ehyde | Entries tagged with reading

I'm slowly working my way through Qi Ye by Priest, although I'm not super far along yet. Pretty much all I knew for a long time was "it has some of the same characters as TYK" or possibly even "it's a prequel to TYK" and "people who only watched WOH don't know about Literal Toddler Murderer Zhou Zishu" and well, I bounced off of Word of Honor, and child death is one of my major nopes, so I had this filed away as not interested for a while. But then I learned a bit more about the actual plot of this novel, and saw it recced with a "if you want political intrigue" note (I did; I'd just finished A Memory Called Empire and thoroughly enjoyed it after bouncing off some Hunt For Red October fic that smoothed out the politics too much) and so, after asking for some clarification about the child death thing, I picked it up.

The premise is it's a time travel fix-it, but with a twist: the main character, Jing Beiyuan, experienced not just one life that went badly, but the following five reincarnations as well, reincarnating alongside the same person each time. Instead of jumping at the chance to make things right between them (as you'd expect in a time travel fix it fic) he's...well he's not quite at "man, fuck this guy" but more "I don't have any feelings for you whatsoever." However, he still needs to make sure he ends up on the throne, that's just good sense...and meanwhile there's this new guy who wasn't there in his first life.

Things I like so far: the twist on the genre. The fact that Jing Beiyuan doesn't even try to act like a realistic child. And I just like him a lot in general.
Things I like less: it feels a bit slow paced so far, and I think that's contributing to my own slow pace reading. I'm also kinda sideeyeing Priest's fantasy foreign culture because this is three for three of her books I've read where she's had a culture with a "noble savage" feel to it and while the characters themselves are fine the vibes are. Yeah.

I ended up giving up on Lie Huo Jiao Chou (Drowning Sorrows in Raging Fire, by priest). I think a lot of it had to do with the translation quality but ehh... not all of it. It just felt--disjointed? Stuff kept happening, but not the stuff that I cared about, nor the stuff that felt important? Something just wasn't clicking. And to be completely honest the main couple was not doing it for me. Well. Actually their backstory was *excellent* but then--anyway it was frustrating, I wanted to care about the characters and the book a lot more than I actually did. If the other translation (that stopped around ch70) ever picks it up again (or if it turns out they stopped because they're working on the official, or something) then I miiight pick it up again but until then, probably not. It's annoying because this is the second priest novel I read and Tai Sui was so good and I think I just kept--expecting there to be more here than there was. Anyway, I was going to read SPL next, but I decided to take a break and read some other stuff first.

I figured out how to, uh, copy library ebooks, so now there's no due date guilt hanging over me! I browsed their currently available sff and read "Light from Uncommon Stars" by Ryka Aoki, which was engaging and enjoyable, although it felt like it was trying very hard to be Popular on Tumblr in that like, hopepunk way, which could get a little too much at times. The story centers around Katrina, a young violinist who has run away from her transphobic family, and the teacher who takes her in--who has made a deal with hell to offer up the souls of seven students in exchange for her own freedom, and Katrina is the seventh. There are also aliens.

After that I picked back up a different cnovel that I had put down for a while, Mr Melancholy Wants to Live a Peaceful Life, which is a double secret identity story where one half of the married couple is secretly a transmigrator who has defeated thousands of worlds, stolen power from the System, and just wants to have a quiet retirement, and the other half of the couple works for a secret organization that keeps transmigrators from wreaking havoc on their world. There were a lot of things I liked here, and several things I didn't like. Mostly, the one-sided reveal--where one knew the other's identity, but the other didn't know his--lasted way too long. And I honestly wasn't really enjoying the main couple's dynamics, although that greatly improved once they both knew each others' identities (I really really don't like jealousy plots, and there was some of that there). But I did really enjoy the plot (the System, transmigrators, saving not just one but several worlds). There were no female characters. Zero. None at all. Which was strange because I think Cyan Wings can write female characters just fine? idk, it was weird. The first two extras were also weird and fatphobic and added nothing. I realize I'm not doing very much to sell this book but I do want to say that the parts I liked, I liked a lot.

Anyway, now I have promised my sister I will read at least one Dorothy Sayers.

Reading:
- when I started reading Lie Huo Jiao Chou the translation seemed to be updating at a reasonable pace of 1-2 chapters a month. Since I caught up, it hasn't updated since the end of November, and just as it was getting into some really juicy backstory bits.
- I started another ongoing translation, Married Thrice to Salted Fish, which is a transmigration story from the pov of the transmigrator's love interest. The transmigrator is an unapologetic villainfucker (or, he would like to be, but this is incredibly slow burn) and the pov character is his problematic fave. I LOVE the characters and the unfolding relationship but it doesn't have a plot that really grabs me, so I don't mind taking it slow and waiting for updates.
- My ebook hold for A Memory Called Empire came in and like a fool, I waited till there were only a few days left on the loan to start reading it (I'm not far enough into it to know if it's going to grab me in the "finish it in two days" way or not).

Admiring:
- this William Morris gift wrap paper pack from Pepin Press. They would be great for endpapers in the right book.

Working on:
- Renegade Bindery does "binderary" in February, which is kinda like inktober but in a different month--basically the idea is just, make as much as you can, and also people can give online talks or workshops if they want. I don't know if I'll be able to attend any scheduled events but there's going to be at least one marbling demo so I'm hoping I can make it. Anyway, I just finished a late gift for my dad, and the rest of this month I'm going to spend prepping for hopefully finishing a lot of books in February! I typeset They All Say I've Met a Ghost and I'm finishing up typesets for a few more fics, and I've spent Too Much on supplies and I'm going to start decorating some fabrics for covers.
- Some furniture rearranging at home: we got a bunk bed for 4yo and 2yo and moved them from 4yo's smallish room into me & husband's slightly bigger room. Husband and I are temporarily in the smallish room, we're going to move to the downstairs bedroom eventually but at this point 2yo still wakes up enough at night that I want to be on the same floor as him. I don't know how long 4yo and 2yo are going to want to share a room, but for now they love it.

How To Survive As A Villain - this was a fun read! I posted a little bit about it in a miscellaneous post a few weeks back, but to recap: it's a transmigration story that starts out with a similar premise to SVSSS--the protagonist (Xiao Yu'an) transmigrates into the villain of a novel, and has to make nice with the original protagonist (Yan Heqing) in order to survive. It takes this in a different direction, though: less than a quarter into the novel,Xiao Yu'an straight up tells Yan Heqing that he's a transmigrator. This proves not to be a straightforward get-out-of-plot free card, although it does mean that they're on the same team from early on (although various misconceptions and miscommunications keep them from becoming a couple right away).

The novel takes a sharp turn from comedy to tragedy (I'd tag it angst with a happy ending) and ultimately, I felt like there was a tone mismatch between the writing style and the subject matter--the writing worked really well for the comedic parts of the novel, but when darker and heavier stuff started happening it felt...idk, almost superficial? This may have been partially the fault of the translation (I'm saying this because my friend who read it in chinese seems to have gotten more out of the novel than I did, but then again, maybe we just had different opinions about it!).

I'd rec it if you're looking for something overall fun and not too deep. I enjoyed it, but I'm not going to be dwelling on it much now that I'm done.

I went ahead and deleted twitter from my phone, which means I'm spending very little time there now. It's nice actually. I'm not planning on deleting my account and I'm still checking in from time to time on my computer but now it's not this thing I automatically look at when I think "now, what was I looking for?" anymore and I think training my brain out of doing that is good, actually.

It probably helps that all this is happening at a time when I'm moving on, a bit, from MDZS fandom, and not really feeling deep in any fandom at the moment. (I mean, I would be deep in Tai Sui fandom if there was a bigger fandom, sigh). I mean I'm not actively trying to distance myself from MDZS fandom like I know some people have done--I still think it's great--it's just that it's not catching my imagination as much as it used to. But I'm pretty sure it's always going to be one of those back-of-my-mind favorites.

So yeah, I've made a mastodon account (

ehyde@wandering.shop) but I'm not really spending much time there and I don't know if I will start. I think I'm better off without twitter-style social media.

I finally picked up and read Network Effect, which I've had since it came out but never read, and I enjoyed it so much that I went back and read three of the first Murderbot novellas and also read Fugitive Telemetry. Fandom brain is going "SecUnit should meet [crossover character from x canon]" quickly followed by "come on now, SecUnit doesn't want to be forced to socialize with new people!" (it's Wen Ning. the person I want him to meet is Wen Ning).

Now I'm reading "How to Survive as a Villain" which was recommended to me a couple of years ago, back when the english translation wasn't very far along. I wasn't up for reading an ongoing translation then but I remembered it was a thing and checked back and it's fully translated now. On the surface it has a similar premise to Scum Villain: the main character transmigrates into the villain of a novel and has to make nice with the male lead to avoid getting brutally killed. But it feels pretty different. The comedic aspects are almost slapstick and the main character really doesn't give a shit about preserving the original storyline, aside from the romance between the male and female lead (his OTP) (guess how well that's going). I'm less than a quarter into the book and he's already told the male lead that he's a transmigrator, so I'm excited to see where that goes.

6yo's friend's girl scout troop had a cookie booth at the skating rink today (6yo may be joining said friend's troop soon) so we decided to go skating and get cookies. I'm pretty wobbly on ice skates and I think after a few more afternoons like this, 6yo will be better at it than I am. Still had fun though! 4yo had to hold hands the whole time he was on the ice but he had fun too. 2yo was excited about the whole concept but alas, they didn't have any rental skates small enough for him. He had fun going for a lap in my arms but kept asking if he could be on the ice "with my feet".

I just spent the past two days catching up on the past two years of Akatsuki no Yona/Yona of the Dawn, which was my main fandom before MDZS showed up and ate my life. For reference, I have 55 MDZS fics on my ao3, and 52 AnY fics--but my Yona fics include a multichapter ficlet collection, which I've stopped doing now.

The current arc's main villain, Cha-gol, feels more like a final boss than any other villains so far. I mean, (highlight for spoilers) he burned Hiryuu Castle! And stole something that made Zeno very worried! And like. His whole deal with Mei Nyan. Who is turning out to be not nearly as delightfully unhinged as she was at her first appearance, alas.

That said I still assume that fate and/or the dragon gods are going to be the actual final boss, especially since Zeno confirmed that Yona's presence won't have any effect on the dragons' short lifespans.

For a while there, one of the translation teams kept inserting Soo-won hate in the margins of their translations. I'm glad someone else took over, but also, it's just funny because after four years of being a Jin Guangyao fan I find it very difficult to find anything objectionable about Soo-won.

❧ Black Friday deals -- Cricut vs Silhouette -- I've been intending all year to get a cutting machine this holiday season, and now's the time to do it, but I'm still undecided between a Cricut or a Silhouette. Cricut has slightly more functions (although possibly with not quite as much customization?) -- mainly it does embossing/debossing, which I would like to explore for book design. Its downside is needing an internet connection to cut--iffy in my craft room--and potential software shadiness from the company (they planned to go to a paid subscription model, backed off when literally no one supported this, but the threat is there). I think I'm still leaning towards the Cricut? But I'd like to hear what other people think, if you've used either one.

❧ WIP Wednesday -- I've been working on another typeset for @renegadepublishing's exchange, so I can't share details, but I can share fonts! I'm using Newt Serif for the body text (a serif font with a bit of a whimsical, fantastical vibe). I loved this font when I first saw it but it wasn't suitable for the book I was working on then, and I kept it in the back of my mind till now. And I'm using Son of Time by Pia Frauss for the titles--no special reasoning here, but I knew I wanted something handwritten, old-fashioned vibes, but upright, and I recalled this site had some possibilities. I've used the same designer's Tycho's Elegy (based on the handwriting of Tycho Brahe) in a different typeset before.

❧ I've been reading Priest's Lie Huo Jiao Chou (danmei, urban fantasy) and in theory I like it a lot, but I've been kind of bouncing off it, and I can't point to any particular reason why (as opposed to Mr Melancholy Wants To Live A Peaceful Life, which I didn't finish, where I could point out exactly why it wasn't clicking for me). I might just not be in a reading mood; I haven't been reading any fic lately either. I don't think the fact that it's an unfinished translation is helping, either, knowing that I'm going to have to stop somewhere and not binge the whole thing whether I "get into it" or not.