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This week I'm reading: Just finished Star Dream by Janet Lambert, a 1951 YA book about a girl who learns to ride a horse while spending the summer at her great-grandma's farm. Great-grandparents aren't super common in fiction; I like to see them.

My favourite book of all time is: I have plenty, but today the first that comes to mind is Mansfield Park

My current favourite book (read or re-read in the last 3 months): Cyteen by C. J. Cherryh.

The last book I bought was: Polly the Powers Model and the Puzzle of the Hidden Camera, which is one of the worst books I have ever read. It's not true occupational fiction because she's visiting home for the entire book, so she doesn't do any modeling onscreen.

The first book I bought with my own money: I don't know. Probably Baby-Sitters Club or something like that.

The first book I received as a gift: Disney Babies Bedtime Stories. There is a picture of me with presents from my first Christmas, and I was a November baby.

The last book I received as a gift was: I'm not sure.

The last book I borrowed from the library: Finding Langston by Lesa Cline-Ransome and The Factory Witches of Lowell by C. S. Malerich.

The book physically closest to me right now: The Kingdom on the Waves by M. T. Anderson

Do you read bookfic, and if so what is your favourite bookshop fic? Does this mean books set in bookstores? I don't think I've read any of those.

This or that

Physical book or e-book: Both!

Used or new: Don't really care.

Fiction or non-fiction: Both!

Read at a coffee shop or at the park: Neither.

Paperback or hardcover: No preference

Romance or Crime:

Romance

Yes or no

Stream of consciousness? Not something I've read much, but I'm not opposed to it.

Poetry? Yes

Memoirs? Yes

Philosophy? Haven't read it much

Thrillers? Sure

Chronicles? As in fantasy series? Yes

Dialogue heavy? Sure

sprocket

Project Hail Mary questions for Ask A Manager. Mostly astrophage era concerns. "Unless you were recruited to the Petrova Task Force" becomes the anti-"except for California". The commentariat has Thoughts about PTF labor rights and working conditions. 99% OCs; Stratt doesn't have time for this and Grace doesn't have the workplace self-development personality.

singedsun

From

thefridayfive

1. Books or movies?
Both? I had this conversation the other day on Fable with someone that I read multiple books at the same time because I tend to read in multiple formats - audio, ebook, physical book. I feel like movies are an extension of that kind of thing. D&D too I suppose. They're all stories in different formats. I think if it was going to be I could only have one or the other, it would be books. I am the man in that old Twilight Zone episode that makes it to the library and thinks 'time enough at last'.

2. Indoors or outdoors?
Indoors. Outdoors is too overstimulating. I can't do the grass or the bugs or the wind or the heat.

3. Morning person or night owl?
Night owl. Have been my entire life. This is very much the ADHD thing, but I know that my dad is also a night owl and I definitely picked it up from him when I was really really young.

4. Online messaging or physical letters?
Online for sure, but also every now and then, I love a written something. Like Christmas cards. I'm not going to write you a novel for Christmas, but I do like sending something physical.

5. Dragons or unicorns?
UNICORNS. Ever since I saw the movie Legend as a kid, I've been sold on unicorns.

isis

Last night I participated in an interesting local event called Common Ground, which invites people from across the political spectrum to discuss issues with the intent to illuminate and find commonalities, rather than persuade. The organizers (who themselves are two liberals and two conservatives) very carefully balance the attendance list to ensure an equal number on both sides. The meeting started with brief introductions, and then we split up into tables of 4, 2 liberals and 2 conservatives (our nametags were coded by color) to discuss a question. After a set time, we mixed up and sat at tables with different people, and discussed a second question, and then all got together to share insights.

The first question was about identifying the core beliefs of liberals and of conservatives (and spoiler alert, we all agreed on pretty similar beliefs), and the second was about the relevance of the Constitution today, and if it should be followed strictly, modified, or scrapped. To my surprise both of the conservatives at my second table said they don't trust the current president to lead any revision of the constitution, and when we discussed things as a group it was clear that nobody is a fan of the current administration. Which, I guess should not have been a surprise, because part of the ground rules were, as alluded to, respect for other points of view and no attempting to argue your point, and as a result those who attended were pretty much normie Republicans, unaffiliated leaners, and mainstream Democrats, with no Trumpers (we have those here) or leftie anarchists (we have those, too).

Anyway, it was interesting and enjoyable, and it definitely made the point that "the other side are people too." I'll probably try to attend again - they put these on every few months.

What I've recently finished reading:

Stiletto by Daniel O'Malley, the second Checquy Files book. This one goes a little harder on the body horror than the first (for plot reasons) but it's still leavened with enough humor that it didn't hit my ick button. The humor mostly comes from the extremely silly powers some people have, as well as from the dry observations by Myfanwy and others. As in the first book, there is a very shippable f/f pair (as well as Shantay from book 1 showing up at the end, yay, and not doing anything to shatter my Myfanwy/Shantay inclinations!) though again it's all just subtext.

Also, I'm reading the collection Lake of Souls by Ann Leckie, and so far I have read:

"Lake of Souls" - this is the title story, and I liked it a lot, mostly because I am a sucker for stories with multiple POVs in which each character is a different alien with a different culture and thus each has a very very different perspective. But I also liked the aww-factor of the outcome.

"Footprints" - horror, I guess? I think I missed the point.

"Hesperia and Glory" - this is fun and harks back to Golden Age Sci-Fi. Is Mr. Atkins mad, or a Martian?

"The Endangered Camp" - this made me think of Tom Toner's The Promise of the Child in which, also, the dinosaurs escaped the extinction event in a spaceship. Not bad, not my favorite.

Speaking of short story collections, I DNF'ed The Age of Calamities by Senaa Ahmad, which I learned about from a review of The Beheading Game by Rebecca Lehmann (which I reviewed here) as the reviewer felt that the story "Let's Play Dead" was a better take on a mysteriously alive post-beheading Anne Boleyn. Unfortunately, stylistically it very much did not work for me (literary, dense, weird); I started and abandoned two other stories in the collection and then decided to give up on the collection entirely.

sprocket

Project Hail Mary / The Good Place.

Eva Stratt in the neighborhood afterlife, compassionately and relentlessly hassled by late canon / post canon "let's rehab people into the Good Place." Some large points numbers on the negative and positive side. Needs a philosophy and/or ethics degree to tackle appropriately. Also, stand up comedy.

merryghoul

Keeping up with these fannish projects is so hard. Might have to start paying for Dreamwidth to actually track comms and threads on these projects. In the meantime I found an account I can try to get notifications on with Bluesky. But I don’t have a Bluesky account. Meh.

sprocket

Long setup, short punchline.

I have one ridiculous critique of Bujold's Five Gods worldbuilding: the Bastard is too cool. The "disasters out of season" becomes "everything driving every plot". The frictions of progression through life are smoothed into background noise. The stories in the novels aren't interested in, say, the frictions in transition from childhood (protagonist in the auspices of the Daughter/Son) to adulthood (the Mother/Father's domain), or between professional domains that cross the gods' domains (a Mother's physician going into the Father's practice of law). The stories told in Chalion, Paladin, Hunt, and the Penric series are almost all stories that get subsumed into the Bastard having a finger in every story-pie. Elsewhere, Bujold writes wife is a pretty damned exclusive role, the way they do it here, which seems applicable to the rigidity of the gods' assigned roles and plot involvement (so far). But then, I'm the sort of reader who wouldn't mind a Quadrene PoV story, because how else do you stress-test the Bastard's "demon god" aspect in the worldbuilding?

So it's fun to read fics like "First Choices", where the queer community is challenging sexual orientation as one of the defining factors for LGBT followers of the Quintarian (and Quadrene) faith. You can be gay and follow a god other than the Bastard!

One imagines, from inside the worldbuilding, that the gods would have their own criteria for what souls they most affiliate to, and why, and so human categorizations would be sometimes completely different from the gods' understanding.

All of this is to say: I don't care how many fox sweaters Ryland Grace owns, his soul is not going to be taken up by the Son. If Earth's astrophage crisis is a textbook case of a disaster out of season, but I'm also not convinced he's the Bastard's. Grace really liked being a middle school science teacher, and the movie leans to blues for science, so I think the Daughter has dibs, fight me.

(movie!Stratt is religious, and if doing a five gods fusion, should know that free will is sacred to the gods. Adds a little bonus religious sin to throwing Grace in a spaceship against his will. Do the gods accept "I knew it was wrong, but the other options were even more wrong" at death. I'm having a great time over here imagining everyone's angst.)

melime

Title: Rescue these ungrateful plants
Fandom: Good Omens (book)
Relationship: Aziraphale/Crowley
Rating: T/Slash
Word count: 2008
Tags: Romantic Fluff, Established Relationship, Post-Canon, South Downs Cottage, I'm still here and will be forever
Summary: Crowley is having a bit of a talk with their garden, to ensure that their plants remain green and beautiful, but Aziraphale isn't entirely sure if he agrees with his tough love approach.
For

seasons_of_fandom's season 2, challenge #13, Earth Day.

Rescue these ungrateful plants

Aziraphale takes a glance out the window, to see the garden, or, more specifically, Crowley tending to the garden. Although tending to might not be the best way to put it, considering the way that Crowley does it. Aziraphale can't quite hear the words from there, since Crowley agreed to keep the shouting to a minimum, but he can still see the tense posture, the threatening demeanour, the wiggling finger. And of course, the trembling, terrified plants.

It's all posturing, really. He knows that Crowley isn't actually as tense as he pretends to be, or as stressed with his plants’ state. How had Crowley put it? He needed to keep up appearances for the plants, so that they would be properly motivated.

The reality is that he's quite proud of his garden, and will talk of his plants at length and to exhaustion - whether Aziraphale is actually paying attention to his words or not -, but only when he's out of earshot. In as much as one can be out of earshot of creatures that don't actually have anything resembling ears.

And he has every reason to be proud. Aziraphale hasn't seen such a lush garden since… well, they certainly don't need to talk about that. It's still the best garden in all of England, in his humble opinion. The judges of that pretentious magazine didn't agree to it, but Aziraphale suspects that they were biased towards flowers, while Crowley clearly prefers his greens.

Either that or they might have noticed the poor things trembling in terror. They had been quite afraid, even if I'm the end Crowley didn't make good on any of his many creative threats.

Aziraphale gives him a few more minutes, then takes pity on the poor plants. He does try not to undermine Crowley's authority with them, but it's hard not to feel a bit protective, even if Crowley insists that his tough love approach works. He grabs a bottle of white wine, not iced, of course, but miraculously kept at a perfect French wine cellar at the end of winter temperature, as well as two glasses, and goes outside.

Now that he's seeing them from up close, Aziraphale suspects that the plants are indeed greener than they had been this morning. They are also quite shaky, although they seem to calm down a bit when he approaches. It's possible that they already got used to how Crowley's lectures will soften when Aziraphale is listening.

“It's a bit warm outside today, isn't it, my dear boy? I brought you a little refreshment,” Aziraphale says, gesturing with the wine bottle.

Crowley gets up from where he had gotten down to inspect the roots. He wipes the dirty off his finger on his trousers, ignoring how that makes Aziraphale twist his nose at the mistreatment, although Crowley's clothes aren't human made, but miracled, so there isn't any need to extend them any excess care. Considering Crowley makes his own clothes from his imagination, it shouldn't be too hard for him to have something more appropriate than a suit, even in the state that they are in.

They don't know if it was a consequence of the way that Adam redid the world or something that their sides did in lieu of getting in contact with them for more drastic punitive measures after that whole ordeal. Aziraphale is certainly not going to try to investigate and remind Heaven that he exists and hasn't really been reprimanded for walking out of his job and later moving in with a demon. Besides, they can still have a fairly decent living in this way, and he's happier with the freedom of not having to report to Heaven.

They haven't lost their miracles completely. He suspects that Crowley wouldn't have the success that he has in making all of his plants grow so perfectly lush and green if he didn't push reality a little bit. And he would be naked, which wouldn't necessarily be a bad proposition, but the neighbours can already be insufferable as it is, so they don't need this sort of argument. Crowley can still make his clothes, and he did something to the kitchen that means that they can always have both ingredients if Aziraphale decides he wants to cook, and decent food if they want to stay in and have something ready to eat. Aziraphale was able to move all of his books to the cottage without making it too cramped, even though the entire cottage is smaller than his former bookshop and now all the books are properly on display rather than occasionally hidden to keep them safe from those rude people who walked in and tried to buy them. The Bentley seems to still be doing well with the one time that Crowley fuelled it, although it should have probably consumed that petrol by now. They don't need to sleep, but Crowley still likes to, and they don't need to eat, but also have no adverse effects when they do. Sobering up seems to have gotten harder, and sometimes they can no longer hit the mark when they are too drunk, and so have to wait it out. Very small miracles around them and their experiences work fine, as well as gentle pushes to reality, but anything bigger than that won't work.

It's no great loss, not when compared to what they gained.

“You can't trick me, angel, you're just trying to rescue these ungrateful, lazy plants who think that they can start slacking off just because I put them in the ground,” Crowley says, the second half of it towards the plants, pointing his finger at them and glaring.

He still accepts the glass that Aziraphale is offering him though. Now, Aziraphale could probably tell himself something along the lines that angels don't lie, but that's both not true and he might not be an angel anymore, so he sees no problem in lying now.

“Not at all, I just thought you might be tired working tirelessly under the relentless sun.”

Crowley raises an eyebrow high enough that Aziraphale can see it over the glasses.

“Were you reading one of those saucy novels again? Because if I'm supposed to be doing something I have to prepare,” Crowley says, more of a genuine question than teasing, although it's both.

Aziraphale huffs. He doesn't have any so called saucy novels. He has great works of literature, some of which happen to contain quality erotica, that's not the same.

“If you would rather question my choice of literature than share a bottle of wine, then I'll go back inside to drink it by myself, and you can go back to tormenting these poor beauties who are trying their best. Aren't you darlings? You are all doing such a good job of growing the greenest and most beautiful leaves that I've ever seen,” Aziraphale says, turning to them for the compliments.

It would be much easier to do this behind Crowley's back, but that would seem a bit disrespectful. Of course, not as bad as when Crowley decided to alphabetise Aziraphale’s books, and Aziraphale, absorbed as he was in his reading, only noticed it when he got to the G.

“Stop being nice to the plants, it makes them think I won't rip them off the ground and use them to start a bonfire to set as an example to the others. Dry and brown plants burn that much easier, and even if they don't, I can always toss in some alcohol,” Crowley says, determined to keep on tormenting the poor things.

Aziraphale happens to know that he very much won't do any of that, but they don't. Crowley can be surprisingly intimidating and convincing when the targets are plants and small critters, but once they get to the size of house cats the effect is greatly diminished. At least the plants seem to still listen to him regardless of their size. He's not entirely sure how long that's going to last though, since Crowley never fulfills any of the threats. Then again, the plants actually do grow beautifully so he has no cause to.

“You can terrorise them all you want, dearest, but I can still give them some positive reinforcement. And I happen to think that they look wonderfully green and lively, the envy of the entire neighbourhood,” Aziraphale says, tilting his empty glass towards a nearby leaf that looks particularly green.

Crowley takes his glasses off and hisses at the plants. “Don't listen to him, he can't save you from my wrath,” he says, and Aziraphale happens to think that he looks perfectly adorable trying to sound so mean and angry.

Of course, Aziraphale has long since thought that Crowley was a more adorable sort of evil than a proper threat. A menace, clearly, but of the endearing kind. Working collaboratively rather than against one another did wonders for his perspective of Crowley's work. And although he's retired now, that doesn't mean that he stopped being a menace. He actually talked one of their neighbours’ rose bushes into strategically withering until the remaining flowers were arranged in the shape of a particular piece of human anatomy that isn't generally shown in public. He didn't even cut them or use a miracle, he just talked to them, but that's the affinity that Crowley seems to have for plants.

As Aziraphale thinks that that particular neighbour can be best described with that piece of anatomy, he refrained from telling Crowley that he shouldn't do something like that. After all, Aziraphale is also retired and has no obligation to inspire good and push others away from evil. If Crowley wants to pester neighbours that annoy them both, he's free to do so.

“Oh, I don’t know they might have a guardian angel of sorts. Retired, of course,” Aziraphale says, giving the plants a wink.

They do seem a bit confused if they should be getting scared or not, and Crowley is the one who understands plants, so maybe Aziraphale should defer to his expertise, as he’s not sure if being confused is all that much better than being terrified.

“Alright, let's get you away from them before you start throwing blessings their way, I swear you are trying to undo all my hard work,” Crowley says, taking the bottle away from Aziraphale with the hand that already has the wine glass.

That happens to mean that both of them now have a free hand, and Crowley wastes no time in taking Aziraphale’s. He practically drags him away from the selection of plants that he has been taking specially good care of, and towards a corner of the garden that only has grass, left clear precisely so they can have a place to sit and have a picnic without being watched by Crowley's plants.

Aziraphale is sure that if they saw Crowley laying on his lap, practically melting over his touch as Aziraphale scratches his hair, then they would never fear him again. He might not be able to recover from that even if he could find it in his heart to burn a few of them to send a message, and he wouldn't do that.

Bringing a picnic towel there is still within the limits of miracles that they can perform, and Crowley opens the bottle for them, filling the glasses. Aziraphale had hoped to lure him back inside, as Crowley had spent quite enough time scolding his plants already, but he supposes that this is perfectly lovely. The sun is out, there is a nice breeze, and considering where they first met, gardens will always be a special place for them.

They share a bottle of white wine that might fill more glasses than one would assume looking at its volume, and laugh at old stories. For them, retirement is not the end of something, but a new beginning, a rebirth of sorts for both of them, where they can finally stop trying to be what is expected of them, and learn who they are together.

isis

Hello from Colorado, which is on fire :( We are not actually near any of the big fires, but we are getting smoke in the mornings from two of them, which means that several times in the past few weeks we've had to get up at 3 am and close the windows and turn on the air purifier. Anyway:

What I've recently read:

The Astrobiology Immersion Program by

startingatmidnight, short-novel-length (~50K) Project Hail Mary gen, I think

petra recommended it. AU in which on the way back to Erid, Rocky and Ryland Grace bodyswap. I love bodyswap as a trope and it's especially rich when the bodies are alien to each other. I thought it was a little long, and the handwaving a little handwavy, though the ultimate "why" resolution was super interesting, and I really liked that the story continues through to the consequences on Erid.

The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt, which is a sort of literary dark-humor western, with a really fun narrative voice. Charlie and Eli Sisters are Bad Men With Guns who wield them for a mysterious mogul called the Commodore. Except Eli's got a sensitive side, and he's starting to wonder why he's killing people for money when he could just settle down and run a trading post somewhere. My favorite part, oddly, was the throughline of Eli being completely unable to hold onto any money; if he doesn't give it away out of soft-heartedness as soon as he gets it, it's stolen, and I was delighted every time it happened.

The Rook by Daniel O'Malley, which was a recommendation from

merit - I couldn't resist the premise of a woman waking up with amnesia and learning, through letters written from her former self, that she's a high-up bureaucrat in a secret organization of people with supernatural powers who deal with supernatural crimes and threats to the country. Sort of like Rivers of London but with Ghostbusters-level humor. ETA: and now I am reminded of another reason I really liked this: the main character, Myfanwy Thomas, discovers (somewhat to her surprise) that she is frighteningly competent at her job. Also there is a fantastic female character with whom I ship her (and there is fic). Anyway, lots of fun, and I'm now reading the second book in this series, Stiletto.

What I've recently watched:

S4 of Dark Winds, which unfortunately had quite a bit of action in LA - not that I have anything against LA, it's just it's not the familiar Four Corners scenery. As soon as they (metaphorically) hung a German on the wall I was expecting it to fire (metaphorically) Karl May, and I was not disappointed.

We've just watched the first episode of S2 of the live-action One Piece. I love how goofy it is!

desertvixen

My general preferences are here.

MAYBE: no-harm dubcon (sex pollen or “fertility artifact”) | period typical attitudes | infidelity | power dynamic

I love treats!

I love weddings. You cannot be too fluffy or have too many details, or get into too-ridiculous or too-complicated situations. You want to go way over the top, I am your girl. I’m here for planning, or seeing it live, or people reminiscing.

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desertvixen

My general preferences are here.

MAYBE: no-harm dubcon (sex pollen or “fertility artifact”) | period typical attitudes | infidelity | power dynamic

I love treats!

( Requests )

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Night On Fic Mountain

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A book meme

General Questions

This or that

Yes or no

Crackfic Thought of the Day, Friday Edition

The Friday Five

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Crackfic Thought Of the Day

Fic: Rescue these ungrateful plants (Good Omens book, Aziraphale/Crowley)

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March 2020

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