#Fantasyland series

[dargeereads]

Midnight Soul by Kristen Ashley

5 stars

audiobook

I wasn’t sure  what to expect with this book, but I knew it would be heavy. I took a small  break from my binge of the rest of the series when I got to this one, I needed  time to re-group before heading into Franka’s story. I was glad I did,  because while this did turn it around, it was a storm of emotions to get  there. And not what I expected, not what anyone would, and even when you  thought you knew, you didn’t, and it turned again. You knew there had to be  brightness, there had to be hope, and sunshine, and rainbows, for these two,  and it did all come together in the end. This story brought all sorts of  emotions with it and it resonated deeply and will have a lasting effect. In  other words, I loved it <3

#Kristen Ashley #Midnight Soul #Fantasyland series #audiobook #audible #fantasy romance #opposites attract #audiophile #am listening #am reading #reader #romance #romance books #bibliophile #book love #book blogger #read romance #romance reader #read

[ataurusinabookshop]

HOLY FUCK THIS WAS SOME MUCH NEEDED CLOSURE FOR TEDRE FROM THE RISING SERIES

The way I cried knowing their twins are together, married and happy 😭😭😭

#booklr #bookish #books #bookworm #booknerd #book nerd #bibliophile #books and libraries #book recommendations #kristen Ashley books #the fantasyland series #the beginning of everything #kristen ashley author

[trelkez]

my one penny in the fountain Bridgerton wish is that season 4 is Eloise, and season 5 is Francesca, and we just keep going through the books without ever re-inserting An Offer from a Gentleman into the mix until a) the series ends with Benedict still a bachelor, or b) we churn through showrunners until we finally hit the one willing to embrace the existence of disaster bisexuals in fantasyland and Benedict's season just goes completely AU

#bridgerton #no offense sophie #you deserve better anyway #just ... so much better

[letteredlettered]

Ooh what about lwjwwx2? These ideas you’ve shared so far are super intriguing and cool!

Thank you!!!! I'm glad you've enjoyed them.

lwjwwx2 is actually a continuation of Lan Zhan, Fantasyland, which is the first CQL fic I ever wrote and also the first I ever posted.

I saw CQL in 2020 and fell in love with it. Read tons of fanfic! I admit to feeling kind of intimidated about writing for a Chinese canon where I really didn't know a lot of the cultural context, also knowing that some non-Chinese fans had been pretty shitty about respecting said culture.

Another barrier to writing fic for the series was I still, in some ways, struggle to imagine WWX having sexual feelings--or even romantic ones, really! Like, I could definitely write an aro ace WWX and that might be interesting, but I wanted wangxian to hook up with kisses and with boning. But like in my head I was just like...WWX is literally going to think of that? And LWJ is never going to tell him?

This is how I ended up writing Lan Zhan, Fantasyland. I couldn't even, in my own head, make WWX get sexy about anyone, so I wrote LWJ struggling, in his own head, to imagine WWX wanting him. Like, he's able to imagine WWX having sex in this careless, possibly-not-even-into-it way, but WWX having sex with him, much less wanting him that way? He cannot compute.

It was going to be a whole series; lwjwwx2 is LWJ imagining that WWX is hit with a sex curse where he has to fuck or die, and LWJ is like "okay but surely this fantasy will allow me to finally imagine us at least being intimate." Hilariously I have written the 5,000 words or so up to the actual fucking and stopped, because I still could not imagine WWX+sex. So I never continued, although I still read it sometimes, because Lan Zhan, Fantasyland is about Lan Zhan being haunted by WWX in his imagination, and the 5000 more words of that I wrote are great, imo.

As a side note, beyond the above mentioned two barriers I will say the biggest barrier to writing fic for this series is I just like it too much. In particular, I like WWX too much. I just get overwhelmed a lot when I think about CQL in general. There's something about it that's just too much of what I want of everything. The only other ship I feel that way about is Kirk/Spock; it's hard to write because it's so much of what I want that I just kind of stare off into space whenever I think about it.

#wips #cql #my fic

[maxwell-grant]

what makes laura a worse rep than blanka in your opinion

I'm not sure if I'm gonna say "worse rep" because I feel like quantifying representation as a tangible game or competition seems worthless and vague. Yes, it is better representation on the baseline for your Brazilian character to be a brown-skinned woman over a green jungle monster. Yes, I've seen plenty of Brazilians who don't like Blanka and find him offensive, and I've seen and even known fans that like Laura, I'm obviously not speaking for everyone. I know there was an attempt with Laura, I would have absolutely loved a representative of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu as a concept, I think the character might have even had promise if someone else had created her.

Blanka tends to get a pass mainly because, being a great lovable hero aside, he is too exaggerated and fantasy-like to even qualify as a stereotype and was created in a vacuum of ignorance that spared Blanka from being as racist as he could have been. We can argue whether Blanka represents a nasty idea of Brazilian people as savages, and I've seen some people take that impression, but I find that a stretch because, well one I've seen that idea a million times and know what it looks like and this is not it, and his design doesn't really have any racialized elements, and he's really only Brazilian by a technicality. Blanka could have come from anywhere, in fact his first draft was this really grody awful racist African character that they stepped back from and just kept making less and less like a person (and in turn less and less like a racist cartoon). He's a character who could have come from anywhere and got attached to Brazil because they wanted to make him green and thought, hey Brazil uuh they have green and jungles there.

Blanka would have been a lot worse if they hadn't altered his design to make him less human or if they had set out from the start to tie him to explicit national elements like they did with other characters. For the longest time, it wasn't even entirely clear whether he was even supposed to be from Brazil or just had a plane crash here (the record is more clear now that he was born in Brazil). I'm not going to say he's harmless because, again, some people have felt harmed by him as the lone representative, but nobody buys, or was ever supposed to buy, Blanka as representing a real person or standing for any group of people, he is just an exaggerated fantasyland monster with a very sympathetic story who happens to come from Brazil. It's not "great", but he was there, and he was there at a time nothing else was, which also goes a long way. There's a lot of reasons Blanka is beloved and embraced the way he is by me and so many others.

Where as Laura, well yes, I'm biased because I love Blanka and find Laura unbearable, obviously that's a deciding factor here. But for one, times have changed a lot since then, we can and must expect better especially from a new character that actually purports to be representative. Two, her story whitewashed Sean and completely cemented in him joke character status, in essence ruining the closest the series ever had to a truly great Brazilian character (he was never *quite* there but Sean had such a great design and I will die on the hill that he could have been something if they had approached him differently) and ensuring Sean will never go anywhere again without that dead weight character weighing him down (I seriously dislike their dynamic and don't think it's funny), so yes, I could say she's worse rep on the basis that at least Blanka is just one character, where as Laura not only exists but actively drags a better character down with her. And three, I don't hate Laura because she's scantily-clad or sexualized, I hate her because she was made in the image of a very twisted stereotype that pushes gringos to constantly and frequently treat Brazilian women like shit, and I just have to quote Ono himself to explain why:

"I've always heard that there were lots of beautiful women in Rio de Janeiro, but that wasn't quite what I saw when I went there in 2011. So for Laura, we decided to work with the more fanciful vision Japanese men have of Brazilian women, not exactly depicting the Brazilian woman faithfully. Oh, and there's some of my personal preferences as well."

I mean, I'm really really not asking for actual faithfulness here but, to put it gently, doesn't that sound kinda fucking disgusting? The audacity of him to say that to a Brazilian interviewer even. Putting aside the larger discussion of oversexualization of black/brown-skinned characters and how Japanese game devs perpetrate it, which this is part of, yeah no, I don't think it's cute that gringos are obsessed with objectifying Brazilian women. I don't think it's cute what tourists come here to do and how they behave around Brazilian women, I don't think it's cute that my friends and family members have been heckled and harassed and mistreated on overseas trips because gringos cannot respect Brazilian women, even white or white-passing ones, and of course I'm couching my language here to avoid getting into the topic of sexual harassment in a post that's just about a dumb videogame. To be clear, I don't have to have personal history with family members being on the receiving end of this to think this is disgusting and vile, and neither do you, but I do have it. And I don't think this gets talked about or criticized enough, in large part because gringos still think this is all just so harmless and funny and sexy.

No, I don't think sexualized Brazilian/brown women are inherently unforgivably offensive or off limits for character design (although maybe then people would think of something else for a change), no I'm not accusing Ono or Capcom of having a sinister agenda or however you wanna interpret what I'm saying to dismiss it as unimportant, I'm just saying it's part of the reasons why I find Laura irritating and upsetting. It would be one thing if she was just an annoying nothing character, but the circumstances of her creation and what she's meant to represent I find personally offensive on top of everything else.

And frankly in matters of representation, I don't think any of the SF characters (or Tekken/KOF/you name it) hold a candle to the cast of Capoeira Fighter, and it's deeply unfortunate that nobody knows of this series and that it was stuck in flash limbo for too long and that it's gameplay is a little too rough around the edges still, because that is a standard of character design I would have loved to see applied and held up to the rest of the fighting game genre (and just pointing out here that the main dev is a white guy from Utah). Still, I just discovered that this game is getting a remaster for 2024, so I do hope it might eventually get a proper release.

#replies tag #fighting games #street fighter #capcom

[fandomanimatic-tournament]

Fandom song animatic tournament: Side A Round 2

Open Up Your Eyes - My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic

"Open up your eyes See the world from where I stand Me among the mighty You caged at my command Open up your eyes Give up your sweet fantasyland It's time to grow up and get wise Come now little one Open up your eyes"

Ready as I'll ever be - Tangled the series

"Now it's time to step up or it's time to back down And there's only one answer for me And I'll stand up and fight 'cause I know that I'm right And I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready Ready as I'll ever be"

Remember that we're voting on how Iconic they are for ANIMATICS, not for the song itself. In order to make things fair, the tone and mood of the song should not affect how iconic it is (for example, a serious song should not be considered more iconic than a joke song just because it's serious)

Propaganda and animatic links of the songs under the cut:

Open Up Your Eyes - My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic

Propaganda:

The older, jaded villain both goading--and trying to offer a kindness to--the young hero by telling them what the world is really like. The villain feels trapped by their traumatic experience and wants to spare the protagonist the pain of finding out firsthand, but the world is more vast than the villain realizes, and the protagonist can open up THEIR eyes. Bro....

Fits with tragic villains, anti-heroes or AUs where the hero lost their friends

Animatics with the song:

Star Vs The Forces Of Evil

Steven Universe

The Owl House Hunter Animatic

Welcome Home

Boku No Hero Villain Deku Animatic

FNAFHS

Ready as I'll ever be - Tangled the series

Propaganda:

I can list at least three full animatics for this song for every major fandom I have ever been a part of, and still it's so hard to find them because there are so goddamn many

It's an absolute banger from the absolute King Alan Menken, originally from the pretty underrated Tangled the Series. I've seen animatics for this for like every fandom I can think of, and it deserves it because it slaps and has great vocal performances from Jeremy Jordan and Eden Espinosa.

i'm pretty sure this song is more well known than the show it came from is lol. i looked up "ready as i'll ever be animatic" on youtube just to confirm and counted 20+ of them, and i didn't even finish scrolling. it is a genuinely really good song from a /surprisingly/ good show that imo is super underrated. i definitely would recommend checking it out if you get the opportunity!

it's a fandom song that transcended its fandom and became a hit for twist villains.

The song really fosters creativity with how many animatics can create a darker AU where the usual protagonist (or a close associate) is made to be the antagonist because of injustice suffered and the other characters have to fight against them

I've seen *at least* one animatic of this song in almost every fandom I've looked into

It has a lot of Animaniacs because it is sung by an ensemble cast It is good for demonstrating a lot of different conflicting perspectives of characters for your big dramatic fight and its catchy and I love it

I mean everyone loves a scenario where one of the main cast becomes a villain for tragic reasons and the rest of the characters have to fight them while dealing with the betrayal and attempting to make them see reason

How in the actual hell does a song from a Tangled spinoff series go this spectacularly hard? More to the point, how does it have an animatic/AMV for practically EVERY FANDOM IN EXISTENCE?! Yeah, most people know it from that one Warrior Cats MAP, but there is SO much more. Not to mention the bucketloads of people who used this song for their own OCs, which is always a bonus.

Animatics with the song:

Star Vs The Forces Of Evil

Miraculous Ladybug

Sander Sides

Danganronpa V3 fantasy AU

BNHA Villain Deku Animatic

DSMP

Please be cautious and read the title, description and warning cards on the animatic videos if you decide to watch them. If you've got specific triggers I'd recommend even more caution when watching animatics of fandoms you don't know, since sometimes canon-typical themes don't get warnings.

Please keep in mind that I don't know all the media and fandoms of the animatics provided as examples and I don't have the time (nor the will) to research them all. Don't come into my notes or my ask box complaining about them being included, I will simply block you. If a ship animatic included is about an adult and a minor, do tell me and I'll take it out of the post

ALSO keep in mind that I don't know all the artists submitted; in fact, even if I do know them I do not know absolutely nothing about them as people (I do not have twitter nor tiktok) and I could not POSSIBLY have the time to research ALL of the artists' controversies and what came of them so PLEASE don't flood my inbox with the artists' entire crime list.

#fandom animatic tournament #tumblr poll #tumblr tournament #tumblr tourney

[luthiest]

anybody have any recommendations for good medieval fantasy romance books? (or any historical fantasy romance, really…)

recently read a taste of gold and iron, the high king’s golden tongue, the lion and the crow (not fantasy), the knight and the necromancer series, the fantasyland series (i hate parallel universe travel), the god eaters, the captive prince series, the winter king, the grace draven… stuff (i remember none of it but ppl rave about her books ??)……

idk i’m looking for stand alone’s, i can’t commit to a series rn :’))) i’ll take any kind of sexualities/dynamics/tw’s, just no ya and no harem/reverse harem plz… so desperate rn i’m reading game of thrones fanfic, and not the good stuff

ideally, alice coldbreath x george r. r. martin. it’s a tall ask, i know.

#please help #book reccs #i’m starving #for anyone about to recommend naomi novik i see you and i’m getting there it’s just a lot and i need romance #for now i’m just reading HER got fanfic lolol

[utilitycaster]

I'm Reading the Drizzt Novels and You Can't Stop Me: Homeland (and some anticipated questions)

Welcome to yet another ongoing series from me, a person who should be doing other things and may abandon it but also frankly will do this for her own entertainment regardless of whether anyone else cares. Let's back up first; if you're not in this car with me, get out of the rearview mirror.

Until now I have pretty much only read the Drizzt novels in situations where I was unwell, tired, or without another easy means of entertainment. Specifically, I read the first few while quarantining with a mild but still unpleasant case of COVID in late 2022, and then some others while dealing with catching up at work/post-illness fatigue/the general vibes of December in the northeast and Midatlantic states of the US. This caught me up to book 6, which represent the scene-setting; more on this later.

I then read Book 7 on a long train ride with nothing else to do, while very tired and probably a little hungover, in January 2023. I enjoyed it, in part because Wulfgar, who I do not care for, dies. (spoilers I guess? I'm not explicitly avoiding spoilers because these books are 30+ years old, but I'm not seeking them out, and I believe he comes back to life eventually).

I then proceeded to read Real Books (TM) for the remainder of 2023, some of which I can recommend highly and some of which were dumber than Wulfgar. Flash forward to getting my car serviced in the tail end of December 2023. I intended to bring my laptop. I did not. I also intended to bring headphones. I did not. And so, with a phone with so-so battery and little interest in watching HGTV, I read book 8. And I thought "what if I started doing this, because I can knock out one of these motherfuckers in a day if I try hard enough." I then thought "what if I slam books 1-7 again and do a book a week in 2024?"

Clearly I did not do this, because again, I have other books to read and things to do. However, I have finally, after another long-ass train ride, finished a reread of book 1. And so, with an unclear but hopefully from now on twice a month at least (?) update schedule, I bring you: Homeland. The rest of these posts will probably be way shorter.

For anyone who is not familiar with Drizzt or Forgotten Realms or whatever: this is a weird choice you've made. Anyway. Forgotten Realms is THE iconic D&D setting; it's where both the Baldur's Gate series is set as well as the D&D movie plus all kinds of adventures. What's it like? Well, it's basically The Tough Guide to Fantasyland, for all my Diana Wynne Jones fans out there. Do none of these references work for you? You'll just have to pick it up as we go along.

The Legend of the Legend of Drizzt is basically, as far as I know (and I don't know much) R.A. Salvatore was hired to write some cool adventures in a D&D setting in the early 90s. The plan, per the suits, was to follow Wulfgar, who was big and blond and very Conan The Barbarian which is, I should note, way more the vibe of D&D than LOTR much as we (D&D players) are loathe to admit it. However, Wulfgar had brains made out of one of the boring adult cereals: dull, and only slightly more fibrous than the fun cereals like Honey Bunches of Oats. Meanwhile, Drizzt, his drow buddy, fucking ruled. And so, after writing three very sword-and-sorcery (or more accurately, scimitar-and-wizardry) books, Salvatore returned to fill in Drizzt's backstory. And thus we begin in Homeland.

Drizzt Do'Urden is a drow, or dark elf, which in this setting are almost universally evil because they worship Lolth the spider queen. Is this Not Great? Yes. I also am reading The Wheel of Time, which is Even Worse About Biology As Destiny. The main purpose of this book is to cover Drizzt's childhood from when he leaves the underground drow city of Menzoberranzan.

Drizzt's mother is called Malice, unironically. The naming of drow makes no fucking sense, while we're at it; Malice, Zaknafein, SiNaFay, and Alton DeVir are all supposed to be from the same language? I'm not buying it. ANYWAY. Drow society is matriarchal bc spiders and because, as this post says, Salvatore REALLY wanted to be stepped on. Drizzt was born the third son, and was going to be sacrificed to Lolth because third sons are useless. His birth was ALSO being used by Malice to fuel an attack on House DeVir, because if you slaughter a whole-ass house in Menzoberranzan it's admirable of you, bc ontologically evil; and Lolth powers are increased by childbirth or some jazz.

Several important things happen here, pretty much all simultaneously, heralding Our Chosen One (Drizzt):

The attack on House DeVir goes super well for House Do'Urden

The second oldest brother, Dinin, kills his wizard elder brother (known as the elderboy by the creative geniuses of Menzoberranzan) which means Drizzt can survive because they need a replacement wizard boy.

We learn that Drizzt's father (one of Malice's several consorts) is Zaknafein, who fucking hates his life and how shitty drow society is but also is really good at murder and so he kind of hangs out doing that for House Do'Urden

A wizard who melted his face off fails to kill Alton DeVir, the last of the house of DeVir, which means technically House Do'Urden's attack was illegitimate. However, Masoj Hun'ett, of another powerful house, kills the faceless wizard and Alton takes the wizard's place, but desires VENGEANCE.

Drizzt has lavender eyes but is not blind. His eye color will come up approximately a zillion times. I considered counting, but trust me it's SO many.

The rest of the book covers the following, roughly in order:

Drizzt is super good at everything from a young age; he is placed in the care of his only full sibling, Vierna. Zak manages to successfully argue that Drizzt's dexterity is SO good that he HAS to be a fighter and not a wizard, which permits him to train Drizzt, who is, as discussed, good at everything. He almost mercy-kills him before school because he'd rather his son die innocent than become a drow, but also he hates the idea of killing a child, and also Drizzt is a really good fighter, and so it doesn't happen. They depart on bad terms though.

Drizzt then goes to fighter school (instead of wizard school) and is an excellent fighter but not naturally deceptive and backstabbing because he is Pure of Heart; he is constantly skirting trouble by asking such questions as "why do we all want to murder each other all the time though" and "why is our graduation ceremony a drug fueled spider goddess orgy"

Masoj and Alton scheme; Alton eventually learns in a hoisted by his own petard way that the faceless wizard was also of house Hun,ett, and that house is willing to help him strike back at house Do'Urden

Masoj has a magic panther named Guenhwyvar who likes Drizzt more than him.

Drizzt goes on a surface raid and fucking loves the surface, and feels bad about murdering the surface elves, so he fakes the brutal slaughter of an elven girl. Lolth sees this and doesn't like it one bit and blames the whole house.

Drizzt proves himself on other patrols, and realizes Masoj Hun'ett keeps trying to fucking kill him, notably on a patrol where they run into deep gnomes (svirfneblin). Drizzt spares one of them as well. Dinin is growing suspicious.

Malice realizes that Lolth is mad and assumes it's Zaknafein, known problem, but Lolth tells her someone already knows

Drizzt tells her about Masoj, under questioning

Drizzt and Zak reunite and realize they are kindred spirits who are like "wait our society is MAD fucked up and miserable" and excitedly decide to run away and stop being miserable, BUT Malice is Scrying on them the whole time.

Drizzt goes out to clear his mind and gets cornered by Masoj and Alton. They try to kill him. Joke's on them! Drizzt kills Masoj, Alton's own wand blows up and kills him, and Drizzt gets the panther.

HOWEVER joke is also on Drizzt because Malice approaches Zak and tells him she's going to murder Drizzt, to which Zak tells her to kill him instead. She does so.

Drizzt learns of this and runs away.

The entire book is threaded through with Drizzt's first person reflections, which are actually quite touching at times but also definitely kind of overwrought so I do keep reading them as if they are Sex and the City/Scrubs/Winona Ryder in the 80s (Beetlejuice, Heathers) diary entries

And so our stage is set. If I recall correctly book two is "you have your father's morals; and his tendency towards clinical depression" so we're going to have a rollicking good time (genuine).

#m reads lod #this time with plot summaries #i'm reading the drizzt novels and you can't stop me

[jennay]

Episode 7

The request:

ok hear me out, i got inspired by all these tiktok comments under edits of jamie in stranger things 💅🏻 so, y/n and jamie are watching st episode 7 and when 001 says "join me" to little eleven, y/n is like "i would without hesitation" and jamie starts laughing at her 😭

master list

Hope you enjoy!

Jamie hated watching himself on tv but enjoyed seeing you this excited to finish a series. One thing about you was a nonexistent attention span. He couldn’t remember the last time it was this quiet while watching anything. Usually, a million questions would be asked by now, and curiosity would boggle your mind, forcing you to skip to the end and rewatch it. Something about the suspense gave you anxiety. You didn’t mind spoilers, but when it came to Stranger Things, Jamie wasn’t allowed to spoil anything, even when you threw a fit and begged to know if they would kill Eddie. He knew better than to tell you what happened to your favorite character. He didn’t want to break your heart, but he knew this would be like when Dean died in Supernatural. You never fully recovered from that one; to this day, you still get upset when anyone mentions Castiel’s death. In your heart, they still live. Unfortunately, Jamie knew that soon you’d be scooting the two over to make room for a third, and he’d be waiting with open arms to hold you, but Knowing you; you might reject his care when you discover his character kills your beloved.

“Tricked you? No, I saved you.” 01 Softly says to 11.

Jamie watches as your eyes widen and your face scrunches together. “Don’t do it. God, why is he so manipulating? Why can’t he use his powers for good!?” You fling your arms up.

This was how Jamie knew you were no longer thinking of Peter as Jamie. You were fully engulfed in his character; maybe you’d forgive him for his treachery later in the season.

“Join me.” He says to poor little 11.

Your lips part just enough to say, “In a fucking heartbeat.”

Jamie’s laughter pulls you out of your fantasyland. You almost forgot he was sitting next to you. “You’re not supposed to go with the bad guy, darling.” He chuckles as you look at him with wide eyes and your jaw slacks like you can’t believe he would say such a thing to you.

“Jamie, I love him. I just want him to be happy. Peter deserves some contentment in his life. He’s just misunderstood and his parents should have gotten him the help he needed instead of pawning him off to a monster!” You say this with such conviction that Jamie is becoming slightly worried about your outlook on his character.

.“Love, he killed his family and a bunch of children.” He chuckles. “Don’t worry you’ll feel massive amounts of hate for him later on in the season.”

You sigh and lean your head on Jamie’s shoulder as the episode continues. “He’s going to kill Eddie. He’s a new character they kill all the new characters.”

Jamie shrugs he wraps his arm around you and your head falls to his chest. “Just watch.” He kisses the top of your head. “Just promise you’ll remember the difference between 01 and me.”

Your phone buzzes and it’s a text from one of your friends. ‘Jamie killed Eddie!?’

You push away from Jamie’s grip and look him dead in the eyes. “You killed him. You know what?” You stand up and grab your cellphone.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going to bed. You can sleep on the couch. This is the worst betrayal, Jamie!” You pout as you start down the hall.

“Love!” He yells from the couch. “It’s just a tv show!”

“Oh, is it!? Tell that to Eddie!”

He hears the bedroom door close. He decides you’re right. The safest place for him is on the couch until you can let go of the loss you’ve experienced. He lightly laughs as he puts his hands in his lap. He stares up at the ceiling. “Why do you keep doing this to me?.”

#jamie bower #jamie campbell bower #jamie campbell x reader #jamie fanfic #jamie bower x reader #jamie bower x you #jcbower #jamie bower fluff #jamie bower x y/n #jamie campbell bower x you

[basedkikuenjoyer]

Back to Narnia! And up next we have one of the more peculiar entries in the seven books. #3 chronologically, #5 in initial release order, The Horse and His Boy. A very popular one when I've talked with other fans of the series and going into this re-read my second favorite. But there is an elephant in the room. CS Lewis was very British, this series was written in the early 50s, this one is unique for being set largely in Calormen which is the very obviously Middle Eastern "bad guy" country for our idyllic European fantasyland. I've seen much worse in my modern lifetime, it'd be a silly reason to dismiss a good story.

What's cool about this one is that it is set in the fantasy world entirely. Where it falls on the timeline is ambiguous and not really important until an iconic reveal at the end. A great twist I don't have to spoil because it's obvious what I'm talking about if you've read it. One that is potentially the best use of the alternate orders. The book has a very different effect depending on when in the series you get that twist; as #3 it makes a great contrast to temper the overly whimsical The Lion, The Witch, & The Wardrobe so the darker Prince Caspian is less of a tonal whiplash but as #5 it works to transition us into the more philosophical pair of The Magician's Nephew and The Last Battle. Both ways it serves a different role of being a more mature story. There's a reason I could compare it to a lot of more modern fiction...people don't give CS Lewis credit for how experimental Narnia can be.

You have to give credit for its influence. As an adult who is more familiar with how heckin' cool the original 1001 Nights are, you can see the spirit of Scheherazade shine through. The Horse and His Boy is a sidestory. You do not need it for the main plot. A nested narrative to illustrate core themes from a different vantage point. All nestled in the story of a slave boy breaking free. Don't let the heavy shit fool you. Calormen is a fun environment to explore and it's a refreshing change of pace to get away from the WW2-era Britspeak. Two human runaways with two talking horses. The titular talking horse Bree is a hilarious, neurotic little shit and it's a true testament to Lewis's writing he can keep the animal personality up for a whole book.

#chronicles of narnia #the horse and his boy #the sidestory between the years

[dargeereads]

Broken Dove by Kristen Ashley

5 stars

audiobook

I had such  high hopes for Apollo at the start of this book and he just let me down.  Luckily, Valentine was having none of that and got him straightened out. He  only slipped up once after that and realized his mistake almost immediately.  But for these moments, this was a sweeping love story with a single dad who  loves his kids and a woman trying to find herself after years of neglect and  abuse. They connect and disconnect, but keep coming back together. Their  chemistry is addictive and like nothing they have experienced before. The  sweetness between them, it would be goofy if it wasn’t so genuine. They had  me in tears, they had me angry, they had me worried, and they had me happy.  They were so perfect together and also so in sync with the other, there was no  way their HEA wasn’t going to happen <3

#Kristen Ashley #Broken Dove #The Fantasyland series #fantasy romance #audiobook #audible #audiophile #am reading #reader #romance #romance books #bibliophile #book love #book blogger #read romance #romance reader #TBR reads

[ninja-muse]

I read The Goblin Emperor and Witness for the Dead awhile back, and I really liked them (especially The Goblin Emperor, I loved Maia as a protagonist). Do you have any book recommendations with protagonists who are kind? I miss that. Doesn't have to be the same genre. Thank you!

Oh gosh. Um. Thanks for the ask and I'm glad you liked the books! I'm still waiting for my library to put Grief of Stones into circulation. For me, and probably for you by the sounds of it, one of the things that makes the books so great is that you don't see pure kindness in a protagonist very often. I'll give it my best shot though!

Small Gods by Terry Pratchett - A novice monk who's quite happy tending a garden and getting in nobody's way suddenly finds himself the only person who can speak to his god (who is currently a tortoise). Everyone else is too busy playing politics, converting people, and heating up the pokers to believe anymore.

The Dark Lord of Derkholm by Diana Wynne Jones - A sorcerer and his family are elected to represent Evil in the annual "let's play fantasyland for the people from Earth or else" show. His secret mission is to end the show forever—but he's really bad at being bad.

The Watchmaker of Filigree Street by Natasha Pulley - A government clerk is saved from a terrorist attack only because he got a watch in the mail. His mission to find out who sent it and why leads to all manner of life changes.

honestly, the main character dynamic in any Pulley novel is "kind, gentle, sort of lost man meets aggravating and mysterious stranger, they heal each other", and I'm a sucker every time.

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke - A man determined to explore the infinite House he lives in (and maybe help the new albatross family) discovers there's an awful lot about himself and House that he's forgotten.

Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree - An orc, newly retired from adventuring, moves to a river town to start a coffee shop. She's not always the nicest person, but she tries and it's an incredibly kind and gentle story.

A Man and His Cat by Umi Sakurai - An aging teacher and a cat who's grown up in a cage find their forever home together.

A Green and Ancient Light by Frederic Durbin - A boy is evacuated to live with his grandmother and discovers a mysterious garden with a riddle and a faun.

I have Heard Good Things about the Murderbot books by Martha Wells and Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers as well, but haven't read them so can't rec them for sure. I also have a hunch you might enjoy the Temeraire books by Naomi Novik. They don't fit the kind protagonist request even if Lawrence is a fundamentally decent person and tries his best to do right, but they're a very hopeful series about striving for human dragon rights and reconsidering perspectives.

#book recommendations #rec lists #read-alikes #the goblin emperor #katherine addison #answered asks

[narrativelysignificantturtleduck]

atla characters + star trek

aang

favorite series: he likes the optimism of tos and tng best but he appreciates them all

character he should meet: benjamin sisko. sisko would make him a delicious vegetarian meal, over which they'd discuss struggling with their responsibilities as spiritual leaders

katara

favorite series: ds9 because it has the most explicit antifa politics, and voyager because powerful women. captain katara!

character she should meet: kira nerys. they could bond over losing their mothers at a young age and fighting colonizers, as well as their unwavering faith in their friend who is also a spiritual leader

sokka

favorite series: tng and ds9, but he's seen them all. biggest trekkie of the gaang. has built model spaceships with hakoda

character he should meet: literally any of the engineers. let him follow them around with wide starstruck eyes as they explain the workings of a warp engine. it's what he deserves

toph

favorite series: does not watch star trek but has heard sokka talk about it

character she should meet: seven of nine. they've both fought fictionalized versions of the Rock, they're both defiantly independant because of a repressive upbringing, and seven has been known to bond with intelligent young girls

zuko

favorite series: tos and tng - they offered a comforting refuge for him as a kid with a difficult home life

character he should meet: worf. the only people more obsessed with honor than zuko are klingons, and they could theoretically bond over having a complicated relationship with the warrior culture they're from. but that would require emotional openness, so realistically they'd probably just spar and compare weapons. that would still be fun for them i think. also worf might tell him he fights with honor and that would make him happy

suki

favorite series: voyager, because women, but familiar with all of them via sokka

character she should meet: jadzia dax. they'd spar and talk about their dating lives, bicon to bicon

azula

favorite series: star trek is for nerds like zuzu

character she should meet: kathryn janeway. she'd benefit from a mom figure, and she'd need one who's just as tough as she is and who has experience guiding young women who were raised to be weapons

mai

favorite series: ds9. she enjoys the moral ambiguity and political drama

character she should meet: spock. with the blunt bangs and emotionless attitude, she's basically already a vulcan, and like spock she has had to rebel against her emotionally repressive upbringing

ty lee

favorite series: ds9, also for the moral ambiguity and political drama.

character she should meet: deanna troi. they could have a girls' night eating chocolate and talking about vibes and auras and how people underestimate them

iroh

favorite series: tos - he likes a classic. the politics probably went over his head when he was young though

character he should meet: jean-luc picard. they'd have tea and talk about philosophy, in the process of which picard would call him on only changing his mind about the war when he was personally affected. iroh could call picard out for being a frenchman lecturing an asian man about imperialism but unfortunately picard has probably already acknowledged Earth's past in his speech, plus iroh is from a fantasyland and doesn't know what french people are

hakoda

favorite series: don't make him pick! he's seen them all and is the reason sokka and katara are into it. your stereotypical nerd dad. he sings along to the enterprise theme song, much to his children's embarrassment

character he should meet: james t. kirk. bakoda is so spirkcoded

#this has been in the drafts for a while but i've been getting back into star trek in a big way lately so i figured i'd dig it up #it's a bit skewed towards ds9 bc i love ds9 plus it's the one that's most similar to atla #themes of colonialism and war and spirituality and all that #nina's personal log #<- you see why this has been my tag #the gaang #atla star trek

[luvlyhyunjin]

Oh my God I don’t even know what to write, what to say.. This new chapter might be my new favorite chapter of yours damn !

First of all, your writing is so poetic ? But also easy to read ? I loved the metaphors you used ! And the way you wrote Hyunjin and Y/N, it felt so real. I could see myself watching them from there, it was so vivid. Their feelings too, I was so deep and into it oh my god. I rarely felt like the characters in a story were so profound and complex until now !

I literally am so invested in your story that I look forward to it and think about it every day. I think it might be safe to say that this is my favorite story, and that you’re my favorite author !! Thank you so much for taking so much of your time to bless us with your masterpiece 🥹

Now I’ve always been team Hyunyn but this chapter just comforted me in my thoughts. Yes, he was an asshole to her, but so was she ? And that’s because they are exes and are hurt by their previous relationship and obviously bad break up. They must’ve said some hurtful things to each other back then. My theory is that Y/N’s mom forced her to break up with Hyunjin (because he’s poor ? because he’s a bad influence ? to not « embarrass » her husband ?).

I even love all of the other characters. Although Yeosang’s behavior irked me a bit 🥲 I totally understand how horrible he must be feeling, torn between his feelings for the 2,but putting the blame and burden of his feelings on Y/N was beyond unfair… Especially when he chose Yeji over her :( I’m so scared for the moment where he will realize he actually loves Yeji and leave her behind 😭 I’m sure the truth will eventually come out and Y/N will lose friends like Felix :( (at least for a little while 🥲).

This chapter broke me though 😭😭 Especially when they got out of fantasyland and reality finally set in. Their situation and relationship are so complicated man 😭 The last lines broke me, I’m sooo scared. But at the same time, I love me some slow burn angst written by you omgg.

Anyways, sorry for the long ass paragraph but I had so many things to say (still do 😭) and your story is so good I can’t help it 🥲 Hope my theories didn’t annoy you too much !! Anyways, rest well and thanks a lot for the blessing that is this masterpiece gfjfdhhfjvhf 🫶🏼

hand on my heart cus i was literally waiting for your feedback specially diawjd i had the biggest smile on my face reading this please don't apologize for writing to me! i and i can't stress enough love reading your thoughts and your theories i get so giddy and excited reading them ahhh!! i'm so happy you enjoy my writing and story that much to call it your favorite hopefully you'll continue to feel this way till this series is finished. I'm so happy thank you so much pls don't ever hesitate to tell me more of your thoughts!!

[wearethekat]

I just read an obscure ebook I rather liked so I though I’d mention it here! I found it via Alexis Hall recommending the author.

it was a really cute gay romance set in a school that was very much fantasyland turn of the century boys' boarding school a la PG Wodehouse. Which is to say, thinly veiled military school, somewhat evil. also, there are curses. It’s about this nice young man who comes from an ethnic minority who’s admitted to Evil Fantasyland Military School on the strength of his skill as an inventor. I did a little sketch of the romance Dynamic here: 

also, did I mention And They Were Roommates? they were roommates. Anyway, it’s a fun series.

#book recommendations #behold my really excellent ms paint illustrations #lord of the white hell #ginn hale

[magicaltrash]

In 2024 Tokyo Disneyland launched a series of mini-festival events called Disney Pal-Palooza. The first ran from January-March 2024 and was themed as "Minnie's Funderland," a celebration of Minnie Mouse and all the things she dreams and loves. Special decorations, merchandise, food, and a parade were part of this event - and so was a special trash can design! These pink garbage and recycling cans featuring light blue trim, light pink polka-dots, and a red bow situated on the inlet flap. It's great to see Tokyo delivering limited-time themed cans to support their festivals. TDL also did this back in 2021 for their "Happy Fair with Baymax" limited-time meet-and-greet event - and a special red Baymax can. Love it! // Tokyo Disney Resort, Tokyo Disneyland, Fantasyland, 2024 [Source: OmniSnoozer. Used by Permission.]

#Disney #Magical Trash #Disney Trash Can #Trash Can #2024 #Recycling #Tokyo #Tokyo Disney Resort #Tokyo Disneyland #TDL #TDR #Fantasyland #Disney Pal-Palooza #Minnie's Funderland