#left to rot in the pages of my browser

[djappleblush]

"This fic is not abandoned," "Next chapter coming right up!" "Apologies for the cliffhanger; the wait will be worth it,"

advertised the fanfic author whose work was written in the 1500s.

[pathologicalreid]

doctor and doctor | S.R.

in which you add a degree to your repertoire

who? spencer reid x fem!reader

category: fluff

content warning: i tried my best and the process described is pretty accurate to my graduate school but there might be some discrepancies. mentions of marriage and anxiety.

word count: 470

a/n: my brain has been rotting this finals week so i just needed some good academic validation fluff to write. i also got in a car accident this morning (I'm fine lol someone hit my car) so fluff was mandatory. hoping to get a lot of writing done over the school break.

There was an old joke that only five people would ever read your dissertation, you, your supervisor, your two examiners, and your unlucky partner or spouse who has to act as an unpaid proofreader for you. It was something you had heard for the past four years.

Of course, in your case, your boyfriend had three PhDs of his own and was more than happy to read through your dissertation, even though it was pushing five hundred pages.

The BAU’s jet had just landed after a three-day case in Georgia, and you had just hung up after talking with Spencer. You complained about feeling like a sitting duck, waiting to hear from your doctoral advisor to see if your thesis was accepted, and he told you he imagined it wouldn’t be long now.

You had been offered a teaching position starting in the new semester, but it was contingent on your dissertation being approved.

That all led to the email sitting in your inbox, you left your laptop open on the kitchen counter, leaving the email unopened, which is how Spencer found you when he got home.

“Angel?” He said, slightly alarmed, you stood still in the kitchen, watching your laptop like it was going to combust.

Pointing at the device, you took a deep breath, “I got the email.”

Hastily, he set his bag on the couch of your shared apartment before joining you in the kitchen. “Did you look at it?” He asked, leaning over and looking at the screen that displayed your still unopened email. You shook your head, “Were you going to?”

“What if they didn’t accept it?” You whispered, not moving your eyes from the screen.

He waited a moment, “Do you want me to open it?”

You shook your head again, “No, I’ll do it.” You told him, in a sudden surge of bravery, you leaned forward and clicked on the email. Automatically, the email popped up with a burst of confetti – an effect from your email browser recognizing the word ‘congratulations.’ You gasped and Spencer wrapped his arms around you, holding you tight.

It all faded away. The nerves from the past four years, because you had done it.

“I’m so proud of you,” Spencer murmured. “So, so proud.”

You twisted in his arms to look at the screen and read the email in its entirety. “My degree will be officially conferred on the next date designated by the university. Oh, my goodness,” you said, overwhelmed. “I really got my PhD!” You said excitedly, bouncing on the balls of your feet.

“So, when we get married, we’ll both be Dr. Reid,” Spencer said, glancing over at the email before looking down at you fondly.

Your smile spanned from ear to ear, “Yeah!” You said excitedly, the smile dropping from your face, “Wait, what?”

[sleepymarmot]

I haven’t giffed for a while, so making the previous post was a bit of an adventure.

I started this gifset in February 2021. Back then I ripped every frame and the gifs were too big for tumblr, so I had to delete every other frame by hand. It looked so choppy that I put the post on ice, and it got buried under other drafts. Evidently I found the post again months later but didn’t fix it and left it to rot again.

I found the post again this week and almost published in that state, but thought it’d be too embarrassing to post a gifset with every second frame in 2023. I then tried to remake it in proper quality. I discovered that I had one of the gifs ripped with every second frame, and had to re-rip it again (and remember how to crop them). For some reason, the new screenshots were brighter, so I had to use a different coloring for them. I also had to split that gif into two, but that’s easy.

The gifs were still way past the Tumblr limit, and I was on the brink of losing hope and shelving the post again when I realized that I can just reduce the number of colors. This is b/w! There are 64 and even 32 colors per gif in that post and it all looks perfectly fine. So my big problem from two years ago was finally solved. (Too bad this solution would not work with normal color gifs.)

The original version was also awfully slow. For the new one I started experimenting with frame delays since I’m unfamiliar with giffing every frame. At first I tried to abandon frame animation altogether and set the FPS on the timeline the same as original video, but that didn’t work (in two different ways). Then I realized that gif exporting ruins frame delays anyway, rounding them up/down to either 0.03 or 0.07. 0.03 looked perfect in my desktop image viewer but too fast on Tumblr in the browser. 0.05 looked too slow. Then it finally occurred to me to do the math, and 1 second / 23.976 fps indeed equals 0.04 (rounded). So I adjusted the gifs to have 0.04 as frame delay and it still looks wrong somehow, even though objectively it should be the best option.

By the way, I had to carefully replace gifs one by one in the original post buried like fifty pages deep within my drafts, and not just because I didn’t want to make a new one: that draft is in the legacy photo post format, and I don’t have access to it for new posts anymore.

After finishing and uploading all that, I realized that I never cropped out the black border, and it’s quite visible at the edges of the gifs. But I already wasted way too much time to go through every gif again.

In the end, the only thing I had to redo from scratch was the final gif (now split in two). For all the others, I used the same psd, adjusted the export settings, then redid the frame delay of the exported gifs. The real time-consuming part was not the editing process itself, but figuring out what I needed to do.

All this was for an extremely simple gifset, by the way. The kind that requires no actual creativity or hard work, only a bit of technical know-how. If you know what you’re doing, and not blindly poking at the settings you’re not used to, it should take no time to make. I just want to share how much I’m overthinking everything. (And also to journal for my own sake, because this has been An Experience.)

[bubonickitten]

Hey, I saw an old post of yours about you finding a ton of dogs and bringing them home in Minecraft, and you mentioned that you were playing with mods. I was wondering if you'd be willing to recommend some good mods to me? Been playing with them for awhile but it's hard to find more good ones

I’m sorry it’s taken over a month for me to answer this – I’ve been using the mobile app way more than the browser lately and I always forget to check my inbox on mobile.

Anyway, I made a mod rec post before but it was almost two years ago and I’ve changed up my mod lineup a lot since, so here’s an updated list.

Right now I’m using Minecraft 1.12.2 and Minecraft Forge 1.12.2-14.23.5.2814. (Looks like there’s a newer edition of Forge, I just haven’t updated it yet.) Also some mods are dependent on other mods or require you to download additional resource packs/libraries/etc., so just make sure you check the requirements before downloading (probably goes without saying, but just in case).

I’m putting the list under a cut because otherwise this post will be an absolute wall of text. 

PERFORMANCE MODS

OptiFine: This one’s a performance mod that aims to boost FPS and improve the graphics.

NotEnoughIDs:This expands Minecraft’s ID limit for blocks and items, which is necessary if you’re using a ton of mods that add a lot of new content. 

CONVENIENCE MODS

Just Enough Items (JEI):This one is an item/block/recipe viewing tool with a search feature. There’s also a cheat mode that lets you just drop whatever item you want into your inventory.

Inventory Tweaks:This adds new options for managing/sorting your inventory (on your person or in storage chests) and some convenience features, like automatically replacing tools or item stacks when broken/depleted as long as you have more in your inventory (which also includes your backpacks, if you use the Backpacks mod listed below).

Multi-Hotbar:Just gives you 2-3 additional hotbars, so you aren’t just limited to nine slots and don’t have to constantly go into your inventory screen to move things around if there are more than nine tools/stacks you use regularly. 

JourneyMap: This one automatically maps your Minecraft world as you explore – there’s a minimap in the upper right corner of the screen, and it can be expanded to view the whole map if you want. It also lets you set waypoints (which you can teleport to), with an option to mark them with visible beacons that can be seen from the overworld. It also automatically creates waypoints when you die, so you can easily teleport back to where you died once you respawn.

Nature’s Compass:In-game biome finder, with teleport feature. Also works with biomes added by mods (e.g. Biomes O’ Plenty).

Find Your Way:Adds some new compasses to point you in the direction of various overworld structures (strongholds, mansions, villages, etc.). 

Backpacks: Adds recipes for backpacks. By default they’re 3x9 but by crafting and adding backpack pouches, they can be expanded. They start out brown but can be dyed. They can also be nested, so if you want a backpack within a backpack within a backpack, you can do that. Which I do. Excessively. My inventory situation is… hellishly recursive. But at least I can collect stuff forever before I have to go back home and stash it all.

Fence Jumper: A very simple convenience mod that lets players jump over fences. Doesn’t apply to mobs.

Survival Flight:This just lets you use Creative Mode’s flight mechanic in Survival Mode. Is it cheating? Probably, but it’s your Minecraft world and you can fly if you want to. 

WORLDGEN/ITEM ADDITIONS MODS 

Quark: This one adds a lot of new features – blocks, decoration, mobs, automation options, underground biomes, recipes, convenience tweaks, etc. etc. etc. Main website with descriptions of all the added features can be found here.

Roguelike Dungeons: As the description says, “a mod that generates large underground dungeon structures which have a procedurally generated layout and loot.”

Actually Additions:Adds a lot of random stuff, check the manual to see the full list.

Chisel:More decorative blocks, including many new texture variations of vanilla Minecraft blocks. 

Biomes O’ Plenty: Adds over 60 new biomes to the world, with new trees, blocks, plants, etc. Works best with the creation of a new world, but you can make it work with an existing world with some extra steps (see the installation section here). It’s pretty simple, but you need to download an NBT Editor to do it (last time I had to do it, I used NBT Explorer). 

Terraqueous:New fruit trees, flowers, mineable cloud blocks, tools, etc. 

Natura:More new worldgen stuff. 

Ferdinand’s Flowers:Literally just adds A Lot of new kinds of flowers to the overworld and makes things very, very colorful.

Pam’s HarvestCraft:More crops, food recipes, etc. 

Fairy Lights: Adds recipes for creating hanging lights, string lights, etc. for decoration and lighting options.

MrCrayfish’s Furniture Mod: Adds recipes for furniture. Mostly good for decoration, but some are also functional (e.g. cabinets and refrigerators that provide storage).

MOBS/CREATURES MODS

Mo’ Creatures: Adds a bunch of new mobs to the game (passive, neutral, hostile, and tamable).Many of the tamable mobs can be used as mounts, such as big cats, wyverns, manticores, giant scorpions, elephants, komodo dragons, dolphins, manta rays, bears, and several different kinds of horse (including unicorns, winged horses, ghost horses, and fairy horses). The config files are straightforward and easy to edit if you want to tweak the spawn rates of different mobs. Note: The Forge page says that DrZhark’s Custom Mob Spawner is required, but when I was having trouble with another mod’s custom mobs not spawning properly, Custom Mob Spawner turned out to be the culprit. I removed it, and it seems like Mo’ Creatures is still working even without Custom Mob Spawner, and it takes far less time to load a world than it did before. 

Dragon Mounts 2:Tameable dragon mounts. I love them.

Ice and Fire:Adds new mythical mobs – dragons, sirens, cockatrices, sea serpents, etc. 

Doggy Talents:Your tamed wolves can Do More Stuff.

Wolf Armor and Storage: What it says on the tin. Wolf armor is very similar to horse armor, and chests can be added to wolves like they can be added to llamas.

DIMENSIONS MODS

Twilight Forest: Adds a new dimension, the Twilight Forest. The list of added features can be found on the Wiki here. Each new biome has its own boss (usually with a corresponding dungeon) to defeat (bosses can be defeated more than once since there’s at least one per biome and, like in the overworld, there’s more than one of each kind of biome in the world). It follows a progression system, meaning certain areas (and therefore boss fights) are locked until you defeat other bosses (e.g. certain biomes having a weather effect that renders it virtually impossible to traverse until defeating the boss and getting the item that will allow you to pass through the area). It can be a bit laggy but it’s still fun.

Advent of Ascension:Adds several new dimensions with their own biomes, mobs, items, bosses, etc. It’s fun but I don’t recommend it if you hate clowns because there is an entire clown dimension and even though you can avoid that, there’s also this one clown mob that spawns in the overworld underground, you’ll just be minding your business mining and suddenly BOOM creepy murder clown in the shadows. Also, if you’re using Mo’ Creatures, don’t use the Custom Mob Spawner because it’ll prevent Ascension’s mobs from spawning properly. 

Cavern II:Adds new cavern dimensions to explore, new blocks and ores, and a miner stats/progression system. It’s the successor to the original Cavern mod. One of my favorite things is the randomite ore, which drops a random item when it’s mined (which can include items added by other mods). 

The Betweenlands:This one adds a dark, swampy dimension with its own lore and survival challenges (e.g. you can only eat what you can gather in the Betweenlands and any food from the overworld rots when entering the dimension; there are new mechanics like food sickness, player decay, and tool corrosion that occur when spending long periods of time in the Betweenlands; etc.). 

Erebus:Erebus is the “dimension of the arthropods” and is exactly what it says on the tin.

Better Nether:Some tweaks to the Nether that make it more fun to explore – new biomes, new mobs, new structures, etc. 

AbyssalCraft:New eldritch dimensions, mobs, biomes, items/blocks, etc. You do some inadvisable rituals, read some questionable tomes, collect some dubious artifacts, encounter things with lots of eyes and tentacles… oh and one time, when I was playing one of the earlier versions of the mod, Shoggoths invaded my home and killed all my horses and left a residue all over everything and I had to restore an old backup save, so. I recommend reading the wiki before you do any summoning rituals.

VoidCraft:This is an older mod no longer in development, but if you’re like me and get bored easily and download every new dimension mod you can find, have at it. 

The Aether II:This is the sequel to the old Aether mod (which also has a reboot for Minecraft 1.12, here). It’s still in development and I actually haven’t had a chance to explore the new dimension much yet myself, but it looks interesting. 

[waqasblog2]

GDPR - Let's all calm down a bit, shall we? - SEO, Content Marketing & Website Design

GDPR is getting to be like Y2K preparations.

It seems everyone is talking about it as if there will be Armageddon on the 25th May unless we all run around burning files and throwing hard drives off cliffs just in case the rozzers find someone's email address on them.

I was at a gin festival recently (great by the way, I'll tell you about it sometime), and people were talking about it at the bar.

Give it a break already!!!

Something more important than GDPR is happening on the 25th May, I'll be bothered about that.

What this article isn't

There is approximately one cubic gazillion of articles claiming to be the ultimate guide to GDPR, and I bet you've read a few and still don't understand them.

So, I'm not going to get into that here. This isn't a comprehensive GDPR marketing guide.

Instead, I thought what might be useful is a “cut through the crap” set of very short, succinct points that will give you some sort of idea about the whole process and what, if anything, you need to do about it.

Mostly, though, I'm hoping to stop a few people destroying their email lists because some guy in a suit said they should.

If I'm not compliant by the 25th May, will I be fined £17 million and sent to rot in jail?

NO!

Let me explain why:

There are consultants currently travelling the country telling everyone, usually on their first PowerPoint slide, that the fines that the ICO (the UK organisation that will implement GDPR) can punish you with are mahoosive; up to 4% of turnover or 17 million quid.

You can imagine that ACME window cleaning Ltd with two employees is positively quaking in its boots at this revelation, but it's nonsense.

In fact, the ICO themselves are getting a little hacked off with it.

I quote, from their own blog:

Myth #1:

The biggest threat to organisations from the GDPR is massive fines.

Fact:

This law is not about fines. It’s about putting the consumer and citizen first. We can’t lose sight of that.

Focusing on big fines makes for great headlines, but thinking that GDPR is about crippling financial punishment misses the point

GDPR gives the ICO more clout to punish people, yes, and it gives them the teeth to act when companies fail to follow the rules, but they're not going to be knocking on your door in the middle of the night threatening to take you to a cash point.

Last year they concluded 17,300 cases. 16 companies got fined. And none were fined the maximum available to the ICO.

The sort of companies that get fined are the ones that systematically or blatantly break the rules.

For example, ignoring people's requests to be removed from mailing lists and continue to email them on a huge scale.

The ICO wants to educate, so rather than throwing fines about willy-nilly, they'll work with the companies to ensure they're doing it right and help them stick to the rules.

Is it illegal to send marketing emails under GDPR?

Seriously, this is just nuts.

I've had more than one person say they're going to cancel their MailChimp account because they won't be able to email people anymore.

Let's make it clear:

But I need their consent, yeah?

Yep. Just like now. The important thing with GDPR is that they need to know exactly what they're signing up to.

You can't imply or assume consent anymore.

Make it clear what they're opting in to

When someone gives you any of their details such as email address, phone number etc., you need to make it really clear what it is they're opting in to and what you'll do with that information.

For example, if someone downloads an e-book from your website, you need to give them the option of also signing in to your mailing list. You can't just assume that because they've downloaded the book that they're also happy to receive your other emails.

To be fair, this has been a grey area for a while, but GDPR now makes it clear.

It's going to affect a lot of websites, for example, those that only let you read the rest of an article after you've signed up, but that's OK, they'll cope.

You probably can't just email them because they've bought from you

It's the same with online shopping.

You can send them transactional emails, that is, emails that are triggered by their purchase such as order confirmation, invoice and dispatch data, but you can't then start bombarding them with marketing emails unless they tick the box saying they're happy to have them.

(Note: This is actually covered by PECR, which is additional regulation, that suggests that you can contact your customers for legitimate reasons. A reason might be you want to offer them something. Just make sure they can opt out, you’ll be fine.)

Again, this is a grey area that's being tidied up, but many shops have been doing this for years, it's no biggie.

You can't have pre-ticked boxes or confusing consent

Some stores are a bit naughty, and right at the bottom of the order form there will be a tick-box with a sentence next to it saying “We will occasionally send you marketing emails, but if you'd rather not be pestered, un-tick this box.”

You can't do that anymore, which is a good thing.

This goes hand-in-hand with tick boxes that aren't especially clear, for example, ones that give multiple reasons or say things like

“By ticking this box, you do not allow us to remove your email address from our lists or maybe email you on a regular basis. If you do not wish us to not email you regarding things like this and such, then dance a merry jig while smoking a peace pipe.”

You must make it easy for people to unsubscribe

It needs to be really simple and completely fool-proof.

Ideally, a link on every single email that says “Unsubscribe” which takes them to a page that says “Sorry to see you go, you're now unsubscribed.”

Maybe give them a question to ask why, but that's it.

Close browser, job done.

Some people grind my gears by taking you to a site which you then have to log in to first (i.e. reset password because I forgot it) and then choose a complex set of tick boxes before being released from their vice-like grip.

One click dude, no dick moves.

How about getting consent for emails again, do I need to do that?

In most cases, no.

I've had a flurry of emails from companies saying “Due to GDPR, we need to get consent to keep sending you emails.”

The only time you'd need to do that is if you got the email through nefarious means in the first place.

For example, if I filled out a basic contact form on your site and then you started emailing me.

That's wrong, it's always been wrong, and now it's even wrongerer.

But if I signed up via your newsletter sign-up form, you do not need to ask me again.

Honestly, you don't.

If you got consent in the past, you have consent now.

Also, there's still a grey area about business to business. It seems you don't need consent anyway for this (there are exceptions, stick to the basics and you'll be OK.)

Also (2), do you use a proper mail client like MailChimp or ActiveCampaign or Aweber?

Well don't worry about it, there's an unsubscribe button at the bottom of the email. When people click this, they're unsubscribed, and they can only get back on the list if they specifically ask.

All cool.

Are there any scenarios when I might have to get consent again?

Other than that, you're probably OK. I'm saying “probably” because I don't know where you got your filthy list from, and I don't want you using this blog as an excuse. If you were bad with data in the past, clean it up.

Should I email everyone to get re-consent anyway? Just to make sure? I'm scared…

Oh please, grow some.

Yes, of course you can. Send out that email.

What's your current open rate? 20%?

And click through rate? 8%?

So, just working this out on the back of a fag packet, if I had a list of 800, I'd end up with 13 left on it when I've gone through this utterly pointless exercise.

Stop it.

So what should I do?

If you're a huge company with lots of employees, go get yourself a consultant, they'll help you in exchange for some dollar.

There are different rules for large businesses, and you might have some work to do, so go do it.

If you're a small business, you need to follow some basic steps:

The first is to check out the ICO website which explains everything in detail, it's all you need.

If someone tells you something is “what you need to do”, then check with the ICO, they're being incredibly pragmatic about it all.

Secondly, don't lose sleep over it.

Thirdly, check your mailing list. This next bit is a bit in-depth, so I've decided to give it a new section.

How to make sure I'm not breaking the law and will, therefore, go to jail or have my house repossessed

If you systematically scraped email addresses from the web, typed them in yourself from the Yellow pages or in some way got your mailing list using nefarious means, then delete them all.

However, if you fall into one of these categories, read on:

Still with me?

Audit your mailing lists

Where they from? Can you split out all the ones that opted in via your sign-up form? Good, do that, tag them or add them to another list.

This is the list of people who absolutely, positively wanted to sign up. Good, we're done. Leave them alone.

Got some others you're not sure about?

OK, put those in another list or tag them “we're not sure” or something, we'll work on these guys next.

Send out an email

The mistake everyone is making here is emailing everyone and saying “you need to sign up again” when they don't.

If they signed up before, that's fine. They gave consent and therefore that consent passes into the GDPR era.

So let's just tackle the ones we're not sure about, and rather than asking them to sign up or not hear from you ever again, let's do it another way. Let's give them an option of opting out.

Create an email something like this:

“Hi Geoff,

By now you've probably heard about GDPR and the new rules regarding email marketing and the correct way of getting consent.

Well, we're sure you were asked nicely if you wanted to receive our emails, but we can't be absolutely certain.

It might be that you downloaded something from us, or we met you at a networking event and you said it was fine, in which case, we're all good.

However, If you don't want to receive any more emails from us, then please click the button below to unsubscribe instantly from our list.

You won't need to do anything else, it's all automatic.

If you don't mind receiving our emails, then do nothing, but remember you can unsubscribe at any time.

Thanks for your time!

Keep this in mind

I'm not a GDPR consultant or a lawyer. This advice comes to you from someone who has read the documentation, but your situation might be unique/different.

However, there's no excuse for many in the industry to use scare tactics to get you to do something and propose knee-jerk reactions that might end up in your losing a significant part of your business.

As with everything, be sceptical of what you're told.

Investigate everything and then do what is right.

What if someone complains

Someone is bound to complain. There's been so much publicity about it, there will be people looking for companies to trip up so they can get the feds on them.

Don't panic.

If you're using a good email system (we recommend: ActiveCampaign) then all unsubscribes are handled automatically, you're safe, but if not, and someone requests to be removed from your lists – do it immediately.

As long as you're on the ball, delete people's data as soon as you're asked and be open about what you do with the data you keep, then you'll be OK.

Is this everything GDPR is about then?

Absolutely not.

GDPR is a huge deal for many companies and it covers vast swathes of regulation, that's for others to deal with.

I just wanted to clear up some misinformation about it that's doing the rounds at the moment and make sure that a bunch of companies that are doing everything right aren't forced to the wall by over-cautious consultants.

If you need more advice, find a good consultant.

There's one who reads this blog, he'll be in touch to tell me his contact details, as soon as he does, I'll pass them on!

This content was originally published here.

[onkeywritings]

The Show Must Go On

Rating: PG-15

Warnings: Mentions of … uhm, murders, yeah.

“Come on Jinki, I need the script by Monday!”

Jinki growls at the woman in front of him. She’s tapping her finger impatiently on his table.

“And don’t forget that you have a book signing tomorrow and one again on Friday and that you have a meeting with the proof reader on Thursday along with a meeting with the graphic designer for the front page of this one. Do you even have a title for it yet?”

Jinki glares at the woman and stands from the table.

“Where are you going?” she asks, her finger stops tapping the wood as she glares at his back. Jinki can feel the annoyance fill the room, but his frustrating is far greater than his publisher’s right now.

“I’m leaving so I can write.”

With those words he leaves her alone in the large office.

Jinki used to like his job. When he was a teenager he would have given everything to become what he has become today but it doesn’t come without a prize.

Ever since his first hit novel 5 years ago, he has been working hard to write the sequels and interacting with his readers to promote his image. Jinki can’t count the books he has written his signature in so far and he can’t remember all the things he has rehearsed and said in interviews.

What inspires you? How do you create your characters? Any good ideas on how to plan a story?

Jinki can’t count the workshops he has been on for young writers, he can’t remember the stories he has read as judges on amateur writing contests.

And despite all the things Jinki has achieved, there is nothing he wants to do more than throw his computer out of the window, burn all the rewritten pages, all the edited notes and the destroy the career other people would kill to have.

It’s 3 AM, his eyes are burning and he’s going insane. The blue artificial light from his computer is the only light in the large living room and Jinki is still stuck in the middle of his latest romance novel.

Staring at the blank pages is stupid, though. It doesn’t help him write and the words are still there, still stuck with the frustration of giving without ever getting.

He slams his fist into the table, the cup of tea spilling over, unfortunately not hitting his computer and destroying it. The hot liquid drips off the edge of the table, onto his socketed feet and Jinki feels the slight burn through the fabric as it becomes wet and the heat reaches his skin. He feels numb while the words of his publisher repeats in his mind.

“Jinki! You should’ve slept!” his publisher hisses from beside him before she turns to the line of excited young adults with their copy of his latest romance novel.

“Hello!” she says with a fake smile and a sweet voice, very unlike that she speaks to him in.

Jinki just stares at the young people, the ones he writes about when he writes his books; the ones that looks sweetly at one another, clearly in love; he ones who cast shy glances towards him, shy to be in his company.

He observes the ones who distances themselves from the crowd as if it embarrasses them to be here and the ones that tries not to look jealously at the couples.

He notices it all and knows why he writes his characters and why they’re popular. He observes and makes mental notes and remembers the small things and that’s what made him popular to begin with, that’s what got the public’s attention.

That is why he is Lee Jinki and that is why he sits in front of a line of young people wanting to get his signature on the book he has written.

“I love your book so much! Rose is so easy to relate to,” a girl says and sighs dreamily when she hands over her book. Jinki takes it with a smile, opens it to the front page and looks at her with his charming smile that usually blinds people.

“I’m happy to hear,” he says in a sweet voice. “What’s your name?”

The girl blushes slightly and mumbles her name out loud. Minseo. She points towards a boy further away that rests against a wall.

“That’s my younger brother Minho. He acts like it’s the worst when I say he resembles Jonathan,” she says and references the jealous second lead. Jinki laughs heartily for her sake and tells her to take good care of her brother instead of mocking him.

Minseo just shrugs and thanks him once again. Jinki lets his gaze over the pair of siblings once they leave the book signing before he turns to the next girl in line and signs her book as well.

It’s the insanity that shows up again at midnight, the craving of something Jinki was never meant to have, the longing after something he was never meant to get.

He stares at the web browser, searches his name again and again and finds nothing. There are no discussions, no guesses. No nothing. There is just him, a lonely author, searching his name on the internet and all he finds is professional praise and nothing.

Jinki slams his computer closed and breaks the screen in the process. It’s good all the same.

“You what?!” his publisher spits when Jinki tells her he wants to take a break. “Nonsense! You’re finishing this book before we talk about breaks. How far are you anyway? Oh, he’s here! Jinki, meet Kim Kibum, graphic designer and the artist to create the front page of your next book. I think he has some ideas already, let’s go talk. You can deny or approve of them.”

She pushes Jinki into the meeting room and then sends the other man a smile before she makes a gesture that invites him inside the room as well.

Jinki takes his place at the end of the table and starts picking at the skin on his fingers. He has a loose cuticle and it’s annoying him. He doesn’t listen to Kim Kibum as the other man relays his ideas.

Jinki pulls at the cuticle until he pulls too hard and his fingers starts bleeding. He’s staring at the blood, almost mesmerised at the sight, almost inspired to write. Jinki’s publisher is the one that interrupt Kim Kibum to address Jinki and his bleeding finger instead.

“Will you take this seriously?” she asks and presses a paper towel hard against his finger. Jinki doesn’t feel the pain, fascinated with the way the blood stains the white paper.

“I’m sorry,” he says and gets up from his seat. He takes one look at the design that’s on display. “It looks good. You’ll have to excuse me.”

And then he leaves the room.

Jinki stares at the no longer blank side in a new word document. It has nothing to do with the romance novel he’s writing and he shouldn’t really have bothered with writing it considering how tight his schedule is but Jinki doesn’t care because this is art.

This is the best thing he has ever written, the description of the blood seductive and the physical pain irresistible. He should’ve become a crime writer instead of romance.

But Jinki hadn’t known and romance had been easy. Romance had been easy until he had been removed from his life, his dreams and his world. Jinki lets his finger caress the cracked screen and smiles wickedly.

His publisher is not happy when she finds him on Friday before his book signing. Jinki doesn’t care. He tells her about his change of plans and she whips him over the head with a bundle of papers.

“Nobody wants to read crime novels, Jinki. You’re a YA author, stop daydreaming. You’re good at what you do. Give me that new novel everybody is waiting for instead of writing descriptions of blood.”

Jinki ignores her and turns to the first in line. It’s a teenaged girl with a younger boy by her side. The girl smiles to what Jinki considers her younger brother.

“Hand him the book, Jonghyun,” she says and the young boy looks towards the ground, his cheeks an embarrassing red. She looks at Jinki and giggles a little. “I’m sorry. My brother read your book and he wants to get your signature. He’s very much in love with Rose.”

Jonghyun, the young boy, frowns and whines at his sister. The girl just laughs.

“I’m not in love with Rose,” he mumbles when he hands Jinki the book shyly.

Jinki sends him a smile and addresses the book to Kim Jonghyun and when he hands it back, he winks.

“It’s okay if you’re in love with Asher too.”

Jonghyun blushes tomato-red and crushes his book against his chest before he hurries off, his sister following him with a laugh.

It catches his eyes when he passes. It shines like a diamond, right in his periphery, begging for his attention. And when Jinki lifts it from the trash can and removes the banana peel he recognises it as his own novel. It’s stained with coffee and smells a little of vomit but Jinki still turns it in his hands.

He can feel the anger rise in him, the hard work that has gone to waste, thrown away like it belongs in the garbage. He opens the front page and looks at his smeared hand writing where something has spilled onto the book.

The pages are torn a little but it doesn’t look like it has been enjoyed. It just look destroyed, utterly ruined.

To Minseo it says. I hope you enjoy and you meet your one and only like Rose.

Jinki wrecks his mind to find Minseo; he goes through the catalogue of young readers he has seen in the past days, links names he hardly remember to faces that are slightly blurred by his memory.

He continues until he finds the memory of a girl and a her younger brother leaned against the wall.

I love your book! his memory says. I love it so much! I love your book! So easy to relate to. I love it!

Jinki stares at the copy he has signed less than a week ago and how it has become nothing but mere trash. Love is just as strong a word as hate but Jinki hates his readers in this instance.

Jinki doesn’t really plan anything. The whiskey burns his oesophagus and heats his body as he sits in his large couch and downs the golden liquor. The only thing on his mind is his book that was left in a trashcan, abandoned to rot among the rest of the trash of this world.

Jinki never considered himself worthy of the fame but he’s not that bad. Dammit, he’s not that bad of an author.

He empties the glass and throws it against the wall where it breaks into a million crystal pieces on the floor.

The night is insane and the weather is cold and Jinki shouldn’t be standing in front of a villa he has never seen before. He’s in a part of Seoul he has never been before and he doesn’t really know how he got here.

He’s drunk but he couldn’t care less as he fumbles with his pockets and turns them inside out. His hair sticks out in mess and he’s standing underneath the streetlights, observing the sleeping house.

“So, I was thinking…” someone says and Jinki turns around to look at Kim Kibum, the graphic designer. He has a headache and a cold and it’s all his own fault for staying up so late, getting drunk, observing sleeping houses.

He still hasn’t finished the manuscript for his publisher and he doesn’t want to deal with the fox-like designer that wants to know if he wants roses or bluebells on the cover.

“I don’t care. I don’t care about the cover and you can do whatever you want.”

Jinki glares at the man as he passes him and lifts his tea to his lips, just to burn his tongue on the boiling water.

Jinki needs sleep. Jinki needs clarity. Jinki really needs sleep but his mind is keeping him awake, his doubts, his fear and his annoyance driving him crazy.

He has been searching the book forums, just to find that a new writer, one of those he might have advised in the past, just wrote their hit novel as well, has become wildly popular. Jinki wants that too. He wants to find results of his works as well.

He turns around in his bed, the darkness creating visions he doesn’t want yet they seem so appealing, almost too appealing. Jinki is insane. Jinki is sleep deprived.

“Who’s Lee Jinki?” a voice asks. “Oh! The YA author. No, I didn’t read his works. I’ve heard they’re good, though. I couldn’t find much feedback on them ever since he wrote Mystery Lover so I didn’t think he published more. Haha, no, you must be crazy.”

They laugh and Jinki breaks the pencil in his hand with strength he didn’t know he possessed. There it is. Nobody knows him, nobody cares about him. His publisher lies to him, his readers lie to him. Everybody lies to him. Jinki is not good. He shouldn’t be where he is.

Whatever it was the world saw in Mystery Lover was not enough to take him here, it was not enough to bring him what he wants the most - feedback.

He leaves the broken pencil on the table as he gets up and leaves the room with a sigh.

The flames lick against the sky, the smoke clouding everything else. There are people screaming and sirens howling in the night sky as the fire fighters do their best to combat the fire.

Jinki leaves the chaos and goes back home.

He sits in front of his computer and he writes. The words flow as he lets the experience onto paper, as he lets his characters react the way the family had when they’d noticed their youngest son missing, his screaming drowning in the flames. Dead. They’re all dead inside.

What Jinki has lost, other’s must lose too.

So he writes and he writes and when Monday comes and he hands in the manuscript to a crime novel called Burn Baby, Burn, his publisher almost cries while she scolds him for rewriting everything they had planned. Jinki stands by his manuscript, though.

One would have thought that a young adult author turned crime author wouldn’t have had a chance, but the public loves Burn Baby, Burn.

They love it so much that Jinki sits up day and night and wonders what to do next. The feedback rises for a month before it all dies down again and the nights once again become insanity and loneliness and an unhealthy longing, an obsession with the only thing he can’t have.

So Jinki drinks the whiskey and leaves in the night air to find people that can cure him, that can possibly satisfy his longing, but there’s nobody there. The clubs are loud and dirty and the young people are dancing with only one intention.

Jinki has sex with a young boy that night, he isn’t even sure whether or not the other is of legal age, but he doesn’t care. Jinki doesn’t care about anything.

“Guess who I fucked last night,” a tall, young man says to a girl and she shrugs and lights up her cigarette before she inhales. The boy reaches out towards the lit cigarette and takes it from the girl. “That YA author that wrote … hum, whatever it was, really. I never read that shit but still. Who would’ve guessed he was gay?”

He laughs out loud and the girl steals her cigarette back.

“You’re such a whore, Taemin. How many famous people have you fucked by now?” she asks and Taemin starts counting on his fingers before he gives up.

Jinki listens in on their conversation, fire burning in his veins. A mindless fuck that had been unsatisfying and yet he has become another notch in a bedpost, another semi-famous person to add to a collection.

He’s still someone who people don’t remember, someone nobody cares enough about. He stands in the shadows of the club, waiting for the boy to emerge again.

Jinki can’t recognise himself but this helps, this works.

When the boy says goodbye to the girl, Jinki follows him. He follows the young boy down the narrow streets and past the river. He speeds up when the street lights become farther apart and in a moment of insanity he wraps his hands around the boy’s neck and presses.

He can feel his hands press into fabric and constrict airways. He barely feels the blows he’s given, too occupied with the feeling of slowly taking away what was taken from him.

When Jinki lets go the boy falls to the ground, forgotten and alone. Jinki leaves him and goes back home.

Two weeks later he hands in the manuscript to his second crime novel Null and Void.  

Null and Void is everything Jinki wants it to become. His publisher is overjoyed, forgetting her previous misery now that he’s once again earning big money with his books and now that he’s finally writing again.

It takes a month before it wears off again but Jinki is too far gone by now.

The night has overtaken him completely and he can’t write without the inspiration, without taking from the world what is taken from him every time he’s forgotten, every time he’s left alone in the dust, in the trash can like he belongs with the garbage.

Jinki wants to remove everything on his way, wants to become the most successful of all. Jinki is hellbent on his path now and there is nothing that stands in his way.

“Mr. Lee, can I ask something?” Kim Kibum asks and Jinki lifts his eyebrow as he pours boiling water into his cup of tea. The water turns a golden brown, it looks a little like whiskey if it wasn’t because of the small leaves floating around and the steam rising towards the ceiling.

“No,” he says. Kim Kibum sighs and stands against the counter, preventing Jinki from leaving. Jinki throws the tea bag into the trash can like people throw his books there and looks at the other man.

“I really need to understand where you get your inspiration from so I can follow you in the covers I make for your books,” he says. Jinki doesn’t think it’s any of his business where he gets his inspiration.

Instead he takes a step around Kibum and gently tilts his cup of tea so the water spills onto Kibum’s arm and burns him.

“Oh my, I’m so sorry!” Jinki says when Kibum yells at the burn and as he leaves the office kitchen, Jinki smirks to himself. Nosy people get burnt.

“Can you believe I read that?” a boy says to another boy. It’s a starry night and the moon is illuminating the play ground they’re on. The other boy snorts and shakes his head.

“No, not really Jjong,” he says and leans against the other boy’s shoulder. Their hands are linked, secrets in the night.

Jinki observes them and knows they’re talking about him. He knows it because they’re mocking him, mocking his works. They’re laughing like it’s the funniest thing in the world.

Jinki steps closer to them, the sand cracking under his feet but neither of the two boys notice, too caught up in their own love. Jinki waits under the slide, observes them while they continue their banter and their hidden displays of affection.

It isn’t until they kiss that he sneaks up on them. With a knife in hand, blinded by hatred and success, he slices one of their necks. The other boy soon notices something is wrong in their kiss as the dying boy coughs up blood. The hot liquid spills from the wound on his neck and when he looks up and gets eye contact with Jinki, Jinki sends him a smile, tilts his head, lifts the gun and shoots.

Pull the Trigger wins the literature award.

Kim Kibum doesn’t stop bothering him and Jinki doesn’t stop his murders. How he hasn’t gotten caught yet is beyond his understanding but he enjoys the momentary fame he gets every time he published a new crime story.

Author of the Year, Bestselling Crime Author.

Author Lee Jinki - a journey from young love to thrilling crimes.

They’re only temporary fixes, however. All his awards and the times his name are mentioned are only there briefly before he remembers the books in the trash can, the mocking laughter and the sneers. He remembers it all and he can’t deal, can’t accept it. Jinki is not that bad.

He sees young authors rise up and die out again. He watches them bow to the pressure and Jinki rises above them all because his insanity needs nothing but motivation, needs nothing but a memory to continue on.

He corners Kibum in the meeting room one evening after a discussion on the new website. Jinki hasn’t been a part of the discussion but that’s not important. What is important, however, is that Kibum has started to ignore him, has started to avoid Jinki. He has heard Kibum talk fondly of other authors, joke with the newcomers and he doesn’t like it.

Jinki wants that. Jinki wants the recognition.

Kibum looks up, eyes looking directly through Jinki. Jinki stares back at him.

“My inspiration,” he starts but Kibum interrupts him.

“I know. I know what you do, how you write.”

Jinki doesn’t blink but just continues to stare at the other man.

The mirror he sees in Kibum’s eyes are reflecting his own insanity back at him. He can see it and how it affects him, see how wild the look in his own eyes are.

There, in front of Kibum, stands a man who has left his humanity behind long ago in an attempt to stay remembered, in an attempt to gain recognition. Jinki smirks and lifts an eyebrow.

There, in front of Kibum, stands a man that has finally reached success.

“I’ve saved the best for you,” he says. Kibum coughs and starts shivering. He looks up in fear and Jinki just lifts the cup of tea to his lips.

When Kibum’s eyes widen, his body is already shutting down. Jinki walks closer and sinks down beside him as Kibum falls against the floor and does his best to breathe and call for help.

“A shame the burn wasn’t enough to teach you a lesson.”

Jinki rises to his feet as Kibum’s eyes close and when he leaves the room, he lifts the cup of tea to his lips. Jinki has the world.

Guess Who is his last book.

[nofomoartworld]

Hyperallergic: A Graphic Memoir About Learning to Cope with What’s Left Behind

Kristen Radtke, Imagine Wanting Only This

At the center of Kristen Radtke’s graphic memoir Imagine Wanting Only This is the death of her uncle, with whom she is very close. The book begins when she’s a child, young enough to still be amazed by catching fireflies with her uncle, whose rare, life-threatening genetic heart condition is mentioned within the first few pages. But the majority of the story follows Radtke’s college and post-grad years when she is studying photography and exploring ruins and abandoned mining towns. Her black-and-white illustrative style often breaks with the traditional panel format for a mix of full-page collage spreads where the text floats in the white space of the images, creating an expansive landscape on the otherwise confining page, or utilizes the format of the medium in which her character is exploring — a sketchpad or letterhead as she writes to her friends, or a computer browser as she researches — layering in historical photographs when relevant.

At one point, in hopes of finding interesting urban landscapes to photograph, Radtke and her college boyfriend travel to the abandoned town of Gary, Indiana. There they discover the ruins of a church scattered with photographs in plastic bags covered with dirt. In the oft-parodied mindset of an art student, Radtke immediately says, “Let’s take them. For an installation.” Later, after doing some research on the site, she discovers that the photos were in fact carefully placed items in a memorial to another photographer, Seth Thomas, who was killed by a train while shooting near the site the day before his 24th birthday. Seth’s photos are all that remains of him — both literally and metaphorically — and the dirt they brushed off were his ashes, which his friends had scattered around the site. Radtke’s boyfriend is horrified by this discovery, shouting, “Kristen, you stole this guy’s memorial. I knew we shouldn’t have taken them.” But she holds on to the pictures. Seth’s photos and the death of her uncle are touchstones throughout the book, serving to illustrate parallel forms of decay and loss.

From Imagine Wanting Only This

From Imagine Wanting Only This

Whereas the literal linking of photographic remains and actual remains risks being obvious and trite, Radtke avoids this nostalgic notion of the photograph by contrasting it with a more modern one. In our hyper-documented age, most images are exchanged digitally and aren’t given the emotional weight of printed pictures. The excess reduces value: Why select the 10 best photos from a vacation when all 100 can easily be uploaded and shared to a Facebook album, or posted on Instagram as they occur? Radtke suggests that the compulsive sharing of images, this overwhelming desire to document, is related to the ability of these images to say remember and I was here. But as the abandoned towns and ruins she visits demonstrate, documentation does not deter decay; even what’s left behind eventually fades.

While she is away in school, Radtke attempts to keep in touch with her uncle. An image of her empty living room with a splashy word bubble coming out of her phone says, “Hey sweetie, it went perfect, the doctors said I had no fat on my heart because I’m so big and strong.” The panel below that shows a cell phone open to a picture of her uncle covered in wires in a hospital bed, the “DELETE” selection hovering over it. “I didn’t like looking at it, the wires and tubes and orange goo on his arms,” her narrative explains. While she continues to hold on to Seth’s photos despite their molding and leaking, she does delete the unsettling picture of her uncle. Radtke explains, “I never connected the image to my uncle directly. His pain is something I have no concrete memory of considering.” After her uncle passes away, Radtke laments to her boyfriend, “I just can’t believe I deleted his message, and then he died later that day.”

From Imagine Wanting Only This

Radtke is certainly not the first to parallel an exploration of photography with that of death. Most famously, Roland Barthes did this in his seminal book Camera Lucida, in which the death of his mother figures heavily into his analysis of photographs as referents. But Radtke interrogates this established reading by contrasting the treatment of printed images and digital ones, extended further to contrast physical and digital detritus. One of the book’s most visually and emotionally striking moments occurs several months after her uncle’s death. While home before leaving to travel abroad, Radtke finds an old cassette tape of an interview she did with her uncle as a child. She climbs into a car (the only available means to play a cassette tape!) and puts it in. The visuals splice together her uncle’s words coming from the dashboard with her childhood self conducting the interview, as well as her present-day self curled in the car listening. Surrounded heavily by a solid black background and vertical lines, the images are stark and dramatic, successfully giving the impression of how startling it is to hear the voice of a dead loved one emanating artificially into a dark garage. Rather than over-determining this experience, she lets it hang as the final image of the chapter, asking: How do we cope with what’s left behind? How do we deal with the physical and digital detritus after something has been abandoned or someone is no longer with us?

After her uncle’s death, Radtke continues her urban exploration, seeking out more deserted towns and ruined buildings. While abroad, she watches the clichéd travel photographs pile up and thinks, Every city we visited afterward began to feel like the stock backdrop for some stagnant future. Instead of continuing in that vein, she decides, “Let’s go someplace more exciting. I want to go somewhere no one else I know has been.” At some point during this trip, she misplaces Seth’s molding bag of photographs, which she’s been carrying around for years. Then she stumbles upon a documentary about urban explorers that mentions Seth. Ruins are often born in the wake of stasis, she thinks. That’s easy enough to sense. Maybe being stuck is what killed Seth.

From Imagine Wanting Only This

Radtke’s memoir documents what’s often brushed aside as a “millennial” problem: the restlessness of staying still while simultaneously wanting to be rooted, to be present and known — to mark something as one’s own. Radtke expresses this sentiment while she is living in Iowa City during graduate school: “It was an easy place to feel you’d conquered. It was a whole new kind of ownership … I was never again going to live in a town of houses so filled by people that I knew. I didn’t want to sit still, but I didn’t want to lose anything, either.”

From Imagine Wanting Only This

The photographs degrade like the cities and buildings Radtke desperately seeks out, leaving behind only ruins, which decay like bodies after one has died. As she travels, visiting more and more sites of things that once were, her images bleed together — chests cut open to reveal hearts in the center of abandoned cathedrals, memories of her uncle merged with historical accounts of past residents — as she struggles to make sense of how something or someone can go from being so full to so empty. “And when you love and then cannot continue that loving? And when the walls of a heart designed for protection turn in on themselves? What can be made of the spaces that we cannot witness?” she wonders. Bearing witness, staking claim, and documenting life loom large. Recalling her travels to the Philippines and beyond, she explains, “There were a people nothing like us. These were a people who did not have what we have now. We forget that everything will become no longer ours.” Even our bodies.

In her final revelations of the book, she returns to this claim: “Who knows what will be significant when we have all moved on to whatever is waiting or not waiting? You will have touched nothing on earth.” Everything rots, decays, and disappears, despite the metaphorical significance and seeming permanence given to physical remains, just like the digital detritus carelessly left behind from years of trying to claim and provide permanence. In the end, nothing remains.

From Imagine Wanting Only This

Imagine Wanting Only This is now available from Pantheon.

The post A Graphic Memoir About Learning to Cope with What’s Left Behind appeared first on Hyperallergic.

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Read Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms: The Story of the Animals and Plants That Time Has Left Behind by Richard Fortey Book Online, Download in PDF / Epub

Best Way to Read Online Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms: The Story of the Animals and Plants That Time Has Left Behind by Richard Fortey Book or Download in PDF and Epub hi, my fellowship readers. If you wish to read book Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms: The Story of the Animals and Plants That Time Has Left Behind by Richard Fortey online. Here, i give you recommendation site that is a great resource for anyone who prefers to read books online or download it. today, this book of Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms: The Story of the Animals and Plants That Time Has Left Behind by Richard Fortey is available, Just read the book online for free. Now you can get access of full pages on the book. i and my friends always read the popular book here because this book content can easy access on any device. go to the book : http://tinyurl.com/j9qml2k ( Copy and paste link above on your browser if you wish to read ) Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms: The Story of the Animals and Plants That Time Has Left Behind. Overview : From one of the world’s leading natural scientists and the acclaimed author of Trilobite!, Life: A Natural History of Four Billion Years of Life on Earth and Dry Storeroom No. 1 comes a fascinating chronicle of life’s history told not through the fossil record but through the stories of organisms that have survived, almost unchanged, throughout time. Evolution, it seems, has not completely obliterated its tracks as more advanced organisms have evolved; the history of life on earth is far older—and odder—than many of us realize.   Scattered across the globe, these remarkable plants and animals continue to mark seminal events in geological time. From a moonlit beach in Delaware, where the hardy horseshoe crab shuffles its way to a frenzy of mass mating just as it did 450 million years ago, to the dense rainforests of New Zealand, where the elusive, unprepossessing velvet worm has burrowed deep into rotting timber since before the breakup of the ancient supercontinent, to a stretch of Australian coastline with stromatolite formations that bear witness to the Precambrian dawn, the existence of these survivors offers us a tantalizing glimpse of pivotal points in evolutionary history. These are not “living fossils” but rather a handful of tenacious creatures of days long gone.   Written in buoyant, sparkling prose, Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms is a marvelously captivating exploration of the world’s old-timers combining the very best of science writing with an explorer’s sense of adventure and wonder.. Top Books. Top Authors. Any Device. Enjoy the freedom to explore over 1 million titles and thousands of Hot New Releases Book on any device there. There are also other available format to download: PDF Kindle ePub Mobi Daisy You also can Search for books you want to read free by choosing a title.. You can find works in different literary forms, not just in English but in many other languages of the world, composed by a diverse and interesting array of authors. Many of these books are all time classics appealing to all ages. Authored by many renowned authors of their times, these books are a unique resource of knowledge and enrichment to be cherished forever. Hope this sharing helpfully.

Emma Febby's insight:

Read Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms: The Story of the Animals and Plants That Time Has Left Behind by Richard Fortey Book Online, Download in PDF / Epub

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Read The Isle of the Lost (Descendants, #1) by Melissa de la Cruz Book Online PDF / Epub

Best Way to Read Online The Isle of the Lost (Descendants, #1) by Melissa de la Cruz Book or Download in PDF and Epub hi, my fellowship readers. If you wish to read book The Isle of the Lost (Descendants, #1) by Melissa de la Cruz online. Here, i give you recommendation site that is a great resource for anyone who prefers to read books online or download it. today, this book of The Isle of the Lost (Descendants, #1) by Melissa de la Cruz is available, Just read the book online for free. Now you can get access of full pages on the book. i and my friends always read the popular book here because this book content can easy access on any device. Read this ebook here : http://tinyurl.com/j44tb5j maybe if you want to read this book just visit link above on your browser. The Isle of the Lost (Descendants, #1). Overview : Twenty years ago, all the evil villains were banished from the kingdom of Auradon and made to live in virtual imprisonment on the Isle of the Lost. The island is surrounded by a magical force field that keeps the villains and their descendants safely locked up and away from the mainland. Life on the island is dark and dreary. It is a dirty, decrepit place that's been left to rot and forgotten by the world. But hidden in the mysterious Forbidden Fortress is a dragon's eye: the key to true darkness and the villains' only hope of escape. Only the cleverest, evilest, nastiest little villain can find it...who will it be? Maleficent, Mistress of the Dark: As the self-proclaimed ruler of the isle, Maleficent has no tolerance for anything less than pure evil. She has little time for her subjects, who have still not mastered life without magic. Her only concern is getting off the Isle of the Lost. Mal: At sixteen, Maleficent's daughter is the most talented student at Dragon Hall, best known for her evil schemes. And when she hears about the dragon's eye, Mal thinks this could be her chance to prove herself as the cruelest of them all. Evie: Having been castle-schooled for years, Evil Queen's daughter, Evie, doesn't know the ins and outs of Dragon Hall. But she's a quick study, especially after she falls for one too many of Mal's little tricks. Jay: As the son of Jafar, Jay is a boy of many talents: stealing and lying to name a few. Jay and Mal have been frenemies forever and he's not about to miss out on the hunt for the dragon's eye. Carlos: Cruella de Vil's son may not be bravest, but he's certainly clever. Carlos's inventions may be the missing piece in locating the dragon's eye and ending the banishment for good. Mal soon learns from her mother that the dragon's eye is cursed and whoever retrieves it will be knocked into a deep sleep for a thousand years. But Mal has a plan to capture it. She'll just need a little help from her "friends." In their quest for the dragon's eye, these kids begin to realize that just because you come from an evil family tree, being good ain't so bad.. Top Books. Top Authors. Any Device. Enjoy the freedom to explore over 1 million titles and thousands of Hot New Releases Book on any device there. There are also other available format to download: PDF Kindle ePub Mobi Daisy You also can Search for books you want to read free by choosing a title.. You can find works in different literary forms, not just in English but in many other languages of the world, composed by a diverse and interesting array of authors. Many of these books are all time classics appealing to all ages. Authored by many renowned authors of their times, these books are a unique resource of knowledge and enrichment to be cherished forever. Hope this sharing helpfully.

Ardy Marcille's insight:

Read The Isle of the Lost (Descendants, #1) by Melissa de la Cruz Book Online PDF / Epub