Rise Up, Oh Heart, For There is Another Battle to Win

Anonymous asked: ok so..... i always ignored the animorphs books as a kid (i think i picked one up and it wasn't the first book and i was confused and annoyed and the covers were ???? tacky??) but you're making me want to get into them as a 21 year old.... i mean. i guess i'm asking: what should i expect. how much of a commitment am i getting myself into.

Right, so, the first thing you should know here is that I know plenty of people who started reading these books as adults and therefore: no judgement.  The covers, also, are terrible, so furthermore no judgement on that front.

THAT BEING SAID.

Animorphs is a best-beloved series and it’s not their fault they lost the cover art lottery, this was such a formative series in my life.  Like, Robin McKinley taught me what you could do with words and stories, but Animorphs taught me what you should do to characters.  RIP all my characters who are still paying for that particular lesson.

So, Animorphs is a middle grade series, yes, it can be cheesy and tropey and absurd (and DATED good lord the 90′s seem like a long time ago).  But also…like, it’s a 54 book series literally RIDDLED with grim moral quandries, grisly murder, gory battles, war crimes, and general trauma, so forgive them their occasional descent into middle grade nonsense.  If you’ve ever looked a kid’s series that you loved to bits and pieces and thought to yourself “Jesus, these kids should be an absolute train wreck, I can’t believe Harry Potter/Percy Jackson/whoever sleeps at all ever,” Animorphs is the answer to that thought.  The first named character–my beloved weird alien prince Elfangor, the Wise Mentor Character™–dies horribly forty pages into the first book, and it pretty much goes downhill from there.  I affectionately call the kids the PTSD Squad and lordy.  LORDY.  Are they fucking ever.  Ongoing Fandomn Discourse includes the eternal question of “What is the first onscreen instance of really serious PTSD” and I generally argue for the suicide attempt in Book 3, but I could also see my way to granting the nightmare in Book 2.  The people who think it takes until Book 5 are just wrong, I love you all, but no.

• If you read these, I invite you to join @lathori in the experience of stopping every couple of chapters to say, in a horrified tone of voice, “Why did your parents let you read these when you were SEVEN”
  

• Reasons, okay.  Also I was a really bullheaded kid.  And it wasn’t like they were going to give me nightmares.  They probably should have.  But they didn’t.  Because Reasons.
  

• I digress.
  

But so, in terms of what you’re committing to…that.  That is what you’d be committing to.  In addition to the main series, there are 4 Megamorphs (of WILDLY variable quality, to be sure, and largely optional, but good brain candy most of the time) and 4 Chronicles.  The Chronicles are Andalite (PHENOMENAL BOOK, COULD BE READ INDEPENDENTLY, ABOUT MY GOOD WEIRD BOY ELFANGOR, DEF A FAVORITE), Hork-Bajir (really interesting characters, good concept, a little shaky on the dismount, so to speak), Visser (I don’t remember a ton of this one but GODDAMN I love Eva), and Ellimist (didn’t read this because honestly I didn’t care about the Ellimist that much as a kid except in terms of his ongoing torment of the Squad and I still don’t).

I feel it’s also my duty to warn you that events conspired against KA Applegate and much of the second half of the series is written by an assortment of ghostwriters, who are ALSO of wildly variable quality.  Example: Book 33, affectionately called The Torture Book by much of the fandom, could probably be used to raise me from the dead so that I could enjoy it one more time.  Books 37 or 39, on the other hand, which I pretend don’t exist, could be used to raise me from the dead so that I could bitch at length about how much I Fucking Hate Them.

• What is that Rachel characterization, Book 37, what are you doing with your life.
  

• Book 39.  What the tap-dancing fuck is the buffahuman.  Why.  Why do I have to live with that in my head.
  

• Anyway.
  

To that end, I recommend letting yourself skim and/or skip books if you reach one you really can’t handle the writing in after, say, the early 30′s.

• But don’t skip 37 or 39 because you have to Understand My Pain.
  

ANYWAY.

ANIMORPHS.

GREAT SERIES.

GET THEM ALL FOR FREE HERE.

KEEP ME POSTED IF YOU CHOOSE TO READ THEM.

Anonymous asked: *swoops in* your enthusiasm has convinced me. in what order do i read this imperial radch. how much crying must i prepare for.

GOOD WELCOME TO THE PARTY

Imperial Radch starts with Ancillary Justice, followed by Ancillary Sword and closing with Ancillary Mercy.  You can buy it on Amazon or presumably any bookstore.  It is the elaborately constructed AI-with-feelings-and-revolutionary-intent space opera of your dreams.  I don’t know about crying but a couple times I had to get up and walk around and scream quietly for a while in order to, like, exorcise my feelings.

YOU KNOW A BOOK IS GOOD WHEN YOU HAVE TO WALK IT OFF OKAY

Anonymous asked: Have you read Robin Mckinley's The Outlaws of Sherwood? And if so what where your thoughts?

MY BUDDY.

I HAVE.

Right so I think I’ve mentioned my overwhelming obsession with Robin McKinley’s writing once or twice.  And I love Outlaws of Sherwood!  This is a Good Ask!

All right, so for those of you who haven’t read the Outlaws of Sherwood and don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s Robin Hood.  The basic premise is that Robin accidentally kills someone of a higher status than him and, in the process of hiding him from the Sheriff’s men, his best friends Much (the son of a miller) and Marian (the daughter of a Saxon nobleman) convince him that someone has to take a stand against the regime.  As such, people who are being taxed to death or who have had their homes taken leave with him and hide out in Sherwood Forest.  As the plot progresses, their gang grows, and the standard robbing-of-rich-feeding-of-poor proceeds, Guy of Gisborne shows up, and so it goes.

The major difference between this and most Robin Hood interpretations is that (*gasp*) Maid Marian has a real personality!  She’s a fucking firecracker!  She’s an expert markswoman–Marian is the legendary archer of the Outlaws, and goes to contests in a green hood under Robin’s name.  Marian is a tactician and a fighter and a woodsman AND she teaches all the men how to sew a goddamn shirt.  MARIAN IS THE TOTAL PACKAGE.  She and Robin bicker all the time and she nips it right in the bud when he gets stupid and overprotective and there’s this stunning scene where Marian and Robin are sitting together under a tree and Marian falls asleep on him and Robin just like “my arm is going numb and there’s a tree root digging into my hip but if I sat here for the rest of my life I would be happy, I want to marry this woman under any circumstances if she’d take me.”  And honestly same.  Anyway.  I digress.

All right, so here’s My Thoughts about Outlaws of Sherwood, and they can basically be summed up as “what a good” but also as “this is such a good way to balance the realistic and the hopeful in this story.”  Because like, okay, Robin Hood is a popular story to retell, but, especially in more recent versions, they get really…determined to be ‘realistic,’ which turns into some pretty profoundly grim stuff.  BBC did a Robin Hood show a while back and I passionately hated it–Robin was a womanizing nobleman who treated his manservant Much very poorly, Marian had a REAL WEIRD love triangle with Robin, who was kind of a dick, and Guy of Gisborne, who was a presumptuous pushy pseudo-rapist, and the Merry Men were a nominal saving grace until Marian was murdered at the end of the first season.  At that point, I just fucking bailed and googled how it ended–spoiler, it ends with Robin, after a fuckbuddies relationship with a villain, being poisoned and dying while Nottingham burns.  And here’s why I had an issue with that: Robin Hood, most basically, is the product of a society that was just dead exhausted by the Crusades and the class division between the Normans and the Saxons and the general state of the world that they went “What if someone had the option to not be us” and it was a thing of HOPE.  The idea of Robin as a chivalrous outlaw and Much as a loyal friend and Marian as a charming maiden just rebellious enough to ally herself with someone outside the law started as a story about hope.  A story about the potential to do something to save the people being crushed under the weight of a nobility that didn’t give a good goddamn about them.  A story about the idea that someone might care about them.

BBC’s asshole Robin and indecisive (and fridged) Marian and browbeaten Merry Men aren’t loyal to that idea.  Nottingham being burned to the ground as Robin dies just says “rebellion is pointless and the little people will always be victims of the system no matter what anyone does.”  

B U T.  You know what is loyal to that idea, that core of hope?  OUTLAWS OF SHERWOOD.  Robin is the cynic, here, the pragmatic influence to Much’s ready optimism and Marian’s fire-bright idealism, but even Robin…he loves his people, even if he doesn’t love the dream.  He would rather live to fight tomorrow than die a martyr, but when a young man in ridiculous red clothes shows up lost and alone in Sherwood Forest, Robin can’t help but care about him.  Much is a devoted friend, not just to Robin but to all the Outlaws, and the one whose idealism bears up under the worst the world has to throw at it.  Marian is proud and fierce and the one who turns dreams and love into real action.  

You wanna know why Outlaws is my favorite Robin Hood retelling?  Because it walks the line between honesty (life as an outlaw sucks! they’re hungry and cold and they’re horribly wounded in the last battle against Gisborne! Robin is scared and/or exasperated 99% of the time and the other 1% is pretty much that one scene with Marian!) and joy.  Outlaws loves its characters and its story and its hopes and its dreams, genuinely enjoys the hell out of itself, and that means that it feels like Robin Hood.  I don’t like stories tangled up in their own shadows and darknesses, I like stories that can balance the darkness with some light.  And that’s what Outlaws of Sherwood feels like.  It feels like a forest–the shadows are deep and green and frightening, and the sunlight is so, so bright.

sroloc--elbisivni asked: Have you ever read The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate?

I haven’t.  I don’t generally have the attention span for nonfiction or realistic fiction (that’s what…like…reality is for), sorry!

flvffs asked: hello yes i came in here ages ago to talk abt the farseer trilogy but i just realised i didnt mention triggers so off the top of my head: child abuse, child neglect, bullying, alcohol/alcoholism, detailed blood/gore/injury, broken family, violence, drugs, bodily fluids, weapons, illness, poison, animal death, torture, character death, prison/cells, emotional manipulation, rape mention, suicide, murder, homophobia, mental illness, depression, suicidal tendencies, pregnancy.

(2) anyway im sorry i know its out of the blue but a recent post on my dash reminded me to warn for triggers when i rec stuff so here i am. as i said, those were off the top of my head, but feel free to ask after other triggers and ill answer to the best of my ability. cheers!

HATE CRIMES I FORGOT HATE CRIMES (and discrimination and prejudice, but all three kinda come hand in hand i guess)

So this book rec was a while ago, but it was a great book rec and I intend to get these books once I’m done with my thesis (cries in the corner about my thesis), AND ALL Y’ALL SHOULD LOOK INTO IT ALSO.

Stormdancer

words-writ-in-starlight:

ALL RIGHT GUYS

SIT TIGHT.

Remember how I have no impulse control?  Yeah, I wandered into a Barnes and Noble and bought three books AND ONE OF THEM WAS THIS.

No lie, kiddos, Stormdancer by Jay Kristoff might legitimately be the best book I’ve read all year.  Have I read the rest of the series?  NO I HAVE NOT, because I blew through this thing over the course of like six hours today (I mean…I slept for two of those hours) and I have not shut up about it long enough to buy the next two in the trilogy.  My parents are going to tape my mouth shut if I keep going, so I’m foisting all my need to rant onto you lot.

Okay, so, here’s my pitch.  First off, yes it is just as badass as the cover suggests.  But seriously

THE ‘VERSE: a futuristic steampunk universe based on feudal Japan (and it’s not that standard steampunk isn’t fun, but my God it was nice to get the fuck out of Victorian England), comprised of four clans (Dragon, Fox, Phoenix, and Tiger) on the islands of Shima, ruled by the Shogun, Tora Yoritomo.  Shima runs on the blood lotus, which provides everything from the drug of choice to the chemical used to power their engines (called chi), and the blood lotus (and the chi) is controlled by the Lotus Guild, which is…hella sketchy.  Their dependence on the lotus has turned their lands black, their skies red, their rains acidic, and their air so thick with exhaust that anyone too poor to afford a pricey respirator dies slowly of blacklung.  The worldbuilding is goddamn beautiful, everyone, and the mythos is so gorgeous.

OUR HEROINE: Yukiko of the Kitsune (Fox) clan, the daughter of the Shogun’s Hunt Master, the Black Fox of Shima, who is yokai-kin, able to speak to animals with her mind.  This talent, rare and powerful, makes her one of the Impure, according to the zealots in the Lotus Guild, who will burn her alive in the city square if it comes to light.  She is fierce and grieving and the perfect combination of the open hand and the hidden knife–she cries and screams and loves and fights and I am in love.  I would like to officially request ten thousand more kick-ass stubborn girls of color with messy morals and more determination than training as my novel heroes.  Yukiko is everything to me, guys, she’s so much to me.

THE PLOT: Everyone on Shima knows that, once, arashitora, thunder tigers (half eagle, half tiger), flew in their skies, and sea dragons swam in their oceans.  But the lotus that poisons their lands has choked out the great beasts of myth, too, and now it’s been generations since one was seen.  When the Shogun dreams of himself riding an arashitora into battle like the stormdancers of old lore and summons his Hunt Master to make it a reality, no one expects them to succeed–not the Black Fox, not his two comrades at arms, not the crew of the sky-ship they hire, and not his daughter, Yukiko.  So you can imagine their shock when they manage to capture an arashitora in the middle of a thunderstorm.  The situation goes from baffling to life-threatening when creature’s struggles and the storm wreck the ship, stranding Yukiko alone on a mountainside with herself, the clothes on her back…and a crippled arashitora who wants her dead.  And that’s just the first hundred pages.

TL;DR: this book has it all.  Badass women of every flavor.  Revolution.  Magic.  Demons.  Found family feelings.  Women getting to do vengeance quests.  POC as far as the eye can see.  The writing style–ugh.  *claps hands to chest*  Fucking slays me.  Radically original take on the steampunk vibe, with worldbuilding that is just beautifully intricate.  And the arashitora.  I’m not telling you anything about him, but the arashitora is A MASTERPIECE of a character.

Read this and come talk to me about it because I am howling.

Reblog for the morning crowd, because!!!  This book!!!!

Stormdancer

ALL RIGHT GUYS

SIT TIGHT.

Remember how I have no impulse control?  Yeah, I wandered into a Barnes and Noble and bought three books AND ONE OF THEM WAS THIS.

No lie, kiddos, Stormdancer by Jay Kristoff might legitimately be the best book I’ve read all year.  Have I read the rest of the series?  NO I HAVE NOT, because I blew through this thing over the course of like six hours today (I mean…I slept for two of those hours) and I have not shut up about it long enough to buy the next two in the trilogy.  My parents are going to tape my mouth shut if I keep going, so I’m foisting all my need to rant onto you lot.

Okay, so, here’s my pitch.  First off, yes it is just as badass as the cover suggests.  But seriously

THE ‘VERSE: a futuristic steampunk universe based on feudal Japan (and it’s not that standard steampunk isn’t fun, but my God it was nice to get the fuck out of Victorian England), comprised of four clans (Dragon, Fox, Phoenix, and Tiger) on the islands of Shima, ruled by the Shogun, Tora Yoritomo.  Shima runs on the blood lotus, which provides everything from the drug of choice to the chemical used to power their engines (called chi), and the blood lotus (and the chi) is controlled by the Lotus Guild, which is…hella sketchy.  Their dependence on the lotus has turned their lands black, their skies red, their rains acidic, and their air so thick with exhaust that anyone too poor to afford a pricey respirator dies slowly of blacklung.  The worldbuilding is goddamn beautiful, everyone, and the mythos is so gorgeous.

OUR HEROINE: Yukiko of the Kitsune (Fox) clan, the daughter of the Shogun’s Hunt Master, the Black Fox of Shima, who is yokai-kin, able to speak to animals with her mind.  This talent, rare and powerful, makes her one of the Impure, according to the zealots in the Lotus Guild, who will burn her alive in the city square if it comes to light.  She is fierce and grieving and the perfect combination of the open hand and the hidden knife–she cries and screams and loves and fights and I am in love.  I would like to officially request ten thousand more kick-ass stubborn girls of color with messy morals and more determination than training as my novel heroes.  Yukiko is everything to me, guys, she’s so much to me.

THE PLOT: Everyone on Shima knows that, once, arashitora, thunder tigers (half eagle, half tiger), flew in their skies, and sea dragons swam in their oceans.  But the lotus that poisons their lands has choked out the great beasts of myth, too, and now it’s been generations since one was seen.  When the Shogun dreams of himself riding an arashitora into battle like the stormdancers of old lore and summons his Hunt Master to make it a reality, no one expects them to succeed–not the Black Fox, not his two comrades at arms, not the crew of the sky-ship they hire, and not his daughter, Yukiko.  So you can imagine their shock when they manage to capture an arashitora in the middle of a thunderstorm.  The situation goes from baffling to life-threatening when creature’s struggles and the storm wreck the ship, stranding Yukiko alone on a mountainside with herself, the clothes on her back…and a crippled arashitora who wants her dead.  And that’s just the first hundred pages.

TL;DR: this book has it all.  Badass women of every flavor.  Revolution.  Magic.  Demons.  Found family feelings.  Women getting to do vengeance quests.  POC as far as the eye can see.  The writing style–ugh.  *claps hands to chest*  Fucking slays me.  Radically original take on the steampunk vibe, with worldbuilding that is just beautifully intricate.  And the arashitora.  I’m not telling you anything about him, but the arashitora is A MASTERPIECE of a character.

Read this and come talk to me about it because I am howling.

flvffs asked: this will not hold a candle to your fic recs, but im plunging right in regardless. alright, so *cracks knuckles* where do i begin? you are the bastard child of royal blood, the son of a prince who has no legitimate heirs and stands next in line to inherit the throne. you are made the royal assassin, which is generally not a child-friendly occupation and the kind of thing you introduce yourself with, hence many lies about what you do up in the keep. (1/?)

As you grow, you are still known to much of the keep as the Bastard. You never see your father, but come to be regarded fondly enough by the common people of the keep. Still, you have no close friends, and the combination of loneliness and pressure from the people around you molds you into an extremely loyal bastard with little to no concept of self-worth.  (2/?)

Robin Hobb places you squarely in the heart of the story with compelling narrative, excellent character development, and enough pain to make a brick wall weep tears of slow-dripping cement. (3/?)

This doggedly loyal character is thrown into danger again and again, giving everything he has to the service of the crown despite such trivial factors such as love (ah, who needs love? Not this sorely bereft-of-affection bastard, that’s for sure), reputation (what’s in a name, anyway?), and, well, pain (so much pain). (4/? and deeply apologetic for clogging up your askbox)

The Farseer trilogy, high fantasy, with dragons, magic, growing up, little details, and everything in between. You want a story with seamstresses and cooks doing everyday things? This has it, losing none of its compelling plot in the process. Starring: love, animals (animals!), friendship, FitzChivalry Farseer, whose name literally means ‘son of Chivalry’ and never gets round to changing it (you got the url guess right) (5/? is this 5?)

Also starring: fabulous worldbuilding, combat, mental issues (I just really want to hug him he has been through so much), strong women (so many strong women), great description, diversity (royal family canonically described as having dark skin, I don’t know who keeps fuckin up the book covers), childhood, love, so much love, the idea of duty over choice, tenacity, humour, magic used in cool and realistic ways, what happens to kids when you cut them off emotionally from everything they love (6??)

The series is my favourite right now, perhaps because it doesn’t shy away from the grittier details, and maybe because it’s so fascinating watching Fitz grow up. Thanks for sitting through that rambling, badly-planned book rec, and I really do hope you read it. Assassins! Magic! Old anger! Animals! Pride! Love! (wipes tears away from eye) I just cannot recommend it enough. This is one of the best fantasy series I have ever had the privilege to read.

Dude, I am fucking sold.  I am gonna acquire these books.

flvffs asked: hello, have you ever read the farseer trilogy by robin hobb?

I have not!  Is it good?  Do you recommend it?  Is there magic?  Details, mon ami, I am curious.  A cursory Google search reveals assassins, assassins are good.

charmingcatastrophe asked: What's your favourite book/author, and what's your dream job?

Okay, so, for favorite book, I’d say that The Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley (pitch here, for her other stuff here), the Kencyrath series by PC Hodgell (pitch here), and Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman (I haven’t done a rec for that one, but hit me up if you’re curious) are all strong contenders.  Aaaaand those people would be my go-to’s for favorite authors too…although I’m sure that in a few minutes I’ll come up with half a dozen other things I should have put down.

For my dream job, I would ideally like to work as a doctor in an ER at a Trauma One hospital and write novels in my free time.  Adler wants me to quit everything and write full time, but I get weird after a solid day of writing, I don’t want to know what I’d be like after multiple months.