#that wraps my reread review of book one!

[kazscrows]

Six of Crows Reread🪶

Chapter 46: Pekka

I know this chapter happens but I cannot for the life of me remember anything about it

So this should be fun

Like reading it again for the first time

Poor Nina already sounds worse for wear because of the parem…

Pekka describes her as jutting bones and dark hollows, trembling hands…

She leaned against a giant Fjerdan with a shaved head and grim blue eyes. He was huge, probably former military. Good muscle to have around. Where did Kaz Brekker find these people?

Wait Matthias is bald—

When did that happen??

And Kaz just knows how to find the right people

It’s called making friends.. sort of and being kind.. ish

He’s also just a little lucky

The little canal rat had managed to make it to the Ice Court after all.

It was a good thing, too. If not for Kaz Brekker, Rollins would still be sitting in a cell in that damned Fjerdan prison waiting for another round of torture – or maybe looking down from a pike atop the ringwall.

This is the last time Pekka will think Kaz ever did anything to be glad about

…he’d seen him around the Barrel a few times. The boy had come from nowhere and been a slew of trouble since. But he was still just a lieutenant, not a general, a terrier nipping at Rollins’ ankles.

You created him Pekka

Ooh flashback to the ominous prison cell scene

“Hello, Brekker,” Rollins had said. “Come to gloat?”

“Not exactly. You know me?”

Rollins had shrugged. “Sure, you’re the little skiv who keeps stealing my customers.”

The look that passed over the boy’s face then had taken Rollins aback. It was hatred – pure, black, long simmering. What have I ever done to this little pissant? But in seconds the look was gone, and Rollins wondered if he’d imagined it altogether.

Ha- there and then gone again

“What do you want, Brekker?”

The boy had stood there, something bleak and mad in his gaze. “I want to do you a favour.”

It probably took everything in Kaz not to kill him right then and there

And then he offers him a favor on top of it!

“Why the hell would you help me?”

“You weren’t meant to die here.”

Somehow it sounded like a curse.

Oh it is

Just wait for Kaz’s vengeance…

And the Wraith-

“I owe you, Brekker,” Rollins had said as the boy exited his cell, hardly believing his luck.

Brekker had glanced back at him, his dark eyes like caverns. “Don’t worry, Rollins. You’ll pay.”

Yes, yes he will

Man we probably won’t get something like this on screen anymore

Will Pekka even be at the ice court?

Why did they already do Kaz’s revenge plot in the show???

Ughhh

He stood in the middle of Rollins’ opulent office looking like a dark blot of ink, his face grim, his hands resting on a crow-handled walking stick.

Wow this description of Kaz

He’s a stain in Pekka’s “kingdom”

Kaz just casually asking Pekka for two hundred thousand dollars (kruge)

He offers his shares for the club and fifth harbor too and it’s obviously painful for him

So maybe it’s not so casual actually

It’s weird how the show has flipped this all around

Pekka already has fifth.. he got the club.. it’s already been destroyed..

I don’t get why they did that

It’ll be… interesting to see what they do in the spin-off now to say the least

Rollins leaned back and pressed his fingers together. “It’s not enough, you know. Not to go to war with the Merchant Council.”

“It is for this crew.”

“This crew?” Rollins said with a snort. “I can’t believe you sorry lot were the ones to successfully raid the Ice Court.”

“Believe it.”

Kaz, if not saints, what do you believe in?

My Crows

SaB s1e7

“Van Eck is going to put you in the ground.”

“Others have tried. Somehow I keep coming back from the dead.”

“I respect your drive, kid. And I understand. You want your money; you want the Wraith back; you want a bit of Van Eck’s hide—”

“No,” said Brekker, his voice part rasp, part growl. “When I come for Van Eck, I won’t just take what’s mine. I’ll carve his life hollow. I’ll burn his name from the ledger. There will be nothing left.”

Just like when he eventually comes for you

Such a banger quote

Kaz really has never had a bad track

Pekka Rollins couldn’t count the threats he’d heard, the men he’d killed, or the men he’d seen die, but the look in Brekker’s eye still sent a chill slithering up his spine. Some wrathful thing in this boy was begging to get loose, and Rollins didn’t want to be around when it slipped its leash.

lol it’s already too late for you Pekka

When he held out his hand to shake on the deal, Brekker’s grip was knuckle-crushing.

“You don’t remember me at all, do you?” the boy asked.

“Should I?”

“Not just yet.” That black thing flickered behind Brekker’s eyes.

“The deal is the deal,” said Rollins, eager to be done with this strange lot.

“The deal is the deal.”

Watch your back Pekka…

Or don’t

Actually don’t

RIP (Rest In Pieces)

“What’s with those gloves he wears?” the bruiser asked.

“A bit of theatre, I suspect. Who knows? Who cares?”

Or you know… it’s just Kaz’s greatest weakness.. his greatest shame…

Rollins reached for his watch. It had to be about time for the dealers to change shifts, and he liked to supervise them himself.

“Son of a *****,” he exclaimed a second later.

“What is it, boss?”

Rollins held up his watch chain. A turnip was hanging from the fob where his diamond-studded timepiece should have been. “That little bastard—” Then a thought came to him. He reached for his wallet. It was gone. So was his tie pin, the Kaelish coin pendant he wore for luck, and the gold buckles on his shoes. Rollins wondered if he should check the fillings in his teeth.

I am CACKLING

No one got one over on Pekka Rollins. No one dared. But Brekker had, and Rollins wondered if that was just the beginning.

“Doughty,” he said, “I think we’d best say a prayer for Jan Van Eck.”

Oh it’s definitely only the beginning

And you better save your prayers for yourself

Rollins straightened the knot of his pinless tie and headed down to the casino floor. The problem of Kaz Brekker could wait to be solved another day. Right now there was money to be made.

And that’s what we call a very big mistake my friends

What an idiot

Thats the end folks! Six of Crows finished!

Crooked Kingdom reread… coming soon…

First | Previous

[bloody-wonder]

2024 reading wrap up

january is almost over and yet the ghost of reading year past shall not rest untill i rank all the books👻📚

*the tiers are once again named after different things from the books featured on this list - see explanation below🙃 **the following series i read in full are represented only by one book respectively: doctrine of labyrinths, her instruments, the riverside trilogy, the memoirs of lady trent, the cemeteries of amalo, the stolen heir, the summer hikaru died, evander mills, page & sommers ***usually i don't rank rereads but since this year i had only two - the three musketeers and swordspoint - and they both ended up on the top tier i decided to add them for completeness' sake

so in 2024 i broke all my previous records in regards to the amount of books/pages read. my secret? being unemployed lol. but now that i have started my phd and got a full time job my reading is bound to decrease dramatically which is probably a good thing bc i feel like, while reading so much definitely helps you find more good books and authors faster, the downside is that stories stand out less, regardless of their quality. altho i do love every book i put on the top tier dearly, compared to the previous year's (smaller) selection this one seems quite homogeneous and sff focused. and 3 out of top 5 books/series are straight! who is responsible for this?!🤨

i did well on almost all my nerd ass challenges: finishing and continuing series, starting new ones, not neglecting standalone sff, reading widely in terms of genre and language, not putting off big intimidating books etc etc. i even completed my oldest challenge for the first time by finally managing to read five chunky classics in the span of one year - this won't be happening again any time soon😅 in the future i want to shift my focus to difficult historical novels instead bc i sure don't have enough brain space for both. where i "failed" on the other hand was reading nonfiction: i realized that no matter how much interest i have in the topic the only way i'm able to process factual information is if a trans youtuber dressed as a dominatrix or a cat or some sort of jester is telling it to me in an asmr voice. i'm not very good at encouraging myself to reread the things i want to reread either - hopefully that will change in 2025 so that i can finally reread aftg🪄

last year i tried blogging more about my current reads and it was fun while it lasted - now i sadly don't have time to do that anymore :( so my 2024 reading updates must remain unfinished. in any case, just by looking at this tier list i can come to the same conclusions i would've come to if i had reviewed each and every one of these books: niche sff is where it's at for me, older books are better written, and simply queer is not enough for me anymore - i need intricate mind games and rituals that transcend sexuality lol.

so if you know such books please rec them to me! and tell me about your reading year - by making a tier list, or writing a post or just sharing your fave 2024 reads like @oliviermiraarmstrongs tagged me to do. thank you btw😌💜

@figuringthengsout @fugitoidkry @pinkasrenzo @fandomreferencepending @counterwiddershins @magpiefngrl @sugarbabywenkexing @weirdsociology @theodoradove @doh-rae-me @venndaai @sixappleseeds

p.s. it just came to my knowledge that my year in books is still active. tagging everyone who wants to do this! :D

goodreads │ old yearly wrap ups 2020 2021 2022 2023 │ my book tag

✨explanation of the tier titles under the cut✨

obligation d'âme is a spell a wizard can cast on a person in sarah monette's doctrine of labyrinths that binds them "closer than lovers". it's very bdsm-coded and a tiny bit problematic bc the enchanted then has to do everything the wizard commands and they may or may not be referred to as slave🫢🙈 on the bright side tho it's very hot and gay🤷‍♀️ just like obligation d'âme these books have put me under their problematic spell🪄

peltedverse is the unofficial name of mca hogarth's sci fi universe populated by humans, human-animal hybrids, space elves and aliens, which has been steadily growing on me ever since i discovered the dreamhealers. in 2024 her instruments completely charmed me by its cast of loveable characters, wacky adventures and fairy-tale romance. it's not the best thought-out world but it has this home-cooked quality to it which i prefer to carefully calculated lore that makes 100% of sense all the time. and these books, while not as good as the ones in the upper tier, have still captured my heart😌

racallio ryndoon is an episodic character in george r.r. martin's fire & blood. he's a chaotic crossdressing bisexual pirate captain with purple hair who likes to be spanked by his wives, gives severed heads as a courting gift and will sell the right of safe passage through his waters for a kiss. all in all, a perfect character who is sadly present only for one short episode. i remember him fondly but i wish he had more to give - just like these books☠️🦜⛵

calliagnosia is a procedure ted chiang invented in his short story liking what you see: a documentary which enables people to turn off their perception of physical beauty - leading to less lookism-based discrimination at the cost of finding nobody hot lol (at least in their looks). the story follows the controversy around making calliagnosia obligatory in certain environments and just like the characters who can't seem to decide whether finding people hot or stopping discrimination is more important, i am of two minds on whether these books are actually good or not😅

gong bath is the preferred method of patient treatment of the sex therapist the main character of jen beagin's big swiss is working for. meaning: the patient rests on the couch while the therapist chants and strikes the gong he has in his office. just like gong bath, these books didn't harm me - but they didn't cure me either😐

the philosophers' colloquium is the crusty dusty male centered science academy that kept refusing to admit lady trent despite her outstanding contributions to the natural history of dragons😠 disappointing, overrated, ill-shampooed - just like these books🧐

life-sickness is something the inhabitants of hope mirrlees' lud-in-the-mist didn't realize they suffered from until they tried forbidden fairy fruit. these books were so disappointing, boring, annoying or offensive that they made me brain-sick, depressed and upset about the state of Literature😩

[bigcats-birds-and-books]

Books of 2024: Wrap-Up.

Hello world!! I read sixty-three (63) books in 2024, and here they are! The pages-out books are stand-ins for library books and other borrowed books (which were ADHD for Smartass Women, When Among Crows, Ghost Station, and The Killing Floor). Mostly these are shelved in the order I read them, save for the stack at the end (Ordinary Monsters is Too Tall to fit on my current shelf arrangement, and the borrowed books are out of order).

I posted individual photos (and sometimes reviews!) of everything pictured here, which you can find tagged with their titles or authors, or you can see all of them if you peruse my "books of 2024" tag. Now, for the Highlight Reel, in order of when I read them:

FIVE FAVES

The City We Became by NK Jemisin ★★★★★ Always love Jemisin, but this duology had me laughing more than I remembered for her other books, which I definitely needed! Excellent cast (your honor I love Paolo so much and also literally all of the boroughs), I tore through this by staying up past my bedtime too many nights in a row.

The Butcher of the Forest by Premee Mohamed ★★★★★ Perfect tiny little gutpunch of a book MADE FOR ME, I loved it so damn much. Everyone please go read this immediately.

The Actor and the Target by Declan Donnellan ★★★★★ I was not expecting this to rewire my brain, but it DID, over and over and over again. Very dense chewy book, which I read hoping to get inside an actor character's head better, but honestly I think anyone who does any kind of art or creative endeavor should read this, because OOF was it insightful. (I have ordered his second book that came out this year, but it's hugely on backorder apparently.)(Go figure: The first one was SO GOOD.)

Leech by Hiron Ennes ★★★★★ This was a reread for me, and I'm so glad I revisited it--it holds up even better than the first time through, because so much of it falls into place once you know what's really going on. Masterclass in POV, very gothic, very fucked up, very Deep Winter book, I very much think anyone who was An Animorphs Kid would enjoy the hell out of this (but mind the content warnings, of which there are Many).

Self-Portrait with Nothing by Aimee Pokwatka ★★★★½ This one also hit my perfect trifecta of weird-and-funny-and-fucked-up exactly right, which I wasn't expecting? Pleasant surprise there at the end of the year. Come for the family heart crimes, stay for the unhinged overseas texts to your husband about an art heist, what a blast.

TWO TWOS

turns out i didn't actually read any 1-star books this year, so here's the bottom of the barrel, and yes i DID write lengthy salty reviews about both of these, if you're interested in the particulars of My Beef

Ordinary Monsters by JM Miro ★★ This was too damn long and ~Messy™~, and all of that just to end on a cliffhanger because it's a trilogy. Why did I bother with this 600+ page brick (oh, right: because it sounded promising)(it was Not, or at least not Enough).

Ghost Station by SA Barnes ★★ This was TOO DAMN FRUSTRATING (bad science, bad scientists, stupid characters, etc), and there was JUST ENOUGH neat promising worldbuilding in the background that Could Have Been Cool to make this otherwise mediocre experience enraging. Super bummed, because I wanted to read this author's other stuff, but now I don't trust her and therefore shan't.

Overall! Had a great reading year--those Two Twos were the only things I rated that low, and I enjoyed everything else! Looking forward to another fabulous year of books :)

[amelias-zelda-calamity-quintet]

My card progress and TBR for @expanding-hyrule's TBR BINGO challenge! I'm not actually entering because I'm running the challenge, but including this here to spotlight the works I've done so far.

Because all of these I have already left reviews for, I won't be rehashing my notes, but I enjoyed all of them, and I'll be doing my best to keep this updated until I get that full card.

Card Challenges

The Sea's Prophecy by @cherrysalsa - Recommended by a friend

The King's Lament by @transmascgerudo (A genre I don't normally read)

Divine Gemstones by @divine-gemstones (Caught up on a work)

Cycle of the Stars by @daeyumi (An incomplete project)

A5 - I made an Original Legends work!

I did, multiple! Goddess of Secrecy is complete on Wattpad and currently importing to AO3. Mark of a Hero is wrapping up book 1 on Wattpad & AO3. My other three projects are currently on hiatus, but they will eventually be imported and continued on AO3 as well and are currently on Wattpad.

The Triforce Awakens by @sillylildude - Updated this year

The Hero & The Princess by @mistresslrigtar (Less than 5000 hits or 500 notes)

All That Hurts Us by @karama9 (Picked because of the synopsis)

Alternate Triforce by @alternate-triforce (A comic)

The Mage's Lantern by @loz-untold-myths (Subscribed to an ongoing work)

Hero by @karama9 (A familiar creator)

KeyChain AU by @mirensiart (An Original Legends work not in the archives*)

*was not yet in the archives when I read it

C3 - Show Us Your EH TBR (See below!)

Uneasy Lies the Chosen of Farore by @drsteggy (By a mutual or someone I'd like to be a mutual)

C5 - Multiple POVs (Not yet done)

The Princess's Heart by @loz-untold-myths (A new favorite)

D2 - A reread (Not yet done)

No More. Not One Single Time More by @karama9 (A fic)

On My Honor by @pelicanpig (A genre I love)

Captain Link Araki & the Harbinger of Destiny by @mistresslrigtar (Picked because of the title)

Too Old To Keep by @ladyhoneydee (A compete project)

Stone Fate (both parts) by @loz-untold-myths (Last updated more than a year ago)

Void's Grasp by @the--voided (A new creator)

Remnants of the Past by @justapixelthing (Less than 1000 hits or 100 notes)

Guarding Zelda by @railtracer30 (Left a review in EH's Story Spotlights)

Fic TBR

The Hero of the Dunes

A Crossing of the Stars

Princess Link

The Golden Chain

ALTTS

Unbroken

Legacies and Bloodlines

Make a Wish, Make it Count

Break The Wheel

Path of the Infinite

Song of the City

Blooming in Adversity

The Promise

The Hunt

And the Clouds Parted

Depth of Darkness

In the Blood

Comic/Art TBR

DadLink

Triforce of Power

The Curse of Demise

Untold Myths

Strings of Fate

[kairiscorner]

HEARME OUT 🌼

ive been seeing fics about bad boy x good girl

and i've been seeing novels about hockey players x nerd

YOU ALREADY KNOW WHO I HAVE IN MIND HAHAH ♪(´ε｀*)

he has shitty grades despite being an athletic star so reader tutors him

ITS REALLY SPECIFIC BUT OH YM GO smth abt the bad boy x good girl dynamic does SOMETHING to me ( ≧ᗜ≦)

oH MY GOD ,,, YES PLEASE. LOWKEY WANNA MAKE THIS A SERIES LIKE THE COLLEGE MIGGY ONE HEHEHHEHEHEHEHHE

soccer captain!bad boy!miguel o'hara x nerdy!fem!reader (part 1...?)

the clock mounted on the library wall behind you endlessly ticked all monotonously and rhythmically, ticking you off even more as you tapped your foot against the floorboards impatiently. you knew he was going to have practice after school for an hour and a half, his coach confirmed it with you when you asked–but where the hell was he? you sighed as you shut the book whose contents you were studying closed and began to fix your things and leave–that was, until a loud slam was heard from across the library, which the librarian gave a disgruntled 'shush' for, and the boy of the hour (and the past few) was finally here.

he was all sweaty, his dark, curly locks sweeping over his forehead as he walked over to you and pulled a chair up; slumping into it with a thump, angering the library's patrons and the librarian themselves. you frowned and crinkled your eyebrows at the lack of manners this boy had, and his lack of tact for you taking precious hours out of your day was annoying you beyond belief. "you're late." you reminded him as you folded your arms over your chest. miguel merely chuckled and sat back in his chair. "so what? i'm here now, aren't i?" you grumbled at his cocky response and shook your head gently.

you opened up the book you were reviewing earlier, and before you could even begin to speak, the minute you looked over at miguel, he was napping. with a huff and a look of frustration, you shut the book closed again and leaned over across the table—smacking the top of his head with the book. he mumbled in pain and furrowed his eyebrows at you, looking pissed. "what was that for?" he asked you in a grumble. you opened the book again and reread a few passages. "to wake your lazy ass up." you answered nonchalantly, without even looking up at him. miguel folded his arms over his chest and raised an eyebrow at you. "just so you know, i'm carrying the whole school's soccer team by myself—i'm far from lazy." "in soccer, you might not be, but in terms of... academics..." you trailed off, purposefully making miguel knit his eyebrows together again and making him grumble and lean back into his chair. "just don't act like you're any better than me, which you aren't, dork." he mumbled to you as you took a pen and began writing down some notes. "i'm doing no such thing, you himbo of a jock." you replied to him with a little quip.

though as you were writing, miguel's bigger hand wrapped itself around your wrist, prompting you to look up from the book and papers you were holding and up at his hazel brown eyes. they looked soft, maybe a little... bright, even? wait, why were you even noticing these things, you hardly ever spoke to him—the main reason you were even in the same space as this usually loud, crass, crude jock was because he was in a rough position with his grades. his coach suggested you tutor him after school to keep his act together, or else he'd be off the team entirely; what you weren't expecting was him touching you randomly, this wasn't in the agreement. "what?" "thanks... for doing this for me." he muttered to you, looking into your eyes all sweetly; but you weren't falling for it, you knew he had a reputation for making other people swoon for him effortlessly with his words, if he wanted something else from you, he should just say it directly now. "it's not for you, it's extra credit, which i'll be needing eventually." you correct him as you pull away. miguel chuckled at your response. "extra credit? you already tire the teachers too much with all your babbling in class and being bossy in group projects." "success doesn't come easily, o'hara." "oh, trust me... i know." he said with a light smirk as he stared up at you as he propped his chin up on his folded arms on the table.

you whacked his head with the papers this time, and he grumbled again in frustration at how unfunny this whole shtick was becoming to him. the librarian shushed you two as a second warning, and you leaned in close to him to teach him the lessons he missed wasn't listening to because he was busy napping in class in a hushed voice; though you worried he was focusing on... other things while you were teaching him. what kinds of things? oh, you'll see for yourself eventually.

tags !! @miguelswifey04 @hearts4gabri @hisachuu @wreakingmarveloushavok @fictarian @yuridopted0 @simsrandomstuff @luvstarrstruck @popeheywardssecretgf @meeom @arachnoia @melovetitties @fable-library @ophanimgold @smokeywhalee @capnshtfce

[ninja-muse]

2024 Year-End Reading Wrap-Up

Reading-wise, I think 2024 was about diligence. I kept reading even when I felt slumpy. I managed my goals of minimum one book off my physical TBR per month, minimum 20 non-fiction titles, and 75 of the books I wanted to get to. I didn’t do so great at keeping my book acquisition down, but at least I got rid of as many as I took in (and a lot of the books I bought were used or cheap). I even took in fewer reading copies and managed to pass on a fair number of them! I didn’t quite get to my 2023 total of 128 books and I didn’t quite manage 45,000 pages, only 44,865, but that’s okay. They’re kind of wild goals and I got darn close. Of the 126 books I did read, 29 were off my TBR and 38 were reading copies. That means that 59 were library books, which, thank goodness for libraries! This is why I donate to mine every year.

What I didn’t do so well on were most of my other goals. (2023 for comparison.) I’m still steadyish on Canadian and female authors, steadyish on classics, up on authors of colour (!), but sadly way down on gender-diverse authors. I’m going to have to find more enbies and genderqueer folks I want to read, but that’s hard as it still seems like most non-binary fiction goes towards the dark and grim and realistic and most of my reading choices goes towards the light and hopeful. I will happily take suggestions.

I’m most bummed, though, about breaking my StoryGraph reading streak of 567 days. I went home for Christmas on a late-night flight and the next day, I was just not awake enough to read dense non-fiction. I am looking forward to outdoing myself on this new round.

Yearly total: 126, excluding rereads and picture books Queer books: 37 (29%) Authors of colour: 19.5 (15.4%) Books by women: 77.5 (61.5%) Authors outside the binary: 3 (2%) Canadian authors: 12 (9.5%) Classics: 7 (5.5%) Off the TBR shelves: 29 (23%) Books hauled: 47 Books unhauled: 47 ARCs acquired: 40 ARCs unhauled: 46.5 DNFs: 10 Rereads: 3 Picture Books: 11

Outside of the stats and goals, I think my choice to mostly leave Tumblr was a good one. I’m feeling a lot less pressure to read The Right Things or whatever everyone else is, and less pressure to be constantly posting, though I do miss seeing what you all are reading. Please, please, feel free to tag me in reading wrap-ups and reviews, especially if you think it’s a book I’d be interested in. I do check my mentions regularly. (Friendly reminder that I’m ninjamuse on Storygraph and LibraryThing, if you’d like to follow me there.) And not posting as much as helped me get more writing done. I’m not quite finished the first draft of the cozy fantasy WIP, but I’m within sight of it, if I manage to get my mojo back after Extreme Retail Season.

My goals are 2025 are fairly reasonable and predictable. 126 books and 40,000 pages, and I've set up StoryGraph challenges to encourage myself to read 50 new releases and 50 backlist titles. I'm going to try for 20 non-fiction again too, though this year that was very much by the skin of my teeth. And of course, the enby author thing. And I'm going to finish the dang WIP and restart an old one. Wish me luck?

Click through for more book recs and breakdowns:

Books Reviewed Eve - Cat Bohannon I Love Russia - Elena Kostyuchenko The Briar Club - Kate Quinn Evelina - Frances Burney How to Become a Dark Lord (and Die Trying) - Django Wexler The Jinn-Bot of Shantiport - Amit Basu The Disenchantment - Celia Bell The Dollmakers - Lynn Buchanan Submerged - Hillel Levin A History of Ancient Egypt - John Romer

And if anyone’s interested, here are the rest of my year’s highlights: Top Five Fiction (not ranked) Rose/House - Arkady Martine How to Become a Dark Lord and Die Trying - Django Wexler The Briar Club - Kate Quinn Navola - Paolo Bacigalupi The Disenchantment - Celia Bell Top Five Non-Fiction (not ranked) History of Ancient Egypt, Volume 3 - John Romer Malady of the Mind - Jeffrey A. Lieberman Sociopath - Patric Gagne I Love Russia - Elena Kostyuchenko The Demon of Unrest - Erik Larson Most Impressed By: I Love Russia - Elena Kostyuchenko The Jinn-Bot of Shantiport - Amit Basu Evelina - Frances Burney Nicked - M.T. Anderson

Most Disappointing: Wordhunter - Stella Sands Bad Glass - Richard E. Gropp The Black Bird of Chernobyl - Ann McMan The Dishonest Miss Take - Faye Murphy The Voyage of the Damned - Frances White Longest Book: A History of Ancient Egypt, Volume 3 - John Romer Best Queer Book: A Desolation Called Peace - Arkady Martine

Did I beat 2023? No, but 126 is really close to 128. Did I beat my Best Year Ever? No. That would be 2021. Did I read more classics? Yes Did I read more Canadians? No Did I whittle my TBR shelves down any? No. Was it a good reading year? Average. Breakdowns by month:

January February March April May June July August September October November December

[magicalyaku]

Hello and welcome to my 2023 reading wrap up! A big Thank You to everyone who followed my ramblings throughout the year! <3 I will continue through 2024. Maybe I'll learn how to write proper reviews, at least I'll try to remember better what I actually want to say about the stories. In 2022, I read 93 books plus my own. Guess how many it were in 2023? 93 plus my own!! xD That was huge coincidence and I love it. Of these 94 books, 4 are rereads (which won't be included in the "Favourite" sections), 2 are non-fiction, 11 are non-queer. I only DNFed 1 book (which is not pictured) and other than that I only disliked 6 books! (And it's a pretty soft dislike in comparison. I don't hate them nearly enough to want to shit on them again. :'D).

So on the the awards!

Most Read Author: KJ Charles (8 books)

Least Favourite Book: Daresh (Katja Brandis) (the one I could not finish for dear life)

Favourite Character: Brand (The Tarot Sequence) and Will (The Will Darling Adventures) (yes, there's a trend)

Favourite Covers (of books I read, not releases):

(There were too many. D:)

Highest Emotional Investment (aka The Agony, the suffering, the why you do this to me Award): Dark Heir - The Scottish Boy - In Memoriam

Wildest Story: The Adventures of Pinocchio

Favourite Books:

The Devil's Luck (L.S. Baird)

The Scottish Boy (Alex de Campi)

In Memoriam (Alice Winn)

Just Lizzie (Karen Wilfried)

Dark Heir (C.S. Pacat)

The Will Darling Adventures (KJ Charles)

Gwen & Art are not in Love (Lex Croucher)

The Buried and the Bound (Rochelle Hassan)

More Books I enjoyed greatly:

Oracle of Senders series (Mere Joyce)

Of Feathers and Thorns (Kit Vincent)

Wren Martin Ruins it all (Amanda deWitt)

Simon Snow series (Rainbow Rowell)

The Five Stages of Andrew Brawley (Shaun David Hutchinson)

The Tarot Sequence (K.D. Edwards)

The First and Last Adventure of Kit Sawyer (S.E. Harmon)

Sixteen Souls (Rosie Talbot)

By any Other Name (Erin Cotter)

The High King's Golden Tongue (Megan Derr) and more!!

Most Used Name: I counted names last year and didn't want to do it again this year because I read so much fantasy, so the names were all over. Still, there was one who stood out amongst them all with at least 4 instances, if not more. Probably more.

Will

Congratulations. I have to admit, I've always liked that name. My favourite character of all times and part of my one and only OTP is named Will as well and I kinda hope the last book of their second trilogy never comes because it will probably make me scream and ... ...

Bonus! This year, I counted pages! Because I felt that most books were much shorter than what I read before. So I wanted to know. Turns out, my feeling was wrong. My 93 books had a whole of 33011 pages which results in approximately 350 pages per book. That's pretty normal I dare say.

That's it for 2023! I had a very good year in books. I wanted to read less actually, and failed spectacularly because I had too much fun. And if anyone's wondering how I read so much, I read fast and I just didn't do anything else in my free time. Escapism to the max. I hope, the new year treats you well! I hope, you have fun with the books you read! Let's meet again soon! <3

[eggcatsreads]

January Reading Wrap-Up

Read: 15 books

DNF (Did Not Finish): 2 books

Favorite Book of January: The Gilded Crown by Marianne Gordon

Least Favorite Book of January: My Funny Demon Valentine by Aurora Ascher (DNF'd at 16%)

Genres read: Horror (5), Fantasy (4), Science Fiction (1), Historical Fiction (3), Thriller (2)

See under the cut for book descriptions and links to my Goodreads Reviews!

[I have all the books included in my pinned post, but this is more specific for each book this month instead of just book titles and star ratings!]

Genre: Horror

Gruesome Getaway - RN Cogley: 4/5 - Review

A vacation at a strange village suddenly turns into a slasher movie.

Motheater - Linda H Codega: 4/5 - Review

Something is killing the miners in Kire Mountain, and the woman investigating them must team up with an Appalachian witch to uncover why.

But Not Too Bold - Hache Pueyo: 4/5 - Review

Sapphic monster romance between an enormous humanoid spider and the woman tasked with helping her.

Hungerstone - Kat Dunn: 4/5 - Review

A sapphic Carmilla retelling where a strange woman upends Lenore's life and forces her choose her own destiny.

These Vengeful Wishes - Vanessa Montalban: 4/5 - Review

A teenage girl discovers a magical wishing well that causes unexpected consequences, and discovers a bloodline curse haunting her family.

Genre: Fantasy

The Generation Archives - RR Boxall: 5/5 - Review

A dystopian fantasy where a young girl realizes she has to confront everything she thought she knew to learn who she truly is - and survive.

Hull and Fire - James W Cutter: 4/5 - Review

A ship appears after 9 years at sea, and the captain's children are forced to flee on the same ship when xenophobia begins to spread onto their doorstep.

The Gilded Crown - Marianna Gordon: 5/5 - Review

A young woman who can bring back the dead and the princess she's forced to keep alive try to survive together in this tale about oppressive religious structures that aim to choke out any dissenting voices.

The Outcast Mage - Annabel Campbell: 4/5 - Review

A mage who can't do proper magic must escape to learn how to control her strange powers before she - and those in charge - destroy everyone around her.

Genre: Science Fiction

Nytho - Sheri Singerling: 4/5 - Review

An AI gains sentience and one woman has to do everything she can to free him.

Genre: Historical Fiction

Grimm Curiosities - Sharon Lynn Fisher: 2/5 - Review

A young woman has to run her late father's shop and care for her ailing mother - while strange things begin to happen around her.

Epic of Helinthia - MJ Pankey: 5/5 [Reread] - Review

A small group of people must try to unite to overthrow the Anax and replace him with the rightful heir of Apollo - before the world around them is destroyed in famine.

Oracle of Helinthia - MJ Pankey: 5/5 - Review

The heir to Helinthia is found - but with war on the horizon and the people uprising in unrest, allies are hard to find among the spies.

Genre: Thriller

Death in the Downline - Maria Abrams: 4/5 - Review

Trying to be a "Girl Boss! #SheEO" in this MLM scheme might just kill you.

This Girl's a Killer - Emma C Wells: 5/5 - Review

Cordelia Black is a serial killer - but only to men who deserve such a fate.

[melisnonstop]

𝙱𝙴𝚃𝚆𝙴𝙴𝙽 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝙻𝙸𝙽𝙴𝚂

↳ 📱𝚊 𝚜𝚘𝚌𝚒𝚊𝚕 𝚖𝚎𝚍𝚒𝚊 𝚊𝚞 (4/)

TikTok Video – Alex’s 2nd Chance Review of *Brideshead Revisited*

@acd.chronicles

(Video opens with Alex sitting on his couch with the book in hand, this time marked with tabs and notes. He smirks a little, clearly referencing his earlier statements)

Alex

"Okay, so last time I talked about *Brideshead Revisited*, I... wasn’t exactly kind to it.

(He chuckles softly, flipping through the book’s worn pages)

Alex

“I said it was a story of rich people being sad in castles, and honestly, I stand by a lot of what I said.

"But—Henry, you got me. I reread it, and yeah, I noticed more this time. I have... thoughts."

Alex

"So first off, I’ll admit, Waugh’s ability to write emotional nuance, especially between two men, is something I didn’t appreciate as much the first time around.

“There’s something undeniably beautiful about how Waugh captures queerness through subtext.

(He opens the book to an annotated page)

Alex

"'Perhaps all our loves are merely hints and symbols; vagabond languages scrawled on the walls of caves.'

“And honestly, it’s kind of... heartbreaking, seeing how much is left unsaid because it had to be, for so many reasons."

(Alex pauses, nodding as if considering the layers more)

Alex

"But here’s the thing—while I can appreciate the beauty and complexity of these relationships, I still stand by what I said in my first video.

“We do need to look at these stories critically, especially classics that were written in a different time. *Brideshead* unequivocally centers on the lives of wealthy, white, privileged characters.

“We can appreciate the artistry while also recognizing the limits of who gets to tell these kinds of stories and why they’re still held up as ‘the best we’ve got.’

“It’s important we keep pushing back on this idea that classics should be held up without critique.”

(Alex sets the book aside and smiles, wrapping up on a lighter note)

Alex

"Anyway, shoutout to Henry for making me rethink things, and I’ll admit, this second read gave me a lot to think about. Peace and love, y’all.”

↳ 📱

TikTok Video – Henry’s Review of *The City We Became* by N.K. Jemisin

@SonnetAndSpice

(The video opens with Henry sitting in a cozy setting, soft lighting, with a cup of tea steaming beside him. He smiles warmly at the camera, adjusting the book on his lap before glancing back up with a calm but enthusiastic expression)

Henry

“Hello, everyone. Welcome back to *Fox and Folio*—though today, we’re taking a bit of a detour into the future. And by ‘future,’ I mean N.K. Jemisin’s *The City We Became,* which… well, Alex might’ve just introduced me to a new all-time favorite.

(Henry chuckles softly, holding up the book with an unmistakable glimmer in his eyes, his expression like he’s still processing how much the story resonated with him)

Henry

“So, for those who haven’t read it yet, *The City We Became* is this brilliant mashup of urban fantasy, science fiction, and social commentary. It’s—well—it’s a lot of things, but most of all, it’s alive.

“It’s about New York City becoming alive—literally—and how each borough has its own avatar, these human embodiments that represent the city’s diversity, its grit, and honestly, its soul.

“The way Jemisin creates this rich, living tapestry of New York, while also exploring themes like gentrification, systemic racism, and community—it’s nothing short of genius. It feels… urgent, you know?”

(He takes a thoughtful sip of his tea, as though collecting his thoughts for a moment, then continues with a softer tone)

Henry

“The characters aren’t just representing the city—they’re *fighting* for their boroughs, for the identity of their communities. There’s this brilliant quote in the book: ‘Cities are not people, but something else altogether: cities are alive.’

"And what Jemisin does, beautifully, is show us that cities are made of the people who care for them. The ones who’ve been here the longest, the ones whose voices we need to hear most. That idea just… stuck with me."

(He runs a hand over the book's cover, a brief pause as he looks down, processing the weight of the subject)

Henry

“I’ve only been here a short while, but every day I’m more aware of how the city’s history, and its people, shape it into what it is. How painful it must be to see it change—forcefully, and sometimes, without care.

“And to be honest, it’s something I think about constantly. I’m… aware that I’m part of that problem, just by being here.”

(His voice grows a bit quieter, more introspective, as he acknowledges the weight of his own role in the city)

Henry

“This book doesn’t try to tell you how to feel, but it does ask you to *see*—to see what’s really happening, and to be mindful of your place in it.

"Jemisin doesn’t preach—she just opens your eyes. And... I think that’s the kind of narrative we need more of."

(He leans back slightly, his usual calm demeanor returning, though there’s an undeniable intensity behind his words. His passion is clear, but it’s delivered with a gentle grace)

Henry

“I genuinely think *The City We Became* is one of the most exciting, thought-provoking books I’ve read in years. If you live in New York—or even if you don’t—it’ll change the way you look at cities, at communities, and at identity itself. It’s just... something I can’t recommend enough.”

(Henry shifts slightly, a playful smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth as he continues, making sure to credit Alex)

Henry

“Of course, credit where credit’s due—thank you, Alex, for pushing me to read this. I don’t think I’d have picked it up on my own, but I’m *so* glad I did.”

(He smiles softly, a bit sheepish but sincere, his gratitude genuine)

Henry

“And thank you, N.K. Jemisin, for writing a story that feels so deeply resonant. You’ve truly created something remarkable.

“As always, let me know if you’ve read it—and what you thought. I’d love to hear your perspectives on this one.

"Until next time—happy reading, and cheers."

(The video ends with Henry leaning forward slightly, giving the camera a final, knowing smile)

[elizmanderson]

2024 wrap-up, part 1

part two | part three | part four

[ABBA voice] here we go again, my my—

anyway, now that I've put that song in your head, let's look back at my year

writing

book stuff

as you may know, my second book, The Keeper of Lonely Spirits, releases in March 2025! so I spent much of this year editing, then editing some more, then line editing, then copy editing, then going over pass pages, then over more pass pages... the process never ends (until it's too late to make changes)

(artist: Xuan Loc Xuan)

if you find any typos in the final book come March, instead of being annoyed about them, you should recognize their determination and give them an award for MVT (most valuable typo) and a kiss on their lil typewritten forehead. because they made it not only through my own fifty six thousand rereads, but also through my agent, my editor, my copy editor, and my proofreader, and I think almost every single one of those people went through the book at least twice

anyway, The Keeper of Lonely Spirits is a cozy fantasy about an old man cursed with immortality who hunts ghosts rather than making mortal friends who will die one day. when the residents of an Ohio town beset by a vengeful spirit adopt him as their own, he must decide: leave to protect his heart, or stay to save their lives?

link to StoryGraph listing

link to signed preorders through my local indie

link to unsigned preorders through the publisher

I also received my first ever trade reviews, one of which was a starred review from Library Journal! trade reviews can convince booksellers and libraries to purchase the book, especially if positive, especially if starred. they look good on a book's resume

read the reviews here:

link to Library Journal review

link to Publishers Weekly review

short stories

because I was so busy with novel stuff, I only wrote one short story this year. part of one short story. back at the start of January.

you know what happened? I let it sit for a few days for reasons I no longer remember, and when I came back I couldn't remember quite where I was going with it a l a s

anyway it's a queer Cinderella-inspired short, and I'd love to magically figure out a direction for it afresh so I can finish it in 2025

in-progress stuff

...we still won't talk about how revising last year's cozy mystery is going, but in my defense (a) I've been on deadline for other things and (b) just nine chapters in I had already strayed so far from my scene list that I had to rethink the whole book, whoops

mostly, I've been working on the second book that this publisher bought, which has resulted in a very terrible first draft full of so many footnotes and brackets that I would almost call it a zero draft, except I can't bring myself to use that term*

(*for myself. y'all use it as much as you like, if you like it)

literally it was 79,000 words, 6,000 words of which were footnotes-to-self so as not to ruin my fancy WIP aesthetic (Blackadder and Perpetua ftw) with comments

anyway, then there was a marginally less terrible second draft, which is what my editor got (a respectable 98,000 words with zero footnotes and almost zero brackets)

THEN I was supposed to take a break and not think about the book again until my editor read it and got back to me...but instead I immediately wrote a brand new synopsis, sent it to her like "seriously you don't even have to read the version I already sent you bc it's gonna look so different," and then a couple weeks later whoops turned around started rewriting the whole story

which isn't going great bc I really DO need a break, I can TELL I need a break, but unfortunately when it comes to writing my brain is like "NO BREAK. ONLY WRITE >:[" which is Not Good. but I am trying to let myself casually poke at it instead of going hard and getting it done fast enough to send to my editor before she can even read the version she has lolol, so that's something

no-context spoilers for this WIP:

(tried finding the original post but could not, so screenshot from the internet it is)

that's it for part one! part two to follow is here! link to part two

[jeanmoreaux]

*✧ — october wrap up

after posting my last wrap in may (??!!?), i am bringing back my wrap up this month due to popular demand (one person sending me an ask about it). frankly, my summer has been quite busy and packed with many, many experiences. and while i read a lot of book in the months from june to now, i simply didn't find the time or energy to make these posts. so i won't catch you up on what i have been reading over the summer, BUT you can check out my goodreads if you're interested. if there is a standout among them, i am sure it will end up on my end of year wrap up/favourites list. if you have any specific questions though (best/worst books of a specific month), i am more than happy to give you an answer.

2024 goal: 171/100 books

as alway, feel free to drop book recs, questions, or opinions in my inbox; i am always happy to talk to you about books!

* –> newly added to my favorites shelf

follow my goodreads | follow my storygraph  | previous wrap ups

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The Brightness Between Us by Eliot Schrefer | 5★

The Duke at Hazard by K.J. Charles | 3★

If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin | 5★

The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen by K.J. Charles | 3★

A Nobleman's Guide to Seducing a Scoundrel by K.J. Charles | 4★

Thank You for Listening by Julia Whelan | 4★

The White Book by Kang Han | 4★

* We Could Be So Good by Cat Sebastian | 4.5★

We Can Never Leave This Place by Eric LaRocca | 2★

* You Should Be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian | 5★

The Murders of Molly Southbourne by Tade Thompson | 5★

The Iliad translated by Emily Wilson | 5★

* Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones | 5★

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

rereads

Masters of Death by Olivie Blake | 4.75★ | review

Heartstopper: Volume Five by Alice Oseman | 4.5★

Charlotte's Web by E.B. White | 5★

The Foxhole Court by Nora Sakavic | 5★ | review

The Raven King by Nora Sakavic | 5★ | review

He Started It by Samantha Downing | 4.75★ | review

The King’s Men by Nora Sakavic | 5★ | review

[arimiadev]

2024 Year in Review

If 2023 was a new leaf for me, then 2024 was a year of tying up loose ends. I started off 2024 with multiple unfinished projects that needed wrapping up—more than I like having open at any time.

Canvas Menagerie was entering its 2nd year of development, I was in the midst of finishing Asphodelium—which was supposed to be a Winter Jam 2023 project—and a separate Winter Jam 2022 project, Lost Lune, that only had a partial amount of progress made on it. Suffice to say, I was somewhat in over my head with unfinished games.

I’m the type that is self motivated while working, but I can get overwhelmed when I have several projects in progress (including game dev, marketing, IRL, etc). So, clearly I needed to actually finish some things, even though my games were just hobby projects.

…But, I also had to start some new projects. An idea I’ve had for a while was an otome sequel to Crimson Waves on the Emerald Sea, something I told myself I wouldn’t make unless I could get a writer and artist to help me with it. Well, guess what my Otome Jam 2024 project was…

In February I set up a new side website—Arimia’s Doujin Den! It’s a little blog for me to share the doujin fan games I’ve collected over the years, many of which no longer have any internet presence at all. It takes a lot of passion and dedication to make an indie game but maybe even a touch more for a fan game, and I don’t want that passion to go to waste. I’ve only catalogued a few so far, but I want to do even more in the future.

However, about halfway through 2024 I was laid off from my software development job very suddenly. I was partially expecting for months to be laid off at any point as the company has lay offs every single month, but it was still incredibly sudden. I had hoped to at least make it through to the end of the year, not only half the year!

I also began doing social media work for Studio Everium, an indie otome studio. I’ve only ever worked at Studio Élan for marketing (and this marks my 5th year there!) so it’s been a fun change of pace to help share even more visual novels to the world. Speaking of Élan, I spent a few weekends this year traveling and attending conventions! We had booths at Offkai Expo and Otakon, where we sold our yuri games and met a lot of fans & fellow developers. It was my first time going to a convention outside of Memphis and was so fun to finally meet so many friends (and make new ones).

At the tail end of the year, I finished rereading Umineko in October (on the 5th, of course), which I hadn’t read since….middle school. It was such a refreshing reread, to not only read something made with so much love for the world but also to confirm that it was just as good—even better, with fresh eyes on the queer narrative—than I remembered. Anyway, that’s what led me to get back into reading novels. I wanted to see some of r07’s inspiration for it, so I picked up And Then There Were None and dived into several other of Christie’s tales, which led me to joining an in-person book club (where all of the members could be my parents/grandparents…!) to force myself to get out more.

Projects

Canvas Menagerie

My main goal for 2024 was to finish writing Canvas Menagerie, but my secret internal goal was to finish the entire game—and I did! Just a couple of weeks ago I managed to release it to the world after 3 years of solo development. It’s not exactly what I envisioned it being when I started outlining it (and I definitely chunked and rewrote my outlines several times), but I’m still happy with how it came out.

I’m also happy to finally have a commercial game out that doesn’t have my writings & art from early college (that’s practically high school…!!). It’s something I’ve been somewhat self conscious about for a few years—to be honest, I don’t like my prior commercial works. I can only look at them and cringe somewhat, knowing how old the writing and art is. Now I finally have a commercial project I’m (mostly) proud of.

The final game ended up being 138k words with 15+ CGs and 10+ character sprites. I did all of the work on the project, outside of the backgrounds, music, and GUI design. I’m thankful for all of the people who supported the project to the end!

I was also able to do a lifelong goal—have a physical release for one of my games!

These were handmade by myself. I think they came out pretty cute~

Asphodelium

My other main goal for 2024 was to finish and release Asphodelium. Well, about that….

I did end up finishing it, releasing it in January. That version was right at 40k words long with 1 story line and 2 slightly different endings. But, well… I wanted to do more with it!

I got several extremely positive comments after releasing it and I loved writing Aster & Hazel’s push-and-pull relationship, so I started secretly working on an expansion afterwards. The main story already covers a lot of ideas regarding cults, but I wanted to expand upon it even more. There’s plenty more aspects I want to touch on such as the depersonalization cult members experience and the idea of self identity after leaving a cult. It’s a completely different vibe from the comfyness of Canvas Menagerie, to say the least!

I’m currently aiming to make it a full commercial release sometime in the first half of 2025 by adding a new story path (with at least a couple of new endings), at least 25k more words, and several new CGs. I’ve already written 14k words and drawn 2 new CGs, so it’s progressing smoothly. This will be the main project I’m working on going into 2025.

Crimson Waves on the Emerald Sea: Amaranthine Moon

As mentioned before, I couldn’t go the entire year without starting a new long-term project of course. I began preparing as soon as Asphodelium was out the door to attempt a sequel to my 2021 fantasy mystery visual novel Crimson Waves on the Emerald Sea. I say “attempt” as I went into the planning phase sure that I would only make it if I was able to find solid partners to make the projects with—after all, I had enough projects to work on solo! It’s been years since I directed a project without my writing and art, so I wanted to give it a shot again.

I was lucky to find Runa Winters to helm the writing based off of my terribly shoddy outline & character notes, Iron to edit it into a cohesive narrative, and Dule to bring the colorful cast to life. Together, we were able to get a demo out and also later get featured on the IGN YouTube as part of the Dames 4 Games Fall Showcase!

Witch You Want

Over at Élan, in September we wanted to try something new—a game jam! Several of us had already entered game jams in the past (and I had just finished a game jam—more on that later), so we thought it’d be a good way to rejuvenate ourselves and our creative juices.

I lead a team with Natasha Luna providing her wonderful writing and Dani creating our own magic with their lovely illustrations. The premise is simple—a local witch desperately needs help making enough potions for the festival that weekend. She’s just, like, only slightly incompetent and ditzy. Slightly.

We made the game in under a month alongside 3 other yuri visual novels from the game jam. I did all of the programming, with some outside assistance from Feniks. I think it turned out pretty cute!

Dahlia

Around April I got the itch to join a game jam (we hadn’t decided to do an internal jam at Élan quite yet) and became interested in the Velox series of jams. They’re Ludum Dare-inspired visual novel game jams which is absolutely perfect for me. I got my start making games with Ludum Dare, as a bunch of my first visual novels were Ludum Dare entries. They taught me how to actually make a game from start to finish and set deadlines for myself.

I entered Velox Formido, which was by far the strictest game jam I’ve ever entered. You have 36 hours to make a visual novel. Still, somehow I was able to make a story with 2 character sprites and multiple endings in the time frame. I think it came out rather nice, as the art direction came out exactly as I imagined.

Starlit Regrets

After entering Velox Formido, I found I really liked the format and was eager to enter the next in the series. In August they held Velox Fabula 2, a 10 day long version of the jam. This gave me a lot more room to work with my idea—maybe a bit too much!

Starlit Regrets is a melancholic story focused on reminiscing and letting the player guide the narrative, both the past and present. It has quite a few different scenes in it depending on choices and 5 endings over 15k words long (I don’t know how I was able to churn out that much in such a short time)! Most of my long visual novels are very linear, so it’s fun to try branching narratives for my shorter games.

Articles

Continuing from last year, I interviewed other visual novel developers! I was lucky to have Katelyn from GB Patch Games, Gabby from Two and a Half Studios, and Tony & Abby from Black Tabby Games all sit down with me in 2024 to talk about their visual novels and how they approach the medium.

Interviewing other developers is still a bit nerve-wracking for me, but it always turns out to be a fun and informative experience.

After getting home from Offkai Expo, I wrote up an overview of our (wonderful) experiences as well as some takeaways from it. We had a great time selling there, but it’s not something that can easily be replicated…!

And continuing from last year’s article looking over Mahoyo’s very questionable marketing campaign, I took a look at both Mahoyo and Tsukihime remake‘s approach to visual direction. So no badmouthing Aniplex this time, but instead praising Type-Moon’s art direction.

My last blog post for the year was also partially a postmortem for Canvas Menagerie. I’ve been on a lot of projects in varying states of being finished, so it was a big relief to finally finish my 3 year long project. I hope it’ll help other developers push themselves across the finish line…!

Art

This year I did a lot of art assets! 4 of the images here are in-game assets and 4 are promotional artworks for the games.

I also participated in Umitober this year, an Inktober-inspired month-long art event where you draw Umineko arts based on different themes each day. Most of my submissions were sketches as I wanted to just try a bunch of different poses and focus on quantity over quality—the best way to get better is to draw a lot, so I used it as pose practice.

Goals

2024 Goals:

Fully write Act 3 of Canvas Menagerie: This was the lite version of this goal. I actually wanted to fully finish the visual novel but didn’t want to overshoot, as I was still working a full time job. Suffice to say I cleared this goal with flying colors.

Release the full version & an artbook for Asphodelium: I actually forgot I was going to release an artbook with the original release… Well, I hope I’ll release one with the extended cut next year. I made an artbook for Canvas Menagerie which was a lot of fun, so I want to do it again.

Go to an out-of-town convention: I’ve never been to an anime convention outside of Memphis…until now! I was able to travel to Offkai Expo and Otakon this year which was so amazing.

Share more VNs I like: I was able to do this as well! I’ve started sharing my favorites from Spooktober after the event as well as cataloguing some of the doujin games I own on Neocities. It’s fun to be able to share some of the visual novel gems I’ve played.

2025 Goals:

Release the extended version for Asphodelium: In January I released the “full” version of Asphodelium, but as mentioned I want to extend it even more. This edition isn’t too far from being done, so I hope to release it in the first half of 2025.

Release Crimson Waves on the Emerald Sea: Amaranthine Moon: CWES: AM has had a lot of progress on the writing front, so I need to get back to scripting it…! We were originally thinking of releasing it Q1 2025 but want to give it more time in the oven. It’s only been in development for half a year as of now, so a later 2025 release would be great.

Fill an entire sketchbook: I have a sketchbook from 2 years ago I started for doing pose practice and this year I want to finally fully use the sketchbook with practices. Not full arts—just practicing everything.

Get back to kanji studies: I feel like this is a goal for a lot of people, hah. Given how often I try to navigate JP websites and play JP games, I need to get back to learning JP!

Document more doujin games: One of the hobbies I started in 2024 was archiving doujin games I have, as many don’t have any documentation online anymore. This is still a side project of mine, but I want to continue blogging about doujin games (namely fangames) and sharing these gems.

2024 certainly had a lot of ups and downs and changes and curveballs. Looking back on it, it was a better year for me than I thought it would be (and remember it being). I was able to finally travel on my own, meet so many friends, try new things, and find new joys.

I’m very nervous going into 2025 as my first year being a fulltime freelancer. I’ve got some cushions set in place, but it’s still a bit nerve-wracking. Now that I’m no longer in my early 20s, things are changing—but in a way, I’ve been finding myself through it. I want to be in visual novels for many more years to come. I love making visual novels, playing visual novels, talking about visual novels. I want to spend time with my friends, flying out to see them and going to conventions where I’m able to meet even more amazing people.

I hope this year will be kind to us all. Cultivate the space you want to live in and help the people you care about.

— Arimia

[ramblings-of-lola]

October '24 Wrap Up

The Fellowship of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings #1) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Genre: Classic Fantasy

Thoughts: Rereading this book always feels like returning home. I haven't read this series in a few years and forgot how funny it is. Diving into Tolkien's rich world of Middle-earth is always lovely. This reread I've also noticed more connections to Christian symbolism and that's fascinating.

The Two Towers (The Lord of the Rings #2) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Genre: Classic Fantasy

Thoughts: I had a little bit of a harder time reading through this one, mainly because life got busy and the descriptions of walking in nature got a little tedious to read. But, I still loved my reread of it, some of my favorite moments in the series are in The Two Towers. The main one is the part with Shelob. It's written so well and the second half of the book has been building up to it, and it delivers. I also like when Merry and Pippin are with the orcs (it has the same terrifying feeling as Shelob) and Treebeard (he's such an interesting character). And Gandalf's return with his greater powers and authority is also so interesting to read.

Books I DNFed (did not finish): None this month

Goal Progress (under the cut because it's a little long)

I have a tag list for when I do wrap ups! If you want to be added or taken off of it, please let me know!

Tagging: @thatrandomlemononyourcounter1 @qylinscafvne @book-girl4evaaa @sunflxwcrs @bookwormgirl123

@thoughts-of-caly

These aren't all of my goals, I'm only including the ones that apply for this month. Here's a link to all of them, if you're curious.

Read more books I own ✅ -> I bought the three books and got to read these copies for the first time! Before, I only had a bind up that's over 1000 pages.

Regularly go through Goodreads list to remove books ❌ -> I've just been adding books 😅

Keep up with reviews for wrap ups. ✅

Less scrolling, more reading. ❌ -> I did okay with this for a few days then barely read for a few weeks. Hopefully I can do better next month.

Try to read more classics ✅ -> I'm counting this because even though Lord of the Rings is a reread, it's still classic fantasy.

[bigcats-birds-and-books]

Books of 2024: October Wrap-Up.

Gr8 news: I am no longer very far behind on my NaNo prep reading!! I had to drop JUST LIKE HOME (reread) and HOUSE OF LEAVES, but I got through the rest of my Haunted House and/or Aliens and/or Parasite/Fungus TBR. Here they all are!

Photos and/or reviews linked:

SHRIEK - ★★★★ I think SHRIEK Is my favorite volume of the Ambergris trilogy, taken as a whole--the one-way conversation Duncan was having with Janice was a really neat narrative choice, and then the reveal in the Afterword's Afterword was, in true VanderMeer fashion, mind-blowing.

FINCH - ★★★★ I was actually surprised by how much I liked this one. It helped me figure out a LOT about what kinds of power dynamics I enjoy in borderline-dystopian fiction, and what intrigues me most about limited agency. It wrapped the story up almost too neatly, for a VanderMeer, but I did still have a good time and blitzed through it quickly. Given this one and SHRIEK, I'm counting the Whole Series as a Four-Star read--I'd like to reread it someday, now that I know what's going on.

LEECH - ★★★★★ (reread) STILL ONE OF MY ALL-TIME FAVES, OFFICIALLY!! It's very gothic and heavy and fucked up, but it does FASCINATING things with POV, and worldbuilding, and storytelling frameworks. PLEASE check the content warnings, but if none of those are hard no's for you, definitely pick this one up. I suspect anyone for whom Animorphs was a Formative Influence will adore this (but so far my sample size is really only 1)--please prove me right.

A HOUSE WITH GOOD BONES - ★★★½ This was fun! Not my favorite Kingfisher (that award still goes to HOLLOW PLACES), but I had a good time--I laughed, I squealed over vultures, I blasted through pages to get to the end.

STARLING HOUSE - ★★★★ Alix E. Harrow always manages to write exactly my catnip, somehow. Maybe it's the ADHD, but I'm constantly finding connections to my own writing projects in her work, and STARLING HOUSE was no exception! I liked that this one was more modern, and the sibling dynamic was precious, and I love weird sentient houses where space is more of a suggestion than a hard and fast rule. I'll probably reread this one for Driscoll purposes!

WOODWORM - ★★★½ So much rage in such a tiny volume, and I was Absolutely Here For It. I don't tend to read much lit fic, but I do try to read a lot in translation, and I thought this one did very cool stuff with Spanish--the prose felt natural in English, but I loved the linguistic details the translators left in Spanish and how much depth that added. I feel like this one might be a good fit for Carmen Maria Machado fans, too.

HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE - ★★★ Call this a low 3, from me. It was Fine, I guess. I liked what he did with the act structure (labeling parts as stages of grief was very cool), and I liked the family dynamics and history, but a lot of the humor didn't land for me (I got a few sensible chuckles, but a bunch of it wasn't funny), and the "oh this author is A Man, huh" moments made me roll my eyes (seriously: Who thinks about their ~breasts~ when an angry taxidermied squirrel is clawing down your shirt?? No One With Breasts, Mr. Dude). This book did at least teach me that I'm not really interested in gore (it's just boring, unlike body horror, my beloved). I might still pick up HORRORSTOR, but I probably won't look into most of his other stuff, if this one is indicative of his general style. Meh.

THE ART OF EXCESS - No rating (didn't read the whole thing). At the end of ALWAYS COMING HOME, Richard Powers mentioned this book as the reason he finally committed to ALWAYS, so I was curious what this Tom Leclair dude had to say about it back in 1989. I had a heck of a time tracking down a copy (it's very out of print, and my local library had to source it from the Library of Congress for me), but I didn't want to buy it to read just the preface/intro/epilogue, because I haven't read any of the other texts he analyzes. Leclair's style was very readable, and I was intrigued by his framework, but I found some of his conclusions eye-rolly, given his sample size. I posted this one because I think Library of Congress books are fun, but I didn't add it to my Goodreads.

BLACK TIDE - ★★★½ This one had me rolling my eyes in the first couple chapters, and I was afraid I wasn't going to like it, but once Fucked Up Shit Started Happening, the momentum really picked up and didn't stop--I blitzed through it way past my bedtime on a school night. It was fucked up and weird and tense and bloody pull-no-punches horror, but it ALSO made me laugh, and I loved our two fuck-ups surviving the apocalypse together. NOTE: Dogs (and Gulls) Are Not Safe, and the cast is small enough that it matters a lot :( if you can't stomach animal harm/death, skip this.

A HALF-BUILT GARDEN - 81/338 pages read; will report back. Enjoying it so far! Glad I put it on my NaNo prep reading list, though not quite for the reasons I planned--the reflections on motherhood as well as parenting outside the binary have been interesting, so far (and that's relevant for my own haunted house endeavors!). A much gentler ride than BLACK TIDE, and the immersive tech reminds me of Murderbot's world, just Earthbound.

Overall! Fabulous month for reading! Anytime I think "wow I need A Break™ from writing or life," this is the type of reading I mean--where I can spend a couple weeks annihilating books within a day to Refill the Words Reservoir.

Under the Cut: A Note About ~*★Stars★*~

Historically, I have been Very Bad™ about assigning things Star Ratings, because it's so Vibes Heavy for me and therefore Contingent Upon my Whims. I am refining this as I figure out my wrap up posts (epiphany of last month: I don't like that stars are Odd, because that makes three the midpoint and things are rarely so truly mid for me)(I have hacked my way around this with a ½). Here is, generally, how I conceptualize stars:

★ - This was Bad. I would actively recommend that you do NOT read this one, no redeeming qualities whatsoever, not worth the slog. Save Yourself, It's Too Late For Me. Book goes in the garbage (donate bin).

★★ - This was Not Good. I would not recommend it, but it wasn't a total waste or wash--something in here held my interest/kept my attention/sparked some joy. I will not be rereading this ever. Save Yourself (Or Join Me In Suffering, That Seems Like A Cool Bonding Activity).

★★★ - This was Good/Fine/Okay/Meh. I don't care about this enough to recommend it one way or another. Perfectly serviceable book, held my interest, I probably enjoyed myself (or at least didn't actively loathe the reading). I don't have especially strong feelings. You probably don't need to save yourself from this one--if it sounds like your jam, give it a shot! Just didn't resonate with me particularly powerfully. I probably won't reread this unless I'm after something in particular.

★★★½ - I liked this! I'll probably recommend it if I know it matches someone's vibes or specific requests, but I didn't commit to a star rating on Goodreads. More likely to reread, but not guaranteed.

★★★★ - I really enjoyed this!! I would recommend it (sometimes with caveats about content warnings or such--I tend to like weird fucked up funny shit, and I don't have many hard readerly NO's). Not a perfect book for me by any means, but Very Good. This is something I would reread! Join me!!

★★★★★ - I LOVED THE SHIT OUT OF THIS, IT REWIRED MY BRAIN, WILL RECOMMEND TO ANYONE AND EVERYONE AT THE SLIGHTEST PROVOCATION (content warning caveats still apply--see 4-star disclaimer). Excellent book, I'll reread it regularly, I'll buy copies for all my friends, I'll try to convince all of Booklr to read it, PLEASE join me!!

[e-b-reads]

Books of the month: Oct 2024

Where has November gone!? Better late than never - here's a look back at October as a reading month. Read some more mysteries, started rereading some Diana Wynne Jones, checked occasional interesting-looking things out of the library. (As represented by this screenshot of the only relevant part of my StoryGraph wrap-up.) Here's some highlights:

The Case of the Baited Hook (Erle Stanley Gardner): An aptly named book, because I'd read one Perry Mason mystery a little while ago and found it fine, but I picked this one up at the library and immediately checked out several more on Hoopla when I finished. The hook was baited for me. They're such fun pulpy mysteries; this one specifically is full of ridiculous shenanigans, I think in a little bit of a tongue-in-cheek way. I mostly like the relationship between Perry (hotshot lawyer who is good at everything), Della (his confidential secretary who is good at most things, and sometimes better than him at a thing or two, to give her/the author credit), and Paul (private detective who complains a lot but always does everything Perry tells him). New ot3? The relationship is all in the dialogue and action so it's fun to read between the lines.

Charmed Life (Diana Wynne Jones): OK, I'm cheating and linking this post I made about the Chronicles of Chrestomanci, volume 1. Look, I like them a lot. Fun for kids and adults alike.

Bryony and Roses (T. Kingfisher): Until looking over my list of books read, I'd forgotten I read this in Oct, which doesn't sound like a great review, but it was short and gripping, so I read it in like one afternoon! My only complaint is, I wish it was longer. But it had everything it needed to, so maybe it's fine. I could tell Kingfisher had read and liked Rose Daughter (by Robin McKinley), but it was its own book, with a fun scrappy gardener instead of a beauty.

[just-antithings]

I'm not saying adults insisting they only need to read YA books and watch children's cartoons is leading to this culture wide phobia of sex which in turn is becoming a useful vector for the increasing spread of fascism except that is exactly what I'm saying.

Im not that anon but want to expand on their thought, if they're saying what I think they are.

I thought of this more when seeing an old post of someone saying their English teacher should have let them write a report on Divergent instead making them read 1984. Someone commented supporting the OP, saying that they never read Divergent, but 1984 is problematic. Iirc, the commenter referred to Winston (I think that's the protag in 1984; sorry I haven't reread it in years) as a creep. I can't remember is this specific commenter called Winston a misogynist, but that's a common complaint I hear when people say they don't like 1984.

The screenshot of that post also had other screenshots, including the twt posts of YA authors saying that the classics were problematic. It's a sentiment I keep seeing around book twt before I deactivated my account but still on booktube as well, and it's always booktubers who also read and rant about Colleen Hoover, because they know her name gets clicks. Or booktubers that do those videos titled "I read [old/popular/controversial] series so you don't have to".

Sorry, sliding off topic a bit. Going back to what anon said, YA books tend to be more sanitized. They're supposed to be written for a 15-19 audience, so sex and gore aren't supposed to be explicit. There are YA books with sex scenes. 2 I read recently have sex scenes, but they aren't explicit. One uses mostly poetic language and infers to what's happening, and the other essentially fades to black after they get into bed, as they're touching and then picks up the next morning. (One of these YA books had a big controversy on booktube a few years ago for being problematic, though. Gee, wonder why /s)

But for the most part, often for people who enjoy urban fantasy or romances but not steamy scenes, they may go for YA, since it's usually more "PG". Unfortunately, some people get it in their head that this makes YA inherently "better", that adult books that are being more explicit are only doing it to get more sales, when YA tbh has a tighter hold on it marketing-wise.

Okay, I'm not published (yet), but I've been studying it when I need to take a break from writing to see what course is best for me and what I want to write. YA is becoming oversaturated in the market, so it's not as big a "money making genre" for debut authors as it might have been once (and I'd argue that even in the past when YA was smaller, you still had to be lucky, known, or connected to get that 6-figure check for a debut YA novel). YA is more likely to get scrutinized, considering its supposed to he for a younger audience, so a YA author wanting to push boundaries is going to receive more push-back than an adult lit author.

Now pushback happens in adult lit, too, like Ava Reid saying her editor or publisher (I forget who) told her that Juniper&Thorn might be too dark. (I've read it. Yes, it's dark, but bad reviews I saw for the book blew it way out of proportion. If you (gen) like lyrical/poetic narration and gothic horror, I highly suggest it).

But it feels like there's more of a push to keep YA books "clean". You can find some outliers, but like the YA I mentioned above, those outliers in YA that push boundaries can get wrapped in controversy and called problematic.

And for whatever reason, some people on booktube say this is a good thing and say "think of the children!"

They will say censorship is bad but then advocate for sanitized YA to be read instead of classics, because the classics are "bad" and "teach bad things" and "should be left in the past". They advocate for censorship without realizing they are advocating for censorship. It's exhausting, and as someone who wants to be published and does enjoy a lot of YA, it makes me feel discouraged. I don't think I'm "pushing boundaries" at all in my writing or saying anything new, but I'm very sure it's not sanitized enough for most publishers, especially if I wanted to try for one of the beg houses in the US.

Tl;dr One of the major problems in this anti-intellectualism is capitalism.

.