like Artaud by Sylvere Lotringer -The Story Of The Eye by Georges Bataille -Little Blue Encyclopedia (For Vivian) by Hazel Jane Plante -Blood And Guts In High School by Kathy Acker -Summer Fun by Jeanne Thornton -Splendid's by Jean Genet -VAS: An Opera In Flatland by Steve Tomasula -Sorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want To Come: One introvert's year of saying yes by Jessica Pan -Whores For Gloria by William T. Vollmann -The Notebooks by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Larry Walsh (editor) -L'Astragale by Albertine Sarrazin -The Decay Of Lying and other essays by Oscar Wilde -The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot -Open Throat by Henry Hoke -Prisoner Of Love by Jean Genet -The Fifth Wound by Aurora Mattia -The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx -My Friend Anna: The true story of a fake heiress by Rachel DeLoache Williams -Mammother by Zachary Schomburg -Building The Commune: Radical democracy in Venezuela by George Cicarello-Maher -Blackouts by Justin Torres -Cheapjack by Philip Allingham -Near To The Wild Heart by Clarice Lispector -The Trayvon Generation by Elizabeth Alexander -Skye Papers by Jamika Ajalon -Exercises In Style by Raymon Queneau -Tender Buttons by Gertrude Stein -The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century by Kirk Wallace Johnson

~Some number factoids~ I read 46 fiction and 46 nonfiction. One book, The Fifth Wound by Aurora Mattia, is fictionalized/embellished autobiography, so it could go half in each category if we wanted to do that, but I put it in the fiction category. I tried to read as large a variety of nonfiction subjects/genres as I could. A lot of the nonfiction I read has overlapping subjects, so I’ve chosen to sort by the one that seems the most overarching. By subject, I read: 5 art history/criticism, 5 biographies, 1 black studies, 1 drug memoir, 2 essay collections, 2 history, 2 Latin American studies, 4 literary criticism, 1 music history, 2 mythology/religion, 1 nature, 4 political science, 2 psychology, 5 queer studies, 2 science, 1 sociology, 1 travel, 2 true crime, 3 urban planning. I also read more queer books in general (fiction and nonfiction) than I have in years, coming in at 20 books.

The rest of my commentary and thoughts under a cut because it's fairly long

Here’s a photo of all the books I read that I own a physical copy of (minus Closer by Dennis Cooper which a friend is borrowing):

~Superlatives and Thoughts~

I read so many books this year I’m going to do a runner-up for each superlative category.

Favorite book: This is such a hard question this year. I think I gave out more five-star ratings on Goodreads this year than I ever have before. The books that got 5 stars from me this year were A Simple Story: The Last Malambo by Leila Guerriero, Capitalist Realism by Mark Fisher, The Emerald Mile by Kevin Fedarko, The Mustache by Emmanuel Carriere, The Passion According to GH by Clarice Lispector, trans girl suicide museum by Hannah Baer, The Fifth Wound by Aurora Mattia, Mammother by Zachary Schomburg, and Blackouts by Justin Torres. But I think my favorite book of the year was The Fifth Wound by Aurora Mattia. It is an embellished, fictionalized biography of the author’s life, chronicling a breakup that occurred just before she began her transition, and then a variety of emotional events afterward and her renewal of a connection with that person after a number of years had passed. The writing style is beautiful, extremely decadent, and sits in a sort of venn diagram of poetry, theory, fantasy and biography. My coworker who recommended this book to me said no one she’d recommended it to had finished it because they found it so weird. I read the first 14 pages very slowly because I didn’t exactly know what the book was doing, but I quickly fell completely in love with the imagery and the formatting style and the literary and religious references that have been worked into the book both as touchstones for biography and as vehicles for fantasy. There is a video I remember first seeing years ago, in which a beautiful pinkish corn snake slithers along a hoop that is part of a hanging mobile made of driftwood and macrame and white beads and prism crystals. This was the image that was in the back of my head the entire time I was reading The Fifth Wound, because it matched the decadence and the strangeness and the crystalline beauty of the language and visuals in the book. It is a pretty intense book, absolutely packed with images and emotion and ideas and preserved vignettes where reality and fantasy and theory overlap. It’s one of those books that’s hard to describe because it’s so full. It’s dense not in that the words or ideas are hard to understand, but in that it’s overflowing with imagery and feelings, and it feels like an overflowing treasure chest. Runner-up:The Mustache by Emmanuel Carriere. However, this book wins for a different superlative, so I’ve written more about it there.

Least favorite book: Querelle de Roberval by Kevin Lambert. I wrote a whole long review of it. In summary, Lambert’s book takes its name from Querelle de Brest, a novel by Jean Genet, and is apparently meant to be an homage to Genet’s work. Unfortunately, Lambert seems to misunderstand or ignore all the important aspects of Genet’s work that make it so compelling, and instead twists certain motifs Genet uses as symbols of love or transcendence into meaningless or negative connotations. He also attempts to use Genet’s mechanic of inserting the author into the narrative and allowing the author to have questionable or conflicting morals in order to emphasize certain aspects of the characters or narrative, except he does so too late in the game and ends up just completely undermining everything he writes. This book made me feel insulted on behalf of Jean Genet and all the philosophical thought he put into his work. Runner-up: What We See When We Read by Peter Mendelsund. This graphic designer claims that when people read they don’t actually imagine what characters look like and can’t conjure up an image in their head when asked something like “What does Jane Eyre look like to you?” Unfortunately, there’s nothing scientific in the book to back this up and it’s mostly “I” statements, so it’s more like “What Peter Mendelsund Sees (Or Doesn’t See) When He Reads”. It’s written in what seems to be an attempt to mimic Marshall McLuhan’s style in The Medium Is The Massage, but it isn’t done very well. I spent most of my time reading this book thinking This does not reflect my experience when I read novels so I think really it’s just a bad book written by someone who maybe has some level of aphantasia or maybe is a visual but not literary person, and who assumes everyone else experiences the same thing when they read. (Another runner-up would be The Hero With A Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell, but I think that’s a given because it’s an awful piece of revisionist, racist trash, so I won’t write a whole thing about it. I can if someone wants me to.)

Most surprising/unexpected book: The Mustache by Emmanuel Carriere. This book absolutely wins for most surprising. However, I don’t want to say too much about it because the biggest surprise is the end. It was the most shocking, most unexpected and bizarre endings to a novel I’ve read in a long time, and I absolutely loved it. It was weird from the start and it just kept getting weirder. The unnamed narrator decides, as a joke, to shave off the moustache he’s had for his entire adult life. When his wife doesn’t react, he assumes that she’s escalating their already-established tradition of little pranks between each other. But then their mutual friends say nothing about the change, and neither do his coworkers, and he starts spiral into confusion and paranoia. I don’t want to spoil anything else because this book absolutely blew me away with its weirdness and its existential dread and anyone who likes weird books should read it. Runner-up: Morvern Callar by Alan Warner. I don’t even know what compelled me to open this book at work, but I’m glad I did. The book opens on Christmas, where the main character, Morvern, discovers her boyfriend dead by suicide on the kitchen floor of their flat. Instead of calling the police or her family, she takes a shower, gets her things and leaves for work. Her narrative style is strange, simultaneously very detached and extremely emotional, but emotional in an abstract way, in which descriptions and words come out stilted or strangely constructed. The book becomes a narrative of Morvern’s attempts to find solitude and happiness, from the wilderness of Scotland to late night raves and beaches in an unnamed Mediterranean city. The entire book is scaffolded by a built-in playlist. Morvern’s narrative is punctuated throughout by accounts of exactly what she’s listening to on her Walkman. The narrative style and the playlist and the bizarre behavior of the main character were not at all what I was expecting when I opened the book, but I read the entire book in about 3 hours and I was captivated the whole time. If you like the Trainspotting series of books, I would recommend this one for sure.

Most fun book: The Emerald Mile by Kevin Fedarko. This book was amazing. It was like reading an adventure novel and a thriller and a book on conservationism all wrapped into one and it was clearly very passionately written and it was a blast. I picked it up because I was pricing it at work and I read the captions on one of the photo inserts, which intrigued me, so I read the first page, and then I couldn’t stop. The two main narratives in the book are the history of the Grand Canyon (more specifically the damming of the Colorado River) and the story of a Grand Canyon river guide called Kenton Grua, who decided with two of his river guide friends to break the world record for fastest boat ride down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. The book is thoroughly researched, and reaches back to the first written record of the canyon, then charts the history of the canyon and the river up to 1983 when Grua made his attempt to race down the river, and then the aftermath and what has happened to everyone in the years since. All of the historical figures as well as the “current” figures of 1983 come to life, and are passionately portrayed. It’s a genuine adventure of a book, and I highly recommend it. Runner-up: Summer Fun by Jeanne Thornton. It asks “What if Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys was actually a trans woman?” Actually, that’s not quite it. It asks “What if a trans woman living in poverty in southwest America believed to an almost spiritual level that Brian Wilson was a trans woman?” The main character and narrator, Gala, is convinced that the lead singer of her favorite band, the Get Happies, (a fictional but fairly obvious parallel to the Beach Boys) is a trans woman. Half the book is her writing out her version of the singer’s life history, and the other half is her life working at a hostel in Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico, where she meets a woman who forces her out of her comfort zone and encourages her to face certain aspects of her self and identity and her connection with others. It’s a weird novel, and definitely not for everyone, but it’s fun. I was reading it on the train home and I was so into it that I missed my stop and had to get off at the next station and wait 20 minutes for the train going back the other way.

Book that taught me the most: Breath: The new science of a lost art by James Nestor. In it, Nestor explores why humans as a general population are so bad at breathing properly. He interviews scientists and alternative/traditional health experts, archaeologists, historians and religious scholars. He uses himself as a guinea pig to experiment with different breathing techniques from ancient meditation styles to essentially overdosing on oxygen in a lab-controlled environment to literally plugging his nose shut to only mouth-breathe for two weeks (and then vice-versa with nose breathing). It was interesting to see a bunch of different theories a laid out together regarding what kind of breathing is best, as well as various theories on the history of human physiology and why breathing is hard. Some of it is scientific, some pseudoscience, some just ancient meditation techniques, but he takes a crack at them all. What was kind of cool is that he tries every theory and experiment with equal enthusiasm and doesn’t really seem to favor any one method. Since he’s experimenting on himself, a lot of it is about the effects the experiments had on him specifically and his experiences with different types of breathing. His major emphasis/takeaway is that focusing on breathing and learning to change the ways in which we breathe will be beneficial in the long run (and that we should all breath through our noses more). While I don’t think changing how you breathe is a cure-all (some of the pseudoscience he looks at in this book claims so) I certainly agree that learning how to breath better is a positive goal. Runner-up: The Sober Truth by Lance Dodes. I say runner-up because a lot of the content of the book is things that I had sort of vague assumptions about based on my knowledge of addiction and AA and mental illness in general. But Dodes put into words and illustrated with numbers and anecdotes and case studies what I just kind of had a vague feeling about. It was cool to see AA so thoroughly debunked by an actual psychiatrist and in such a methodical way, since my skepticism about it has mostly been based on the experiences of people I know in real life, anecdotes I’ve read online, or musicians/writers/etc I’m a fan of that went through it and were negatively affected.

Most interesting/thought provoking book: Mammother by Zachary Schomburg. The biggest reason this book was so interesting is because the little world in which it exists is so strange and yet so utterly complete. In a town called Pie Time (where birds don’t exist and the main form of work is at the beer-and-cigarettes factory) a young boy called Mano who has been living his childhood as a girl decides that he is now a man and that it’s time for him to grow up. As this happens, the town is struck by an affliction called God’s Finger. People die seemingly out of nowhere, from a hole in their chest, and some object comes out of the hole. Mano collects the things that come out of these holes, and literally holds them in order to love them, but the more he collects, the bigger he becomes as he adds objects to his body. A capitalist business called XO shows up, trying to convince the people of Pie Time that they can protect themselves from God’s Finger with a number of enterprises, and starts to slowly take over the town. But Mano doesn’t believe death is something that should be run from. This book is so pretty, and the symbolism/metaphors, even when obvious, feel as though they belong organically in the world. A quote on the back of the book says it is “as nearly complete a world as can be”, and I think that’s a very accurate description. The story is interesting, the characters are compelling, and the magical realist world in which the story exists is fascinating. Runner up: trans girl suicide museum by Hannah Baer. This is a series of essays taken (for the most part) from Baer’s blog posts. They span a chunk of time in which she writes her thoughts and musings on her experience transition and transgender existence in general. It is mostly a series of pieces reflecting on “early” stages of transition. But I thought it was really cool to see an intellectual and somewhat philosophical take on transition, written by someone who has only been publicly out for a few years, and therefore is looking at certain experiences with a fresh gaze. As the title suggests, a lot of the book is a bit sad, but it’s not all doom and gloom. A lot of the emphasis is on the important of community when it comes to the experience of starting to transition and the first few years, and the importance of community on the trans experience in general. I really liked reading Hannah Baer’s thoughts as a queer intellectual who was writing about this stuff as she experienced it (or not too long after) rather than writing about the experience of early transition years and years down the line. It meant the writing was very sharp and the emotion was clear and not clouded by nostalgia.

Other thoughts/commentary on books I don’t have superlatives for:

I’m glad my first (full) book read in 2023 was A Simple Story: The Last Malambo by Leila Guierrero. It’s a small, compact gem of a book that follows the winner of an Argentinian dance competition. The Malambo is a traditional dance, and the competition is very fierce, and once someone wins, they can never compete again. The author follows the runner-up of the previous year, who has come to compete again. It paints a vivid picture of the history of the dance, the culture of the competition, and the character of the dancer the author has chosen to follow. It’s very narrowly focused, which makes it really compelling.

The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington could have easily won for most fun or most interesting book. Carrington was a surrealist writer and painter (and was in a relationship with Max Ernst until she was institutionalized and he was deported by the Nazis). In The Hearing Trumpet, an elderly woman called Marian is forced by her family to go live in an old ladies’ home. The first strange thing about the place is that all of the little cabins each woman lives in is shaped like some odd object, like an iron, or ice cream, or a rabbit. The other old women at the institution are a mixed bag, and the warden of the place is hostile. Marian starts to suspect that there are secrets, and even witchcraft involved, and she and a few of the other ladies start to try and unravel the occult mysteries hidden in the grounds of the home. The whole book is fun and strange, and the ending is an extremely entertaining display of feminist occult surrealism.

Sacred Sex: Erotica writings from the religions of the world by Robert Bates was a book I had to read for research for my debunking of Withdrawn Traces. It was really very interesting, but it was also hilarious to read because maybe 5% of any of the texts included were actually erotic. It should have been called “romantic writings from the religions of the world” because so little of the writing had anything to do with sex, even in a more metaphorical sense.

Every time I read Yukio Mishima I’m reminded how much I love his style. The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea almost usurped The Temple of the Golden Pavilion as my favorite Mishima novel. I’m fascinated with the way that Mishima uses his characters to explore the circumstance of having very intense feelings or reactions towards something and simultaneously wanting to experience that, while also wanting to have complete control and not feel them at all. There’s a scene in this novel where Noboru and his friends brutally kill and dissect a cat; it’s an intense and vividly rendered scene, made all the more intense by Noboru desperately conflicted between feeling affected by the killing and wanting to force himself to feel nothing. The amazing subtle theme running through the book is the difference between Noboru’s intense emotions and his desire/struggle to control them and subdue them versus Ryuji’s more subtle emotion that grows through the book despite his natural reserve. I love endings like the one in this book, where it “cuts to black” and you don’t actually see the final act, it’s simply implied.

In 2016 or 2017, I ran lights for a showcase for the drama department at UPS (I can’t remember now what it was) that included a bunch of scenes from various plays. I remember a segment from Hir by Taylor Mac, and a scene from The Aliens by Annie Baker. In the scene that I saw, one of the characters describes how when he was a boy, he couldn’t stop saying the word ladder, and the monologue culminates in a full paragraph that is just the word “ladder.” I can’t remember who was acting in the one that I saw at UPS, but that monologue blew me away, the way that one word repeated 127 conveyed so much. This year a collection of Annie Baker’s plays came in at work so I sat down and read the whole play and it was just incredible. I’d love to see the full play live, it’s absolutely captivating.

Narrow Rooms by James Purdy was a total diamond in the rough. It takes place in Appalachia, in perhaps the 1950s although it’s somewhat hard to tell. It follows the strange gay entanglement between four adult men in their 20s, who have known each other all their lives. It traces threads of bizarre codependency, and the lines crossed between love and hate. The main character, Sidney, has just returned home after serving a sentence for manslaughter. On his return, he finds that an old lover has been rendered disabled in an accident, and that an old school rival/object of obsession has been waiting for him. This rival, nicknamed “The Renderer” because of an old family occupation, has been watching Sidney all their lives. Both of them hate the other, but know that they’re destined to meet in some way. Caught in the middle of their strange relationship are Gareth, Sidney’s now-disabled former lover, and Brian, a young man who thinks he’s in love with The Renderer. The writing style took me some time to get used to, as it is written as though by someone who has taught themselves, or has only had basic classes on fiction writing. But the plot itself is so strange and the characters are so stilted in their own internality that it actually fits really well. Like The Mustache, this book had one of the strangest, most intensely visceral and shocking endings I’ve read in a while. It was also “one that got away.” I read it at work, then put it on my staff picks shelf, and only realized after someone else bought it that I should have kept it for myself.

The Passion According to G.H. by Clarice Lispector blew my mind. I really don’t want to spoil any of it, but I highly encourage anyone who hasn’t read it to do. The build in tension is perfect and last 30 pages are just incredible. Lispector’s style is so unique and so beautiful and tosses out huge existential questions like it’s nothing, and I love her work so much.

Moscow To The End Of The Line by Venedikt Erofeev was another really unexpected book. It’s extremely Russian (obviously) and really fun until suddenly it isn’t. The main character, a drunkard, gets on a train from Moscow to Petushki, the town at the end of the line (hence the title), in order to see his lover. On the way, he befriends the other people in his train car and they all steadily get drunker and drunker, until he falls asleep and misses his stop. Very Russian, somewhat strange, and I was surprised that it was written in the late 60s and not the 30s.

Dr. Rat by William Kotzwinkle was what I expected. Weird in a goofy way, a bit silly even when it’s serious, and rather heavy-handed satire. The titular Dr Rat is a rat who has spent his whole life in a laboratory and has gone insane. The other animals who are being tested on want to escape, but he’s convinced that all the testing is for the good of science and wants to thwart their rebellion. Unfortunately, all the other animals who are victims of human cruelty/callousness/invasion/deforestation/etc around the world are also planning to rebel, connection with each other through a sort of psychic television network. It’s a very heavy-handed environmentalist/anti-animal cruelty metaphor and general societal satire, but it’s silly and fun too.

Confessions Of A Part-Time Lady by Minette is a self-published, nearly impossible to find book that came into my work. It’s self-printed and bound, and was published in the 70s. It is the autobiographical narrative of a trans woman who did drag and burlesque and theatre work all across the midwest, as well as New York and San Francisco, from the 1930s up to the late 60s. It was originally a series of interviews by the two editors, who published it in narrative form, and it includes photos from Minette’s personal collection. It’s an amazing story, and a glimpse into a really unique time period of gender performance and queer life. She even mentions Sylvia Rivera, specifically when talking about gay activism. She talks about how the original group of the Gay Liberation Front was an eclectic mix of all sorts of people of all sexualities and genders and expressions. Then when the Gay Activists Alliance “took over”, they started pushing out people who were queer in a more transgressive or unusual way and there was more encouragement on being more heteronormative. She mentions Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P Johnson, saying “I remember Sylvia Rivera who founded STAR – Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries. She was always trying to say things – the same kinds of things Marsha P Johnson says in a sweeter way – and they treated her like garbage. If that’s what ‘order’ is, haven’t we had enough?”

Whores For Gloria by William T Vollmann was exactly as amazing as I thought it would be. I love Vollmann’s style, because you can tell that even though the characters he’s writing about are characters, they’re absolutely based on people that he met or saw or spoke to in real life. The main character, Jimmy, is searching for his former lover, Gloria, who has either died or left him (it is unclear for most of the novel). He begins to use tokens bought from sex workers (hair, clothes, etc) to attempt to conjure her into reality, and when that doesn’t work, he pays them to tell him stories from their lives, and through their lives he tries to conjure Gloria. This novel’s ending had extremely similar vibes to the ending of Moscow To The End Of The Line.

Prisoner Of Love by Jean Genet was a lot to take in. It was weird reading it at this moment in time, and completely unplanned. It’s just that I have only a few more books to read before I’ve made my way through all Genet’s works that have been translated into English, and it was next on the list. Most of the book focuses on Genet’s time spent in Palestine in the 70s and his short return in the 80s. He also discusses the time he spent with the Black Panthers in the US, although it’s not the main subject of the book. Viewing Palestine from the point of view of Genet’s weird philosophical and moral worldview was really interesting, because what he chooses to spend time looking at or talking about is probably not what most would focus on, and because even his most political discussions are tinged with the uniquely Genet-style spirituality (if you can call it that? I don’t know what to call it) that is so much the exact opposite of objective. It’s definitely not a book about Palestine I would recommend reading without also having a grasp of Genet’s style of looking at the world and his various obsessions and preoccupations, because they really do inform a lot of his commentary. It was also written 15 years after his first trip to Palestine, partly from memory and partly from journal entries/notes, which gives it a sort of weirdly dreamlike quality much like his novels.

Blackouts by Justin Torres was so amazing! It blends real life and fiction together so well that I didn’t even realize that most of the people he references in the novel are real historical figures until he mentioned Ben Reitman, who I recognized as the Chicago King Of The Hobos and Emma Goldman’s lover. The book follows an unnamed narrator who has come to a hotel or apartment in the southwest in order to care for a dying elderly man called Juan Gay. Juan has a book called Sex Variants, a study of homosexuality from the 1940s which has been censored and blacked out. Back and forth, the narrator and Juan trade stories. The narrator tells his life story up until the present, including his first meeting with Juan in a mental hospital as a teenager. In turn, Juan tells the story of the Sex Variants book and its creator, Jan Gay (Ben Reitman’s real life daughter). The book explores the reliability of narrative, the power of collecting and documenting life stories, and of removing or changing things in order to create new or different narratives.

Again, Clarice Lispector rocking my world! Generally I can read a 200-ish page novel in somewhere between 2 and 4 hours depending on the content/writing style. Near To The Wild Heart took me 9 hours to read because I kept wanting to stop and reread entire paragraphs because they were so interesting or pretty or philosophical. The story focuses on Joana, whose strange way of looking at the world and going through life makes everyone sort of wary of her. This book is so layered I don’t really know how to describe it. So much of it is philosophical or existential musings through the vehicle of Joana. Unsurprisingly, it’s a beautiful book and I highly recommend it.

I’m just going to copy/paste my Goodreads review for Skye Papers by Jamika Ajalon: This book had so much potential that just…fell short. I could tell that it was written for an American audience but the way the reader/Skye is “taught” certain British terms and/or slang felt a bit patronizing. The characters were fleshed out and interesting and I liked them a lot but the plot crumbled quickly in the last half of the book Things sped up to a degree that felt strange and unnatural, the book’s pacing was inconsistent throughout. Perhaps that was deliberate considering the reveal at the climax, but if it was, it should have been utilized better. If the inconsistent pacing wasn’t deliberate, then it just made the book feel strange to read. There were moments were I felt like there should have been more fleshing out of certain character relationships. Even with the reveal at the end and the explanation of Pieces’ erratic/avoidant behavior, I wish there had been more fleshing out of the relationship or friendship between her and Skye at the beginning, when Skye first arrives in London. Characters who seemed cool/interesting got glossed over and instead there was a lot more dwelling on Skye walking around or busking or just hanging out. I could have gone without the last 30 or so pages after the big reveal, where Skye went back through everything that happened with the knowledge she (and the reader) had gained. It dragged on and on and at that point I felt like the whole story was so contrived that I just wasn’t interested anymore. A friend who read this book before I did said she thought it was an experimental novel that just hadn’t gone far enough, and I completely agree with her. I think if the style with the film script interludes went further, into printed visuals or more weirdness with the interludes, more experimental style with the main story, or something, it would have been really good. It just didn’t push hard enough.

The Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson was a fun little true crime novel about a young flautist who broke into a small English natural history museum in 2009 and stole hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of preserved rare bird skins dating back to the 19th century. He was a salmon fly-tying enthusiast and prodigy, and old Victorian fly designs used feathers of rare birds. The book first goes through the heist and the judicial proceedings, then examines the niche culture of Victorian fly-tying enthusiasts and obsessives, and then chronicles the author’s attempts to track down some of the missing birds. It was a quick, easy read, but fun and an unusual subject and I quite enjoyed it.

In 2024 I don’t plan on trying to surpass or even reach this year’s number. I’m going to start off the year reading The Recognitions by William Gaddis, then I’m going to re-read a number of books that I come across at work or in conversation and think Huh, I should reread that one of these days. So far, the books I am currently planning to reread: Sometimes A Great Notion by Ken Kesey, As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner, The People Of Paper by Salvador Plascencia, Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, The Mustache by Emmanuel Carriere, McGlue by Otessa Moshfegh, Long Day’s Journey Into Night by Eugene O’Neil, Acid Snow by Larry Mitchell, and Nightwood by Djuna Barnes.

#reading list #book list #book roundup #reading list year in review #books #squash rambles #reading year in review #book list roundup

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