seekingferret (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
seekingferret) wrote2025-09-12 03:12 pm
seekingferret) wrote2025-09-12 03:12 pmEntry tags:
(no subject)
The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune
This was a sweet albeit kind of heavy handed story about magical orphans facing societal prejudice and an unfeeling bureaucracy and learning how to understand their own self worth, guided by an awkward trio of queer adults who are also struggling to get their shit together. The speech Linus gives DICOMY at the end is way over the top but otherwise the book makes its points reasonably well.
But I struggled to completely connect with it. Ironically, though many of the reviews I found online criticized it for blasphemy and anti-Christian ideology, I actually found it too Christian. One of the magical children is the son of Satan, purportedly the Antichrist, and is endowed with reality warping powers and internal voices urging him to destroy the world. The book's heroic characters insist he's merely an imaginative and sensitive 6 year old who if properly loved will not destroy the world, but I found that even taking a side on this question was too theological on a path I was uninterested in following the book to. Either Arthur and Linus are right and Lucy isn't actually the Antichrist but merely a potential Antichrist, or they're wrong and the pull of his fated destiny isn't about his choices but about the role the prophecy will force him into. Klune created the book's worldbuilding, he can pick his own answer to this question, but if you're not invested in Christian eschatology it's not really an interesting debate.
This was a sweet albeit kind of heavy handed story about magical orphans facing societal prejudice and an unfeeling bureaucracy and learning how to understand their own self worth, guided by an awkward trio of queer adults who are also struggling to get their shit together. The speech Linus gives DICOMY at the end is way over the top but otherwise the book makes its points reasonably well.
But I struggled to completely connect with it. Ironically, though many of the reviews I found online criticized it for blasphemy and anti-Christian ideology, I actually found it too Christian. One of the magical children is the son of Satan, purportedly the Antichrist, and is endowed with reality warping powers and internal voices urging him to destroy the world. The book's heroic characters insist he's merely an imaginative and sensitive 6 year old who if properly loved will not destroy the world, but I found that even taking a side on this question was too theological on a path I was uninterested in following the book to. Either Arthur and Linus are right and Lucy isn't actually the Antichrist but merely a potential Antichrist, or they're wrong and the pull of his fated destiny isn't about his choices but about the role the prophecy will force him into. Klune created the book's worldbuilding, he can pick his own answer to this question, but if you're not invested in Christian eschatology it's not really an interesting debate.
yhlee (yhlee) wrote2025-09-12 08:32 am
yhlee) wrote2025-09-12 08:32 amEntry tags:
not-good spinning: demo of spinning silk on a treadle wheel
Ashford Traveller (single treadle although you can see that, Scotch tension). Spinning mulberry (bombyx) silk from combed top.
Echo Invictus (but_can_i_be_trusted) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
100words2025-09-11 05:52 pm
but_can_i_be_trusted) wrote in 100words2025-09-11 05:52 pmEntry tags:
[Challenge #459: Dice] Friends: 'Honest to Goodness'
Title: 'Honest to Goodness'
Fandom: Friends
Rating: G
Notes: Crossposted tovocab_drabbles and emotion100
( Honest to Goodness )
Fandom: Friends
Rating: G
Notes: Crossposted to
vocab_drabbles and emotion100( Honest to Goodness )
stonepicnicking_okapi (stonepicnicking_okapi) wrote in 100words2025-09-11 08:25 pm
stonepicnicking_okapi) wrote in 100words2025-09-11 08:25 pmEntry tags:
459: Dice: Inception: Gen
Title: Dice
Fandom: Inception
Rating: Gen
Notes: Arther & Eames banter about their totems in a dream.
( Read more... )
Fandom: Inception
Rating: Gen
Notes: Arther & Eames banter about their totems in a dream.
( Read more... )
beatrice_otter (beatrice_otter) wrote2025-09-11 04:07 pm
beatrice_otter) wrote2025-09-11 04:07 pmEntry tags:
Dear FFFX Author
I use the same name everywhere so I am beatrice_otter on AO3. Treats are awesome.
I would rather get a story you were happy with than "well, she said she liked x, so I guess I have to do x even though I don't like x and/or am not inspired that way." This letter is long with lots of suggestions and preferences if you find it helpful, but feel free to ignore it if it is not helpful. I'm fairly easy to please; I've been doing ficathons for over a decade and am usually very happy with my gifts.
The most important thing for me in a fic is that the characters are well-written and recognizably themselves. Even when I don't like a character, I don't go in for character-bashing. If nothing else, if the rest of this letter is too much or my kinks don't fit yours, just concentrate on writing a story with everyone in character and good spelling and grammar and I will almost certainly love what you come up with.
I have an embarrassment squick, which makes humor kind of hit-or-miss sometimes. The kind of humor where someone does something embarrassing and the audience is laughing at them makes me uncomfortable. On the other hand, the kind of humor where the audience is laughing with the characters I really enjoy.
other things to keep in mind:
Please no incest or darkfic. I define "darkfic" as stuff where there's a lot of suffering and no hope even at the end and all the characters are terrible. Angst with a happy ending is fine, I enjoy it, but there's gotta be a payoff. Even an ambiguous ending is fine! But there has to be some note of grace or redemption or hope somewhere, it can't just be "people are awful and the world sucks, the end." I define incest as siblings and/or parents, cousins don't count.
I love outsider perspectives and academic takes on things. In-universe meta (newspaper articles, academic monographs--especially with the sort of snarky feuding common in actual real-world academia, social media feeds in current day or future worlds) is awesome.
Also, I'm picky about European historical clothing details. You don't have to talk about it at all! In fact, if you don't know much about historical clothing, I would prefer if you didn't mention it at all. My pet peeve is corsets: no, they weren't a restrictive tool of the patriarchy, no, they didn't interfere with most women's daily lives, no, most women weren't wearing them so tight they couldn't breathe.
I like religion but I'm picky about it. Basically, Christianity is deeply weird compared to most other religions, and a lot of people whose only experience with religion is living in a culturally-Christian nation assume that what they know about Christianity is some sort of universal principle of What Religion Is Like, and that's just not the case. For example, in Christianity what you believe is more important than what you do. This is not to say we Christians don't teach and practice Christian ethics or have rituals we are very attached to, but rather that if you don't believe in Jesus Christ, it doesn't matter what rituals you participate in or what ethical things you do, you are not a Christian (although you may be a "cultural Christian"). Every Christian group has at least a minimal core theology that members must affirm, but participation in ritual is far less rigidly a requirement. Most other religions rank what you do (both ethically and ritually) as more important than what you believe, and it is often quite possible to be a member in good standing if you participate in the practices and rituals even if you believe none of the teachings. Anyway, point is, if you are doing worldbuilding for a fantasy or SF or otherwise non-Christian religion ... unless it is explicitly a Christian-analogue, it should be different from Christianity. Question your assumptions and see where that leads you, and I will be fascinated and thrilled.
( Fandom for Robots )
( Peter Wimsey )
( Rivers of London )
( DS9 )
( TOS )
( TNG )
( Oh, My General )
( Thrawn Trilogy )
( Goblin Emperor )
beatrice_otter on AO3. Treats are awesome.I would rather get a story you were happy with than "well, she said she liked x, so I guess I have to do x even though I don't like x and/or am not inspired that way." This letter is long with lots of suggestions and preferences if you find it helpful, but feel free to ignore it if it is not helpful. I'm fairly easy to please; I've been doing ficathons for over a decade and am usually very happy with my gifts.
The most important thing for me in a fic is that the characters are well-written and recognizably themselves. Even when I don't like a character, I don't go in for character-bashing. If nothing else, if the rest of this letter is too much or my kinks don't fit yours, just concentrate on writing a story with everyone in character and good spelling and grammar and I will almost certainly love what you come up with.
I have an embarrassment squick, which makes humor kind of hit-or-miss sometimes. The kind of humor where someone does something embarrassing and the audience is laughing at them makes me uncomfortable. On the other hand, the kind of humor where the audience is laughing with the characters I really enjoy.
General Likes and Dislikes
other things to keep in mind:
- I like stuff that takes side characters and puts them center-stage, especially when the characters and/or actors are marginalized. I enjoy seeing them come to life.
- I don't like it when marginalized characters get relegated to the sidekick/supporting/helper role so that it can be All About The White Dude.
- I like it when female characters are more than just the Strong Female Character(tm) or The Nurturer.
- I like fluff
- I like angst with a happy ending
- I like stories that make me think about things in a new way.
- I like to know that culture matters to people, and to see how different cultures interact and where the clashes are.
- I like unreliable narrators.
- I like acknowledgment that different people can have different points of view without either of them being wrong.
- I like stories that engage with problematic aspects of the source, and which deal with privilege in one way or another instead of sweeping it under the rug.
- Worldbuilding is my jam, I am pretty much always up for explorations of why the world is the way it is. I love hearing about the economics, the politics, the religion, the clothing, the history, the folklore, all of that kind of stuff. And I want to know why it matters--how is all this cultural background stuff affecting the characters, the plot, everything. You don't have to do deep worldbuilding, but I'll enjoy it if you do.
- I don't like it when plots hinge on characters being selectively stupid, or selectively unable to communicate. Like, if they are stupid or a himbo or whatever in general, or have problems communicating in general, that's fine! Or if they canonically have a blind spot in that area, again, it's fine. But if it's just "the only way I can think of for this plot to work is if the character spontaneously and temporarily loses half their intelligence and competence," then I'm going to spend the rest of the fic wondering why the character didn't just ____?
- I like AUs, but not complete setting AUs (i.e. no highschool or college or coffee shop AUs, and especially not mundane AUs--nothing where you keep characters but drop most of the worldbuilding). I like fork-in-the-road type AUs, where one thing is different and the changes all result from that one thing, and you explore what might have been if such-and-such happened.
- I like the concept of sedoretu marriages.
- I like historical AUs, but only when the author actually knows the history period in question and does thoughtful worldbuilding to meld actual culture of the time with the canon.
- Crackfic is really hit and miss for me, sometimes I love it and sometimes I can't stand it. Basically, if it's the characters we know and love in a ludicrous situation, that's great. If they're OOC or parodied in order to make something funny ... it's not funny to me.
Please no incest or darkfic. I define "darkfic" as stuff where there's a lot of suffering and no hope even at the end and all the characters are terrible. Angst with a happy ending is fine, I enjoy it, but there's gotta be a payoff. Even an ambiguous ending is fine! But there has to be some note of grace or redemption or hope somewhere, it can't just be "people are awful and the world sucks, the end." I define incest as siblings and/or parents, cousins don't count.
I love outsider perspectives and academic takes on things. In-universe meta (newspaper articles, academic monographs--especially with the sort of snarky feuding common in actual real-world academia, social media feeds in current day or future worlds) is awesome.
Also, I'm picky about European historical clothing details. You don't have to talk about it at all! In fact, if you don't know much about historical clothing, I would prefer if you didn't mention it at all. My pet peeve is corsets: no, they weren't a restrictive tool of the patriarchy, no, they didn't interfere with most women's daily lives, no, most women weren't wearing them so tight they couldn't breathe.
I like religion but I'm picky about it. Basically, Christianity is deeply weird compared to most other religions, and a lot of people whose only experience with religion is living in a culturally-Christian nation assume that what they know about Christianity is some sort of universal principle of What Religion Is Like, and that's just not the case. For example, in Christianity what you believe is more important than what you do. This is not to say we Christians don't teach and practice Christian ethics or have rituals we are very attached to, but rather that if you don't believe in Jesus Christ, it doesn't matter what rituals you participate in or what ethical things you do, you are not a Christian (although you may be a "cultural Christian"). Every Christian group has at least a minimal core theology that members must affirm, but participation in ritual is far less rigidly a requirement. Most other religions rank what you do (both ethically and ritually) as more important than what you believe, and it is often quite possible to be a member in good standing if you participate in the practices and rituals even if you believe none of the teachings. Anyway, point is, if you are doing worldbuilding for a fantasy or SF or otherwise non-Christian religion ... unless it is explicitly a Christian-analogue, it should be different from Christianity. Question your assumptions and see where that leads you, and I will be fascinated and thrilled.
( Fandom for Robots )
( Peter Wimsey )
( Rivers of London )
( DS9 )
( TOS )
( TNG )
( Oh, My General )
( Thrawn Trilogy )
( Goblin Emperor )
tielan (tielan) wrote2025-09-11 10:54 pm
tielan) wrote2025-09-11 10:54 pmEntry tags:
sleeeeeep
Okay, so the bit where I'm falling down on the holiday is sleep.
Air-con is too much. Bed is too soft. Pillows are too hard. Not warm enough.
AAAAAAAUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHH
Last night, I woke up at 3:30am and...didn't really manage to get back to sleep until around 6am. And even that was only for about half an hour.
I'm travelling okay, though. COVID has cleared up, although I sometimes feel a bit stupid lately, trying to work out what I'm saying and how to say it, and thinking "I'm sure I used to know how to phrase this".
Anyway, it's nearly 11pm where I am.
Time for sleeeeeeeep.
Air-con is too much. Bed is too soft. Pillows are too hard. Not warm enough.
AAAAAAAUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHH
Last night, I woke up at 3:30am and...didn't really manage to get back to sleep until around 6am. And even that was only for about half an hour.
I'm travelling okay, though. COVID has cleared up, although I sometimes feel a bit stupid lately, trying to work out what I'm saying and how to say it, and thinking "I'm sure I used to know how to phrase this".
Anyway, it's nearly 11pm where I am.
Time for sleeeeeeeep.
seekingferret (seekingferret) wrote2025-09-11 09:39 am
seekingferret) wrote2025-09-11 09:39 amEntry tags:
(no subject)
The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson
This year's Book I Read Because Multiple People Raved About It in the Worldcon Discord. The first book in a secondary world fantasy series with lots of complicated political intrigue, the rave reviews were extremely enthusiastic but also quite vague. And now that I have read it, I understand the vagueness. It's a hard book to describe. It's constantly shifting and transforming, with twist after twist leaving you constantly unsure what the book is actually about and where it is going. But the twists are solid and well supported and never pull you out of the world of the book. But it was an exhilarating read and I highly recommend it.
This year's Book I Read Because Multiple People Raved About It in the Worldcon Discord. The first book in a secondary world fantasy series with lots of complicated political intrigue, the rave reviews were extremely enthusiastic but also quite vague. And now that I have read it, I understand the vagueness. It's a hard book to describe. It's constantly shifting and transforming, with twist after twist leaving you constantly unsure what the book is actually about and where it is going. But the twists are solid and well supported and never pull you out of the world of the book. But it was an exhilarating read and I highly recommend it.
yhlee (yhlee) wrote2025-09-11 05:21 am
yhlee) wrote2025-09-11 05:21 amspinning WIP
Or: if your goal is threadweight/cobweb, why silk fiber is not quite as profligate an expense as you might think:
The white is mulberry bombyx silk; the tawny stuff was my briefly foraying into eri silk. This is for personal use/enjoyment (needle lace) so it's fine that I'm wandering off like this. This is several hours of admittedly inefficient spinning, since I take frequent breaks so there's a very start-stop nature to it, but because the spin is so fine, this bobbin is...not very full.
This is what I have REMAINING in 2 oz. of mulberry silk combed top (about $25 USD). It exploded out of the package (typical) and also, it barely looks like I've even used any of it. As it stands, I suspect I'm going to be spinning this combed top for the next 30,000 years. :)
That said, silk is my absolute favorite to spin and I prefer spinning threadweight, so this is not a hardship.
The white is mulberry bombyx silk; the tawny stuff was my briefly foraying into eri silk. This is for personal use/enjoyment (needle lace) so it's fine that I'm wandering off like this. This is several hours of admittedly inefficient spinning, since I take frequent breaks so there's a very start-stop nature to it, but because the spin is so fine, this bobbin is...not very full.
This is what I have REMAINING in 2 oz. of mulberry silk combed top (about $25 USD). It exploded out of the package (typical) and also, it barely looks like I've even used any of it. As it stands, I suspect I'm going to be spinning this combed top for the next 30,000 years. :)
That said, silk is my absolute favorite to spin and I prefer spinning threadweight, so this is not a hardship.
Katie (drabblewriter) wrote in 100words2025-09-10 10:05 pm
drabblewriter) wrote in 100words2025-09-10 10:05 pmEntry tags:
[Prompt #459: Dice] Greek Myth: Lucky Shot
Title: Lucky Shot
Fandom: Greek Myth
Characters/Ship: Apollo, Achilles, Cassandra
Rating: G
( Read more... )
Fandom: Greek Myth
Characters/Ship: Apollo, Achilles, Cassandra
Rating: G
( Read more... )
yhlee (yhlee) wrote2025-09-10 09:38 pm
yhlee) wrote2025-09-10 09:38 pmEx Tenebris TTRPG on Kickstarter! (I'm writing a scenario for this)
Ex Tenebris: a gothic space opera TTRPG [Kickstarter, already funded!].
- Josh Fox, lead designer & writer
- Becky Annison, writer
- Juan Ochoa, illustrator
- Nathan D. Paoletta, layout and graphic design
- Andriy Lukin, logo design
- Jog Brogzin, cartographer
- Chirag Asnani, writer
- Sarah Doom, writer
- Eleanor Hingley, writer
- Kieron Gillen, writer
- Yoon Ha Lee, writer (howdy!)
- Tejas Oza, writer
- Galen Pejeau, writer
Beyond the dark emptiness of space, beyond dreaming, lies the Tenebrium. Only you can unearth its mysteries, defeat the twisted horrors that lurk there, and keep humanity from becoming prey.
In Ex Tenebris, you play a ragtag team of investigators, protecting the Republic of Stars from terrifying supernatural threats. You will face sorcerers and cults, dark technology from lost civilisations and the slobbering terrors lurking in the nightmare realm of the Tenebrium.
Ex Tenebris is a complete TTRPG containing all the rules, setting and scenarios that you need to embark on adventures amongst the stars.
[...]
Ex Tenebris takes inspiration from the grotesque imagery of the Aliens movies, the existential dread of Event Horizon, the mysticism of Dune, the dark gothic setting of Warhammer 40,000, and the weird science/magic fusion of Ninefox Gambit.
- Josh Fox, lead designer & writer
- Becky Annison, writer
- Juan Ochoa, illustrator
- Nathan D. Paoletta, layout and graphic design
- Andriy Lukin, logo design
- Jog Brogzin, cartographer
- Chirag Asnani, writer
- Sarah Doom, writer
- Eleanor Hingley, writer
- Kieron Gillen, writer
- Yoon Ha Lee, writer (howdy!)
- Tejas Oza, writer
- Galen Pejeau, writer