#katarina vorkosigan

[egelantier]

chocolate box recs

chocolate box is open! go, go, enjoy the delicious chocolatey goodness of this challenge.

i'm enjoying it a whole lot - both my recip and my treatee liked their fics (if you spot me, i'll write you a drabble of your choosing! one book, one webnovel)

and i've gotten a completely delightful gift for the sleuth of ming dynasty, a beautifully tender and intimate moment between sui zhou and tang fan that explores everything that's delightful about their relationship:

Joining, in the Candlelight (成化十四年 | The Sleuth of the Ming Dynasty)

It's been a long night, and all Sui Zhou wants is a bath and Tang Fan.

and also a smattering of recs from all over the collection:

life is endlessly delicious (The Sleuth of Ming Dynasty)

Five tastes of how Tang Fan and Sui Zhou's relationship was discovered.

really excellent summary of relationship, in five povs.

In the Reaches (Books of the Raksura - Martha Wells)

It's a warm, calm day in the Reaches, Moon and Chime takes a rest under the canopy.

gorgeous fanart!

art: curse swallower (Original Work)

Cursed Female Knight/Swamp Witch - "I can take your curse, for a price."

really, really beautiful linework.

A Small Chance of Happiness (The Goblin Emperor)

"You need our marriage," Vedero Drazhin said to Maia one spring night when they were pressed together on the rooftop, using Vedero's telescope to examine a comet that was visiting their night sky.

that's such a sweet story, and i think it hits very well on the defining theme of the book as i see it - how kindness begets kindness begets kindness, slowly transforming the world around maia. i really love the careful code-switching too, formal and informal, an emperor and a subject, a brother with his older sister, back and forth - it's so careful, and so tender. i'm glad vedero took this risk, along with maia.

Mostly Fine (Vorkosigan Saga)

Gregor held the paper bag in one hand with the slightly befuddled air of a man who had never been handed fast food before. "This is... a burger," he said. "Yeah," Ivan said. "If you keep staring it will go cold. I already had to show it to your security detail."

After the events of The Vor Game, Ivan comes to visit Gregor.

awwww, ivan.

The Sharp End (My Next Life as a Villainess)

She really didn't need further swordsmanship lessons, but she definitely needed an appropriate venue in which to practice. "I think this competition will do nicely, don't you?"

katarina, in a breeches, with a sword in her hand. katarina's harem, especially giordo: REALLY happy.

Each Breath You Take Is a Brand New Begin (Saiyuki)

Gojyo's getting tired of his houseguest. But things are about to change.

a different take on hakkai and goyjo's meeting: they start in a different place and end up in the same one. really great character voices, too.

No Me Without You (Saiyuki Gaiden)

When Kenren is seriously injured, Tenpou comes face to face with his feelings about "that person."

really beautiful and understated grasp of tenpou's voice, and excellent whump.

Here There Be Dragons (Discworld)

Sam Vimes didn't know what he'd done in life to deserve Lady Sybil Ramkin. He held her in the highest esteem for being everything that he wasn't.

Unfortunately, the settee might not survive the enthusiasm of his esteem tonight.

sybil and sam finally get it on, and it's delightful :D

A Bit of Fuss (Benjamin January)

Rose missed the initial commotion because she was teaching a mathematics lesson at the time.

"I've had worse," Shaw said.

"You have no idea how alarming that is to hear," Ben told him.

Most Musical, Most Melancholy (Aubreyad)

Would he die? Was he in fact dying right at this moment? And Jack not there?

Jack forcibly steadied himself. He thought of Stephen's heart beating beneath his hand. Rapid, straining, like a—

—like a trapped bird. He looked up. At once he saw, tangled in a line, a pale and blotched little bundle, feebly thrashing.

stephen falls; jack frets. amazing grasp of voices, amazing pastiche, everything great about canon stirred and mixed together.

[ninja-muse]

Read-in-2016 Masterlist

This is not my personal best year for number of books read. (That was last year.) I read 68 books for the first time, and reread 12. But I did read more non-fiction and non-genre books than I usually do, and I enjoyed most of what I read, and I got through 2/3 of the Riverside Chaucer, so I’m counting this year as a win.

Italics: rated 7-8; Bolded: rated 9-10

Urban Fantasy

Chaos Choreography - Seanan McGuire

The Grendel Affair - Lisa Sherrin

Once Broken Faith - Seanan McGuire

Who Killed Sherlock Holmes? - Paul Cornell

Zoo City - Lauren Beukes

Other Fantasy

A Conspiracy of Ravens - Lila Bowen

A Gathering of Shadows - V.E. Schwab

The Invisible Library - Genevieve Cogman

Johannes Cabal the Necromancer - Jonathan L. Howard

Sailing to Sarantium - Guy Gavriel Kay

The Untold Tale - J.M. Frey

A Wake of Vultures - Lila Bowen

Whitechapel Gods - S.M. Peters

Science Fiction

Caliban’s War - James S.A. Corey

Chimera - Mira Grant

Crosstalk - Connie Willis

Dune - Frank Herbert

Feedback - Mira Grant

Jokers Wild - George R. R. Martin et al.

The Man in the High Castle - Philip K. Dick

Starfarers - Vonda N. McIntyre

Time Salvager - Wesley Chu

Mystery

Beauty, Beast, and Belladonna - Maia Chance

Come Hell or Highball - Maia Chance

The Devil’s Making - Seán Haldane

Girl Waits with Gun - Amy Stewart

A Murder of Magpies - Judith Flanders

The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss - Max Wirestone

Graphic Novels

Alias, Vol. 2 - Brian Michael Bendis

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen - Alan Moore

Planetary, Vol. 1 - Warren Ellis

Rat Queens, Vol. 3 - Kurt Wiebe

Rivers of London: Body Work - Ben Aaronovitch

Saga, Vol. 6 - Brian K. Vaughan

The Unwritten, Vol. 5 - Mike Carey

We Stand on Guard - Brian K. Vaughan

Will Supervillains Be On The Final?, Vol. 1 - Naomi Novik

Middle Grade

The Case of the Girl in Grey - Jordan Stratford

The Dark Lord of Derkholm - Diana Wynne Jones

George - Alex Gino

The Great Sasquatch Escape - Suzanne Selfors

The Key to Extraordinary - Natalie Lloyd

Teen

Dumplin’ - Julie Murphy

Into the Dim - Janet B. Taylor

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children - Ransom Riggs

Openly Straight - Bill Konigsberg

This Savage Song - Victoria Schwab

A Study in Charlotte - Brittany Cavallaro

Short Stories and Novellas

Every Heart a Doorway - Seanan McGuire

Genius Loci - Jaym Gates, ed.

The Green Man - Ellen Datlow, ed.

The Witches of Lychford - Paul Cornell

Witpunk - Claude Lalumière and Marty Halpern

Other Fiction

The City of Mirrors - Justin Cronin

Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon

Eagle in Exile - Alan Smale

Fellside - M.R. Carey

Finding Fraser - K.C. Dyer

Possession - A.S. Byatt

The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend - Katarina Bivald

Yiddish for Pirates - Gary Barwin

Non-Fiction

Bird by Bird - Anne Lamott

A Forest of Time - Peter Nabokov

Grunt - Mary Roach

The Monuments Men - Robert M. Edsel

Sister Queens - Julia Fox

SPQR - Mary Beard

A Time of Gifts - Patrick Leigh Fermor

Time Travel: a History - James Gleick

Other

The Canterbury Tales - Geoffrey Chaucer

The Comedy of Errors - William Shakespeare

The Riverside Chaucer, Part 2 - Geoffrey Chaucer

Rereads

Discworld from Soul Music to Jingo (I’ve been following along with @markdoesstuff

Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats - T.S. Eliot

The Vorkosigan Saga from Warrior’s Apprentice to Komarr

[batandbeecostuming]

Hand painted silver maple leaves for our #vorkosigan commission. I think my back is actually broken...