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lebateleur) wrote2025-09-03 08:16 pm
lebateleur) wrote2025-09-03 08:16 pmEntry tags:
What Am I Reading Wednesday - September 3
I am so, so behind on ::flaps hands:: everything...but that still hasn't stopped me from spending hours each day reading books, and then even more hours writing about them.
What I Finished Reading This Week
The Chosen Queen – Sam Davey
This novel is an Arthurian retelling from Igraine's perspective. ( Boy, did I have Thoughts. ) But the utterly maddening thing is, 80 percent of this book was good enough that, when the next volume in Davey's "Pendragon Prophecy" comes out in a couple of years, I will probably read it despite knowing better.
Kindling The Celtic Spirit – Mara Freeman
Kindling The Celtic Spirit was published during the heyday of the shopping mall new age/occult publishing boom. In those pre-Wikipedia, pre-Internet dark ages, it and its ilk served a valuable purpose, making accessible information from niche, out of print, and otherwise inaccessible primary and secondary sources on Celtic folklore and belief from the proto-, early, and early modern historical periods, albeit mixed in with liberal amounts of neopagan accretions.
There's much less need for such things in our current existence of commercial ebook and ejournal publishing, Project Gutenberg, Wikipedia, and museum and historic trust youtube documentaries, but there's something naively charming about the book's mix of academic fact and invented tradition and ritual. And while for some reason The Festival of Lughnasa has yet to be republished (unlike its brethren (Carmina Gadelica and The Silver Bough), there are plenty of references and and quotations from it here.
What I Am Currently Reading
Song Of The Huntress – Lucy Holland
I needed a palette cleanser after The Chosen Queen.
What I'm Reading Next
This week I acquired Sistersong by Lucy Holland and Buried Deep And Other Stories by Naomi Novik
これで以上です。
What I Finished Reading This Week
The Chosen Queen – Sam Davey
This novel is an Arthurian retelling from Igraine's perspective. ( Boy, did I have Thoughts. ) But the utterly maddening thing is, 80 percent of this book was good enough that, when the next volume in Davey's "Pendragon Prophecy" comes out in a couple of years, I will probably read it despite knowing better.
Kindling The Celtic Spirit – Mara Freeman
Kindling The Celtic Spirit was published during the heyday of the shopping mall new age/occult publishing boom. In those pre-Wikipedia, pre-Internet dark ages, it and its ilk served a valuable purpose, making accessible information from niche, out of print, and otherwise inaccessible primary and secondary sources on Celtic folklore and belief from the proto-, early, and early modern historical periods, albeit mixed in with liberal amounts of neopagan accretions.
There's much less need for such things in our current existence of commercial ebook and ejournal publishing, Project Gutenberg, Wikipedia, and museum and historic trust youtube documentaries, but there's something naively charming about the book's mix of academic fact and invented tradition and ritual. And while for some reason The Festival of Lughnasa has yet to be republished (unlike its brethren (Carmina Gadelica and The Silver Bough), there are plenty of references and and quotations from it here.
What I Am Currently Reading
Song Of The Huntress – Lucy Holland
I needed a palette cleanser after The Chosen Queen.
What I'm Reading Next
This week I acquired Sistersong by Lucy Holland and Buried Deep And Other Stories by Naomi Novik
これで以上です。
proustbot (proustbot) wrote2025-09-03 05:29 pm
proustbot) wrote2025-09-03 05:29 pmEntry tags:
Cracker Baudrillard
COLLEAGUE #1: "R. F. Kuang has a new book out."
ME: "Yeah, but I read The Poppy War and it was terrible."
COLLEAGUE #1: "Oh, yeah, The Poppy War sucks. You can't judge her by The Poppy War. She wrote that when she was, like, 17."
ME: "I don't gotta give juvenilia a pass. I don't gotta hand it to Eragon just because the author was a zygote when he wrote it."
COLLEAGUE #2: "I liked Eragon. I was in grad school when I read it."
ME: "Grad school???"
COLLEAGUE #2: "Yeah. First I read all of A Song of Ice and Fire, then I read all the Hunger Games books, and then I read the Eragon books. As I wrote my dissertation chapters."
ME: "I love this portrait of intellectual age-regression you're painting for us."
ME: "Yeah, but I read The Poppy War and it was terrible."
COLLEAGUE #1: "Oh, yeah, The Poppy War sucks. You can't judge her by The Poppy War. She wrote that when she was, like, 17."
ME: "I don't gotta give juvenilia a pass. I don't gotta hand it to Eragon just because the author was a zygote when he wrote it."
COLLEAGUE #2: "I liked Eragon. I was in grad school when I read it."
ME: "Grad school???"
COLLEAGUE #2: "Yeah. First I read all of A Song of Ice and Fire, then I read all the Hunger Games books, and then I read the Eragon books. As I wrote my dissertation chapters."
ME: "I love this portrait of intellectual age-regression you're painting for us."
Alison (landofnowhere) wrote2025-09-03 08:23 pm
landofnowhere) wrote2025-09-03 08:23 pmEntry tags:
wednesday books in the domestic sphere
(It may look like I'm posting this earlier than usual, but nope, I'm just in a different time zone!)
The Will of the Many, James Islington. This worked well as a book to read over the course of a long plane trip, except maybe for the bit where by the time I got to the complicated ending I had lost brain cells from lack of sleep and was rushing to finish before the plane landed. This book is so tropey: in the not!Roman Empire, a lost heir is sent to boarding school to investigate a mystery and climb to the top of the class rankings, which ultimately involves a deadly game of Capture the Flag. It's the first book in a planned trilogy, I will probably keep reading.
The Barbarous Babes: Being the Memoirs of Molly, Edith Ayrton (Zangwill). My Discord friend Vicki, who scans and digitizes old books to get them into Project Gutenberg, obligingly agreed to do some Edith Ayrton Zangwills! She sent me a preliminary OCR'd version with many typos; the text is currently being proofread by Distributed Proofreaders, after which it will appear on Gutenberg! This is not my favorite of Edith's books, but I still enjoyed it. It's in the tradition of early 20th century writers, particularly those involved with the suffrage movement, pushing back against the Victorian sentimentalization of childhood. It starts with a description of imaginative play games with a lot of pretend violence and torture, sometimes with near-disastrous results. Past the first couple chapters it doesn't so much live up to its title, but continues with tales of various family members misbehaving in adventurous ways. Not sentimental, but does have real family feeling and a charming ten-year-old narrator.
A Nursery in the Nineties, Eleanor Farjeon. This memoir got less excitingly plotty and more impressionistic once the author appeared on the scene, but was still enjoyable, and an interesting pairing with the book above, since it also focused on the protagonist and her brother's (less violent) imaginative play games. I put it down wondering what the next steps would be in Eleanor Farjeon's story, which led me to the next book.
Edward Thomas : the last four years, Eleanor Farjeon. This is the other memoir-ish thing that Farjeon wrote. It skips forward over a decade, and focuses on Eleanor's close friendship with the writer and poet Edward Thomas, who I hadn't previously heard of apart from having read his poem Adlestrop. I was more interested in Eleanor (who didn't talk enough about herself) than Edward, though I was charmed by this poem by Edward. Eleanor was in love with Edward, who was married with three children, and the love triangle resolved itself in an unusual way: Edward volunteered for WWI, where he was killed, and Eleanor and Helen remained fast friends for the end of her life.
As It Was and World Without End by Helen Thomas. After this, I was interested to look up how Helen wrote about her marriage with Edward, and these two short memoirs were much breezier reads. Helen Thomas was less of an intellectual than Eleanor Farjeon, but her writing is more emotionally evocative. She met Edward when they were in their late teens, and had an unconventional relationship until she got pregnant and everyone insisted that they should get married. They then proceeded to do something the Edwardian version of the cottagecore life, though this is not particularly romanticized -- Edward being a struggling freelance writer supporting a family the houses they could afford in the country were not particularly nice, and they moved a lot (also, they could afford a servant, which made the country life more pleasant). Helen's commentary on the socially progressive circles that she mingled with but ultimately found shallow were also interesting.
The Will of the Many, James Islington. This worked well as a book to read over the course of a long plane trip, except maybe for the bit where by the time I got to the complicated ending I had lost brain cells from lack of sleep and was rushing to finish before the plane landed. This book is so tropey: in the not!Roman Empire, a lost heir is sent to boarding school to investigate a mystery and climb to the top of the class rankings, which ultimately involves a deadly game of Capture the Flag. It's the first book in a planned trilogy, I will probably keep reading.
The Barbarous Babes: Being the Memoirs of Molly, Edith Ayrton (Zangwill). My Discord friend Vicki, who scans and digitizes old books to get them into Project Gutenberg, obligingly agreed to do some Edith Ayrton Zangwills! She sent me a preliminary OCR'd version with many typos; the text is currently being proofread by Distributed Proofreaders, after which it will appear on Gutenberg! This is not my favorite of Edith's books, but I still enjoyed it. It's in the tradition of early 20th century writers, particularly those involved with the suffrage movement, pushing back against the Victorian sentimentalization of childhood. It starts with a description of imaginative play games with a lot of pretend violence and torture, sometimes with near-disastrous results. Past the first couple chapters it doesn't so much live up to its title, but continues with tales of various family members misbehaving in adventurous ways. Not sentimental, but does have real family feeling and a charming ten-year-old narrator.
A Nursery in the Nineties, Eleanor Farjeon. This memoir got less excitingly plotty and more impressionistic once the author appeared on the scene, but was still enjoyable, and an interesting pairing with the book above, since it also focused on the protagonist and her brother's (less violent) imaginative play games. I put it down wondering what the next steps would be in Eleanor Farjeon's story, which led me to the next book.
Edward Thomas : the last four years, Eleanor Farjeon. This is the other memoir-ish thing that Farjeon wrote. It skips forward over a decade, and focuses on Eleanor's close friendship with the writer and poet Edward Thomas, who I hadn't previously heard of apart from having read his poem Adlestrop. I was more interested in Eleanor (who didn't talk enough about herself) than Edward, though I was charmed by this poem by Edward. Eleanor was in love with Edward, who was married with three children, and the love triangle resolved itself in an unusual way: Edward volunteered for WWI, where he was killed, and Eleanor and Helen remained fast friends for the end of her life.
As It Was and World Without End by Helen Thomas. After this, I was interested to look up how Helen wrote about her marriage with Edward, and these two short memoirs were much breezier reads. Helen Thomas was less of an intellectual than Eleanor Farjeon, but her writing is more emotionally evocative. She met Edward when they were in their late teens, and had an unconventional relationship until she got pregnant and everyone insisted that they should get married. They then proceeded to do something the Edwardian version of the cottagecore life, though this is not particularly romanticized -- Edward being a struggling freelance writer supporting a family the houses they could afford in the country were not particularly nice, and they moved a lot (also, they could afford a servant, which made the country life more pleasant). Helen's commentary on the socially progressive circles that she mingled with but ultimately found shallow were also interesting.
Riona (rionaleonhart) wrote2025-09-03 05:49 pm
rionaleonhart) wrote2025-09-03 05:49 pmEntry tags:
Fanfiction: Bad Company (Danganronpa: Despair Time, Arei/David)
Sometimes I finish a canon and have to write fanfiction IMMEDIATELY to deal with the fact that there is no more canon left. I finished watching Danganronpa: Despair Time approximately twenty-four hours ago; here's a fic.
Title: Bad Company
Fandom: Danganronpa: Despair Time
Rating: 15
Pairing: Arei/David
Wordcount: 1,200
Summary: Arei grins. “Hiiiii, David. That’s the real you, isn’t it?”
( Bad Company )
Title: Bad Company
Fandom: Danganronpa: Despair Time
Rating: 15
Pairing: Arei/David
Wordcount: 1,200
Summary: Arei grins. “Hiiiii, David. That’s the real you, isn’t it?”
( Bad Company )
mozaikmage (mozaikmage) wrote2025-09-03 12:29 pm
mozaikmage) wrote2025-09-03 12:29 pmEntry tags:
Anime and comics about GIRLS! WHO! CLIMB!
As some of you may know, I’ve been getting into rock climbing lately. I’m still not very good at it due to my crippling fear of heights and complete lack of upper body strength, but I’m getting better!
So, what better time to watch Iwa-kakeru: Sport Climbing Girls?
Honestly, I did not watch this show when it aired despite some of my friends talking about it mostly because the vacuum-sealed tank top aesthetic did not appeal to me. And the numerous cleavage shots also did not appeal to me. And then I completely forgot about it for the next five years. But now! I remembered it exists!
And so I watched the first episode and I was not impressed.
We open with a cute little cameo of real-life professional Japanese climber Akiyo Noguchi, who is genuinely super cool and whose youtube video on finger stretches is extremely useful. She does her attempt at the problem and then up next is... Konomi, the protagonist of the show.
We then go back to Konomi’s first year of high school and how she discovers competitive climbing. She was wandering randomly through her school grounds and stumbled on a climbing wall, and is then challenged by Jun, the prodigy first year member of the club who won’t let her join if she’s not serious. Climbing immediately appeals to her because, as a formerly almost-pro puzzle gamer, it’s like solving puzzles in real life! The next day the club upperclassmen help the two of them have a sport-climbing competition, and Konomi just barely loses to Jun, but Jun is impressed enough to let her stay. Which is good for the club because they have a competition the next day!
Fundamentally, I believe it is not a well-constructed first episode, and this is why:
The characters are not introduced to each other and the audience in a memorable way, and the sport is not introduced to the audience and the viewpoint character in a memorable way.
From this first episode, I feel like only Konomi and Jun got any kind of personality, while the upperclassmen are just Upperclassmen (Generic.) Which I’d understand if they were trying to introduce a dozen people at once, but there’s only four people on the team! You can introduce four characters in 22 minutes!
As for Konomi and Jun, Jun is very clearly a girl iteration of The Kageyama Archetype but is also, like, unreasonably harsh. You have three people on the team right now! You can’t really afford to turn newbies away!
What threw me off the most was how immediately good at climbing Konomi was. I’ve seen a lot of types of climbing newbies at the gym since I started, and even the people more naturally advantaged than me (tall, athletic, strategic thinkers) can’t just hop on the wall and move perfectly on their very first day climbing. Even if we accept the premise that Konomi is amazing at route-finding because of her puzzle game expertise, it’s hard for me to buy that she can move her body the way her mind wants it to move right off the bat, even if she did ballet as a kid. Unless she went really, really hard at ballet as a kid, and quit relatively recently... but if she’d been playing video games for all of middle school, there’s no way she wouldn’t have lost some of her strength and mobility.
As a casual go-to-the-bouldering-gym-a-few-times-a-week climber, the lack of explanation of how sport climbing worked was really confusing. I don’t have any experience with that type of lead climbing, and it confused me how Konomi didn’t need anyone to tell her how to clip into the bolts or when to switch over. Why didn’t she ask any questions? Did the harness feel weird to her? What about chalk?!
The speed at which Konomi just starts kicking ass at climbing felt very unrealistic.
The climbing showdown between Konomi and Jun had a sequence of still images with voiceover on top of them that felt very low-budget for a first episode of a new anime. Also. The cleavage shots. I did not care for them. It is not against the rules of climbing for teenagers to wear T-shirts.
There’s a surprising amount of manga about bouldering out there! Rock climbing is fairly popular in Japan. I haven’t read most of it, but I did take a look at the first chapter of Strawberry Canyon and it reminded me of Chihayafuru but with rocks. The Berry Canyon gym sounds a lot more professional and intense than the gym I go to. I would probably be struggling on the Grade 5 wall in there, even if I can flash V3s at my gym now. Seems cute! Still undecided on if I want to spend money to read the whole thing.
But the webcomic I’ve been reading since I started going to the climbing gym is actually a manhwa on webtoon called Deadpoint by MAYORAC, and it rules!
Hoji is okay at rock climbing, but her real special skill is the ability to see other people’s “talent ceiling” – the highest they can go in their field before they fail, an ability she developed after her mother died in a tragic accident. When she unexpectedly befriends climbing prodigy Aseong Chae, the two of them start training together to discover if it might actually be possible to overcome all limitations.
I just love the art- absolutely gorgeous bright colors, dynamic poses, smooth shapes and sleek lines. And the main character gets to wear T-shirts! Hoji’s design is so cute. She is so babey.
I like that she’s competing at a high level but still struggling to send the high-level problems, which makes the comp problems feel legitimately difficult. I also like that her relationship with Aseong Chae is a little toxic and messed up. Adds flavor!
Despite Aseong also being a black-haired sports prodigy, she’s not quite a Kageyama because she’s taking a break from the sport entirely, and is serving more as a coach-mentor type to Hoji than as a rival/deuteragonist. Her true motivations in helping Hoji are still unclear and possibly sinister— she’s really concerned with learning about the “talent ceilings” of her and Hoji’s biggest rivals in the South Korean youth climbing scene, and she’s still thinking about the final hold in that Olympics problem that made her fall. Something’s up, and hopefully, we’ll find out what that is soon enough.
hamsterwoman (hamsterwoman) wrote2025-09-03 08:29 am
hamsterwoman) wrote2025-09-03 08:29 amEntry tags:
TMNZ s6e5-6, Worldcon part 3: Friday Aug 15 panels
There are too many moving parts in RL to write up at the moment (I need to write about my post-Covid weekend, the new air fryer, L's car shopping in progress, and the Return to Office extravaganza), but I haven't had a chance to write up any of that yet. So instead you get Taskmaster NZ and the first of the Worldcon days that was getting too long for LJ so I ended up breaking it up into two.
*
TMNZ s6e05 -- this was a less fun episode for me: I thought the tasks were not all that interesting, nobody did anything I really loved, and Jeremy's scoring continued to annoy me with nothing to distract me from it really. I mean, it was still a baseline level of fun, but was the episode this season I enjoyed the least so far. ( Spoilers from here )
TMNZ s6e06 -- I'm digging Pax's jacket, which is like the upholstery of your grandma's armchair, and also Bree's crossed swords necklace. And Jackie's wig du jour. ( Spoilers )
*
Continuing on with the Worldcon account:
( Friday, Aug 15: panels )
By this point it was 8:30 p.m. and time to head over to the Terra Ignota fan fathering, but I'll leave that for the next post (right now I'm thinking that + the Saturday panels could be one post, and the Hugo Awards and my thoughts on the stats a different one, but we'll see; maybe Sunday will fit in there also...)
( A couple of photos -- mostly just Hugo bases this time )
*
TMNZ s6e05 -- this was a less fun episode for me: I thought the tasks were not all that interesting, nobody did anything I really loved, and Jeremy's scoring continued to annoy me with nothing to distract me from it really. I mean, it was still a baseline level of fun, but was the episode this season I enjoyed the least so far. ( Spoilers from here )
TMNZ s6e06 -- I'm digging Pax's jacket, which is like the upholstery of your grandma's armchair, and also Bree's crossed swords necklace. And Jackie's wig du jour. ( Spoilers )
*
Continuing on with the Worldcon account:
( Friday, Aug 15: panels )
By this point it was 8:30 p.m. and time to head over to the Terra Ignota fan fathering, but I'll leave that for the next post (right now I'm thinking that + the Saturday panels could be one post, and the Hugo Awards and my thoughts on the stats a different one, but we'll see; maybe Sunday will fit in there also...)
( A couple of photos -- mostly just Hugo bases this time )
proustbot (proustbot) wrote2025-09-02 10:59 pm
proustbot) wrote2025-09-02 10:59 pmEntry tags:
a machine in the corner wrapped in human skin
Shin Megami Tensei: Persona (1996/2009, PSP) -- Finished Persona 1, a game I have been grimly playing since...March? Ugh. I mainly dragged myself across the finish line to end the jeering of my siblings. I did not enjoy this game. I'm not going to rail too hard against the tedious and boring mechanics of the gameplay since, whatever, it's an update of a 1996 game. Plenty of 1996 games are no longer fun to play thirty years later. However, I feel fine railing against the plot (bad!) and characters (boring!). This game does not have a lot of redeeming qualities.
Sometimes I see old-school Persona fans in the wild, and they're deeply dismayed at the current crop of Persona games, and they often labor under the misapprehension that the earlier Persona games have been unfairly forgotten. They like to confidently assert that Atlus simply needs to port Persona 1 & 2 to modern devices, and then those games would explode in popularity and find an eager audience. And possibly this is true of the Persona 2 duology, which is reputed to have a much better story (albeit with maybe slightly too much Hitler). But this game? No. This game would not find a happy reception with modern players; it should be allowed to languish in its shadowy historical moment. Atlus has a clear-eyed view of the property. They've made the right decision there.
Anyway, now I have finished the game (with the good ending even!), and I am blessedly free of it. Time to play something else! Something like...Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Spirit of Justice...
Sometimes I see old-school Persona fans in the wild, and they're deeply dismayed at the current crop of Persona games, and they often labor under the misapprehension that the earlier Persona games have been unfairly forgotten. They like to confidently assert that Atlus simply needs to port Persona 1 & 2 to modern devices, and then those games would explode in popularity and find an eager audience. And possibly this is true of the Persona 2 duology, which is reputed to have a much better story (albeit with maybe slightly too much Hitler). But this game? No. This game would not find a happy reception with modern players; it should be allowed to languish in its shadowy historical moment. Atlus has a clear-eyed view of the property. They've made the right decision there.
Anyway, now I have finished the game (with the good ending even!), and I am blessedly free of it. Time to play something else! Something like...Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Spirit of Justice...
Entry tags:
2025 Sign-Ups
I'm so glad we're here! I am very grateful to my tagmod helpers (who did a lot more work than me this time, honestly) and to everyone answering queries.
Sign-ups are open until 11:59pm EDT, September 11.
Basics
-Ask for 4-10 fandoms, 1-10 "relationship" tags in each, and in each of your requests, tick at least one of the additional tags that specifies what kind of gift you're interested in.
-Offer 1-10 fandoms, 1-10 "relationship" tags in each, and in each of your offers, tick at least two of the additional tags that specifies what kind of gift you're willing to create.
-In fffx's tagset, the "relationships" field covers characters, relationships, and worldbuilding. fffx uses OR matching - you will get, or create, a gift focusing on one of those tags. If you want specific characters to interact, select a single "relationship" tag that names all of them and uses & and / as appropriate.
-You can repeat fandoms in your requests - ie, you can ask for Original Work twice. You still need 4 unique fandom requests. Offers can be be as minimal as you like, but you will need someone to create for in order to receive an assignment.
-Please list dealbreaking Do-Not-Wants in your sign-ups. You must also put some other, positive information about your interests in each request - this can be a likes list, some prompts, or just talking about what you like about the canon & characters.
Please consider your DNWs carefully. "DNW: unrequested relationships" might suit a 1k relationship-based exchange that also matches on freeforms like "trapped together in an elevator", but may cause stress to someone considering a longer plot. DNWs should give guidance but not constrict your author to a plot that is dramatically narrower than the possibilities of the tag you requested.
-Participants must be aged 18 or over.
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-There is a space in Offers - Title - for "Notes to Mod". You can use this space to tell me more about your matching preferences, if you like. You can also leave it blank. If you have Do-Not-Match requests, I may follow up with you for more information - ie, how pinch hits will be handled.
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How the Additional Tags Work
If you request Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic, you will receive 1 gift that is a comic of at least 10 pages or at least 40 panels. (Ie, if there are 40 distinct panels, it can have 9 pages. If there are 10 full pages, it's okay if there are only 36 panels.)
If you request Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic OR 2 x 5-Page Comics at Artist's Discretion, you may receive 1 gift that is a comic of 10 pages or at least 40 panels, or you may receive 2 gifts of 2 comics that are each half that long. (If selecting that option, I recommend also selecting Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic - there are no drawbacks. But you don't have to.)
If you request Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic, you will receive 1 gift that is a fanfic of at least 10,000 words.
If you request Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic OR 2 x 5000-Word Fics at Author's Discretion, you may receive 1 gift that is a fanfic of at least 10,000 words, or you may receive 2 gifts of 2 fic that are each half that long. (If selecting that option, I recommend also selecting Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic - there are no drawbacks. But you don't have to.)
It is possible that if you select both Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic OR 2 x 5-Page Comics at Artist's Discretion AND Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic OR 2 x 5000-Word Fics at Author's Discretion, you may get two gifts, one of which is a 20-panel comic and 1 of which is a 5,000-word fic. It is possible that if you select "2 x 5" tags for more than one fandom, you will get half-length gifts from two different fandoms. This is up to your creators.
You have to offer two Additional Tags. If you are someone who creates only in 1 medium, you can select both the Fanart tags, or you can select both the Fanfic tags.
Groups
Groups & Creator's Choice tags works like this:
"Thop the Gribble & the Splonks"
This means a story focusing on Thop and his platonic relationship with two characters who fit into the category of Splonk. The characters chosen from the Splonks are up to the creator.
"Gribbles/Splonks"
This means a sexual or romantic relationship including at least two Gribbles and at least two Splonks.
"Gribbles & ALL: Splonks"
This means a story featuring platonic relationships between at least two Gribbles and all of the characters who can be defined as splonks.
"Creator's Choice of Gribble & Splonks"
This means a story featuring platonic relationships between ONE Gribble and at least two Splonks.
When ALL is part of the tag, all members of the group must play significant roles in the work. If it isn't, the creator gets to choose which character feature. Requesters may not select within the tag or DNW members of the group.
Groups that are nominated in this way should be discrete and clearly defined.
If an existing group or Creator's Choice tag doesn't work for you, please use your supplementary nominations slots to nominate a tag between specific characters.
If requesting a group, I recommend using your prompts to talk about who you see as part of the group, just in case your creator has a different idea.
Unusual Things fffx Is Doing
-Comments are really important. This exchange is scheduled to reveal on March 14 2026; I recommend thinking twice abut signing up if you think you'll struggle to comment during the anonymous period or soon after. It is a requirement of this exchange that you must comment on any gifts you receive or, if you cannot, refuse the gift.
-Please don't link to a letter (an external document containing prompts, general preferences, etc) unless you're confident you can complete it by September 21. I know you can't predict the future - please just plan in good faith. Letters, of course, are optional - you don't have to link one at all. If you do link to a letter, please consider keeping a status message at the top to let readers know whether it's complete or not and when it was last updated.
-This exchange requires you to put prompts, or general likes, or something you like about the canon, in the AO3 form. It doesn't have to be long or eloquent, but something other than your DNWs is required. Ie, Optional Details are only optional for creators - they are not completely optional for requesters.
-Please sign up with one account only.
-There are also extra deadlines - September 21 for asking to swap your assignment for any other assignment & for finishing your letter, and November 30 for confirming you're still committed to your assignment, as well as the posting deadline of January 24.
Welcome.
Sign-up instructions
You can sign up at the collection.Sign-ups are open until 11:59pm EDT, September 11.
Basics
-Ask for 4-10 fandoms, 1-10 "relationship" tags in each, and in each of your requests, tick at least one of the additional tags that specifies what kind of gift you're interested in.
-Offer 1-10 fandoms, 1-10 "relationship" tags in each, and in each of your offers, tick at least two of the additional tags that specifies what kind of gift you're willing to create.
-In fffx's tagset, the "relationships" field covers characters, relationships, and worldbuilding. fffx uses OR matching - you will get, or create, a gift focusing on one of those tags. If you want specific characters to interact, select a single "relationship" tag that names all of them and uses & and / as appropriate.
-You can repeat fandoms in your requests - ie, you can ask for Original Work twice. You still need 4 unique fandom requests. Offers can be be as minimal as you like, but you will need someone to create for in order to receive an assignment.
-Please list dealbreaking Do-Not-Wants in your sign-ups. You must also put some other, positive information about your interests in each request - this can be a likes list, some prompts, or just talking about what you like about the canon & characters.
Please consider your DNWs carefully. "DNW: unrequested relationships" might suit a 1k relationship-based exchange that also matches on freeforms like "trapped together in an elevator", but may cause stress to someone considering a longer plot. DNWs should give guidance but not constrict your author to a plot that is dramatically narrower than the possibilities of the tag you requested.
-Participants must be aged 18 or over.
-Do not use "AI" generative tools for fic or art. Please reach out to me directly if you're not sure if your assistive tool counts.
-There is a space in Offers - Title - for "Notes to Mod". You can use this space to tell me more about your matching preferences, if you like. You can also leave it blank. If you have Do-Not-Match requests, I may follow up with you for more information - ie, how pinch hits will be handled.
-You are not eligible to sign up if you have not commented on previous gifts (check your name here) or discussed the situation with me. You are not eligible to sign up if you posted a placeholder for which I banned you, unless you've posted a make-up work.
-You are not eligible to sign up if you took part last year and either defaulted after check-in, didn't check in during check-in, or checked in then didn't post a work. However, if that happened to you in any of rounds 1-4, you're welcome to sign up again now.
How the Additional Tags Work
If you request Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic, you will receive 1 gift that is a comic of at least 10 pages or at least 40 panels. (Ie, if there are 40 distinct panels, it can have 9 pages. If there are 10 full pages, it's okay if there are only 36 panels.)
If you request Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic OR 2 x 5-Page Comics at Artist's Discretion, you may receive 1 gift that is a comic of 10 pages or at least 40 panels, or you may receive 2 gifts of 2 comics that are each half that long. (If selecting that option, I recommend also selecting Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic - there are no drawbacks. But you don't have to.)
If you request Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic, you will receive 1 gift that is a fanfic of at least 10,000 words.
If you request Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic OR 2 x 5000-Word Fics at Author's Discretion, you may receive 1 gift that is a fanfic of at least 10,000 words, or you may receive 2 gifts of 2 fic that are each half that long. (If selecting that option, I recommend also selecting Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic - there are no drawbacks. But you don't have to.)
It is possible that if you select both Fanart: 1 x 10-Page Comic OR 2 x 5-Page Comics at Artist's Discretion AND Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic OR 2 x 5000-Word Fics at Author's Discretion, you may get two gifts, one of which is a 20-panel comic and 1 of which is a 5,000-word fic. It is possible that if you select "2 x 5" tags for more than one fandom, you will get half-length gifts from two different fandoms. This is up to your creators.
You have to offer two Additional Tags. If you are someone who creates only in 1 medium, you can select both the Fanart tags, or you can select both the Fanfic tags.
Groups
Groups & Creator's Choice tags works like this:
"Thop the Gribble & the Splonks"
This means a story focusing on Thop and his platonic relationship with two characters who fit into the category of Splonk. The characters chosen from the Splonks are up to the creator.
"Gribbles/Splonks"
This means a sexual or romantic relationship including at least two Gribbles and at least two Splonks.
"Gribbles & ALL: Splonks"
This means a story featuring platonic relationships between at least two Gribbles and all of the characters who can be defined as splonks.
"Creator's Choice of Gribble & Splonks"
This means a story featuring platonic relationships between ONE Gribble and at least two Splonks.
When ALL is part of the tag, all members of the group must play significant roles in the work. If it isn't, the creator gets to choose which character feature. Requesters may not select within the tag or DNW members of the group.
Groups that are nominated in this way should be discrete and clearly defined.
If an existing group or Creator's Choice tag doesn't work for you, please use your supplementary nominations slots to nominate a tag between specific characters.
If requesting a group, I recommend using your prompts to talk about who you see as part of the group, just in case your creator has a different idea.
Unusual Things fffx Is Doing
-Comments are really important. This exchange is scheduled to reveal on March 14 2026; I recommend thinking twice abut signing up if you think you'll struggle to comment during the anonymous period or soon after. It is a requirement of this exchange that you must comment on any gifts you receive or, if you cannot, refuse the gift.
-Please don't link to a letter (an external document containing prompts, general preferences, etc) unless you're confident you can complete it by September 21. I know you can't predict the future - please just plan in good faith. Letters, of course, are optional - you don't have to link one at all. If you do link to a letter, please consider keeping a status message at the top to let readers know whether it's complete or not and when it was last updated.
-This exchange requires you to put prompts, or general likes, or something you like about the canon, in the AO3 form. It doesn't have to be long or eloquent, but something other than your DNWs is required. Ie, Optional Details are only optional for creators - they are not completely optional for requesters.
-Please sign up with one account only.
-There are also extra deadlines - September 21 for asking to swap your assignment for any other assignment & for finishing your letter, and November 30 for confirming you're still committed to your assignment, as well as the posting deadline of January 24.
Some previous nominations queries remain
Please see previous post.Additional nominations
Nominations will be re-opened tomorrow, for 3 fandoms/3 tags. If you care about recording what you've already nominated, please save that information now.Errors in tag set
There will inevitably be some. Feel free to let me know and I'll do what I can to sort them out (this may not be until sign-ups close). I mostly care about errors that could cause confusion or difficulty in matching.Welcome.
yuletidemods (yuletidemods) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
yuletide_admin2025-09-02 07:33 pm
yuletidemods) wrote in yuletide_admin2025-09-02 07:33 pmEntry tags:
A 2025 Experiment: Increasing fandom slots for nominations & requests
As we all start planning our nominations and requests, mods have been reviewing our rules around the number of fandoms that can be nominated and requested.
Traditionally, Yuletide has allowed participants to nominate a maximum of 3 fandoms to the tagset, with up to 4 characters each. We increased that to 4 fandoms in 2023 and got positive feedback about that change.
During signups, participants have been required to request at least 3 fandoms, and up to 6 fandoms if they choose. They must offer a minimum of 4 fandoms.
We've needed to limit the tagset size due to a combination of AO3 technical limitations as well as the logistical effort to confirm each fandom is eligible while avoiding duplicate fandoms. The good news is that we’ve found AO3’s tagset interface loads the moderation tools a bit faster lately. We've also developed more scalable processes and a group of wonderful, experienced volunteers to help with that checking. We think we can handle more nominations this year, but we won’t know until we try!
For 2025 only, we are going to increase the number of tagset nominations from 4 fandoms to 5 fandoms per person. The maximum number of characters will remain at 4 per fandom.
We’ll see how this goes, and whether the additional workload seems manageable to us, before deciding whether to keep the increased limit in 2026.
For 2025 only, we are also going to increase the maximum number of fandom requests from 6 to 8. The minimum of 3 will not change. This means you must request at least 3 fandoms, and up to 8 fandoms if you choose.
Everything else remains the same: for each fandom, you will still be able to request up to a maximum of 4 characters. You will still be required to offer at least 4 fandoms with a minimum of 2 characters each.
Again, we will evaluate how it goes, and how this affects our workload, before deciding whether to keep the increased limit in 2026.
We hope this opens up some exciting possibilities for you in the 2025 round! Please stay tuned for our usual eligibility and evidence posts.
Traditionally, Yuletide has allowed participants to nominate a maximum of 3 fandoms to the tagset, with up to 4 characters each. We increased that to 4 fandoms in 2023 and got positive feedback about that change.
During signups, participants have been required to request at least 3 fandoms, and up to 6 fandoms if they choose. They must offer a minimum of 4 fandoms.
We've needed to limit the tagset size due to a combination of AO3 technical limitations as well as the logistical effort to confirm each fandom is eligible while avoiding duplicate fandoms. The good news is that we’ve found AO3’s tagset interface loads the moderation tools a bit faster lately. We've also developed more scalable processes and a group of wonderful, experienced volunteers to help with that checking. We think we can handle more nominations this year, but we won’t know until we try!
Change to nominations:
For 2025 only, we are going to increase the number of tagset nominations from 4 fandoms to 5 fandoms per person. The maximum number of characters will remain at 4 per fandom.
We’ll see how this goes, and whether the additional workload seems manageable to us, before deciding whether to keep the increased limit in 2026.
Change to requests:
For 2025 only, we are also going to increase the maximum number of fandom requests from 6 to 8. The minimum of 3 will not change. This means you must request at least 3 fandoms, and up to 8 fandoms if you choose.
Everything else remains the same: for each fandom, you will still be able to request up to a maximum of 4 characters. You will still be required to offer at least 4 fandoms with a minimum of 2 characters each.
Again, we will evaluate how it goes, and how this affects our workload, before deciding whether to keep the increased limit in 2026.
We hope this opens up some exciting possibilities for you in the 2025 round! Please stay tuned for our usual eligibility and evidence posts.
mrissa (mrissa) wrote2025-09-02 04:46 pm
mrissa) wrote2025-09-02 04:46 pmEntry tags:
Books read, late August
Pria Anand, The Mind Electric: A Neurologist on the Strangeness and Wonder of Our Brains. This is the most like Oliver Sacks of anything I've read since Oliver Sacks died, and one of the ways in which that's the case is that Anand is writing from her own experience as a neurologist but also as someone who has gone through relevant symptoms and has a particular perspective, so: in the tradition of Sacks rather than attempting to clone him. If you like "weird things brains do oh goodness" stories, this will be your jam, and it sure was mine. Also Anand is meticulous about gender: if there are relevant studies that talk about the occurrence of a particular condition among trans women as compared to cis women, cis men, or trans men (or etc. with other groups in the spotlight), she will note them as clearly and calmly as she would something about cis women, treating it all as part of our composite picture of how the brain works and what affects it. Highly recommended.
Charlie Jane Anders, Lessons in Magic and Disaster. This book completely wrecked me. It's in some ways a gentle story about subtle and small-scale magic and about human relationships in our own structurally substantially unequal society. It's also about long-term grief where most stories that touch on grief are fairly short-term (months or 1-2 years) or muted somehow, and it's the only recent book I recall really delving into helping your parent with their grief while you, an adult, deal with your own differently-shaped grief for the same person. It's really beautifully done, I wanted to be doing nothing else but reading it once I started reading it, and also it was emotionally devastating in parts.
Scott Anderson, King of Kings: The Iranian Revolution: A Story of Hubris, Delusion, and Catastrophic Miscalculation. Sometimes I feel like the most confusing parts of history are not the really distant ones--who doesn't like a good Ea-Nasir joke--but the things that happened just before you arrived or as you're arriving. They're simultaneously foundational to a bunch of the world around you and happened while you weren't looking, in ways no one thinks to teach you formally. For me, born in 1978, the Iranian Revolution is one of those things, so when I spotted this on the library's new books table I picked it up immediately. This is a detailed history from someone who got to interview many of the Americans involved, and who is committed to not oversimplifying the benefits or detriments of the shah's reign. I could have wished for somewhat deeper Iranian history, though there was some, and stronger regional grounding, but also those things can be found elsewhere, it's all part of the process. The fact that there's an American flag on the cover of this book as well as an Iranian flag is not an accident. A book that was focusing on Iranian relations with for example France in this period would have a very different take.
Stephani Burgis, A Honeymoon of Grave Consequence. Discussed elsewhere.
Robert Darnton, A Literary Tour de France: The World of Books on the Eve of the French Revolution. This is a microhistory of booksellers and their job routes and wares in the pre-Revolutionary era. Of all of Darnton's books, I'd say this should be low on the list for people who are not deeply interested in the period, least of general interest. Luckily I am deeply interested in the period. So.
John M. Ford, From the End of the Twentieth Century. Reread. Satisfying in its own inimitable way. Those poor skazlorls.
Karen Joy Fowler, Black Glass. Reread. And the threads Karen was pulling out of the genre/literary conversation at the time were so different from the ones Mike did, I hadn't intended to read them in close proximity to compare and contrast but it was kind of fun when I landed there.
Gigi Griffis, And the Trees Stare Back. This is not my usual sort of thing--creepy YA with eventual explanation--except for one major factor: it's set in the lead-up to the Singing Revolution in Estonia. Really great integration of historical setting and speculative concept, bonded hard with the characters, loved it. Most of the historical fiction I read has me reading through the cracks of my fingers, wincing at what I know is coming but the characters do not. This was the opposite, I spent the entire book super-excited for them.
Dave Hage and Josephine Marcotty, Sea of Grass: The Conquest, Ruin, and Redemption of the American Prairie. I am always disappointed to find out that I am already pretty expert in something, because I learn less that way. The American Prairie! Soil restoration, water conservation, habitats, farming...it turns out I already know quite a lot about this. Darn. If you don't, here's a good place to start.
John Lisle, Project Mind Control: Sidney Gottlieb, the CIA, and the Tragedy of MKULTRA. Ooooof. This is another "I saw it on the library's new books shelf" read for this fortnight, and its portrayal of CIA misbehavior was...not a surprise, but having this amount of detail on one project was...not cheering.
Ada Palmer, Inventing the Renaissance: The Myth of a Golden Age. If you internalized the idea that historians should be effaced as completely as possible from the writing of history, in the pretense that the history wrote itself really, this will not be the book for you. Ada Palmer is as major a factor in this book as Machiavelli or any of the Medicis. If, on the other hand, you enjoy Ada's classroom lecture voice, it comes through really clearly here. There are some places where I was clearly not her target audience--I honestly don't have a personal investment in what Machiavelli's personal religious stance was, so the chapter about why we want him to be an atheist was speaking to a "we" I am not in. Still, lots of interesting stuff here. Including, surprisingly, cantaloupes.
Jo Piazza, Everyone Is Lying to You. This is a thriller about social media influencers in the group that would have been called "Mommy bloggers" a generation ago, set in the Mountain West. It's very readable, and if you know anything about tradwife influencers you'll see lots of places where it's spot on. I think people who read a lot may find the twists less twisty, but it doesn't rely solely on twists for its appeal.
Joe Mungo Reed, Terrestrial History. I haven't had a satisfying generational epic in a long time. This one spans Earth and Mars, with point of view characters in four generations and multiple points on their partially shared timeline. My preferences would have been for more of everything, more all around--for a generational epic this is comparatively slim--but still very readable.
Sophy Roberts, A Training School for Elephants: Retracing a Curious Episode in the European Grab for Africa. The subtitle calls this a curious episode. It is instead a staggeringly depressing demonstration of how colonialism was fractally horrible. Zoom in a little closer! more horrors! hooray! No. Not hooray. And Roberts is clearly not claiming it is a cause for celebration, but...well. For me this microhistory was more upsetting than illuminating. Maybe I should stop looking at the new books shelf at the library for a minute.
Jessie L. Weston, The Three Days' Tournament: A Study in Romance and Folk-Lore. Kindle. Comparison and contrast of different appearances of a particular legend throughout western/northwestern Europe and England. Nostalgic for me because I used to read a lot more of this sort of thing.
Darcie Wilde, A Purely Private Matter, And Dangerous to Know, A Lady Compromised, A Counterfeit Suitor, and The Secret of the Lady's Maid. This is not all the Rosalind Thorne mysteries there are, but it's all the Rosalind Thorne mysteries my library had. If you like the first one, they are consistent, and I think you could probably start anywhere and find the situation and characters adequately explained. Regency mysteries! Do you want some of those? here they are.
Charlie Jane Anders, Lessons in Magic and Disaster. This book completely wrecked me. It's in some ways a gentle story about subtle and small-scale magic and about human relationships in our own structurally substantially unequal society. It's also about long-term grief where most stories that touch on grief are fairly short-term (months or 1-2 years) or muted somehow, and it's the only recent book I recall really delving into helping your parent with their grief while you, an adult, deal with your own differently-shaped grief for the same person. It's really beautifully done, I wanted to be doing nothing else but reading it once I started reading it, and also it was emotionally devastating in parts.
Scott Anderson, King of Kings: The Iranian Revolution: A Story of Hubris, Delusion, and Catastrophic Miscalculation. Sometimes I feel like the most confusing parts of history are not the really distant ones--who doesn't like a good Ea-Nasir joke--but the things that happened just before you arrived or as you're arriving. They're simultaneously foundational to a bunch of the world around you and happened while you weren't looking, in ways no one thinks to teach you formally. For me, born in 1978, the Iranian Revolution is one of those things, so when I spotted this on the library's new books table I picked it up immediately. This is a detailed history from someone who got to interview many of the Americans involved, and who is committed to not oversimplifying the benefits or detriments of the shah's reign. I could have wished for somewhat deeper Iranian history, though there was some, and stronger regional grounding, but also those things can be found elsewhere, it's all part of the process. The fact that there's an American flag on the cover of this book as well as an Iranian flag is not an accident. A book that was focusing on Iranian relations with for example France in this period would have a very different take.
Stephani Burgis, A Honeymoon of Grave Consequence. Discussed elsewhere.
Robert Darnton, A Literary Tour de France: The World of Books on the Eve of the French Revolution. This is a microhistory of booksellers and their job routes and wares in the pre-Revolutionary era. Of all of Darnton's books, I'd say this should be low on the list for people who are not deeply interested in the period, least of general interest. Luckily I am deeply interested in the period. So.
John M. Ford, From the End of the Twentieth Century. Reread. Satisfying in its own inimitable way. Those poor skazlorls.
Karen Joy Fowler, Black Glass. Reread. And the threads Karen was pulling out of the genre/literary conversation at the time were so different from the ones Mike did, I hadn't intended to read them in close proximity to compare and contrast but it was kind of fun when I landed there.
Gigi Griffis, And the Trees Stare Back. This is not my usual sort of thing--creepy YA with eventual explanation--except for one major factor: it's set in the lead-up to the Singing Revolution in Estonia. Really great integration of historical setting and speculative concept, bonded hard with the characters, loved it. Most of the historical fiction I read has me reading through the cracks of my fingers, wincing at what I know is coming but the characters do not. This was the opposite, I spent the entire book super-excited for them.
Dave Hage and Josephine Marcotty, Sea of Grass: The Conquest, Ruin, and Redemption of the American Prairie. I am always disappointed to find out that I am already pretty expert in something, because I learn less that way. The American Prairie! Soil restoration, water conservation, habitats, farming...it turns out I already know quite a lot about this. Darn. If you don't, here's a good place to start.
John Lisle, Project Mind Control: Sidney Gottlieb, the CIA, and the Tragedy of MKULTRA. Ooooof. This is another "I saw it on the library's new books shelf" read for this fortnight, and its portrayal of CIA misbehavior was...not a surprise, but having this amount of detail on one project was...not cheering.
Ada Palmer, Inventing the Renaissance: The Myth of a Golden Age. If you internalized the idea that historians should be effaced as completely as possible from the writing of history, in the pretense that the history wrote itself really, this will not be the book for you. Ada Palmer is as major a factor in this book as Machiavelli or any of the Medicis. If, on the other hand, you enjoy Ada's classroom lecture voice, it comes through really clearly here. There are some places where I was clearly not her target audience--I honestly don't have a personal investment in what Machiavelli's personal religious stance was, so the chapter about why we want him to be an atheist was speaking to a "we" I am not in. Still, lots of interesting stuff here. Including, surprisingly, cantaloupes.
Jo Piazza, Everyone Is Lying to You. This is a thriller about social media influencers in the group that would have been called "Mommy bloggers" a generation ago, set in the Mountain West. It's very readable, and if you know anything about tradwife influencers you'll see lots of places where it's spot on. I think people who read a lot may find the twists less twisty, but it doesn't rely solely on twists for its appeal.
Joe Mungo Reed, Terrestrial History. I haven't had a satisfying generational epic in a long time. This one spans Earth and Mars, with point of view characters in four generations and multiple points on their partially shared timeline. My preferences would have been for more of everything, more all around--for a generational epic this is comparatively slim--but still very readable.
Sophy Roberts, A Training School for Elephants: Retracing a Curious Episode in the European Grab for Africa. The subtitle calls this a curious episode. It is instead a staggeringly depressing demonstration of how colonialism was fractally horrible. Zoom in a little closer! more horrors! hooray! No. Not hooray. And Roberts is clearly not claiming it is a cause for celebration, but...well. For me this microhistory was more upsetting than illuminating. Maybe I should stop looking at the new books shelf at the library for a minute.
Jessie L. Weston, The Three Days' Tournament: A Study in Romance and Folk-Lore. Kindle. Comparison and contrast of different appearances of a particular legend throughout western/northwestern Europe and England. Nostalgic for me because I used to read a lot more of this sort of thing.
Darcie Wilde, A Purely Private Matter, And Dangerous to Know, A Lady Compromised, A Counterfeit Suitor, and The Secret of the Lady's Maid. This is not all the Rosalind Thorne mysteries there are, but it's all the Rosalind Thorne mysteries my library had. If you like the first one, they are consistent, and I think you could probably start anywhere and find the situation and characters adequately explained. Regency mysteries! Do you want some of those? here they are.
Riona (rionaleonhart) wrote2025-09-02 07:02 pm
rionaleonhart) wrote2025-09-02 07:02 pmEntry tags:
I Guess I Have A Lot Of Blood.
Glancing at the watch I'm not wearing, I see that it is once again time for me to lose my mind over something ludicrously niche.
Danganronpa: Despair Time is an unofficial Danganronpa fan series on YouTube, mimicking the style and concept of the Danganronpa games: sixteen talented young people are trapped in a building and forced to murder each other. I was a little sceptical, but I thought I might as well give it a try.
I'm really impressed! This fan series nails the Danganronpa tone, I like the characters, and it's so dense with interesting plot developments and revelations. I tore through the whole thing and had a great time.
Below the cut are the increasingly rambling and invested notes I made while watching everything that exists so far: the prologue and the first two chapters. At one point I fall hard in love with one of the characters within the space of a few seconds for extremely predictable reasons, i.e. that character being The Worst.
( Notes on Danganronpa: Despair Time, up to the end of chapter two. )
I'm already impatiently looking forward to more. Why have I done this to myself?
Danganronpa: Despair Time is an unofficial Danganronpa fan series on YouTube, mimicking the style and concept of the Danganronpa games: sixteen talented young people are trapped in a building and forced to murder each other. I was a little sceptical, but I thought I might as well give it a try.
I'm really impressed! This fan series nails the Danganronpa tone, I like the characters, and it's so dense with interesting plot developments and revelations. I tore through the whole thing and had a great time.
Below the cut are the increasingly rambling and invested notes I made while watching everything that exists so far: the prologue and the first two chapters. At one point I fall hard in love with one of the characters within the space of a few seconds for extremely predictable reasons, i.e. that character being The Worst.
( Notes on Danganronpa: Despair Time, up to the end of chapter two. )
I'm already impatiently looking forward to more. Why have I done this to myself?
ioplokon (ioplokon) wrote2025-09-02 11:41 am
ioplokon) wrote2025-09-02 11:41 amEntry tags:
Zoom alternative!
I've been increasingly annoyed at Zoom kicking me off calls after 40 minutes and finally started looking at alternatives. I recently had a great experience with Framatalk (a project among others!) , a browser-based version of Jitsi Meet. It has clear audio & video, plus screen sharing. The one irony is that screen sharing only fully works on Chrome, when the whole mission of the Framasoft suite of tools is to "DeGoogle the Internet" (for what it's worth, I believe this is a problem on the Firefox side rather than the Jitsi side. I want to experiment with the desktop version of Jitsi meet, but it looks like this isn't really supported anymore.
But for simple video calls where you don't need to screen share with audio, Framatalk (a project among others!) is a really serviceable, free tool.
But for simple video calls where you don't need to screen share with audio, Framatalk (a project among others!) is a really serviceable, free tool.
KD (karel) wrote in fire_emblem2025-09-01 07:13 pm
karel) wrote in fire_emblem2025-09-01 07:13 pm[ fic ] please, she's perfect in your design | ch 10-11
► please, she's perfect in your design (ongoing)
tellius | volke/ilyana
explicit | 6582 words
overall story cws for canon-typical violence, arguably underage sex, relationship nonsense of the unhealthy and undernegotiated variety
[ After the war, Volke picks up a new hobby, and it's unraveling why Ilyana is so hungry all the time. Ilyana's new hobby is him, and being the vessel of a god.
Ch 10-11 | Volke licks his wounds, Heather tries to help in her own way, Ilyana has a really, really uncomfortable (and then not so uncomfortable) time. ]
tellius | volke/ilyana
explicit | 6582 words
overall story cws for canon-typical violence, arguably underage sex, relationship nonsense of the unhealthy and undernegotiated variety
Ilyana bit her lip, looked away.
"Hey… I'll go with you! We go track him down, you tell him-"
"He wanted some space," she said, quietly. "I'll tell him… when he comes back. He promised he'd come back."
Heather's expression softened. "Ok… huh. That's not very dirty novel of you, but.. hehe, it's probably better. Give him some space, and then when he's back, explain it all. Yeah! Yeah, girl, that's good. Look at you, making more grown-up choices than I woulda!"
She cackled, laying back on the bed.
"Hey… I'll go with you! We go track him down, you tell him-"
"He wanted some space," she said, quietly. "I'll tell him… when he comes back. He promised he'd come back."
Heather's expression softened. "Ok… huh. That's not very dirty novel of you, but.. hehe, it's probably better. Give him some space, and then when he's back, explain it all. Yeah! Yeah, girl, that's good. Look at you, making more grown-up choices than I woulda!"
She cackled, laying back on the bed.
[ After the war, Volke picks up a new hobby, and it's unraveling why Ilyana is so hungry all the time. Ilyana's new hobby is him, and being the vessel of a god.
Ch 10-11 | Volke licks his wounds, Heather tries to help in her own way, Ilyana has a really, really uncomfortable (and then not so uncomfortable) time. ]
littlefics (littlefics) wrote in seasonsofdrabbles2025-09-01 01:01 pm
littlefics) wrote in seasonsofdrabbles2025-09-01 01:01 pmAuthors now revealed!
Authors are now revealed! Many thanks to all who participated in this round, especially our pinch hitters. <3
Reveals doesn't mean you should stop reading and commenting (or indeed treating), so we hope you continue to enjoy the haul of drabbles this round.
A feedback post will be up soon with a couple specific questions, so keep an eye out for that!
Reveals doesn't mean you should stop reading and commenting (or indeed treating), so we hope you continue to enjoy the haul of drabbles this round.
A feedback post will be up soon with a couple specific questions, so keep an eye out for that!
pumpkinkingmod (pumpkinkingmod) wrote in trickortreatex2025-09-01 09:33 am
pumpkinkingmod) wrote in trickortreatex2025-09-01 09:33 amEntry tags:
Trick or Treat 2025 Nominations Open! 🎃
Welcome back to Trick or Treat! Nominations are open until September 8 at 7:59 PM EDT/23:59 UTC. Please read this post before nominating!
Countdown until nominations end.
Here is this year's tag set! You may nominate up to 8 fandoms with 8 characters or relationships in each.
Nominations format
You can nominate characters and/or relationships under each fandom you nominate. For AO3 matching algorithm reasons, both characters and relationships are nominated under the “Characters” slot in the tag set, and relationships should be specified by including “Ship:” in front of the pairing, whether romantic/sexual or platonic.
All fandoms in the tag set need to be nominated with at least one character or relationship tag under that fandom.
For all tags:
Please nominate original works under the fandom Original Work. If you don't specify a character's gender in the tag, you're leaving it up to the creator to choose.
Please avoid using pipes where possible and do not use diacritics/tone marks where unnecessary.
All character and ship nominations must be disambiguated. (See below for an explanation!)
Please use the name order as in the canon ("Given Name Family Name" for most western canons, "Family Name Given Name" for most Asian canons).
For relationship tags:
Relationships must include "Ship:" in front of the pairing.
You may nominate / or & relationships. "A/B" is a romantic or sexual relationship; "A & B" is a platonic relationship.
Please alphabetize ships by family name.
Please nominate crossovers under the fandom Crossover Fandom, with ships in the format:
Ship: Yuri Plisetsky (YOI) & Rajah (Aladdin).
You cannot nominate both / and & in a single tag. This means any nominations like "Ship: Aerith/Tifa & Cloud (FFVII)" will be rejected.
What is disambiguation?
This means adding the fandom in brackets after your nomination. Some examples:
Sakurayashiki Kaoru (SK8)
Leia Organa (SWOT)
Luke Skywalker (SWST)
Ship: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (BBC Sherlock)
Ship: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (Sherlock Holmes - ACD)
Ship: Mia Fey/Phoenix Wright (Ace Attorney)
Ship: Enoshima Junko/Tsumiki Mikan (DR Hope's Peak)
Ship: James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers (Marvel 616)
Before nominating, please check if your fandom is already in the tagset, and what disambiguations were used. Your nominations get approved faster if they are already in the correct format.
Specific Fandom Nomination Guidelines
Updated per feedback for 2025: Please nominate all MCU movies and Marvel TV shows under Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Updated per feedback for 2025: Please nominate Dimension 20 campaigns separately according to continuity.
Updated per feedback for 2025: Please nominate FFVII Remake/Rebirth separately from Compilation of FFVII.
Marvel Comics should be nominated by the characters' native universe, e.g. Marvel 616.
DC Comics should be nominated together under DCU (Comics). You may specify timeline (e.g. Pre-Flashpoint) in the disambiguation.
Arrowverse TV shows should be nominated together under DC's Arrowverse. Superman & Lois is separate.
All DCEU movies should be nominated together under DC Extended Universe.
Baldur's Gate games should be nominated together as Baldur's Gate (Video Games). "Tav" or "Dark Urge" are the main character of BG3. "Charname" is the main character of BG1 or 2. "Original Character(s)" are not player characters.
Buffyverse (TV) consists of the television shows for both Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV) and Angel: The Series.
Doctor Who is divided between 1963, 2005, and Torchwood.
Danganronpa has the original continuity ("Danganronpa - Hope’s Peak Arc") while Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony is separate.
Dragon Age should be nominated as Dragon Age - All Media Types.
If you've read this far down the post, please comment with your favorite spooky creature. This doesn't mean anything, it's just for fun.
Star Trek should be divided by show, with Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies) separate.
Star Wars should be divided into Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, the standalone movies, then the individual properties, e.g. The Mandalorian (TV).
Ace Attorney and The Great Ace Attorney are two separate fandoms. Please use localized names where applicable, i.e, "Miles Edgeworth" and "Herlock Sholmes."
Countdown until nominations end.
Here is this year's tag set! You may nominate up to 8 fandoms with 8 characters or relationships in each.
Nominations format
You can nominate characters and/or relationships under each fandom you nominate. For AO3 matching algorithm reasons, both characters and relationships are nominated under the “Characters” slot in the tag set, and relationships should be specified by including “Ship:” in front of the pairing, whether romantic/sexual or platonic.
All fandoms in the tag set need to be nominated with at least one character or relationship tag under that fandom.
For all tags:
Please nominate original works under the fandom Original Work. If you don't specify a character's gender in the tag, you're leaving it up to the creator to choose.
Please avoid using pipes where possible and do not use diacritics/tone marks where unnecessary.
All character and ship nominations must be disambiguated. (See below for an explanation!)
Please use the name order as in the canon ("Given Name Family Name" for most western canons, "Family Name Given Name" for most Asian canons).
For relationship tags:
Relationships must include "Ship:" in front of the pairing.
You may nominate / or & relationships. "A/B" is a romantic or sexual relationship; "A & B" is a platonic relationship.
Please alphabetize ships by family name.
Please nominate crossovers under the fandom Crossover Fandom, with ships in the format:
Ship: Yuri Plisetsky (YOI) & Rajah (Aladdin).
You cannot nominate both / and & in a single tag. This means any nominations like "Ship: Aerith/Tifa & Cloud (FFVII)" will be rejected.
What is disambiguation?
This means adding the fandom in brackets after your nomination. Some examples:
Sakurayashiki Kaoru (SK8)
Leia Organa (SWOT)
Luke Skywalker (SWST)
Ship: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (BBC Sherlock)
Ship: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (Sherlock Holmes - ACD)
Ship: Mia Fey/Phoenix Wright (Ace Attorney)
Ship: Enoshima Junko/Tsumiki Mikan (DR Hope's Peak)
Ship: James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers (Marvel 616)
Before nominating, please check if your fandom is already in the tagset, and what disambiguations were used. Your nominations get approved faster if they are already in the correct format.
Specific Fandom Nomination Guidelines
Updated per feedback for 2025: Please nominate all MCU movies and Marvel TV shows under Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Updated per feedback for 2025: Please nominate Dimension 20 campaigns separately according to continuity.
Updated per feedback for 2025: Please nominate FFVII Remake/Rebirth separately from Compilation of FFVII.
Marvel Comics should be nominated by the characters' native universe, e.g. Marvel 616.
DC Comics should be nominated together under DCU (Comics). You may specify timeline (e.g. Pre-Flashpoint) in the disambiguation.
Arrowverse TV shows should be nominated together under DC's Arrowverse. Superman & Lois is separate.
All DCEU movies should be nominated together under DC Extended Universe.
Baldur's Gate games should be nominated together as Baldur's Gate (Video Games). "Tav" or "Dark Urge" are the main character of BG3. "Charname" is the main character of BG1 or 2. "Original Character(s)" are not player characters.
Buffyverse (TV) consists of the television shows for both Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV) and Angel: The Series.
Doctor Who is divided between 1963, 2005, and Torchwood.
Danganronpa has the original continuity ("Danganronpa - Hope’s Peak Arc") while Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony is separate.
Dragon Age should be nominated as Dragon Age - All Media Types.
If you've read this far down the post, please comment with your favorite spooky creature. This doesn't mean anything, it's just for fun.
Star Trek should be divided by show, with Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies) separate.
Star Wars should be divided into Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, the standalone movies, then the individual properties, e.g. The Mandalorian (TV).
Ace Attorney and The Great Ace Attorney are two separate fandoms. Please use localized names where applicable, i.e, "Miles Edgeworth" and "Herlock Sholmes."
Trismegistus (lebateleur) wrote2025-09-01 11:43 am
lebateleur) wrote2025-09-01 11:43 amEntry tags:
August Language Roundup
It sure is frustrating when the owl's periodic language path updates wipe the results of all your hard work off the board. I know the real goal is to maximize user's time-on-app vice the user's experience, but I don't see how resetting someone's progress from Unit 26 to Unit 6 would encourage them to spend more time engaging.
Chinese — Finished 1/10 of Rookie Unit 8; legendary through Rookie Unit 6
Dutch — Finished 1/5 of Explorer Unit 2; legendary through Rookie Unit 3
Gaelic — Finished 1/5 of Explorer Unit 13; legendary through the Explorer Unit 10
Hindi — Finished 4/5 of Unit 1; backburnered to focus on the letters with the GC
Indonesian — Finished 2/5 of Explorer Unit 12; legendary through 2/5 of Explorer Unit 11
Japanese — Finished Traveler Unit 24; legendary through Traveler Unit 21
Korean — Finished 1/5 of Rookie Unit 6; legendary through Rookie Unit 5
Latin — Finished 1/5 of Rookie Unit 6
Manx — Finished lesson 3 of the Loayr Gaelg 3 textbook
Welsh — Finished 1/5 of Rookie Unit 6; legendary through 1/5 of Rookie Unit 4
And, because, why not? Here's where things stood ( last month. )
これで以上です。
Chinese — Finished 1/10 of Rookie Unit 8; legendary through Rookie Unit 6
Dutch — Finished 1/5 of Explorer Unit 2; legendary through Rookie Unit 3
Gaelic — Finished 1/5 of Explorer Unit 13; legendary through the Explorer Unit 10
Hindi — Finished 4/5 of Unit 1; backburnered to focus on the letters with the GC
Indonesian — Finished 2/5 of Explorer Unit 12; legendary through 2/5 of Explorer Unit 11
Japanese — Finished Traveler Unit 24; legendary through Traveler Unit 21
Korean — Finished 1/5 of Rookie Unit 6; legendary through Rookie Unit 5
Latin — Finished 1/5 of Rookie Unit 6
Manx — Finished lesson 3 of the Loayr Gaelg 3 textbook
Welsh — Finished 1/5 of Rookie Unit 6; legendary through 1/5 of Rookie Unit 4
And, because, why not? Here's where things stood ( last month. )
これで以上です。
lightreads (lightreads) wrote2025-09-01 10:23 am
lightreads) wrote2025-09-01 10:23 amEntry tags:
Rakesfall by Vajra Chandrasekera
Rakesfall
3/5. Chandrasekera’s first book made a splash, but this one really didn’t. I didn’t know why until I read it, and now I’m pretty sure it’s because no one wants to talk about it and demonstrate that they have no freaking clue what it’s about.
I’m . . . sort of . . . kidding. This is a strange passage of a book. It is ostensibly about two people who are instantiated across many lives over huge spans of time, and how they relate to each other, and how they don’t. It’s also about colonialism and modes of resistance and a sort of cosmic war. Probably?
Mostly, it’s a beautifully written piece with extremely clever intertextual stylings that is disorienting (on purpose, but I suspect he thought he was being much clearer than I think he is) and that does the reader only a few very basic favors in trying to figure out what is what. Or who is who, from chapter to chapter. Read if you like that sort of experience of disorienting fragments stitched together into something that, for me, did not resolve much at all.
Content notes: Many kinds of interpersonal and terroristic violence.
3/5. Chandrasekera’s first book made a splash, but this one really didn’t. I didn’t know why until I read it, and now I’m pretty sure it’s because no one wants to talk about it and demonstrate that they have no freaking clue what it’s about.
I’m . . . sort of . . . kidding. This is a strange passage of a book. It is ostensibly about two people who are instantiated across many lives over huge spans of time, and how they relate to each other, and how they don’t. It’s also about colonialism and modes of resistance and a sort of cosmic war. Probably?
Mostly, it’s a beautifully written piece with extremely clever intertextual stylings that is disorienting (on purpose, but I suspect he thought he was being much clearer than I think he is) and that does the reader only a few very basic favors in trying to figure out what is what. Or who is who, from chapter to chapter. Read if you like that sort of experience of disorienting fragments stitched together into something that, for me, did not resolve much at all.
Content notes: Many kinds of interpersonal and terroristic violence.