#tag: young adult

[the-merry-librarian]

Set in an apocalyptic, mythical future, after the death of the gods and the Collapse of the world, Threads That Bind is an intriguing, layered mystery. Io Ora is moira-born, a descendant of the three Greek goddesses of fate, and as the youngest of three, she is representative of Lachesis—or, more colloquially known, a cutter: a severer of the threads between people. Stumbling across the scene of a violent and unexplainable murder, Io is drawn into the teeming underworld of half-sunken Alante, and into a conspiracy that changes everything she knows about her life and her family.

Genre: Fiction, Fantasy

Target Age Group:

Grades 9-12

Justification:

I love Greek mythology. This is probably something that people can intuit about me very quickly, just sort of based on the kind of person that I am. I grew up with D’Aulaires Book of Greek Myths and devoured the Percy Jackson series as a middle schooler, so when I read the synopsis of Threads, I was captured immediately by the premise—descendants of the gods with peculiar, miraculous powers. As for how I found it, I was browsing the BookRiot list of Best Books for Teens 2023. (Pretty prosaic.)

Evaluation:

For this review, I will be evaluating characters, plot, and setting. I’ll admit, it took a while for me to warm to the characters in this book. In the beginning, Io feels a little generic; she’s the typical troubled YA protagonist, with powers that ostracize her from others, and her personality felt muted and a little too understated. However, as the novel went on, more facets of her personality were revealed—her humor, her compassion, her strong senses of loyalty and justice. Other characters are at first presented a little one-dimensionally and could be summed up with brief titles: The Love Interest. The Mob Boss. The Older Sister. By the end of the novel, though, all of these characters have a little more depth to them. Edei, the love interest, is a lovable but quiet boy, with his own demons to face; Bianca, the mob boss, is more than a swaggering threat; Ava and Thais, the older sisters, offer their own unique brands of familial love and betrayal. While each of the cast has room to grow, I think that Threads reaches farther than many YA novels in their characterization, and allows further development in the sequels (one of which is already published; I anticipate a trilogy). The plot is also more ambitious and far-reaching than many YA novels I’ve read. It’s a mystery that begins with a murder, but it’s far more than that—Io finds herself hip-deep in a conspiracy from over a decade before, the consequences of which are still rippling through the city. Without giving away too many spoilers, I found the plot of Threads to be genuinely engaging. Intrigue didn’t have to be manufactured, it was simply generated by every new fact and twist that we discovered through the protagonist. The only aspect I didn’t immediately enjoy was the romantic subplot, although I suspect that’s a matter of personal preference: I’ve never been a huge fan of the soulmate trope. Finally, the setting of this book absolutely blew me away. Hatzopoulou’s description of this postapocalyptic world is rich and riveting—a moon that shattered into three, continents drowned under tides, cities that flood in the onslaught of neo-typhoons, isolated city-states that jealously guard resources, swarms of chimera-like beasts that crawl from the seas, and wars over the last clean water in the form of icebergs… and that’s everything that’s talked about in any kind of detail. There are references to parts of this world that haven’t even been explored in text, such as the Flying Orchards, but Hatzopoulou does such a good job of establishing the state of the world that once the Orchards are mentioned it’s easy to guess what they might be. The existence of other-born, humans with some kind of ancestry from a god or goddess, is almost unremarkable when compared to the rest of the world; it’s just a part of this new world, one that Hatzopoulou clearly put just as much thought into as the rest of it. I really enjoyed this book. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t hooked right away—it did take me a while to get into. But, I think, if one can get past the first fifty pages or so, it’s worth finishing. I absolutely recommend it to fantasy-loving teens, readers of mystery stories, and anyone interested in new interpretations of mythology.

References:

Doherty, A. (2023, October 5). The 20 best books for teens: 2023 picks. BOOK RIOT. https://bookriot.com/best-books-for-teens-2023/ Hatzopoulou, K. (2023). Threads That Bind. Penguin Young Readers Group. Penguin Young Readers. (n.d.). Threads that bind by Kika Hatzopoulou. PenguinRandomhouse.com. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/713492/threads-that-bind-by-kika-hatzopoulou/

[latenightsundayblues]

This idea came to me in a dream and it impacted me so violently i had to sit down for a while

Diana being ADAM'S daughter instead of Lawrence's. Financially struggling single father Adam. Trying-his-best father Adam. Can anybody hear me

[sadiejosworld]

i love jason todd more than the next guy and love how his story has progressed. but like, willis todd was this big man who was mean, a drunk, and hit his family. if young jason saw older jason, a trained assassin with anger issues who tried to kill tim, drinks (i think?), and is built like a brick shithouse… would he not just see willis?

as a child of an alcoholic, it is my worst fear to become my parent. i hate everything related to alcohol, and i know sometimes the abused becomes the abuser and all, but would he not like hate himself? idk just a thought, cause im angsty and like making my fav characters more traumatized than they already are.

[skylersprompts]

DC x DP Prompt *30*

If anyone would ask Bruce how he could have known, he would tell them that it is obvious. Phantom - the new part-time member of the Young Justice - who seemed to be forever young and their new engineer Danny Fenton who is in his early twenties have perfectly fitting schedules. When Fenton is working in the Watchtower, Phantom will be unavailable for the Young Justice and vice versa. Also, the pranks started after both of these figures appeared. Of course one could argue that they could just be related or somehow knew each other otherwise, but the pranks that were pulled on all of the mentors of the Young Justice were only possible with Phantom Powers. And because of the new Ghost Shield the young hero wouldn't be able to just fly into the Watchtower and had to use the Zeta-Tube, what would mean that they should be able to look at the logs. But Phantom never entered the Watchtower while the pranks were under way. And as soon as his team really needed him, Fenton would make an excuse to leave work early.

What he wouldn't tell anyone, is that he saw how Fenton had transformed himself into Phantom, shortly before the Flash got up to run for a snack, just to fall down because his ankles had been cuffed together.

And maybe he helped him from time to time, with a well timed question to distract his fellow heros. Because the motive became clear really fast. Everytime someone got pranked, that someone had done something to ignite the wrath of the younger heros.

All of that also meant two things.

First of all, as soon as Danny was at work, Batman would be extra aware of his surroundings. The pranks never worked on him, which meant he had to dodge more attempts for the rest of the day.

And secondly: He should talk to Tim, after he found out how he had put his foot in his mouth this time, since he just saw his spoon move in his coffee mug without anyone's involvement. He just let his (probably salty) coffee go cold, brooding. Maybe he should go home early today and spend some quality time with his son...

[kyeterna]

(since people are drawing her with their nationality) greek hatsune miku but instead of traditional clothing I made her a φασαία for the funsies. Her name is Χατζιάνη Μιχαέλλα she drinks fredo espresso like it's water, studies philology in Aristoteleion University in Thessaloniki, lives in a 25 square metre appartment with her lesbian vegan anarchist roommate (they pay 500 euros rent) and probably copes with the fact that her future is bleak in this stupid fucking country by smoking weed. She needs to pass 10 more subjects and submit her thesis to graduate, she is in her 7th year, and if her stupid professor Mr. Malakizopoulos doesn't finally pass her instead of failing her with 4.9's then she will be expelled from uni because of Kerameos's lovely n+3 bill <3 (This is starting to get personal actually, even if the circumstances do not reflect mine)

She is the lead singer in a band with some uni friends, they make mostly political songs

[drakkonyan]

The future never forgets the events that shaped it The past awaits for better times to come

[thetwilightroadtonightfall]

family visit 🏝️

(ghosts can be haunted too)

[Scala script translation in alt text]

[that-girl-glader]

Spot the difference games getting harder and harder....

[bookish-karina]

thank you for the tag @invalidstories !

Heads Up, Seven Up!

rules: post the last seven lines you wrote, then tag seven people.

here’s a little something from chapter 12 of Your Average Fangirl :)

A quick glance at the nightstand tells me it's 10:03AM. I stretch my arms above my head before moving to a sitting position, the standard hotel white duvet rustling with every miniscule movement.

I grab my phone off the charging stand and quickly swipe through all of the notifications. After getting back to the hotel last night, we all went to our separate rooms. When Jace didn't follow me as he normally did, I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed at not talking with him well into the early morning hours.

softly tagging @kyuponstories @kbwritesstuff @romances-not-tragedies @fortunatetragedy @taranorma

@that-0n3-shr00mi3-guy @honeybewrites

[descendant-of-truth]

If I may throw my hat into the ring here, I think the source of a lot of problems in the writing of Miraculous can be boiled down to its confusion over its target demographic.

There are two very clear audiences the show is trying to cater to:

Grade school girls around 5-10

Teens/young adults around 15-20

And this results in some. unique conflicts in the show's internal logic.

Because it's a superhero show for little kids, it's full of fun, bright colors, wacky villain-of-the-week designs, and the characters are all very straightforward with exaggerated personality traits. The cheerful, clumsy, scatterbrained girl protagonist, her utterly charming and goofy (but slightly clueless) love interest, her cool best friend, her mean bully, etc.

This extends to the romance; the show is so comedic that Marinette's nervous crush and Cat Noir's flirting are played up for laughs. Their more "problematic" behaviors read as cartoon shenanigans first and foremost, which I do think was the intention - they're both shown as being more than a little ridiculous for acting this way, so they're not exactly trying to encourage people to emulate them. They're allowed to be genuinely wholesome, too, because it's nice to give the kids something to go "aww!" at, but it's not meant to be more complicated or deep than that.

And of course, it's gotta follow a sweet and simple episodic formula! A conflict in Marinette's civilian life, an inciting incident to get a side character upset enough for Hawk Moth to turn into a villain, Ladybug and Cat Noir show up, there's fun banter, Ladybug uses her Lucky Charm to figure out a wacky solution to the problem, and boom! The day is saved, Marinette and/or someone else learns a moral, and we get a cute little end screen showing all the key players of the episode.

The one aspect of the show's setup that's a little more serious is the fact that Adrien has a super controlling and distant father, but even this is something that doesn't necessarily break the kid-friendly tone for the first season or two. Superhero shows in particular like to put in some stuff that's a little more emotionally challenging for the viewers, even when they're mostly comedic, so it's not totally out of place here.

For example, while they tend to have more grounded tones overall, Spider-Man cartoons are aimed at kids and regularly keep the conflict between Harry Osborn and his father, Norman, intact; often including the plot point of Norman being the Green Goblin, a notorious villain. It's a similar deal with Adrien, and his dad secretly being Hawk Moth.

You can easily anticipate drama coming from this, but the show primes you to expect it to work out fine in the end because every other conflict so far has been wrapped up in a nice little bow once the episode's over. Though I will say, the choice to have Hawk Moth be Gabriel instead of his own, separate character is perhaps the first sign of the tone shift to come.

And, uh. it sure is a shift.

See, Miraculous does not start out with what you'd call a... plot. It vaguely alludes to there being more going on behind the scenes, but the only thing it really tries to get you invested in is the Love Square dynamic. Marinette and Adrien dancing around each other while fighting crime IS the plot, and it's clearly going to end with a cool final confrontation with Hawk Moth.

You expect it to end like... well, like the movie. Identities are revealed, Gabriel realizes the error of his ways when he finds out he's been fighting his son this whole time, and they may or may not make up but he almost definitely gets arrested. Marinette and Adrien kiss, roll credits.

This is not what happens, because the plot the writers actually had in mind is complex in a way that I would argue is meant for the same audience as YA novels. And with that plot comes a lot of darker, weightier traits to these otherwise silly characters.

Marinette isn't just scatterbrained and nervous, she has debilitating anxiety and an increasing need to be in control of everything due to the stress she's under. She has panic attacks on-screen. She's not just great at strategizing, she also knows how to manipulate people, and does so with increasing frequency - and to Cat Noir at times, no less. Her positive traits haven't gone anywhere, she's still loving and creative and sweet and doing her best to help everyone she can, she just. has all of that other stuff going on, now.

Adrien isn't just a charming, goofy, clueless love interest with a gazillion skills and a controlling father, he's like. actively being abused, and in some cases straight-up mind controlled. His tendency to heroically sacrifice himself so that Ladybug can do her Cool Protagonist Thing is gradually but unmistakably reframed as being a sign of suicidal inclinations. He has identity issues out the wazoo and he doesn't even know he's an artificially created human yet, because everyone in his life is keeping secrets from him and/or lying to his face about crucial information.

Information like, uh. how his dad died???

Yeah, so we're at a point in the story now where there was no satisfying conclusion to the Gabriel plot, no team-up, no moment where he realizes he's been fighting his son, none of that. He still has something akin to a change of heart, but he also still kind of gets what he wants - the Miraculous of the Ladybug and Black Cat, which he uses to rewrite the universe with a wish. It's just that instead of reviving his wife, he trades his life for Natalie's. Of course, he was already dying anyway, which was his own fault but he did force Cat Noir's Cataclysm onto himself, so, that's another thing poor Adrien is going to have to deal with at some point.

And because there's all these astronomically messed up things in Adrien's life, and Marinette's the one who got to learn about all of it before him, she decides that maybe it would be better if he just. didn't know about it. Which is understandable, if I was 14 and had all this information about my boyfriend's life that he didn't, I wouldn't know how to begin telling him about it, either.

But. can you see how we've maybe lost the plot, here?

Here's the thing: starting with a simple framework and gradually getting more complex and subverting the audience's expectations for how the main villain is going to be dealt with is not a bad thing. The fact that it gets darker over time is not an issue. I actually think that all these developments are, themselves, pretty cool! I'm a sucker for angst and complex character dynamics and the show is absolutely giving me those things.

The problem is that it didn't just start with a simple framework, it started with the framework for a different demographic entirely, and perhaps just as importantly, it never actually... stopped.

For as much complexity and intensity they're injecting this story with, they're still working under the logic of it being "for young kids." We still get goofy villain-of-the-week designs with equally goofy motivations, and the supporting cast is stuck remaining two-dimensional no matter their circumstances. Chloe is the most blatant example of this - she was made to be a simple bully first, so no matter what else they do with her, she has to remain straightforwardly evil.

This, I think, is the reason that Gabriel is a more nuanced and "sympathetic" antagonist than her, and why so much care goes into Adrien's character as a victim of abuse while Chloe is just a Problem Child despite suffering similar neglect; she wasn't made to be interesting, and so the show is resistant to changing that. Gabriel and Adrien, however, were already made with nuance in mind, and so they're allowed to develop as characters. And at the same time, it's a kid's show! We need to teach the kids what kind of behavior is acceptable, and Chloe's home life isn't an excuse to treat people badly, so--!

...Oh crap we're supposed to be teaching kids about acceptable behavior. Uh. Um. Quick, bring back the ice cream akuma who cares way too much about his ships so that Cat Noir can learn about consent! Uhh, but don't change his character too much afterwards, he's only marketable because of his silly flirting, and we can't lose that.

Yeah, remember when I said that the romance having problematic elements to it used to work well enough because it was clearly just exaggerated cartooniness? It wasn't free from criticism or anything, but you could see how it was intended to be endearing and silly, right? You were supposed to point and laugh at Marinette's convoluted plans to spend time with Adrien, at Cat Noir's dramatic flirting attempts that Ladybug herself fondly rolled her eyes at.

The tonal shift into deep character exploration kinda paints the previous stuff in a worse light, and to an extent, I think the writers know that. It's hard to laugh at Cat Noir being flirty all the time when he's also supposed to be taken completely seriously, and the more Ladybug rejects him, the more it turns into harassment, and it. kinda just stops being funny, even with the comedic framing.

It's also hard to laugh at Marinette's crush being so all-consuming when they try to tell us (in what I can only assume was an attempt to get people to stop complaining) that she's like this because it's fueled by an event in her past, one that made her so scared of loving the wrong person that she now needs to know Everything about them before asking them out. Her cartoon antics aren't funny under that light, it's just concerning, but they're dedicated to keeping it up anyway.

The show runs on straightforward cartoon logic where you're not supposed to think about it too hard just as much as it runs on grounded, closer-to-real-life logic where people are messy and complicated and actions have consequences. It's so divided that you can hand-pick parts of the story that are influenced by one or the other pretty easily, and depending on the episode you can find instances of both in the same 20-minute time span. Maybe even multiple times!

Neither thing they're trying to go for is bad, and neither is a better approach than the other, but forcing them into the same show makes both sides suffer.

It's not just hard to laugh at the parts I mentioned earlier, it's hard to take Gabriel seriously as a villain whenever you rewatch an episode and remember that he has a once-per-episode pun-based speech that he says so self-seriously that you can't help but laugh at. It's hard to take him seriously when you remember that he repeatedly akumatized a Literal Baby and practically threw a tantrum every time it didn't work, or when he randomly steals (and enthusiastically performs) his nephew's musical dance number, or something similar that you would only do for a cartoon villain aimed at five-year-olds.

And I can only imagine this whole show is a marketing nightmare, too. Hey, little girls, here's your cool role model! She's cute and smart and talented and powerful and can fix anything by shouting the title of the show! Hope you're having fun watching her tell her boyfriend that his newly-deceased father (who used deepfakes of him to sell merchandise that's built to enslave the population and then locked him in a solitary confinement chamber in another country) was actually a hero who sacrificed himself to stop the main villain instead of, y'know, being the main villain! Aren't you excited to watch her wrestle with the guilt of this lie for the next season or so? Doesn't it just make you want to buy her merchandise??

Like. what is even happening right now. what am I watching. how did we get here and why did we start where we did if this was what the story was going to be about

[wyvernity]

sss day my favorite national holiday WOOOOHHHH

bonus

[the-merry-librarian]

            Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me is a bittersweet, beautiful graphic novel about being a teenager in love with someone who can’t seem to stop breaking your heart. The novel follows Freddy Riley, a young lesbian on the cusp of adulthood, navigating her relationship with her friends, her family, and her on-and-off-again girlfriend Laura Dean, who’s broken up with her three times (even though it never, ever lasts). Though Laura Dean is certainly a queer book, its focus is on recognizing toxic relationships, making tough decisions, and the relatable experience of struggling in one’s first love.

Genre: Graphic Novel, Fiction, LGBTQIA+ (Michael L. Printz 2020 Honor Book)

Target Age Group:

14-18

Justification:

This novel has been on my to-read list for a long time, and I was delighted to find it on the Printz Honor list. The cover is marvelously eye-catching, and I confess I have a weakness for the color pink – it’s the only color used in the illustrations in the book. Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me was a must-read as soon as I found out about it.

Evaluation:

For this review, I will be evaluating the illustrations, characters, and theme. As a graphic novel, obviously, the illustrations are arguably the most important part, and Rosemary Valero-O’Connell’s fluid and precise art truly elevates the book to a new level. Characters’ expressions are subtle but expressive, with subtle details like freckles or changing earrings that give each character a lovely understated piece of personality. Pale pink is used throughout as an accent color, standing out starkly against black, white, or gray. Though most lettering throughout the novel is typewritten, Valero-O’Connell uses handwritten cursive script to emphasize dramatic dialogue, making the text stand out and yet integrating it overall into the soft, flowing style of the art. Mariko Tamaki, meanwhile, writes characters that shine. The protagonist, Freddy, is flawed and stubborn and insecure, and creative and hopeful and loving—all details provided by Tamaki’s carefully written dialogue, which combines with Valero-O’Connell’s illustrations to reveal character insights that prose alone might not have conveyed. Each character feels unique and realistic, with tiny details given that strengthen our impressions of each character: Laura Dean’s mother is never shown, Freddy’s mother never took her father’s last name, Doodle’s father only refers to his child as Deirdre. These are the characters we see the least of in the story, but these small pieces of information give them a brilliant shape, enhancing our understanding of them as Freddy interacts (or doesn’t) with the adults in her life. The theme is perhaps the most important part, at least to me. Unlike other YA novels with queer themes, the theme of Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me is not inherently queer. Many novels in the same genre are focused on expressing the queer experience, either attempting to echo the experiences of queer teens or make their experiences more relatable and understandable to a non-queer audience, but Laura Dean’s theme is young, toxic love, and freeing oneself of those relationships. That is a theme that endures throughout sexualities and ages, and while homophobia and other queer issues do arise throughout the course of the novel, the focus is on a teenager’s experience with teenage life. It expands the queer experience beyond this is what we experience as queer people and into this is what we all experience, it just happens to be a queer story on top of it all. In short, everyone should read this book. Teens going through heartbreak, teens who feel like no one’s had the same experience, adults who have dealt or are dealing with toxic relationships, anyone who loves beautiful art. Laura Dean is a book I’m going to be thinking about for a long time.

References:

Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me. Macmillan Publishers. (2021, July 20). https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626722590/lauradeankeepsbreakingupwithme Tamaki, M., & Valero-O’Connell, R. (2020). Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me. Groundwood Books.

[character-obsessed-fem]

listen. hear me out. shadow not being able to talk properly and just mispronouncing/mumbling EVERYTHING when gerald first created them. i'm talking toddler/infant speaking level despite being like. above six years old when they first came out of that tube.

the adults who didn't like shadow using this as an excuse to ignore whatever the hedgehog has to say under the pretense of 'not being able to understand them', and not listening when shadow says they're hungry or that an experiment hurts.

maria teaching shadow how to speak and pronounce things right - it takes them a while, but eventually, shadow is the most well-spoken being on that ARK.

the adults hating maria for this because now they actually have to listen to what shadow has to say now because they can longer dismiss them due to them being unintelligible. they actually have to listen when shadow says 'that hurts!' or 'i want professor robotnik.' or 'i need water.'

and if they don't - well, shadow tells everything to maria, and maria brings up every little issue regarding shadow up to gerald, the lead scientist, who does everything to make sure maria is happy - which means making sure shadow is happy.

[commanderwindy]

Swap Au but Linked Universe :D

credits to the wheel for choosing it not me. Love you wheel

[lunarharp]

uhh another modern au agott follow-up. They've gotten progressively sillier

[harrowscore]

can't believe a show based on a videogame (usually games adaptations are notoriously bad, which isn't the case here tho) gave me the beauty and the beast/twisted mirrors/enemies to traveling companions/ruthless antihero+optmistic but still badass heroine who takes none of his shit/age gap but make it sexy dynamic of my dreams. as much as i love maximus and i think he deserves the best writing ever because 1. he's a clever deconstruction of the aspiring Knight bro who's actually a bit of a loser and, as much as lucy, sees the world in black&white at first and then doesn't get what he thought he wanted but what he needs (or at least i hope he'll eventually get it), and 2. he's a cutie and i want an epic love story for him too, it's very funny how they tried to give us a puppy kind of romance and the tumblr girlies still fixated on the "toxic ~she bites his finger off and he cuts hers off and sews it on his hand in what we'll pretend it's a symbolic marriage rings exchange or whatever~ asshole who used to be a nice guy/good girl™ with a lot of spunk and hidden anger but unshakeable morals" kind of relationship.