#still a good read though i recommend

[kataraslove]

as someone who has recently read the reckoning of roku, it’s really not the anti fire nation propaganda that a certain subsection of fandom is making it out to be. yes, gyatso says those words to roku, but he’s angry - at both the world and at himself for the death of his sister. he later apologizes to roku. the book does not paint gyatso out to be in the right, and neither does it paint all fire nation citizens to be in the wrong. the narrative even makes a distinction between the good fire nation citizens (ta min and roku) and prejudicial fire nation citizens (sozin, primarily), and some morally ambiguous ones like dalisay, but they’re more or less abolished from any accountability for partnering with sozin.

avatar the last airbender does not do a good job at displaying much of the context associated with the crimes of the fire nation, aka the climate and perspectives that justified sozin eradicating the air nomads and many of the benders in the southern water tribe. we know from avatar that sozin wanted to conquer the rest of the world for fire nation domination and expansion, but we’re not given much insight into the causal factors that allowed him to conduct genocide and colonialism, beyond “he was able to do it all in one day with the power of the comet,” and “he was a very bad man.”

the reckoning of roku provides the context for all of that, the factors that contributed to sozin’s blood-thirst. which means seeing sentiment from sozin that view the air nomads - and their pacifist ways of life - as inferior and below human. the novel doesn’t particularly attempt to humanize sozin, not in the way that other medias do when exploring the backstory of their villain. at the end, the takeaway from the novel is that sozin is on the road to becoming the ultimate fascist we all know him for, but this time we’re provided more context into how he became that fascist, and why roku hesitated to kill him.

is it more critical of the fire nation than most of the franchise? yes, i would say so, and having a filipino author be the one to offer that commentary is an excellent decision by avatar studios. but the extent of the critique is still more or less along the lines of “this one guy was truly the operations behind it,” which is still consistent with what we’ve seen in atla. there’s nothing too radical introduced in terms of colonial theory, unlike what parts of the fandom are saying.

which leads me to my final point: if this is how badly a subsection of fandom (aka fire nation worshippers and zutara shippers [not mutually exclusive]) are reacting to the simple notion exploring how sozin committed genocide, then they’ve hit further rock bottom than i can imagine. not only that, but this type of reactionary behaviour risks alienating other parts of the fandom; for instance, fans of the avatar novels who otherwise would have given the ship and the shippers grace.

in other words, many of these hardcore shippers “criticizing” the roku novel have no one to blame but themselves if their behaviour leads to the alienation of regular fans. this loud subsection of fandom is so caught up in their one-sided, imaginary fantasy where everything in the franchise somehow revolves around aang/kataang vs zuko/zutara, that the Evil Bryke are always targeting them, to the point that they’ll fail to realize that the fire nation and fire nation characters are often absolved from accountability across the IP, and the fire nation is explored much more than the other nations are.

[makiswirl]

can i just say. and this is probably a niche hill to die on. that i am so gobsmacked every time someone vaguely hints at the idea that jotaro doesn't care meaningfully for the other crusaders, usually particularly kakyoin and joseph, when those two actually tend to be the ones he reacts to being hurt the hardest

like he cares for his loved ones!!!! that literally plays into his character motives in every single part he shows up in!!! stop lying to me!!!!!!!

[echolepzy]

Seeing other people experiencing ISAT for the first time is so fucking funny because like

Oh!!!! I remember how that felt! Yikes! Anyway keep going pal you’re doing great (silent screaming because It Gets Worse and yet nothing can be said without spoiling it)

[collectingavenuesmwue]

holy shit go read this everybody

this fic has ruined and made my day at the same time it’s written so beautifully and it’s made me cry im so serious

[lovers-instead]

Sapphic YA Book Rec: Good Moon Rising by Nancy Garden

1996 follow-up to Annie on My Mind, this time featuring 2 girls who compete for the lead role in their high school theater department.

Links to download:

Internet Archive (to borrow)

Anna's Archive

LibGen

[the-busy-ghost]

Alright uninformed rant time. It kind of bugs me that, when studying the Middle Ages, specifically in western Europe, it doesn’t seem to be a pre-requisite that you have to take some kind of “Basics of Mediaeval Catholic Doctrine in Everyday Practise” class. 

Obviously you can’t cover everything- we don’t necessarily need to understand the ins and outs of obscure theological arguments (just as your average mediaeval churchgoer probably didn’t need to), or the inner workings of the Great Schism(s), nor how apparently simple theological disputes could be influenced by political and social factors, and of course the Official Line From The Vatican has changed over the centuries (which is why I’ve seen even modern Catholics getting mixed up about something that happened eight centuries ago). And naturally there are going to be misconceptions no matter how much you try to clarify things for people, and regional/class/temporal variations on how people’s actual everyday beliefs were influenced by the church’s rules. 

But it would help if historians studying the Middle Ages, especially western Christendom, were all given a broadly similar training in a) what the official doctrine was at various points on certain important issues and b) how this might translate to what the average layman believed. Because it feels like you’re supposed to pick that up as you go along and even where there are books on the subject they’re not always entirely reliable either (for example, people citing books about how things worked specifically in England to apply to the whole of Europe) and you can’t ask a book a question if you’re confused about any particular point. 

I mean I don’t expect to be spoonfed but somehow I don’t think that I’m supposed to accumulate a half-assed religious education from, say, a 15th century nobleman who was probably more interested in translating chivalric romances and rebelling against the Crown than religion; an angry 16th century Protestant; a 12th century nun from some forgotten valley in the Alps; some footnotes spread out over half a dozen modern political histories of Scotland; and an episode of ‘In Our Time’ from 2009. 

But equally if you’re not a specialist in church history or theology, I’m not sure that it’s necessary to probe the murky depths of every minor theological point ever, and once you’ve started where does it end? 

Anyway this entirely uninformed rant brought to you by my encounter with a sixteenth century bishop who was supposedly writing a completely orthodox book to re-evangelise his flock and tempt them away from Protestantism, but who described the baptismal rite in a way that sounds decidedly sketchy, if not heretical. And rather than being able to engage with the text properly and get what I needed from it, I was instead left sitting there like:

And frankly I didn’t have the time to go down the rabbit hole that would inevitably open up if I tried to find out

[hinsaa-paramo-dharma]

My first step towards taking over the world.

[eclaire-went-bam]

related to prev post, i wanna get back into reading so bad but i'm always so preoccupied with imaginary competition lmfao

[spry-the-artist]

Ink Demonth Day 15th: Colour

He was only in black, gray, and white tones now. The color had been leached from his body and he sometimes caught Henry looking out the window at the rainbow of a world around him before he would glance at himself and sigh

-Excerpt from A Drop of Ink: Prologue Part Two

Fan art of an old BATIM fanfic, and one of my favourites. Highly recommend you read it, even though it doesn’t seem like it’s continuing anytime soon (with only one chapter not being from either of the prologues)

(You have to read the first part before reading the second part so I’m not linking it here, even though this scene is from that fic)

Bonus: A version without the aura of grayscale around Henry (more book accurate, but I just wanted to add the effect because I thought it was a good idea. I like both equally so I’m including this here)

[skitskatdacat63]

I feel like Khachaturian is such an underrated composer :<

Everyone should listen to Gayaneh >:(

[navxry]

Random idea: what if I open up a yandere IDV writing blog

[mikimeiko]

Books I read in 2023

From the Top of the World - Derin Edala (2023)

[britneyshakespeare]

i finished troilus and cressida today and no wonder they call it a problem play. honestly what was that

[humanmorph]

having thoughts about webcomics tonight. like ooohh my god i love webcomics

[cherchersketch]

The Villainess becomes the Leading Lady / Even though I’m the Villainess, I’ll become the Heroine!

villainess isekai? check contract marriage? check revenge on asshole friends/family? check *~chef’s kiss~*

Summary Ok so... our main girl unalives herself and ends up in the body of a novel villainess. But... plot twist! Her bully ends up in the novel’s heroine. Oh no. Nothing a little contract marriage can’t fix! Now it’s “villainess” + true(?) crown prince vs “heroine” + tyrant emperor. Let’s goooooo

Tropes   - isekai-ed as the villainess   - *proposal* at first sight   - this is just a contract marriage he/she would never love me   - what do you mean I’ve drastically changed the plot the original FL and ML definitely still belong together (with a twist)

FL - Cha MinJoo Dahlia Margaret

 - gaslight gatekeep girlboss  - mum said it’s my turn to be the bully now (but only to the “FL”)  - why is the backstory always depressing  - please just give her a happily ever after with the Grand Duke

ML - Grand Duke Johan Cartesian Servien

 - *Grand Duke* is just Crown Prince with extra steps  - it’s always a duke from the North with a mostly blue outfit  - you go boy, overthrow that tyrant emperor

not the FL - Lee SooYeon Florre Margaret

 - I don’t mean to be one of those WEBTOON comment people, but she’s like if Rashta (from The Remarried Empress) was more self-aware  - all these manipulative bully girls be cray

Rating: I enjoyed my time reading this Some parts of the plot are kind of... but the main storyline and couple development are pretty good Status (as of 19 Jan 2023) Ongoing.

Same Same but Different   - I’m the Tyrant’s Secretary   - When the Villainess is in Love   - The Reason why Raeliana ended up at the Duke’s Mansion

full rec list