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slytherinlesbians · 7 months

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slytherinlesbians' whumptober masterlist (complete!) *ੈ✩‧₊˚

day six: recording/made to watch/"it should've been me." | fandom: criminal minds | characters: derek morgan, emily prentiss, aaron hotchner, jason gideon, penelope garcia, jennifer jaraeu | ship: none | trigger warnings: none | content: 2x15 revelations, the tobias hankel case, kidnapped spencer reid, team as a family | word count: 507

day seven: "can you hear me?" | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid (centric), emily prentiss, jennifer jareau, derek morgan, penelope garica | ship: past spencer reid/maeve donovan | trigger warnings: mentions of drugs/drug use, depression | content: post 8x12 'zugzwang,' spencer's isolation, team as a family | word count: 1k

day ten: "you said you'd never leave." | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid (centric), diana reid, derek morgan, aaron hotchner, jennifer jaraeu, penelope garcia, emily prentiss | ship: past spencer reid/elle greenaway | trigger warnings: parent abandonment, depression, grief | content: spencer reflects on the people who have left him over the course of his life and grieves | word count: 1.3k

day thirteen: "i don't feel so good." | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid (centric), aaron hotchner, david rossi, jennifer jaraeu, emily prentiss, derek morgan | ship: none | trigger warnings: gunshot wound recovery, vomiting | content: spencer recovers from an injury sustained on a case, team as a family, dad!hotch | word count: 724

day fourteen: (alt prompt) shaking | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid, aaron hotchner, jennifer jaraeu, emily prentiss | ship: none | trigger warnings: gunshot, autistic meltdown | content: spencer has a meltdown after a case, autistic spencer, team as a family, hotch & spencer friendship, dad!hotch | word count: 642

day twenty: blanket/found family | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid, aaron hotchner | ship: none | trigger warnings: none | content: post 2x15 'revelations,' the tobias hankel case, dad!hotch, autistic spencer, non-verbal spencer, hotch & spencer friendship, team as a family | word count: 589

day twenty three: stalking | fandom: criminal minds | characters: jennifer jareau (centric), emily prentiss | ship: mentioned jennifer jareau/will lamontagne | trigger warnings: mentions of sexual assault, rape, abuse and stalking | content: a case reminds jj of a past relationship, emily & jj friendship | word count: 1.2k

day twenty six: working to exhaustion/"you look awful." | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid (centric), jennifer jareau, david rossi, aaron hotchner | ship: none | trigger warnings: ableism | content: on a case, local officers treat the team badly, dad!hotch, team as a family | word count: 1.7k

day twenty seven: scars | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid, luke alvez, penelope garcia | ship: pre spencer reid/luke alvez, but can be read as platonic | trigger warnings: past self harm, past drug addiction | content: case fic, post prison spencer, autistic spencer, spencer is uncomfortable in his body, luke helps | word count: 1.6k

day twenty nine: "what happened to me?" | fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid (centric), derek morgan, jennifer jareau, aaron hotchner | ship: none | trigger warnings: past addiction, gunshot wound | content: spencer is shot on a case, pain relief used in the hospital brings up bad feelings, team as a family, dad!hotch | word count: 888

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dankusner · 17 days

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Expunge

Right On Crime Supports S565: A Conservative Approach to Strengthening North Carolina’s Economy and Workforce

Right On Crime supports the policies of North Carolina S565, a bill that restarts the automatic expunction of criminal records for thousands of North Carolinians who were found not guilty or whose charges were dismissed.

Currently, these criminal records are eligible to be cleared, but government bureaucracies, fines, and fees are a barrier to them attaining meaningful employment, housing options, and educational opportunities which improve public safety.

More than a million cases are eligible for expunction, but remain in limbo after a pause was extended until July 1, 2024.

S565 will put in place the necessary provisions to address the concerns that arose with the initial round of automatic expunctions, implementing the administrative changes necessary to correct these issues, and to allow for District Attorneys to have access to the expunged records.

“This legislation is a conservative and data-driven approach to fortify our state’s economy with individuals who are eligible to be actively engaged in our workforce,” said Maggie Horzempa, North Carolina Director of Right On Crime. “S565 will alleviate a burden on taxpayers, strengthen our economy, fortify families, and create safer communities in North Carolina.”

One in every three Americans has some type of criminal record, and the same barriers and stigmas of a criminal record are hurdles for those who are found not guilty and whose charges are dismissed.

S565 only allows for expunction of dismissed charges and those where a person was found not guilty, no convictions will be expunged.

Expungement does not hide criminal records from law enforcement, but court records are sealed from public view for things like employment, housing, and education access.

Eligible individuals will no longer file a petition in court—a process that can be both expensive and time-intensive as courts process each paper petition individually, straining valuable judicial resources.

North Carolina employers are struggling to meet their workforce needs.

S565 removes barriers to work and broadens our state’s potential workforce.

Horzempa says, “North Carolina was named America’s Top State for Business, propelled by a robust economy and a skilled workforce—a feat we aim to sustain. Let’s stay business-minded and ensure the prosperity of North Carolina for generations to come. As conservatives, it is our duty to hold the government accountable, support family values, and demand a justice system that promotes public safety for every hard-earned tax dollar.”

Communications Director for Right On Crime

A native Texan, Kerr has a B.A. in Journalism and minor in Political Science from Texas Tech University, and she’s the proud parent of three grown daughters. Stay Informed

Thank you! 901 Congress Avenue Austin, TX 78701 (512) 472-2700

Contact Privacy Policy

by Tonya Kerr May 6, 2024

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spoilertv · 1 month

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#SpoilerTV

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thesheel · 1 year

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How does a city come to be recognized as the “International City of Peace and Justice”? What does that city which carries such a title, and thus the responsibility to act as the international hub for fostering peace, security, and justice, look like? Most importantly, does it live up to its name? The Hague is a city with two faces – it is advertised by its municipality as the city which safeguards peace for humankind and enforces international law through the courts and tribunals which are at home in the city. Yet at the same time, The Hague bears the status of the most segregated city in the Netherlands. After living in The Hague for three years, the striking incongruity of its international institutions and the wealth these have brought to parts of the city, and the socioeconomically disadvantaged areas which are often only a street-crossing away – and particularly the rare intermingling between these co-existing worlds – have led me to ponder on the notion and embodiment of “justice” itself. What does justice entail? And how is it achieved - or not? Is the opposite of justice, injustice? Ignorance? Invisibility? Answers to the question, What does justice mean to you? from residents of the city show, first and foremost, that justice has many shapes and sizes. It takes the form of a concept, a tool, an ideal, a practice, an emotion. It is an infrastructure of ecosystems, institutions, buildings, streets, people, more-than-humans. In some cases, justice manifests itself in monuments. And where justice is lacking, people take to the streets. It Starts in the Soil “Justice is an unspoken agreement that you have respect for every person – what they look like, how they live, how they act – and should treat them equally, until the law proves otherwise. So, justice is also to enforce the law.” (Els) [caption id="attachment_14291" align="aligncenter" width="512"] The International Criminal Court (ICC)[/caption] The ICC is the most prominent court of international criminal law. Established in 2002 with the ratification of 60 states to the Rome Statute, this building – which houses the first permanent court of its kind – was formally opened in 2015. Inside its glass walls, individuals who are accused of having committed crimes against the international community or humanity at large are put on trial. Such crimes include crimes of genocide, torture, war crimes, sexual slavery, and enforced prostitution. The scales of justice flutter on the blue flag in the salty wind which blows from the North Sea nearby. Its white flagpole is dug into the ground that is composed of sand dunes, and is located in the city’s “International Zone,” which, according to the municipality, is the “heart of The Hague.” This area runs from the Statenkwartier to the Archipelbuurt, where one can find embassies from all over the world, historic stately architecture, and an impressive assembly of international organizations. But moving through the city and encountering its locals which live their day-to-day in close proximity to the ICC, it becomes clear that the sands in which the scales of international law are planted are not only part of an international, but also of a local history – one which ties this infrastructure of glass, walls, laws, surveillance, and procedures, to the soil on which it stands. “If justice is the outcome of a relation, two things come to mind. One is a more institutional approach: the courts and a number of international organizations that fight for social justice. A city with certain assumptions that, as a cosmopolitan society, we ought to improve the conditions of life of those who are more vulnerable. But if you look at The Hague, then that definition is totally at odds with the structuring of the city. There is an invisible The Hague for that international city that is clearly segregated and has quite a lot of contradictions in itself. And you can see it very clearly through the axes that divide the city into the expat city and the immigrant cit

y.” (Daniela) [caption id="attachment_14293" align="aligncenter" width="512"] Public square at Hollands Spoor train station[/caption] The urban infrastructure of The Hague is separated by a geological border which cuts across the city: a border between sandy dunes, and low-lying peatland. In the 18th century, the dry sand areas close to the seaside were claimed by elite groups, while the working class were left to build on the marshes. It Lives on in Language The socio-spatial distinction has filtered into The Hagueian slang: the ‘Hagenaar’ characterizes the rich on the dunes, and the ‘Hagenees’ identifies the poor living on peatland. Over time, this duality has expanded from a purely socio-economic to include an ethnic delineation: a ‘Hagenaar’ is born and raised in The Hague, and a ‘Hagenees’ is an immigrant into the city. But who classifies as an immigrant of the city? “There is a lot of segregation here – mainly, palpably racial, but also class-based. And both at the same time, of course. That’s unfair, that’s not justice to me, because you have radically different ways of experiencing the place you live in. Maybe that’s not inherently bad, but when invisible lines are drawn between different kinds of people, then some are bound to have a harder time with things than others, through no individual fault. But because it’s (I’m guessing long ago) become normalized, and I guess people have gotten used to their comfort zones, despite how they were built, it’s not really a conversation the Hague is having as a city to its people […] Past the courts and into the city, it’s hard to be just if you don’t acknowledge there’s a problem to begin with.” (Selma) There is a stigmatized duality of (mostly white, western) so-called “expats” who come to the city to work for one of The Hague’s numerous international organizations, and those (mostly non-western migrants of colour) whose families came to the city as refugees, with socio-economic disadvantages, or from former Dutch colonies. In conformity with the city’s historical soil-division, the “expats” typically live in on the sands, and the “immigrants” live in areas where the peat used to be. What the “International Zone” in which the ICC is located conceals, then, is the complex nature of The Hague’s “internationals” and diversity. By officially branding the city as the “International City of Peace and Justice” in 2006, much emphasis of The Hague’s image is placed on the cultural diversity that is brought by people working for international organizations. As an in-depth study by Vlada Kuznetsova (2016) into the city’s branding strategies shows, “courts and tribuals, they defined the role of The Hague as a “City of Peace and Justice,” including the Peace Palace and the International Court of Justice inside the Palace. If they are not here, the city would never be the “City of Peace and Justice”… about more than 150 NGOs are here not because they like the city but because they’re linked to the bigger courts and tribunals or the other organizations…” (p.32) The diversity which is brooding in poorer districts that are widely associated with lower socio-economic groups – for instance the Schilderswijk and other areas around the Hollands Spoor train station – and which equally define the social dynamics of the city, play no part in the proud image which the City of The Hague has constructed to attract tourists and organizations. Even though “here people are working every day to make the world just, a bit more peaceful than it was yesterday” (Kuznetsova 2016, p.32), the institutions and “internationals” which this face of The Hague attracts, re-traces the infrastructural lines on which the city is built. If the sands are where the “heart” of The Hague is located, then the peatlands are its lungs; hidden away between the infrastructural ribs and city branding, providing the city with the breath to sustain it. “The Hague has always been segregated because it has always had this dual character of being a very wea

lthy city. But wealthy citizens need servants. If there is a break in the dunes, the city that sinks first is the peat city.” (Daniela) It Moves In-Between Walls “The situation where all parties feel like they have been treated fairly.” (Sibel) The ICC has faced grave criticism since its establishment. It has been accused of having an “exclusive focus on Africa,” (Eseed 2013, p.590) although the curious notion is perhaps not that individuals from the African continent have been convicted, but rather that individuals from elsewhere have not. The permanent members of the UN Security Council (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) have the right to veto resolutions, and to defer investigations. As Ovo Imoedemhe (2015, p.78) explains, the consequence of this is an “unspoken truth about international criminal law […] It is that certain individuals, from certain countries of origin will never find themselves indicted before an international criminal tribunal.” If justice is the outcome of a legal procedure, a rectification of sorts, then such critiques from member states beg the question: justice, yes, but justice for whom? It Flutters On The scales fluttering in the wind are recognizable, but why? They originate from the Greek goddess Themis, the goddess of justice and order. A scale in balance connotates a state of equality before the law, a meticulous weighing of right against wrong. But the scales also denote a sense of utmost fragility; the lightest weight may tip the scales in favour of one or the other. Can such a fragile state of justice be achieved when a handful of states weighs down on the scales with an unconditional veto power? The wreath around the scales – also of Greek origin – is an ancient symbol for victory. But can a court be victorious, achieving a state of equality for all, when its physical infrastructure is planted into the soil of a subtle yet systematic story of segregation, which is re-told today through the municipality’s own branding as the “International City of Peace and Justice”? “I link the concept of justice to an unbiased determination of right or wrong. I think that The Hague strives to embody this through the various institutions it houses, but it cannot always live up the ideal of an unbiased truth. Realistically, it will always be prone to be local biases and imperfections and will thus inevitably fall short of the ideal it aims to house.” (Justus) “Wings of Mexico” sculpture at the ICC [caption id="attachment_14294" align="aligncenter" width="345"] The interview excerpts and photographs in this article were created in the context of Eline Koopmann’s course in Fine Arts Photography at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, where they were first exhibited in May 2022.[/caption]

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lets-steal-an-archive · 4 years

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John Rogers, co-creator + executive producer: "Look, if we told you Eliot's entire timeline or Nate's entire timeline, you wouldn’t be able to have then have enough flexibility to fold that timeline in with Supernatural in your fanfics because they'd be no space for that. The space we leave is the space for you to write your slash! That's super important for us to do! We do that for you, people! The fans appreciate the empty space we leave so you can write your Buffy, Supernatural, NCIS, Criminal Minds, Leverage crossovers."

Geoffrey Thorne, co-producer + writer of this episode: "But don't do any Doctor Who ones because…"

John: "You're writing those."

Geoffrey: "Just don't do it."

Chris Downey, co-creator + executive producer: "You've staked those out?"

John: "He's staked those out."

— Leverage 10 Podcast: 512 The White Rabbit Job

*Kung Fu Monkey blog: LEVERAGE #205 "The Three Days of the Hunter Job" Post-game (August 24, 2009) for the original "I think fanfic is the sign of a healthy show" short essay

#leverage #the white rabbit job #john rogers #geoffrey thorne #chris downey #leverage10 podcast #from the archives

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dtrhwithalex · 3 years

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TV | Leverage (Season 2, Rewatch)

Rewatch of the second season of TNT's LEVERAGE (2008-2012), created by John Rogers and Chris Downey together with Dean Devlin and his production company Electric Entertainment.

In anticipation of the show's reboot / revival / sequel LEVERAGE: REDEMPTION coming to IMDbTV on 09 July this year, I am rewatching the original 77 episodes and writing about my favourite moments and things from each episode, season by season.

201: THE BEANTOWN BAILOUT JOB

D: DEAN DEVLIN. W: JOHN ROGERS. Original Air Date: 15 July 2009.

We here at the Rabbit Hole adore the Beantown Bailout Job very much (and by we I mean me). It is such a great season-opener and everything about it sets up the season so nicely. Also let me just say, I love the cheesy intro. I like to imagine that this plays on whatever website the clients usually end up finding the team. It would be so confusing. And wonderful.

This episode, of course, also introduces another of my favourite characters: Lt. Patrick Bonanno, State Police. And I am very sad that there is zero chance we'll ever get to see him in the reboot, since the wonderful Robert Blanche has unfortunately passed away last year. Bonanno was such a fantastic addition to this show and I love him very much. He is just brilliant in every episode he is in.

Aside from the introduction of Bonanno, Beantown is a brilliant episode for various reasons, but I wanna talk about this one most of all. John Rogers talked about this on his blog, I think -- not one member of the team can come straight out and admit that they need the others. It is the impromptu meeting at Sophie's performance that brings them together again (very much against Nate's best attempts). Only once they're at McRory's and Parker suggests stealing something to cheer up Sophie is when they all fess up and tell Nate that they want this team back together again. And then, of course, we have one of my favourite sequences in this entire show: Nate forcefully being bullied back into this family. They do exactly what he did to them in The Second David Job -- they get him to contribute knowledge to the case that they, allegedly, lack. And he knows what they're doing, of course, he's not an idiot. Well played, indeed.

I would also like to personally thank one Nadine Haders, this show's most brilliant costume designer, for every single piece of clothing she put on Christian Kane for this episode. That green sweater with the brown jeans jacket? All my love to you, Nadine. All of it. Also, uncharacteristically, Nate has some very good looks in this episode (the man looks healthy for once!) and I am unreasonably mad about it (actually, he has some very good looks this entire season).

One last thing: I would like to have a word with whoever decided to play the Andy Lange song here that Sophie's departure in The Two Live Crew Job is set to. It makes this first half of the season a circle. Who do I need to have words with? Who?

202: THE TAP-OUT JOB

D: MARC ROSKIN. W: ALBERT KIM. Original Air Date: 22 July 2009.

An absolutely amazing episode for Eliot but also very much for Sophie. They are the Conference Of Mom Friends, and I adore them very much, thank you. It is a fantastic episode for them individually, but especially also for the specific relationship these two people have. There is an amazing post floating around on this website (this one here) talking exactly about this episode and Eliot and Sophie in the role of protectors in their team, their family.

There are a few scenes here that I really like and really, most of them are about or with Eliot. I love in the briefing at the hotel that Eliot does not just dismiss Sophie's misunderstanding of wrestling, but takes the time to explain to her what the sport is about -- and she listens. We also here get a nice glimpse at the fact that Eliot teaches them certain fighting skills and self-defence techniques, which I just love so much. Just as Sophie coaches them all in their grifts, he makes sure that they all have a certain know-how in fighting and protecting themselves. It's so good.

I am also very fond of both the moment where Eliot brings Sophie to the restaurant to meet with Rucker, but also Sophie showing up at the gym at night to talk to Eliot while he's preparing for the fight against Tank. Eliot gives away so much of himself in this episode, and it is very interesting to me that the person he does this with is, continually, Sophie. The others may be on comms, and might be, for all we know, listening in, but it is Sophie he tells these things to. It's like Hardison says later in The Two Live Crew Job: "We trust Nate to make sure the plan works, we trust you (Sophie) to make sure we're all okay." While I would not necessarily call Sophie the heart of the group (that's Hardison), she is very much the emotional centre of it.

This episode is also just very lovely to see how they all take to an environment that is, for once, not big city life. Eliot takes to it immediately, which makes sense, because he probably is from a town not much different from this one. Parker, somehow, fits in immediately as well (I love her I <3 Nebraska shirt). I feel like Nate never has any issues fitting in anywhere, he just takes things as they come. It is Hardison and Sophie who have difficulties -- Sophie because she is, after all, a bit posh and needs certain standards met, and Hardison because his world of technology does not mix well with a small, rural Midwestern town ("Can't hack a hick" anyone?).

203: THE ORDER 23 JOB

D: ROD HARDY. W: CHRIS DOWNEY. Original Air Date: 29 July 2009.

I occasionally see some posts on here that call what the team does to Charles Dodgson in 512: The White Rabbit Job the worst thing the team does to a mark. I have to say, objectively, I think what they do to Eddie Maranjian in this episode is much worse. Of course, Dodgson is a good person, and Eddie is a crook, but still. Objectively? This episode is more evil.

Anyway, this episode has some fantastic moments that I adore a whole lot. I love Eliot and Hardison as cops, Sophie's act is absolutely amazing, and I have a super soft spot for both Nate teaching Parker what he is doing, and also Eliot and his side quest of helping Randy.

I am so incredibly fond of all these little moments where Parker's eventual role of Mastermind is already being planted. She always asks Nate questions, if she doesn't have a part to play in the con, she is with Nate, learning. She says it in the pilot episode already: "I'm really good at one thing, only one thing, that's it. But you, you know other things, and I can't stop doing my one thing, can't retire." And then she does her best to learn the other things Nate knows. This episode particularly, how Nate explains to her how NLP works, that what he is selling is fear. Nate is so patient with her, too. I love them both so very much.

Eliot's side quest with Randy and his abusive dad is an absolutely excellent addition to this episode. Especially after the previous Eliot-centric episode, this small thing just goes to show that, at their core, these are good people. Yes, they are criminals, the lot of them. But they are not bad people. Things like this just make me think that, it had to have been this exact combination of people Dubenich put together. Any other thief, any other hacker, and Nate would have walked away from this alone. It had to be Parker, Hardison and Eliot for this to work exactly as it did. And Eliot looking out for Randy even though they are in the middle of a con, taking his time to make sure Bob, the U.S. Marshall goes to see Randy, is exactly something that brings this point home.

Lastly, I adore that everyone shows up at the court house when Eddie goes to find his money. He knows they all conned him, but they know no one is ever going to believe him. It's a fantastic gloat scene. And I also really love that Nate explains why this works to the others: "So, here's everything you need to know about criminal law. Every crime has two elements, Actus reus, the act itself, and mens rea, Literally "The Guilty Mind." ... Now, for escape, the prisoner has to both break out of custody and show the intent to escape. ... Which brings us back to our friend Eddie and how the brain reacts to fear. In the heat of the moment Eddie didn't ask himself a simple question, who would doubt his guilty mind?"

204: THE FAIRY GODPARENTS JOB

D: JONATHAN FRAKES. W: AMY BERG. Original Air Date: 05 August 2009.

This one was Bernie Madoff inspired, if I recall correctly, who was arrested in 2008, around the time Berg, Downey and Rogers were already bouncing ideas back and forth for this season.

There is so much to love in this episode! Where to even begin. Maybe with Parker replacing Sophie at the client meeting? Or Sophie immediately heading for both popcorn and the cookie tin after the breakup? How about Parker perching on Eliot's arm rest with her food? Nate's headmaster act? Eliot as Coach Brewer (red is a fantastic colour on him, thank you Nadine)? Hipster rich newlyweds Parker and Hardison? The return of my beloved FBI fools McSweetheart and Taggert? Taggert being McSweetheart's biggest supporter in his affection for Parker? Sophie and Widmark? The actual science-sical with all these adorable kids singing about science?

So much to love. Chock-full of greatness, this episode. Also Frakes, once again, directed the hell outta this. I love this episode so very much.

One moment that does, however, absolutely win out over everything else, is the scene at Nate's apartment after Hardison and Parker meet McSweeten and Taggert again:

Eliot: One of you two can identify the gunman, right? Hardison: Oh, yeah, sure. He stopped and let me take a picture of him as I was chasing him. Eliot: Hey, you know what, man? I've been around little kids all day. I don't need to come home and do all this crap.

That line, Mr Spencer? "I don't need to come home and do all this crap"? Home? Sir, we are four episodes into the second season, and you are already calling Nate's apartment home. Honestly, that boy has been invested into this group as a family from the moment Hardison hands him a check in the pilot episode, if not earlier. And I am very much here for all of it.

205: THE THREE DAYS OF THE HUNTER JOB

D: MARC ROSKIN. W: MELISSA GLENN & JESSICA RIEDER (GRASL). Original Air Date: 12 August 2009.

This is another one of those episodes which, when I think about it, I am not entirely into, but then when I watch it, I always love it. It's a brilliant episode, but the mark rubs me in all the wrong ways and I think that's why my general reaction to this episode in theory is mostly "ew". Which I think is kind of the point, as well.

There is much to love in this episode, though. Sophie being Nate in this one, Nate being very wary of this concept and also having difficulties letting someone else take control ("If you don't mind, I would still do the 'Hardison, run it' thing" Nathan you precious little man, I love you so much). I think it's so nicely done. I mean Sophie has run cons before -- she was the Mastermind behind the First David Job, and she runs their con in the Second David Job as well -- but then she was confident, now she is going through things, on the brink of rediscovering herself for who she is. And of course, it bites her in the ass a little bit.

I absolutely adore Conspiracy Nut Hardison and his fantastic apartment. Set Design did a magnificent job here. I am so fond of Parker asking Eliot about the different things -- the council, the moon landing, Loch Ness monster -- and also very much the bit at the end where he and Hardison answer Parker's questions while he prepares food. That ending bit overall is just absolutely excellent and I love it with my whole heart. Eliot cooking for all of them in Nate's kitchen, giving Parker stuff to try, while Hardison sits there and sips his orange soda out of a wine glass. Meanwhile Nate pouring wine for Sophie, and then going over to her to make sure she is alright. For his slightly more sadistic streak in this season, Nate is so good with Sophie here. And honestly I think this conversation here is one of the reasons why Sophie feels able to leave them for a while. It is Nate's reassurance of "Whatever you need, I'm here for you" that lets her take this leave of absence.

206: THE TOP HAT JOB

D: PETER O'FALLON. W: M. SCOTT VEACH & CHRISTINE BOYLAN. Original Air Date: 19 August 2009.

I adore this episode! The fantastic Veach and Boylan on the keyboard for this one (who, I've had to find out, are both tangentially involved with my latest hyperfixation, SHADOW AND BONE -- Veach having written my favourite episode, and Boylan being married to the showrunner), which is just lovely, because they are both excellent.

First off, I would like to, once again, give all my love to Nadine Haders for that Pizza Guy outfit she put Kane in for the recon sequence. A+ costuming, thank you Nadine.

This episode has so many excellent comedic beats and a wonderful many Hardison/Eliot moments. Sophie trying to set up Nate with their client is absolutely hysterical -- especially considering that she had just been broken up with and had been urging Nate to figure out what it is that is between them since day one. I especially love her attempt at finding things Nate has in common with Jameson: "She's a scientist. And well, you're a bit nerdy, aren't you? ... And food, she works with food. Well, you eat, don't you?" Like, girl, what are you trying to do here, really?

I absolutely adore Hardison and Eliot trying to get into the server room so Hardison can access the data they are trying to get before anyone can get rid of it. Eliot hooking Parker's rope to Hardison's belt, Eliot's complete awe at Hardison's ability to remote access their mark's phone ("You can do that?" Eliot, honey, he can do so much more), the two of them wedged underneath the desk, and then, of course, Eliot's huge smile when Hardison hacks the scanner at the door with the help of his gummy frogs. I love these boys together so much, and this episode has given me so many great moments.

I am also incredibly fond of Nate's magician act. That is a brilliant role and it suits him so well. And I love how genuinely enthusiastic he is about magic.

207: THE TWO LIVE CREW JOB

D: DEAN DEVLIN. W: JOHN ROGERS & AMY BERG. Original Air Date: 26 August 2009.

This is an absolutely brilliant episode for so many different reasons. Let me get two things out of the way straight off the bat: 1) Where do I address my "Chaos For Leverage: Redemption" campaign to? and 2) Where do I address my "Apollo Robbins For Leverage: Redemption" campaign to? I want both of them back desperately!

Of course, this episode is important as a major stepping stone in Sophie's character arc. Because of Chaos and his bomb, she has to kill off one of her aliases which is the last thing that then leads to her taking a leave of absence to figure out who she is and who she wants to be. That scene in her apartment with the bomb is also just an excellent moment for the team as a family. The care with which everyone interacts with Sophie, Parker's instant pudding hack, Eliot's instructions on how defuse this situation, Sophie's immediate shift into protector mode once it becomes clear that the only real solution is to run and telling everyone to leave immediately, Nate staying behind and even when Sophie tells him to leave, waiting for her by the apartment door -- they care for each other so much.

I also really love the con-off with Starke's crew. It is so nice to see how similar yet different he and Nate are, and the same goes for the other crew members. I adore their individual confrontations a lot. Eliot's non-fight fight with Mikel Dayan, Parker's thief-off with Apollo, Hardison and Chaos' baby monitor fight. It just really highlights who our beloved characters are and what makes them them, now that we see them, metaphorically, in front of their mirror.

And then, of course, the actual heist is also just amazing. I adore that Starke chooses Nate as his alias to gain access, it is such a great move. Parker and Apollo talking in the ventilation shaft about birds is also just so lovely. And as an admirer of Eliot's arms, I am also very fond of his fight with Mikel. Good choices have been made, I appreciate all of them. The reveal at the end is also absolutely amazing. To beat them they had to save them? Brilliant.

Lastly, of course, Sophie's goodbye at the graveyard with Nate. What a spectacular moment. Also just, the visuals are so beautiful. I love the lighting here. And of course the return of Andy Lange's song, which is just perfect. I am so happy that this is the journey they decided to give Sophie when it became clear that Gina would not be able to be in the full seasons due to her pregnancy. They accommodated her so beautifully and gave Sophie such an amazing moment of character growth. This is why I love this show and the people who made it so much. All my love, to all of them.

208: THE ICE MAN JOB

D: JEREMIAH CHECHIK. W: CHRISTINE BOYLAN. Original Air Date: 02 September 2009.

We love The Ice Man Job! Another fantastic episode by one Christine Boylan who we love in this house. Our very first episode without Sophie being there, and it's a great one. I absolutely adore how they worked in moments with our favourite grifter in a way that so wonderfully accommodates Gina's pregnancy.

I absolutely adore the moments where all of them eventually end up calling Sophie. Parker, hiding underneath the bar after Nate tells her she'll be the grifter in this one, calling her mom Sophie in a panic without wanting the others to know, but still needing her advice and missing her so much. Then Eliot, calling to complain to his mom Sophie about Hardison going overboard again with the grift, needing the knowledge that his concerns are being heard and aren't unfounded, needs to hear the other protector of the family acknowledge his rightful fear that things will go sideways. And of course also Hardison, calling mom Sophie so she can pick him up from the party help him out of the mess he's made, hoping against all hope that she'll be able to help without having to involve Nate. The others both had the luxury to ask Sophie not to tell Nate -- Hardison had no other choice but to let her call it in. Lastly, Nate too, at the end, calling his wife Sophie. And honestly, I love that Sophie drops her phone into her drink after the call, because Nate is the only one not giving her what she wants to hear. The kids, all of them, called with an "I need you" and that is the one thing Nate doesn't give her.

There are many other things in this episode that I love very much. The opening briefing, Parker feeling alone on the big empty couch, trying to sit next to Eliot, but he makes her move. Nate's big DadTM moment of "Eliot, can you please sit next to Parker" and Eliot's very long-suffering oldest child answer "No! I'm sitting here now."

Then of course Eliot and Hardison's two moments -- Eliot telling Hardison "I ain't bailing your ass out" and then when he eventually does anyway, Hardison's smug joy, forcing Eliot to sort-of-hug him back at McRory's. Eliot's unsuccessful attempt to make him helping Hardison a decision forced onto him by Parker, and Parker refusing to accept the "blame" immediately. Their whole dynamic this episode is just so good. Neither Eliot nor Parker being happy with Hardison in this role (Parker's refusal to ride with him in the Ferrari), Eliot proudly watching Parker do her thing over the security camera ("Stuck it!").

Lots of love also to Pasha Lychnikoff as our main Russian goon, who is just fantastic here, our much beloved Lt. Patrick Bonanno, and also Nadine Haders for so many amazing looks, especially on Eliot.

209: THE LOST HEIR JOB

D: PETER WINTHER. W: CHRIS DOWNEY. Original Air Date: 09 September 2009.

Court-room episode, which means we have our friend Chris Downey on the keys here, and he gave us an absolutely excellent introduction for Tara Cole played by the lovely Jeri Ryan. Honestly, the more often I watch this episode, the better it gets. Tara is just so good.

Highlights of this episode include: Sophie's immediate "who died?!" when Nate shows up at her apartment in London, Hardison playing "Where is Waldo Ford," Hardison and Eliot in prison, the first appearance of Nate's lawyer alias Jimmy Papadokalis who wears brilliantly loud and obnoxious suits in outrageous colour-combinations, Hardison stalling Blanchard at court security with his keys, Nate's reveal of Ruth as Kimball's daughter (I am fascinated that he completely drops the character here -- he is just Nate now), and of course, the reveal of Tara at the end.

Honestly, this is such a magnificent episode to introduce Tara's character. We have just watched the team scramble and fuck up without Sophie, and then their next job gets more complicated because of this random lawyer who shows up. And she's so righteous and law-abiding and absolutely not someone they should be taking with them on their job. And Tara plays it perfectly. Her honest try at getting Orson to talk to them, her confusion about her "dogs", her excited smile when she gets to con Blanchard and be a bit dishonest -- it is so good. And then we get that complete 180° when the team finds her in Nate's apartment. Not just visually, but the personality. Her voice drops a bit too. Jeri fucking rocked this introduction. The reveal is so damn good.

210: THE RUNWAY JOB

D: MARC ROSKIN. W: ALBERT KIM. Original Air Date: 13 January 2010.

I have zero interest in fashion but I honest to God love every single one of these characters at fashion week. Fashion!Eliot is absolutely fantastical and I love him. Julien, my beloved. Fashion!Parker is very cute with her braid and even before she gets the model makeover she outshines every single other person at the event. Fashion!Hardison is surprisingly understated but I dig it. Tara as Caprina is also just excellent. And I absolutely, un-ironically adore Fashion!Nate. Jacques is such a character. Nate exchanged the usual "obnoxious and greasy" with "gay," slapped some would-be-French that sounds like German on top of it, and called it a character. And I love it.

I also very much love the three video calls with Sophie in this episode. The kids calling in the beginning, complaining about Tara. I absolutely adore both the "she's hot" moment and Eliot's "...and all the way to Europe?" when Sophie says Nate lets what is good for him walk out the door. Parker's little "I just miss you" before they hang up has me all the way up in my emotions every damn time. Tara calling Sophie to complain about Nate is also just excellent. The whole bit with Nate's "I'm sexy because I'm broken" thing is just *chef's kiss*. And of course Nate's call at the end. I love that Sophie hangs up on him, it is so fair, it is absolutely justified. And I think he knows that too.

So many great other moments too -- Hardison's Steven Seagal comment about Eliot's clothes, Nate's "Julien, sweetheart" and Eliot's little clap before taking the money, Nate and Parker at the mark's house, Eliot and Tara vs the Triads, Eliot and Parker at fashion week together ("It's a fashion show, not Thieves'R'Us"), and of course Tara's "For what it's worth, Sophie was right. You guys are the best I've ever seen ... But no one in the world, is as good as you think you are."

211: THE BOTTLE JOB

D: JONATHAN FRAKES. W: CHRISTINE BOYLAN. Original Air Date: 20 January 2010.

This episode has got to be one of my favourites, if I were forced to chose some. I love a bottle episode, and this one is just magnificent. Excellent client, great mark, fantastic additional characters, wonderful episode for the team. All around just, so good. Not surprising if Frakes and Boylan are at the wheel together, of course.

The addition of Cora is so lovely. I would have loved to see more of her, to be honest. She is such a great character. I love what her presence does to who we see Nate as. I adore when characters get to show new sides of themselves, it's so nice. Also, Nate's comment to Eliot about him not wanting Eliot to like Cora because she's like his niece? Most excellent.

I adore our three police officers too. Mickey, Danny and Johnny are such great additions. I really liked them. How they just went with whatever Nate was planning and in the end decided to just pretend none of this ever happened, it's just so good.

Doyle and the Liams as our villains of the week are also just fantastic. Also I just love Irish accents, it sounds so good. I love to hear it.

Other highlights of this episode include: Tara's "I'm Trish and I'm lonely", the kids going for their individual emergency funds stashed in Nate's place (they are all so fantastically in character, I love it), Nate using his dad's name as his alias, everyone stopping to see if Nate is going to succumb to the booze again, Hardison's excitement about pulling off the wire in under 2h, Hardison faking the weather, Eliot and Parker on safe duty. Also, rewatching this episode, I am absolutely 100% convinced that what Eliot is doing to distract the Liams from Tara conning Doyle, absolutely categorises as flirting. The way he throws that dart at the board and then buys them beer? Mr Spencer, sir, you are flirting with these guys.

212: THE ZANZIBAR MARKETPLACE JOB

D: JEREMIAH CHECHIK. W: MELISSA GLENN & JESSICA RIEDER (GRASL). Original Air Date: 27 January 2010.

The wonder twins with yet another magnificent episode. No surprises here. We have not just the return of Maggie but also of Sterling! We love this!!! (Seriously, I want both of them back in the reboot. I don't care that they're most closely tied to Nate. Bring them back.)

This episode has so many absolutely excellent moments as well. I love the opening sequence in the bar, with them going over possible next clients together, Nate kicking Eliot for flirting with the bartender, and then of course also Sterling walking in. The interaction Nate and Eliot have here is just fantastic.

Sterling: *walks in* Nate: Eliot, I'm gonna ask you not do do anything violent. Eliot: Wha-what are you talking about? I only use violence as an appropriate response. Sterling: Hello, Nate. Eliot: *responds appropriately*

And to think that Sterling only gets beat up here because Mark Sheppard's son was visiting the set that day and wanted to see his dad get beat up by Eliot. We stan one Sheppard Jr.

I very much love the scene where Nate and Sterling go over what they have on Lundy, and then Parker interrupting them out of nowhere, just sitting there on the counter, like she's been there forever (which she probably has). Also just, fantastic clothes on Parker, thank you Nadine. Maggie showing up here is of course also brilliant and I am very fond of Parker making Maggie a fugitive bag. It is so completely adorable. I love my girl so much.

Another favourite moment is, of course, Tara and Eliot getting Chernov to tell them where the sale of the Fabergé egg will take place. Tara not saying a damn thing, Eliot grumpily doing what Tara tells him to ("Do that thing with your eyes that scares people" / "What -- I don't know what you're talking about"), Chernov's complete unease about this whole entire situation, and then of course Tara and Eliot's other interaction:

Tara: What we imagine is always so much better than reality. Eliot, with the tiniest voice possible: Like love? Tara: *just stares at him, confused*

Just, *chef's kiss* this scene.

The scenes in the embassy are also just excellent. Tara and Nate pretending to be a couple, Nate's inability to deal with the idea of Maggie and Alexander, Maggie and Tara hysterically giggling while talking about Nate, Sterling pretending to be drunk (and incredibly gay) to get Parker access to the egg room -- brilliance, all the way through.

I adore Eliot taking charge of the situation once it becomes clear that Maggie and Nate have been taken hostage. Parker doing her magic and switching the bomb with the empty briefcase in the elevators is beautiful. Maggie kissing Nate instead of Lundy in what could have been their final moment and regretting it instantly the moment Parker shows up is excellent.

And the final scene back at McRory's is also just wonderful. The kids watching the news about Sterling with Tara ("I hate this guy" / "Now, you're part of the team"), and Nate talking with Maggie. I adore Maggie in this scene so much. Her and Nate's relationship is so lovely. We know Sophie understands how Nate ticks, but Maggie knows him so well too, still.

213: THE FUTURE JOB

D: MARC ROSKIN. W: CHRIS DOWNEY & AMY BERG. Original Air Date: 03 February 2010.

This episode is so good for so many reasons. First off, I adore Luke Perry (I'm still sad about him) even if he plays creeps like Rand in most everything I've seen him in. He was just so good. Second, Medium Tara is probably my favourite role of hers. It's a lot softer than many of the other characters she's done, and I love it. Also the costuming is just excellent.

But I want to talk about Parker most of all. The scene where Rand cold reads her is so well done. Riesgraf knocked it out of the park here. Also, I love how Nate, as soon as Rand starts approaching and doing his act, barely ever takes his eyes off her. He occasionally glances at Rand, but his attention is on Parker at all times. And it just makes me feel things.

The team coming back to Nate's to find Parker sitting on the floor in front of the couch, crying also makes me super emo. They are all so very careful with her here. Even Tara, who hasn't been with them for that long. I quite like how Eliot and Hardison choose to sit a bit away, giving her space, and Nate carefully approaches and sits closest to her. They are all so good with her here, I love them all so much. And I absolutely adore this part of the conversation:

Tara: So what do we do now? Parker: Cut off his arms. And his head. Yeah. I wanna kill him. Can we make that happen? Eliot: Yeah, I can...I mean, I could...

Also earlier, after Tara acknowledges that Rand is good at what he does, Hardison says "He should be shot." I adore how both our boys would not hesitate to end this man for hurting Parker like this. That's their girl and he went too damn far. And even though Nate suggests a way of retaliation that is less final, he isn't above hurting the man either. Because that's his girl, too:

Hardison: Nate had me rig the table with a mild electrical current. Eliot: You electrocuted him? Nate, smugly: Yes, I did. It helped sell the bit. Parker: I approve. Nate: Thanks, Parker. Eliot: No, her agreeing with you is not a good thing. Nate, whispering to Parker: Thanks.

And add to that the absolute joy each and every one of them have when fucking with Rand to fulfil Tara's predictions? *Chef's kiss.* Absolutely beautiful.

There is so much more absolutely fantastic content in this episode, but I just wanna point out the ending where they meet with the client again. Nate is so good with them here. The way he talks to Jodie about her baby and how she will see her late husband in the child, makes me cry every damn time. Just like Tara says, "Yeah, now I see why you do it," this is why this show is so damn good. It's because of this exactly. Because for one shining moment within so much suck and tragedy, there is goodness and a wrong that has been made right. They help people and it isn't just fleeting momentary relief. They change people's lives for the better. I love this fucking show so much.

214: THE THREE STRIKES JOB

D: DEAN DEVLIN. W: JOHN ROGERS. Original Air Date: 10 February 2010.

First half of the second finale! Patrick Bonanno my beloved! I get so sad every time he gets shot here. My man deserves better than this. I love Bonanno so damn much, man. I absolutely adore that Nate goes to see his family at the hospital. Like, this is a cop. The very opposite side of the law Nate and his people operate on. But he goes to see him anyway, because this is their cop. And I love that Bonanno's wife recognises Nate's name. "He wanted to buy you a drink. And then arrest you." That's just so good.

I also absolutely love Richard Kind as Brad Culpepper, the corrupt mayor. I would love to see him back in the reboot, but I doubt there'd be any reasonable explanation why on earth they'd have to see this particular mayor again. I just think Richard Kind is an absolutely fantastic actor.

Anyway, favourite moments. Hardison and Eliot at Bonanno's house is beautiful. I am so fond of how Hardison deals with law enforcement while impersonating law enforcement. He tears them down and builds them back up again, every single time. And I adore how Eliot just smiles at his antics. He crawls around on that carpet with the young cop and Eliot just stands there and smiles. I love them, guys. I really do. Parker pretending to be Brad's pregnant lover with Tara's help is also just most excellent.

And of course: Roy Chappell. Baseball Eliot, my most beloved. There is so much to love about this whole concept. Eliot's reluctance at first because he doesn't like baseball. The discovery that baseball is actually something cool and something he is good at. His absolute childlike joy at the energy drink commercial Hardison made him. His damn hair during the actual game. The sandwich! The enthusiasm about the sandwich. Hardison admitting that the sandwich thing is cool.

I also absolutely love Hardison and Parker as Beavers Fans. The badly photoshopped picture of Dean Devlin and John Rogers as the radio hosts makes me smile so much. So does hearing their voices on the show. Both Hardison and Parker's phone calls to them are also brilliant. Parker speaking Spanish? Marvelous. The two of them demonstrating the Beavers leaving? *Chef's kiss.*

The final showdown with Brad and then the FBI is also just most excellent. Nate going ballistic on Brad because of Bonanno. Hardison and Lucille. Parker giving Lucille a little kiss before they send her to explode as a distraction. Hardison quoting Spock to say goodbye to Lucille. Hardison being pissed at Nate about Lucille. And of course: Jim Sterling, Interpol. The bastard. I love him.

215: THE MALTESE FALCON JOB

D: DEAN DEVLIN. W: JOHN ROGERS. Original Air Date: 17 February 2010.

Second half of second finale! And it's a good one, too. This show has absolutely brilliant finales, lemme tell you.

What do we love about this episode? MUCH. Tara's naked bit is excellent. Eliot and Parker sharing a look after watching Tara's naked bit is even better. Parker turning on the porn channels on the hotel tv is hilarious. Eliot talking to the receptionist about the gym is hysterical ("Ah, the fitness spa. Isn't the Zen Steam Garden divine?" / "Yeah....delicious").

Nate on stairs vs Sterling in elevator is probably the pettiest thing I have ever watched on television and it is absolutely amazing. I don't think anything can ever top this as pettiest moment. It is just so good.

Sterling, of course, is always great fun. I love that he has his own little villain theme that announces him before he even enters the screen. Love a good villain theme. And I adore his moment with FBI Bob outside Brad's hotel room.

Sterling: Name's Bob, right? Bob: Yes, sir. Sterling: You've been here the whole time, Bob? Bob: Yes, sir. Sterling: And nobody's gone in or out, Bob? Bob: No, sir. Sterling: Then would you mind explaining, where the HELL THE MAYOR IS?!

Absolutely perfect.

Nate going back to his place always has me all up in my emotions. Also, I think Sterling here absolutely believes that what he is offering Nate, is good for him. That he can save him from himself or something. They were something like friends at some point, after all. And of course, Nate calling Sophie. She is, of course, unbeknownst to him, already on the way to save his ass. But he calls her and finally tells her exactly what she wanted to hear at the end of The Ice Man Job: "I need you. Not the team, me." Sir. I am emo about you.

And then of course the final con and the reveal of Sophie's return. I absolutely love that Parker's first reaction to Tara possibly betraying them was to try and throw her off the roof. That's my girl (I love Tara, but that was fair). Also just, if you pay attention on the boat scenes, you can see Sophie from as early as Kadjic hearing Nate's offer and then leading Nate and Eliot below deck. If you can pick out her hair and know the colour of her coat from the scene in the helicopter, you know that she is there. And then, below deck, you can see her so many times -- at one point essentially back to back with Nate -- before any of the characters know she's there. And can I just say, I absolutely love Nate's completely shocked face when he hears her voice. Those comedically big eyes are just excellent.

Everyone seeing Sophie again is done so well. Hardison and Eliot's confused "Sophie?" when she walks past. Eliot winking at Sophie after they free Nate. Parker hugging her immediately once her and Tara arrive on the ship. Hardison putting his hand on the small of her back as he passes by her to go down the stairs. I just love them all so much.

And lastly of course, the reveal of the plan, Nate cuffing himself to the railing and making Sterling leave his family alone. What Nate says to them always makes me so emo too: "You guys are the most honourable people I have ever met in my life. You have become my family, my only family. And I will never forget that." John Rogers, sir, we need to have some words once I get this lake out of my eyes. And I obviously can't not mention the kiss. Finally, finally Nate gets his shit together. And she slaps him and it is perfect. And then they leave and he sits down and bleeds and Sterling, for a moment, is genuinely concerned about Nate as a person and not merely about Nate as his only way to nail Kadjic.

Bob: Who the hell is this guy? Sterling: I have no idea. Nate: My name is Nate Ford. And I'm a thief.

Yes. Yes you are, you magnificent bastard.

[image taken from the electricnow website]

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ixalit · 4 years

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Hi! So I don’t know if you ship desteil (I don’t watch SPN so I don’t) but I assume you have seen the scene where casteil confesses his love to dean. I can’t help but feel a little jealous (I am a hardcore stevebucky shipper). I mean I guess it wasn’t the greatest because he died right after but at least it was confirmed. I just wish we could’ve gotten something like that for Steve and Bucky.

I hear where you’re coming from and I get that it would’ve been nice to have Steve or Bucky say the words “I love you” or have them confirmed BUT I have to respectfully disagree.

I think I’m able to find the Destiel situation hilarious because I’m not invested in Supernatural anymore and haven’t been for 5 or 6 years. But if I was still a part of the spn fandom, I think I’d be pretty upset right now. Even where I am.... I mean... yes, it technically became canon, but in my opinion the writing (and acting) did the characters so dirty with that shit they pulled. Like I said, I’m not invested, but I did love these characters at one point, and under the hilarity of the whole situation, seeing it end like this is... well, frankly it’s disappointing.

All that to say I’m kinda glad Marvel didn’t do something like this to Stucky. It means we, as fans, get to live in the worlds we create on AO3 and it means we can keep that faith in the characters. If stucky had a big “reveal” where one of them looked disgusted and shocked while the other poured his heart out and then died, that would mean giving up the hope of a “happy stucky comfirmation.”

While I think we would all want Stucky to be canon if it meant they were treated with respect and dignity and not used to reinforce homophobic ideas (like being a happy gay in love gets you sent to mega super hell or wherever), we’re kidding ourselves if we think Marvel would be up to the task. Remember, this is the Marvel who’s big First Gay Character was this guy

And the “gay” part was one completely-unrelated-to-the-plot, blink-and-you-miss-it line.

I want my boys to be happy and have my headcanons about their history and future. I want to imagine and write and read about the infinite first kisses and dates and love confessions and sweet, domestic moments.

John Rogers, the co-creator and executive producer of Leverage, put it really well when he said this:

"Look, if we told you Eliot's entire timeline or Nate's entire timeline, you wouldn’t be able to have then have enough flexibility to fold that timeline in with Supernatural in your fanfics because they'd be no space for that. The space we leave is the space for you to write your slash! That's super important for us to do! We do that for you, people! The fans appreciate the empty space we leave so you can write your Buffy, Supernatural, NCIS, Criminal Minds, Leverage crossovers."

(From Leverage 10 Podcast: 512 The White Rabbit Job)

If we know everything about the characters (and it usually won’t live up to expectations), it puts limits on what ideas still fit into ‘canon’ and I, for one, would like to keep reading and writing about how Steve Rogers could very easily be canonically transgender, or what exactly was the process Hydra put Bucky Barnes through to break him down and build him as the soldier, or what happened in the time between the end of Civil War and the start of Infinitu War.

(Personally, I like to think that last one was lots of Stucky cuddles and recovery in Wakanda and Skype calls while Steve became Nomad, but if Marvel revealed the specifics and they didn’t fit that narrative, I’d be sad to lose that happy place in my mind for them.)

#does this even make sense #basically it’s ‘fuck Marvel I make the rules’ just drawn out into a couple paragraphs #asks #stucky #destiel

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the-cookie-of-doom · 4 years

Text

Just for fun, I decided to add a table of contents now that I have everything fully copied over, and. Dude. My ToC alone is 7 pages

I’ll post it below the cut to give you guys a lil sneak peak about what’s to come ;)

January 2019

Strings of Fate 9

Crimson Peak AU 21

Southern Gothic AU 21

ABO Angst (First Fic) 32

Genie/Demon Slave AU 40

Maker AU 40

Construction AU 41

A/B/O & Teen Parents 42

Nude Modeling/College AU 44

Vampire Academy AU 45

Gym AU W/Emily 47

Mitch/Peter Canon Meta 57

Panther AU 59

Stiles/Mitch/Peter Void AU 69

Drifter/Amnesia AU 70

Point Break AU 71

A/B/O Spy AU 72

Single Dad AU W/Amelia 74

Siren Highschool AU 77

Werewolf AU (Mitch Goes Missing) 79

Mob/Panther AU (Peter/Mitch) 81

Criminal Minds AU 83

February 2019 83

Reincarnation AU (Stiles/Peter/Mitch) 83

Exorcism AU 85

Dorian Gray AU 87

Mini AUs (Mitch/Derek) 91

Priest AU (Steter) 93

Siren/Selkie AU 95

Angsty Band AU 96

Babysitter AU 97

Stiles Gets Sick 98

Runaway AU 99

Teen Angst 102

Undead Mitch (Mitch/Peter) 132

Southern Transfer Student AU 133

Professor/Stripper AU 134

Eichen House AU 136

Psychic Mitch AU (Mitch/Peter) 137

ABO Escort AU 138

Faerie Ring AU 140

(Lame) Bartender AU 140

Prohibition AU 141

Time Travel AU 141

Umbrella Academy AU 142

Stripper/Hitman/Runaway AU (Katrina/Mitch/Stiles) 142

Online Relationship AU 145

Mitch/Nogitsune/Stiles AU 145

John Wick AU 148

March 2019 148

Pornstar AU 148

Drifter AU 149

Drifter/Hooker AU (Sterek) 149

Hometown AU 150

Void Stiles AU (Steter) 151

Post-Nogitsune Body Horror AU 152

Country AU 153

Diego/Klaus Meta?? 156

Mitch/Chris Casual Sex AU (Ft. Interdimensional Travel) 158

Equilibrium 158

Survivor’s Guilt 159

Summer Roadtrip AU (Stetopher, Mitch/Katrina) 169

Massage AU 170

Conspiracy Theory AU 173

That Time They (Almost) Fucked* 176 *note for readers, it’s part of the Conspiracy AU

Stardust AU 178

Mitch/John AU 179

1500s(?) AU 181

Mitch Raised Little Brother Stiles (Platonic) 182

Snowed In AU 182

Camboy AU 183

Opposite Time Travel AU 183

Family Fight (Mitch/Peter) 185

Mitch/Void AU 188

Fantasy AU w/Dragons 194

House AU (S. 6 Ep. 4) 195

House AU 2.0 Single Dad w/Sick Daughter 197

Chronicles of Nick AU 198

Game Designer/YouTuber AU 202

April 2019 202

Peter’s Anchor AU 202

Hunter Mitch AU (Mitch/Peter) 203

Eichen AU (Mitch/Peter) 209

Teen Angst But WORSE 210

MMA/UFC AU 214

Restaurant AU 215

House AU 3.0 Stiles Gets Sick 216

Neighbors AU 217

Supernatural AU 219

Magic Mike AU 220

Hunter AU (Mitch/Peter) 221

Misc. AUs 222

- Elemental AU 225

- Angel/Demon AU 225

- Doppelganger AU 225

- Sordid Catholic Happenings AU 226

- Stoner AU 226

- Yogi/Body Builder(?) AU 226

- “I don’t love you” AU 227

- Avian AU 227

- Supernatural Detectives AU 227

- Mini Cyberpunk AU 228

- Domesticated Crptid 229

- Katrina Tops AU 229

- Mitch Being Abused (& Adopted by Hurley) 229

Death AU 230

ReplicantCloud Atlas AU 231

Serial Killer/Psychologist AU 233

DID/Nogitsune AU 234

Chambers AU 236

May 2019 246

Parole AU 246

Talia Takes Peter’s Memories (Meta) 247

Forced to Mate AU 247

What You Sow (ABO) 248

Service Dog AU (Peter/Mitch) 249

Victorian ABO AU 251

Beyond Reasonable Doubt 253

Accidental Puppy Acquisition 254

Mitch/John AU 257

Night Angel AU 257

Trafficking AU 258

Demon/Witch AU (Mitch/Katrina & Stitch) 259

Post-Apoc (Original) 259

Speech Counselor AU (Mitch/Peter) 261

Medieval Cult ABO 262

HS/College AU (Spin the Bottle) 265

Single Dad w/Bailey 266

June 2019

Roadtrip AU 272

Werewolf War AU (Mitch/Laura, Stiles/Derek) 273

Lake Siren/Monster AU (Original) 275

Neighbors AU (Mitch/Stiles, Allison/Scott) 275

Stardust AU 276

Cyberpunk Post-Apoc AU 277

Highschool ABO 278

Priest/Sinner AU 279

Crossdressing/Historical Convention AU 282

Love Sacrificed AU (Mitch/Stiles/Peter) 284

Fake Dating AU 285

Devil AU 285

YouTuber AU 286

Vintage Porn AU 289

Prohibition Porn AU 289

WW1 Prostitute AU 290

Artillery 290

Stiles Kills Someone 297

Morning After AU 298

Captured By Hunters AU (Mitch/Peter) 299

July 2019 299

Necromancer AU (Stiles/Peter) 299

Rape Recovery (Mitch/Peter) 301

Vampire AU 303

Altar Boy/Sinner AU 304

Emissary Mitch AU 306

Agent Provocateur (Original) 308

Post-Nogitsune Wandering 308

Hippie/Punk AU 309

Mom’s Roadtrip Horror Stories 311

Renaissance AU (Stiles/Peter) 312

Harem AU (Mitch/Peter/Stiles) 312

The Hobbit AU 315

Buzzfeed Unsolved AU 318

Ice Skating AU 319

Non-Serious BDSM 320

August 2019 321

Dad Fic/Child Abuse* (Mitch/Peter) 321 *note for readers, Mitch and Peter aren’t the ones doing the abuse, they adopt the kid being abused and kill their dad.

Unstable (Stiles/Derek, Mitch/Peter) 328

Christmas AU 334

Hunted 338

GoT Inspired/Birthday Fic 340

AHS: Coven AU 342

Stiles Kills Donovan 346

Stranger Things AU 349

Allison Angst (Wings of a Butterfly) 352

God/Mortal AU (w/Reincarnation) 353

Crimson Kiss 355

Mitch Saves Peter (Unrequited Love, Peter/Stiles) 356

Jigsaw AU 358

Kid Fic (Inspired by that one PtV Song??) 359

Blood Drive 360

Summer Camp AU 361

Succubus/Cupid AU 364

Human/Sex Demon AU 365

Rescue Me (Mitch Saves Stiles from Rogue Werewolves) 366

September 2019 367

AHS: Murder House AU (Mitch Sees Dead People) 367

Disney Cast Members AU 368

Winter Soldier AU 368

Definitely Not Haunted 369

Elemental AU (inspired by a Steter fic) 369

Fever Dream 370

Halloween Pumpkin Carving (Mitch/Peter) 373

Mitch Raises Cora 373

Naughty Bits 386

Dad Mitch (Not sure which au??) 396

Kill Shot/Strip Club AU 396

Sims AU 397

Mercy 404

Ghosts Katrina & Mitch 410

Musician/Long Distance AU 413

AA Girls/Lydia 416

Marionette Meta (GoT) 417

Cold War AU 419

Unicorn AU 419

Mitch Sleeps With An Informant (Jack Ryan-esque) 420

Vampire AU (Museum Edition) 422

Snowed In AU 423

Medieval Tourney AU (Peter/Chris) 423

October 2019 429

Crown Prince AU (Mitch/Peter) 429

Peter Has A Kink For Being Picked Up 431

Creepy Boarding School AU 431

Damaged Bois 435

Dracula AU (Mitch/Katrina/Stiles) 436

The Last Time 437

Worst Fears AU (Stiles/Peter, inspired by Jae/Allistair) 440

November 2019 444

Eichen House (Political Prisoner Mitch) 444

Dragon AU 444

Transfer Student Mitch Usurps Jackson 446

Locker Room Slut Stiles 447

Petopher AU 447

Rebound 448

Princess and the Pauper AU 467

Rival College Sports Teams AU 481

Teen Dad/Lawyer AU (Mitch/Peter) 482

Childhood Best Friends AU 487

Culinary AU 489

Rival/Married Teachers AU 490

Angel/Demon AU 491

December 2019 492

Christmas Fake Dating/Wedding AU 492

Vikings AU 495

Artist/Muse AU 498

CIA Escort Agency 498

Mitch Can’t Die 499

Hooker Mitch/Act of Treason (?) 500

Long Live the King 500

Mitch Gets Wrecked (Triathlon Aftermath) 504

The Mirror’s Curse (Original) 504

Angel/Reaper AU 505

January 2020 508

Bystander Effect 508

Melting Point 509

Vampire AU "I'll bet you're hungry." 512

Vampire AU - Katrina Turns Mitch 514

Witch/Incubus Bookshop & Sanctuary AU 517

Cottagecore Wish Fulfillment (Fae Stiles) 518

Ace Mitch 520

Monster Menagerie 521

Vampire Venom Black Market 523

Florist/Tattoo Artist 524

Gentle Angst AUs 524

Counselor/Praise Kink 526

Hanahaki AU 527

There is something bitterly funny about the last idea I told my ex about, being a Hanahaki AU, only for her to break up with me a month later bc I’m aromantic...

When I realized that last night while looking at this, it really made me see hanahaki AUs in a different light lmao. Maybe there’s a reason they’ve always been one of my favorite.

If there’s an AU that sparked your interest, feel free to ask me about it! I love talking about my fics : 3

#cookie writes #stiles stilinski #mitch rapp #peter hale #derek hale #p much everyone is involved but those are p much the maind #stitch #pitch #steteritch #and whatever the fuck Mitch/Derek is lmao #Merek?

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lovemesomesurveys · 4 years

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800 questions survey part 11

501) What’s your favorite party game? I like board games or card games like Cards Against Humanity.

502) Is it acceptable or unacceptable to smack a child as form of discipline? I think it’s absolutely unacceptable to smack a child. There’s no reason to hit a child at all, I don’t care if you call it “discipline.” There’s other ways to do that.

503) Can a heterosexual male ever wear pink? Uh, yes. It’s a color.

504) Is it criminal to wear socks with sandals? Absolutely. Haha.

505) If you were captain of a ship, what would you call it? *shrug*

506) If you were to join an emergency service which would it be? I wouldn’t join an emergency service.

507) If you were to join one of the armed forced which would it be? I can’t. I wouldn’t be cut out for it, anyway.

508) What’s the worst thing about being your gender? The monthly unwanted visitor definitely sucked. I had horrible PMDD. I don’t have one anymore, though.

509) What’s the best thing about being your gender? I just like being a female.

510) If you swapped genders for a day how would you spend it? Let’s be real, I’d be doing the same thing (nothing) but doing it as a male, ha.

511) If you were exiled what country would you choose as your new home? Uhhh.

512) Have you ever made someone cry? Yes, but it was never intentional. <<<

513) Have you ever starred in a school play? No. Never even tried out for a play.

514) Were you a member of any celebrity fan club? Jonas Brothers and Drake Bell back in the day.

515) Have you ever been a member of any other club? I was an active member and board member for the psych club in community college.

516) If you could have a full scholarship to any university what would you choose to study? I wouldn’t go back to school if you paid me. I’m finished with it. <<< Saaaame.

517) What’s been your greatest ever day? Hmm.

518) What historical period would you like to live in if you could go back in time? I wouldn’t mind going through the 90′s again. They were the best, <<< Yesss, that would be fun. It’d be interesting experiencing it as an adult.

519) What would you bring along to an idyllic picnic? Sandwiches, pasta salads, and cheesecake. 520) What’s your favorite children’s story? A few of my favorites when I was little were The Berenstain Bears, Little Critter, various Little Golden Books books, Amelia Bedelia, etc. When I got to like 4th and 5th grade I got really into Goosebumps, Nancy Drew, The Babysitter’s Club, Sweet Valley High, Ramona and Beezus, Judy Blume books, etc.

521) What movie ending really frustrated you? And how would you change it? For some reason I can never seem to think of an example when prompted, but there’s been plenty of movies with wtf endings.

522) What three things do you think of most each day? Health related things mostly, but I’m also a scheduled, routine person so I’m always thinking about stuff relating to that i.e taking my medicine, eating, drinking.

523) What do you call your evening meal? Dinner Tea or Supper? I just call it dinner.

524) What do you call your after meal sweet? Pudding or Dessert? Dessert.

525) If you had a warning label, what would yours say? Warning: Sensitive and awkward.

526) Have you ever got sweet revenge on anyone? I’m not a revengeful person.

527) Have you ever been to a live concert? Yeah, a few.

528) Have you ever been to see standup comedy? Nope.

529) Have you ever needed stitches? Several times.

530) If you could invent brand new baby names what would they be? I don’t feel like attempting to come up with any.

531) Do your dreams ever tell you to do anything? I rarely remember my dreams, but I do know is that they’re just super random and weird.

532) Who’s your favorite radio 1 DJ? I don’t listen to the radio.

533) What’s the best way to your heart? Hopefully I can find a guy that is very patient, understanding, caring, and trustworthy. A nice sense of humor, too.

534) Do you know your own mobile phone number off by heart? I do.

535) If you were a fashion designer, what style of clothing or accessories would you design? I have no idea, I’m not creative.

536) Do you ever laugh at things you shouldn’t? I have to laugh at myself sometimes, otherwise I’ll cry, in certain situations. <<<

537) Have you ever been in a submarine? Yeah, a ride at Disneyland.

538) Have you ever walked out of a cinema before the film was done? Ha, I saw one of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movies when I was like 12 in theaters, at night, and I was a big scardy cat. My cousin and I ended up running out to the lobby, which wasn’t any better because the concession stand closed up and the lobby was empty. I remember a car pulling up out front and that scared us so we ran back into the theater with our moms lol. I want to also mention this was the night before I was going to have a big surgery... not sure why we thought that was a good idea. Maybe to take my mind of the surgery?

539) What song would you say best sums you up? I don’t know. There’s several with relatable lyrics that could very well be talking about me cause they fit so well.

540) Do you have any old friends you wish you could meet up with again? I do miss some of my former friends.

541) What’s your favorite Nursery Rhyme? Hmm.

542) Do you prefer metric or imperial measurements? Metric is the one I’m familiar with.

543) Who’s your favorite monarch of all time? I don’t have a favorite monarch.

544) What was the last thing you ate? I just had ramen a bit ago.

545) What’s your favorite farmyard animal? Horses.

546) If you could choose one celebrity to be the father/mother of your child who would it be? I don’t want children.

547) What would you do if someone proposed to you tomorrow? Uh, no.

548) What are your 3 favorite internet sites? Tumblr, YouTube, and Twitter.

549) How high can you jump? I can’t jump at all.

550) Which fictional character do you wish was real? Tony Stark.

#personal #text #survey #surveys #800 questions #501-550

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booksociety · 5 years

Photo

Book Society presents its September reading event! The members have selected Outcasts as the theme and Vicious by V.E. Schwab as the optional book of the month. Come and join us in reading books that focus on outlaws, criminals, rebels, villains, and those who don’t fit in. This event is open to everyone, not just our members.

✧ how to participate:

optional: reblog this post; check out our network and members

read (or reread) either Vicious (adult, scifi; 366 pages) or a book of your choice that fits this month’s theme

share what book you’ve chosen, thoughts, reactions, and/or creations

use the tag #booksociety in your posts, and include “@booksociety’s Outcasts Event: [insert book title here]” in the description of your creations

the event starts on 1 September and ends on 30 September

✧ reading recommendations (under the cut):

A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas (new adult, fantasy, romance; 626 pages)

An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir (young adult, fantasy, romance; 446 pages)

Artemis by Andy Weir (adult, scifi; 305 pages)

Aurora Rising by Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff (young adult, scifi; 473 pages)

Bring Me Their Hearts by Sara Wolf (young adult, fantasy, romance; 370 pages)

Catwoman: Soulstealer by Sarah J. Maas (young adult, superheroes; 384 pages)

Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi (young adult, high fantasy; 544 pages)

Cinder by Marissa Meyer (young adult, scifi, retelling; 400 pages)

Circe by Madeline Miller (fantasy, mythology, retelling; 336 pages)

Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken (young adult, scifi, dystopia; 488 pages)

Daughter of the Burning City by Amanda Foody (young adult, fantasy; 384 pages)

Divergent by Veronica Roth (young adult, romance, dystopia; 487 pages)

Ever The Hunted by Erin Summerill (young adult, fantasy; 392 pages)

Fire by Kristin Cashore (young adult, high fantasy; 480 pages)

Flame in the Mist by Renée Ahdieh (young adult, fantasy, romance; 392 pages)

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (classic, scifi, gothic; 335 pages)

Frostfire by Amanda Hocking (young adult, urban fantasy, paranormal, romance; 321 pages)

Girls of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan (young adult, fantasy, lgbt; 400 pages)

Graceling by Kristin Cashore (young adult, fantasy, romance; 471 pages)

Heart of Iron by Ashley Poston (young adult, scifi, retelling; 467 pages)

Heart of the Fae by Emma Hamm (new adult, fantasy, romance, retelling; 350 pages)

In Other Lands by Sarah Rees Brennan (young adult, fantasy, romance, lgbt; 437 pages)

Jade City by Fonda Lee (adult, urban fantasy; 560 pages)

Life1ik3 by Jay Kristoff (young adult, scifi, dystopia; 402 pages)

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs (young adult, fantasy; 352 pages)

Nevernight by Jay Kristoff (young adult, fantasy; 429 pages)

Nimona by Noelle Stevenson (young adult, fantasy, comic; 272 pages)

Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens (classic, social problem novel; 608 pages)

Onyx & Ivory by Mindee Arnett (young adult, fantasy; 512 pages)

Poison Study by Maria V. Snyder (adult, fantasy; 412 pages)

Princess Academy by Shannon Hale (middle grade, fantasy, romance; 214 pages)

Providence by Caroline Kepnes (fiction, mystery, thriller, contemporary; 367 pages)

Red Rising by Pierce Brown (young adult, scifi, dystopia; 382 pages)

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi (young adult, scifi, dystopia, romance; 338 pages)

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo (young adult, fantasy; 465 pages)

The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden (young adult, historical fantasy, folklore; 323 pages)

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black (young adult, fantasy; 370 pages)

The Foxhole Court by Nora Sakavic (young adult, contemporary, sports; 237 pages)

The Gilded Wolves by Roshani Chokshi (young adult, fantasy, historical; 388 pages)

The Host by Stephenie Meyer (adult, scifi; 620 pages)

The Last Magician by Lisa Maxwell (young adult, fantasy, historical; 512 pages)

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch (adult, fantasy; 499 pages)

The Lost Causes by Alyssa Embree Schwartz (young adult, scifi, thriller; 344 pages)

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky (young adult, contemporary; 213 pages)

The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang (adult, fantasy, historical; 544 pages)

The Shamer's Daughter by Lene Kaaberbøl (middle grade, fantasy; 235 pages)

The Star-Touched Queen by Roshani Chokshi (young adult, fantasy, romance, mythology; 342 pages)

The Young Elites by Marie Lu (young adult, fantasy; 355 pages)

Warrior of the Wild by Tricia Levenseller (young adult, fantasy, romance; 329 pages)

#booksociety #september 2019 event #*event

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slytherinlesbians · 8 months

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Whumptober 2023, Day 9: Mistaken Identity

Spencer slumps in his seat in the jet, exhausted.

“I… I really thought it was him,” he mumbles.

Rossi and Morgan exchange an apprehensive glance. The last few days have been incredibly emotionally taxing on all of them, with the kidnapping case and then watching Spencer come back into contact with his father for the first time since he was a kid. This whole time, they’ve been watching Spencer like hawks, waiting for him to break. It’s not that Spencer is this fragile thing they have to walk on eggshells around, but he’s been through so many emotions in the last twelve hours alone that anyone in his position would have lost it by now. He’d come close a few times, blowing up at his teammates and then his father. But ever since sitting in a room with both of his parents for the first time in over a decade, he’s been unusually quiet.

“We all make mistakes,” Rossi says, unusually gently.

“Not me,” Spencer says shakily, inspecting his hands and frowning. “I’m supposed - my brain - I remember everything. How could I mess something up this badly?”

“Reid,” Morgan says seriously, leaning over the table, trying to get Spencer’s attention, but Spencer ignores him. “Your brain was playing tricks on you. It could happen to anyone in your position. Anyone with trauma.”

“Yeah,” Spencer says, but his voice cracks. He still refuses to look up at his friends. “I know.”

“I’m going to get you some water,” Rossi says, standing up, “and do you want a snack? It might help, I know you haven’t eaten much today.” Spencer shakes his head.

Rossi makes his way towards the kitchenette, and Morgan prepares to continue comforting Spencer when his phone buzzes suddenly.

“Hey baby girl, we’re on our way back n- what? You’re kidding!” Morgan’s voice changes suddenly, filling with excitement. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll tell them! We’ll be there in a couple of hours, d- yes, yeah! That’s amazing - tell her congrats - yeah, we’ll see you all soon - okay - see you then -,” Morgan grins at Rossi, who returns with three bottles of water and some snacks, despite Spencer’s answer. “JJ’s in labor!”

Rossi smiles. “Soon we’ll have a baby profiler running around!” Both men turn to face Spencer to see the reaction to his best friend’s news, and their grins immediately drop. Spencer is curled up in his seat, knees drawn to his chest and head leaning against the window. There are silent tears pouring down his face.

“Sorry,” he whispers, feeling pathetic. Both Rossi and Morgan’s faces turn to ones of sympathy.

“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, kid,” Morgan says quietly. “It’s been a rough week.”

“Yeah,” Spencer says, sniffing, wiping at his face. This does nothing to quell the tears that continue to fall, and he cringes away from his friends.

“Just let it out, Spencer,” Rossi soothes. “We can talk about it when you’re ready.”

After a few moments, Spencer’s eyes begin to droop with exhaustion.

When he sleeps, he dreams of his father leaving all over again.

#whumptober2023 #no.9 #mistaken identity #criminal minds #fanfiction #spencer reid #david rossi #derek morgan

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dankusner · 3 months

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From: Daniel Kusner Subject: Lawrence wright Date: September 7, 2015 at 1:29:18 PM CDT To: "Kusner, Daniel" [email protected]

You could use this: "Austin is already at the center of the bicycling culture, with flatlands on one side and hills on the other, and great weather for cycling. All we need is more bikeways to make it the perfect place for bikes to rule."

Sent from my iPhone

On Sep 7, 2015, at 1:10 PM, Kusner, Daniel [email protected] wrote:

Next Thursday, author Lawrence Wright ("Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief.") is coming to Dallas for a reading and signing to promote his newest, “God Save Texas: A Journey Into the Soul of the Lone Star State ” which Knopf releases on April 17.

In Chapter 7, “Big D,” Wright recalls having dinner with Robert Wilonsky. That same chapter, Wright says, “The Dallas Morning News, the most important paper in the state and one of the leading papers in the county."

PDF — 512 CYCOLOGY

PDF new yorker — 1988

Can God Save Texas? A Film God Like Richard Linklater Might Help

One of Texas film's greatest voices speaks on the "cruelty" of the criminal justice system in a new HBO docuseries.

Eva Raggio

Film director Richard Linklater takes a look at the inhumanity of Texas prisons. Mat Hayward/Getty Images for IMDbGod Save Texas, a trilogy of documentaries that debuted Feb. 27 on Max, examines some of the state’s deeply rooted issues. Based on the book God Save Texas: A Journey into the Soul of the Lone Star State by Lawrence Wright, the limited series was made in three parts, each by a different Texas director.

The first, “Hometown Prison,” was directed by Richard Linklater; the second, “The Price of Oil,” by Alex Stapleton; and the third, “La Frontera,” by Ilana Sosa.

Linklater has produced a widely varied body of work, including the highly stylized intellectual favorite Waking Life, the coming-of-age comedy and stoner cult classic Dazed and Confused and indie hits such as School of Rock and Bernie.

Cinephiles are perhaps most sincerely attached to his naturalist masterpieces on time, such as Boyhood — which followed its characters through scenes that took place over 12 years and earned Patricia Arquette a Best Supporting Actress Oscar— and the Before trilogy, in which he surprised viewers with out-of-the-blue sequels, completing a love story through near-voyeuristic glimpses of a couple (played by Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke) across cities and decades.

We spoke to Linklater via Zoom from Paris, where he's working on a film that’ll keep him away from his adopted hometown of Austin’s SXSW festival — an event he’s hardly missed in two decades. It's nighttime in the City of Lights, and he has Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris and much more on his mind.

For the Austin-based director, dealing with real subjects (including his own mother, Diane Margaret Linklater, a former professor and advocate for inmates) in God Save Texas prompted a different form of investment into his film’s characters.

“I'm always close to my characters, even if I've kind of created them, written them,” Linklater says. “But there's a real actor there. There's a real person you're working with. So in this case, you're working with real people, you're getting their own personal stories. On one hand, it didn't feel that different. I want to have an affection and an understanding for people, but it's personal: It's their lives, it's my life, it's my mom. It couldn't help but be personal. And you're asking others to tell very personal, sometimes painful stories in their own lives.

"So yeah, it's a big ask. But I think in a way, they trusted me because I was local and maybe they knew it was personal for me, but I feel close to every story. You're just trying to tell in the way you feel. So it felt right.”

Intercut with scenes from protests and stories of death row inmates, the film sees Linklater returning to Huntsville, a city 70 miles north of Houston that has the most active death row prison in the U.S. Viewers can practically smell the grease off the small-town diner menus as Linklater reflects with his subjects (many of them his old classmates), on how his hometown’s prison industry grew so wildly out of control — at least tenfold, from 10 prisons to 114 — in the past few decades, and uncovers the inhumanity of inmates' living conditions.

The auteur filmmaker is a proud Texan whose roots creep up in his work. And he maintains the love of home while decrying its systemic failures.

“You're catching me on the wrong night,” he says of his feelings for Texas. “We're executing an innocent guy tomorrow in Huntsville, Ivan Cantu, who's being put to death without … I mean, I can't believe it. I'm just stunned and really depressed, kind of a little desperate. We've been doing all we can. It's just like, gosh, the new normal. OK, we can kill innocent people. The next administration, maybe we can start … There's talk of camps. What's next? What can we put up with?

"So on the one hand, I love Texas and I love the people, but I really do feel a disconnect with the cruelty. ‘Cause I know Texans aren't cruel by and large, but I think our government policies are extremely cruel, and this executing an innocent person is about the top of the list. So I don't know. It's times like this you feel pretty bad.”

Linklater says he didn’t stumble into any major production roadblocks, but taking on a project that required such a deeply personal investment was a matter of facing his past to expose a haunting present.

“Everyone was so giving and open and kind; I think it was just me getting over just wanting to go there myself,” he says. “This film concerns my mom. It's a lot of my own past. I was asking people to tell their stories. So it was just deciding to do it, I think. And I mean, these issues about criminal justice and the death penalty, these have swum around in my head all these years.

“It was kind of cathartic and satisfying to find a home for some of these feelings. And my summation is fairly simple, really. I think after all of it, it's just like, yeah, the death penalty really does hurt a lot of … there's a lot of collateral damage to so many people and these state employees who have to be dragged through it. So to me, it's just kind of unnecessary trauma induced on innocent people.”

The film focuses on the trauma on both sides of the bars, from convicted inmates (many of whom proclaim their innocence) to state workers whose daily duties include strapping the bodies of death row prisoners onto and off the gurney. His opinions on the death penalty haven’t necessarily changed, but Linklater is more adamant than ever that the system predatorily exploits human error for profit, as we idly cede our rights to a state where punishment far too often exceeds the crime.

“My conclusion is don't do it,” he says. “I'm not a full-blown prison abolitionist, but I'm heading that way only in that — I don't mean let murderers out on the streets. I just think we could approach in a much more humane … the way we systematically create all this pain. We could systematically create more worthwhile treatment. I mean, face it, the prisons are full of people in on — it's mental health and drug addiction. If you treated those things, there goes 90% of the population right there.

“And then keep really the psychopaths, the murderers, serial sexual assaulters. I think we all have a vested interest in keeping certain people isolated from the general population, but people who made a bad mistake or something, I can't explain a tenfold increase. Crime is down everywhere. That's just the trend. Violent crime, everything's down. So why is our prison gone up 10 times in the last 40 years? I don't know. Things we have to ask ourselves. ... We should be investing in people, not just punishing them.”

For God Save Texas, he says, the trio of directors hardly compared pre-production notes beforehand.

“We were sort of siloed in our own projects,” Linklater says. “We knew what everybody was doing, but I guess I went first and set a certain tone, maybe with the personal. When we started I don't think we really had a full plan. I was like, ‘Larry [Wright, who also executive-produced the series], so are we gonna go to Huntsville?’ And we just felt our way through it.”

Before and After the Before Trilogy

With his cinematic oeuvre falling into an array of styles and genres, Linklater doesn't give much thought to his overarching body of work, preferring to hyper-focus on each film. He says he hasn’t even pondered the uniting thread woven across his projects.

“I don't know. I'm always telling kind of character-based work,” he says. “The concept is never bigger than the characters. They're pretty far away from superhero or anything like that.”

While his films are often of the deeply felt variety that persist on viewers’ minds long after the credits roll, he also adds: “Or laugh. I've made comedies, a little bit of everything. I don't know, just always trying to express myself in my own relation to the particular story or subject.”

Least of all does he consider his legacy, or his writing living on through the ages.

“Boy, I can tell you, I never think I'll live on for generations,” he says with a laugh. “I'm really focused on what I'm doing like right now, making this movie. So that's really all you can do.”

He concedes that he's mildly aware the Before movies have prompted a niche form of tourism, made up of fans who visit the first film’s Vienna locations, for example. But he hasn’t been to Vienna in about 15 years and assumes the interest has dwindled. (It hasn’t; visit the record shop where Jesse and Celine share a charged exchange of awkward missed glances in a listening booth, and see for yourself.) He laughs at our joke suggesting the Austrian capital should’ve given him a key to the city.

Nonetheless, as he finds himself in Paris, Linklater has learned that the bookstore featured in the second installment, Before Sunset, is still a bit of a treasure for fans following the Before map.

In Huntsville, he’s known as “Rick,” a former football player for the state’s highest-ranking team. As a young adult, he self-taught filmmaking on a Super 8 camera. Before long, Rick went on to receive Academy Award nominations, be named one of Time’s most influential people in the world in 2015, and become an advocate for filmmaking, and particularly Texas filmmaking, as co-founder of the Austin Film Society.

He's a successful independent filmmaker whose movies have made a crater-sized mark on pop culture, so one would assume Linklater finds himself in a privileged spot coveted by any artist looking to make an impact without the fine print double-dealings.

“Successful? I don't know. It doesn't feel that way all the time when you're working on a real low budget and you don't have enough time or money to make your movie,” he says. “But maybe that's it. I've just never cared about, I guess, the money or that result. I've really just focused on the next story I'm trying to tell and kind of avoided a certain kind of careerist trappings. Maybe staying in Texas probably was a good thing for my mental health.”

It hasn’t been hard, he says, to sustain that balance, keeping a sense of artistic autonomy while avoiding industry money grabs and other Hollywood pitfalls.

“You say no a lot," he says. "I think you define yourself a lot in this world — it sounds corny or maybe you heard it: It's like you kind of define yourself by what you don't do. Just because you have opportunities doesn't mean you have to do it. So the things I've turned down, the things I've not wanted to do that I could have, kind of defined you. It's like, yeah, no, I'm really focused over here. I know that's more money and that [I’ll] get to work with some big star, but I don't really want to do that. I want to tell [my stories]. So just follow your own muse.”

During the pandemic, his kids became an elite audience in a Linklater-selected, at-home film festival. He was glad they’d grown past the animated children’s movie days (“I could not wait to get out of kid movies. We did that pretty quick. I'm a filmmaker, I was showing them stuff, but yeah, I could not wait until they were starting to ask me more about movies”) and into more sophisticated cinematic territory.

“Say what you will, the pandemic was terrible, but we watched a movie every night,” he says. “These teenagers [would ask], ‘What movie are you going to watch now? Let's do the French New Wave, or let's watch films from Brazil.’ It was like my own little one-year curation, my own little film society in the family.”

For all the brilliant dialogue that mark his own films, the uniting thread he never thinks about, Linklater isn’t surprised that the most quoted line from his movies was famously ad-libbed by Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused.

“He wasn't even scheduled to work that night,” he says of his fellow Texan. “We worked up that scene and he just threw in that 'All right, all right, all right’ — he said that as he was driving in, and I thought it was really funny."

Linklater remembers that "within a day or two after that," the expression became a popular saying among the film crew.

"I noticed a key grip say, ‘OK, we're laying some dolly track over there. Let's go do that. And [he] goes, ‘All right, all right, all right, all right.' He was already repeating it," Linklater says. " And on one hand, I'm not surprised. I mean, of course you're surprised when you see a T-shirt with it or something like that, that's crazy.

“Matthew … he's earned it, I guess.”

click to enlarge

A new HBO docuseries finds Austin director Richard Linklater visiting his hometown to examine a universal issue: the ever-expanding prison industry.

Max/Richard Linklater

newyorker.com

In “Hometown Prison,” Richard Linklater Looks at Life on Both Sides of the Wall

Richard Brody

8–11 minutes

With little fanfare, a complex and far-reaching personal documentary by Richard Linklater, “Hometown Prison,” dropped last week on the streaming service Max. It’s one of a trio of excellent films made under the rubric “God Save Texas,” based on the book by Lawrence Wright, of this publication—all of which consider the state’s history and politics in the light of the filmmakers’ own lives and families. The second film, “The Price of Oil,” directed by the seventh-generation Texan Alex Stapleton, traces the economic racism on which the state’s oil industry was built, as manifested in its disproportionate pollution of predominantly Black neighborhoods, including her family’s own. The third, “La Frontera,” by Iliana Sosa, who was born in El Paso to a family of Mexican descent, considers the historical unity of that city with its Mexican neighbor, Ciudad Juárez, and the enduring burdens imposed on Mexican Americans by white supremacy and the resulting militarized border. It takes nothing away from these latter films—exemplary blends of journalistic investigation, historical analysis, and intimate experience—to call particular attention to the power and the aesthetic range of Linklater’s documentary, which combines a narrow focus on a single institution with a conjoined exploration of the director’s life and his œuvre.

“Hometown Prison” is about Huntsville, Texas, where Linklater lived from 1970 (the year he turned ten) to 1981. He has previously explored his boyhood experiences there in such films as “Dazed and Confused,” “Everybody Wants Some!!,” and, of course, “Boyhood.” However, “Hometown Prison” concentrates on one oppressive peculiarity of the town: there’s a large prison in the middle of it, in plain view of much of daily life there, and a vast network of prisons spread throughout the town and its vicinity. The prison system is the town’s main employer. Texas, as Linklater relates, has the most incarcerated people of any state; it also executes more people than any other state, and those executions take place in Huntsville. Prisons, in other words, are a ubiquitous presence in Huntsville’s landscape, and yet, Linklater says, “At some point, you don’t really even see it.” In “Hometown Prison,” he attempts to see—and to give voice to silences on the subject, in his life and his work, that he has until now not managed to break.

It wasn’t for lack of trying. Though Linklater credits Wright (one of the filmmaker’s longtime friends, who appears on camera, as he does in the other two films in the series) with the suggestion to make “Hometown Prison,” the work is anchored in two incomplete projects of Linklater’s. The first, a drama that he’d hoped to make in 2002, was about two high-school football players who, a year after graduation, end up on opposite sides of the prison walls. The second was to have been made from documentary footage that he shot in 2003, of protests outside those walls, when an inmate named Delma Banks, Jr., was about to be executed despite abundant evidence of his innocence. Linklater couldn’t find funding for the drama and never did anything with the footage—plentiful amounts of which appear in “Hometown Prison.”

Here, Linklater breaks silence in the most direct and literal way—by speaking. He delivers a copious and confessional voice-over, complete with reminiscences, observations distilled from research, and candid assertions (as when he declares capital punishment “barbaric”). He also appears on camera, in conversation with Huntsville residents whose lives intersect with his and with the town’s carceral economy. Linklater’s recollections of his late mother, Diane (included by way of a talk with one of her friends), involve her activism on behalf of incarcerated people released into town with no support. One of the most revealing exchanges is with Elroy Thomas, a manager at a Huntsville bus depot, who estimates that, in his thirty years on the job, he has sold one-way tickets out of town to hundreds of thousands of newly released prisoners—and adds that, in the process, he has become acutely sensitive to their frame of mind and the extent of the preparedness to return to private life. It’s shocking to see a line of former inmates walking casually away from prison with no clear destination down the closed-off vista of a leafy street. “They don’t offer no rehabilitation,” one of them comments. “If you’re trying to get right, you need to do it on your own.”

Among the ex-prisoners with whom Linklater speaks is Dale Enderlin, one of his former baseball teammates from Huntsville’s Sam Houston State University, where Linklater’s mother taught. (The team was later the subject of “Everybody Wants Some!!”) Enderlin spent thirty-nine months in prison for white-collar crimes, and his main observation from his time there is how routinely young, nonwhite people are railroaded into confessions for crimes that they didn’t commit. A civil-rights lawyer, Bill Habern, who arrived in town as a public defender in the nineteen-seventies, dated Linklater’s mother, and remained a family friend, says, “I came to Huntsville and I thought I’d landed in Mississippi twenty years before.” He shows Linklater bullet holes in his home, estimating that there are twelve to fifteen. Ed Owens, the first Black warden of a Huntsville prison, says that he experienced far more racism owing to his work inside the walls than to anything in ordinary town life; during protests involving one execution, the Ku Klux Klan demonstrated outside his house.

A prison in Huntsville, Texas.

The attitudes of many Sam Houston students interviewed in the documentary belie the centrality of prison to life in Huntsville. Despite being on a campus with clear views of uniformed prison guards, inmates being released, and demonstrations against capital punishment, they claim not to pay much attention to the facility’s proximity. “I’ve never given too much thought to it, until you hear the siren go off,” one student says. Another notes, “It seems that everyone’s aware of it, but no one wants to talk about it”; a third adds, “I’ve never heard no professor talk about it.” Linklater affirms that the “disconnect” is “kind of a Huntsville tradition.” One of his former high-school football teammates says that, even now, the prison “doesn’t even come to my consciousness.”

Of course, there are some in Huntsville for whom the prison system looms large. Linklater interviews many of them: the formerly incarcerated, and family members of the incarcerated; a local historian and activist who seeks to change the town’s civic life and is well aware of being despised for it; former corrections officials, whose firsthand experiences witnessing or even participating in executions has caused them to reject the practice; and a current one who finds the rigors of the carceral system hard to bear. Moreover, Linklater recalls one of his stepfathers, a prison guard (whom he dramatized in “Boyhood”) whom the stresses of the prison system psychologically warped and darkened.

Just a few minutes into “Hometown Prison,” there’s a shot of a restaurant across the road from a barbed-wire-fenced prison unit, which has a cheerful sign announcing “Sunday: Kids Eat Free.” I was reminded of another movie in current release, Jonathan Glazer’s historical drama “The Zone of Interest,” which is set outside the walls of Auschwitz, in a house where the camp’s commandant, Rudolf Höss; his wife, Hedwig; and their three young children live, apparently pretending, to the fullest of their capacities, that their lives are normal. Unlike Glazer, Linklater doesn’t merely observe Huntsville residents’ lives alongside prison but also hears from them. He displays deep and sincere curiosity about what people involved in a cruel system—or even merely living in view of one—say, think, and feel. He probes the psychology of their efforts to keep prison from their minds and also considers the ideologies behind the prevalence of incarceration and the death penalty in Texas—including racism, class-based inequity, an enduring myth of frontier justice, brazen demagogy, and a form of Christian fundamentalism that emphasizes strictness rather than mercy—as well as the practical policies that sustain the carceral system there, including the economic motives of contracts for businesses and employment for residents.

“Hometown Prison,” with its free and hybrid form, empathetically and indignantly brings suppressed agonies to light. It does more, too. Linklater looks deeply at the town’s self-gaslighting, at how it’s maintained and who maintains it, and to what ends. The film is a fervent and trenchant work of political psychology, living history, investigative journalism, and anguished confession.

With humor and the biting insight of a native, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author Lawrence explores the history, culture, and politics of Texas, while holding the stereotypes up for rigorous scrutiny.

God Save Texas (Penguin, 2018) is a journey through the most controversial state in America. It is a red state in the heart of Trumpland that hasn’t elected a Democrat to a statewide office in more than twenty years; but it is also a state in which minorities already form a majority (including the largest number of Muslims). The cities are blue and among the most diverse in the nation. Oil is still king but Texas now leads California in technology exports. The Texas economic model of low taxes and minimal regulation has produced extraordinary growth but also striking income disparities. Texas looks a lot like the America that Donald Trump wants to create. And Wright’s profound portrait of the state not only reflects our country back as it is, but as it was and as it might be.

Lawrence Wright is a staff writer for The New Yorker and the author of nine previous books of nonfiction, including In the New World, Remembering Satan, The Looming Tower, Going Clear, Thirteen Days in September, and The Terror Years,and one novel, God’s Favorite. His books have received many prizes and honors, including a Pulitzer Prize for The Looming Tower. He is also a playwright and screenwriter. He is a longtime resident of Austin.

A light reception will precede the event beginning at 5:30 pm, with the lecture starting at 6:00 pm. Parking will be available on the SMU campus. FREE passes will be emailed to registered guests before the event. Seating is limited, and not guaranteed.

Wright's publication of the same title will be available for purchase and signing after the event.

TEACHERS ONLY -- Please sign in at the registration table to receive continuing education credit.

Co-sponsored with SMU's Clements Center for Southwest Studies, Center for Presidential History, the John Tower Center for Political Studies, the Clements Department of History, the Dedman College Interdisiplinary Institute, and Dedman College of Humanities and Sciences.

-- Southern Methodist University

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Living with Ghosts: Eleven Extraordinary Tales

Author: Prince Michael of Greece

First published: 1996

Pages: 192

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆

How long did it take: 1 day

I was hoping for a cozy-creepy reading for an autumn day, unfortunatelly, Prince Micheal failed me yet again. The man is, at best, and average writer, and this book more than any other shows how self-obsessed and special he (thinks) he is. Because this Prince can see ghosts. Literally any place he steps in he can see them and they narrate their stories to him. The worst parts of the book were him trying to "sound" like the female ghosts he chose to present, because they all sound like a machine. And a male one at that. His stories, so completely and obviously made up by him (whereas I had hoped he was simply rewriting an original lore) were uninspired and for most part bland. Finally, the dude cannot even get his own family history accurately right, so how am I supposed to believe even the parts which are supposed to be a real depiction of history? Greatly disappointed.

House of Glass

Author: Susan Fletcher

First published: 2018

Pages: 368

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 7 days

This book is like a strong summer heat, the kind which flows through your bones and closes your eyes and everything feels lazy and languishing, the pleasant type of exhaustion. There are so many aspects to it, and so many things I love, that I do not feel the need to explain and describe it. I just want to bask in its feeling for a little while more.

The Romanov Royal Martyrs: What Silence Could Not Conceals

Author: Mesa Potamos Monastery

First published: 2019

Pages: 512

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 7 days

This book offers yet another view of the Romanovs, their personalities, decisions and influence on the Russian history (as well as guilt/innocence). Naturally one needs to take into account that this ais a book by deeply religious Orthodox Christians about other deeply religious Orthodox Christians and the faith and its importance for the last Imperial family is the underlying theme for this whole book. The writing flows very naturally, and even though at times I thought the book was way too apologetic in regards to Nicholas and his share of blame on the minefield of events between 1894-1917, it does make one consider those events from a perspective rarely explored by historians (who in general tend to be snarky and smart-ass, if not outright damning). Finally, one has to admit this publication is simply beautiful. Richly illustrated with black and white photos and a bunch of coloured ones near the very end as well.

Maria and Anastasia: The Youngest Romanov Grand Duchesses In Their Own Words

Author: Helen Azar (editor)

First published: 2015

Pages: 191

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 5 days

Excellent resource focused on two msot overlooked girls in the family. The letters written by Maria Nikolaevna especially give the Grand Duchess her own distinctive voice.

Man's Search for Meaning

Author: Viktor E. Frankl

First published: 1946

Pages: 165

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 6 days

What makes this recollection of Holocaust different from all other books on the same topic is the chosen point of view. The horrible situation of the prosoners, the torture, the humiliation, all of it is there, but instead the focus is on looking for a viable reason for living. Extremely interesting, uplifting and definitely offering food for thought and self-reflection. The only problem I had was the audiobook, where the narrator, for whatever ungodly reason, decided to speak with a ridiculous German accents every time a fellow prisoner or a guard was quoted.

The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America

Author: Eric Larson

First published: 2003

Pages: 496

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 7 days

What an excellent book! (at least as far as the enjoyment goes)I was honestly surprised at how much it grabbed me and did not let go. The juxtapositioning of the achievement of the human effort and inspiration (and pigheadedness) to the lowest brutality which forms the other part of the human nature was well balanced. Whenever the parts about the World exhibition started to be a bit too tiring, one was thrust into the cold and horrifying world of a serial killer. And when those became too overwhelming, returning to the lights of the White city felt like a welcome reprieve. Definitely a non-fiction worth your while.

Anna Pavlova: Twentieth Century Ballerina

Author: Jane Pritchard

First published: 2013

Pages: 208

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 2 days

This is a beautiful tribute to Anna Pavlova the Dancer and her enormous legacy. It is richly illustrated with high-quality photographs and makes for a perfect cofee table book. Sadly, I still know next to nothing about Anna Pavlovna the Person.

Children of Blood and Bone

Author: Tomi Adeyemi

First published: 2018

Pages: 531

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 15 days

Sooooooo..... this is one of those books I probably would have loved had it been around when I was 14, but at 32 and some pretty decent reading behind me I feel rather indifferent to it. I appreciate the underlying thought as well as the African-inspired setting, but other than that the book felt extremely awkward in pacing (the first half is literally just action with hardly any world-building, other times the story seems to simply stop.... and not do anything). The author holds a promise, but as of this book it is far from genius (the random modernized language thrown into the conversation rubbed me the wrong way) and all three main protagonists were extremely interchangable when it came to their "voices". I prefer some mystery to my stories too, so the very much linear and served-all-at-once kind of storytelling here did not suit me. Add to it the book is full of YA chlichés, and what you get is a competent book that can take your mind off of your own daily worries for a bit, but that could also have been so much more.

Chernobyl Prayer: A Chronicle of the Future

Author: Svetlana Alexievich

First published: 1997

Pages: 294

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 5 days

I have read books about torture and plagues, about wars and pandemics, about murders and slavery, but few of those raised such horror in me, made me so utterly exhausted and left me both angry and just numb. I am one of the children who were born in the central Europe shortly after the Chernobyl disaster and as such I have heard the name and have always had some knowledge of the event. But this book finally put it into perspective, made me aware of the acute danger, criminal decisions and human despair the name of Chernobyl truly stands for. It is as important as it is horrifying.

A Dog's Heart

Author: Mikhail Bulgakov

First published: 1925

Pages: 125

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 5 days

I love Bulgakov with all his feverish energy, poetic descriptions of the ordinary and racing imagination, but though I liked this book, it was, in parts, way too jumpy and sketchy to be truly enjoyed. Would probably work better as a theatrical play.

Marina

Author: Carlos Riuz Zafón

First published: 1999

Pages: 196

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 3 days

In spite of some issues I had with the pacing and revelations of vital information..... I enjoyed this book and read it very quickly. It holds the same love of old Barcelona as the author´s more famous The Shadow of the Wind, it has the same issues of feeling abandoned, experiencing first love and raking through a mysterious past to reveal something extraordinary. Unlike The Shadow of the wind it holds some supernatural elements and would make a good read even for younger readers. Me myself just needed a bit more flesh on the solid bones of the story for the book to be simply excellent.

#booklr #wrap up #November 2019

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