gates of ivory and horn

Reading this was kind of an exercise in frustration...mostly because the flaws from the first have decided to stick around.

( Read more... )

ETA: Never mind. 30 or so pages into the third book, Spell of Fate, and I'm sick of speechfying and moralizing and random POV switches and pointless monologues and not even curiosity of what's what with the plot can make me keep going at this rate.


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Here's the story: so this guy was published in the 80s and the 90s, but his books didn't sell very well and they were pulled out of print. Now, he's trying to see if there's a market for his books and as such has released the full text of all four online in order to gauge interest. And if there is some, well...that's up in the air.

At any rate, the rec that led me to the series sounded rather interesting so I figured I'd check it out. I've just finished the first book, Spell of Catastrophe, and, well...

On the YAY side, the plotting is tight and interesting; it's definitely of the sort where different threads converge on the same thing and it's pretty engaging seeing what's going to happen. While there's an ensemble cast the main protagonists are for the most part distinct from each other and interesting in their own way. I like the world-building, too, with its hints of the past and a magic system that's more like programming than anything else. It's different enough that I'm not bored.

( However, the NAY side gets a bit long... )


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Part 4 of Contract Theory is up.

(Be sure to check out this post if you want access.)


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I'm still in super-fangirl mode for Freakangels but I'm taking a break to switch gears and go into normal-fangirl mode for Kuroshitsuji! Though really I'd rather have some more Freakangels, sob. Such is the curse of the webcomic! *shakes fist*

( Naturally, HERE BE SPOILERS. )


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SPOILERS: more or less up to the current chapters.

WARNING: for discussion of (fictional) rape in that I speculate over the (fictional) rapist's motives.

( Read more... )


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"23 years ago, twelve strange children were born in England at exactly the same moment.

6 years ago, the world ended.

This is the story of what happened next."

What is FreakAngels? FreakAngels is a free online webcomic written by Warren Ellis about a post-apocalyptic and flooded London. It's not steampunk, though I've seen it described as such, even if it has some vaguely steampunk-ish elements in the from of KK and her bike-copter. What it is is post-apocalyptic, the type of post-apoc fic that shows how people pick up the pieces. The comic's full of tasty moral dilemmas and interesting characters, both male and female, and despite the characters' special nature their actions and reactions really feel, well, human.

I've never read any of Warren Ellis' work before, though I know of him and I have to say if he writes everything like he writes FreakAngels I can see where his reputation comes from. I love the contrast between their flashback-selves and their current selves, I love the way each short arc becomes a way to create possibilities for new arcs and ways to see the characters interact and react -- they're united, but they're not a team, and their myriad interactions are fascinating without being too over-the-top with angst and issues; they have problems but they're also people, trying to get by and make a living as best they know how.

I like the art, too, the way the FreakAngels' faces are differentiated from each other and the way every face is unique and individual. I like the colors, which evoke a vague feeling of...dreariness, downbeatness, of something grounded in the real world when the real world's not all that wonderful to begin with. It's lovely and detailed and all around gorgeous; I've only noticed slips in it a few times but since this comic is being updated once a week with six pages at a time I can forgive them.

"Young, gifted and aimless, the Freakangels gang have built some kind of life for themselves in Whitechapel. A life that starts to show big cracks when a girl called Alice from Manchester turns up with a shotgun and a grievance, having met the lost, prodigal last Freakangel, who had very different ideas about what they should do with themselves and this future flooded England."

If any of this sounds like your cup of tea (and I hope so! I'd love to have someone to talk to about the comic) then you can find the entire FreakAngels archives online for free. WARNING: archives contain several instances of violence and one instance of rape as well as some nudity.


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Title actually has nothing to do with the post other than the fact that I've been listening to The Hazards of Love on repeat since yesterday and how awesome is the Queen's vocalist I mean seriously?

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So I'm out sick today and it's been raining constantly the past couple of weeks (seriously, Seattle, this is a bit excessive even for you) so I'm going to do a meme in an effort to take my mind off everything in spite of sickness and paper due dates. This one snagged from puella_nerdii because I love AUs and crossovers and whatnot.

Give me the premise for a crossover (example: Felix is sent as an emissary to Dalaran and meets and/or bones Kael'thas), a fusion (example: Naruto and Kuroshitsuji fusion: Kyuubi as Naruto's demonic servant), or an AU (example: the Star Trek high school AU: straight-A student Spock snaps and beats up a student for insulting his mom; his detention is to tutor the class delinquent and playboy James T. Kirk.). I will write you one to three sentences of fic based on that premise (number of sentences does not include how many I may spend babbling excitedly about possibilities).

Fandoms I am good for: Naruto, Katekyo Hitman Reborn!, Star Trek (the new one), Kuroshitsuji, Doctrine of Labyrinths, Sakura Gari, Warcraft, Mononoke, The Umbrella Academy, Vassalord, and oh why the hell not, The Decemberists' The Hazards of Love album. Any other fandom I may ask you to request something else depending on how I feel about my ability to write for it.

Also open to any original projects I have mentioned previously, whether or not I'm actually writing them yet.

ETA: Multiple requests are totally okay.


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It's late and I'm not getting this novel even mostly read in time for class. What can I say? I think I just don't like non-genre fiction. It's not even that I think non-genre fiction is without merit -- I do -- it's just that I don't like it. I define myself so heavily as being a reader and writer of fantasy, sometimes it's hard for me to step out of that and enjoy something that isn't part of the genre. Sci-fi isn't too bad because it has a lot in common with fantasy as a genre and I think my lack of experience reading sci-fi is more due to lack of exposure than anything else.

But the truth is that nonfiction just doesn't do it for me. I can count the number of nonfiction novels I've read, usually for a class, that I've really enjoyed and coveted and wanted to read A and B the C of D. And both of them have fantasy elements; in Sophie's World it's the twist I won't reveal and in The God of Small Things it was all the dreamy sequences, the motif and symbol of the moth that recurs and affects their lives and yet is not a real thing at all. I don't know. Do I just feel that reading nonfiction is like a betrayal of myself because fantasy is so integral to who I am? Or maybe it's just not my thing and I should accept that. I'm sure fantasy is a lot of other people's not-things too, but that doesn't mean either genre is lacking in merit.

I guess this is just weighing on my mind particularly heavily because I love this class, and I love my teacher, and I just wish I could get more into the books he picks for us to read because I want badly to be able to engage in discussions without feeling like a fraud for bullshitting answers from what my classmates are saying (or, in high school, secondary source sites like SparkNotes. No, I am not proud.). It's not that I don't think the themes we're encountering aren't important or things that need to be said and read, it's just that I can't get into reading examinations of racism, or sexism, or classism, or any other social issue in a real-world context. Which is just all kinds of fucked up, but there you go.


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ETA: So I just realized that the part of this post I had outside of the cut was full of spoilers for the arc. Sorry, all! orz

So. Ochou. I think it's been generally agreed that this is the most puzzling arc of the entire anime and I can't disagree. But I think I might have figured it out. YMMV, of course, but ( SPOILERS FOR ALL OF EPISODES 6 & 7 )


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Jesus fucking Christ I think I threw my retainers away. As in they were wrapped in a napkin and I tossed them along with the rest of the trash from my lunch.

And my orthodontist is in fucking Taiwan.

SHIT.


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