A ginormous post of everything
You can probably tell that between tumblr and goodreads, I rather ditched this place. Still, I used to use it for years, so here is a giant post of everything I was into for the last week.
1. Gena Showalter, The Darkest Craving - I have a highly complicated relationship with the PNR subgenre - the vast majority of PNR romances make my brain burn, and not in a good way. But occasionally I come across a book which reminds me why I keep reading them - because when they are good, they are ridiculously good and very little can match how happy they make me.
Enter the Darkest Craving, Gena Showalter's latest entry in her 'Lords of the Underworld' series, and a book that had me giggling, sniffling, shrieking and fanning myself.
LOVE LOVE LOVE.
I really enjoy the Lords series (as I said, a lot of PNR sets my teeth on edge, but this is a rare series where no book does that, though I like some of the entries in the Lords world more than others), but I don't remember the last time I adored a book in that series so. (OK, OK, I lied. Paris' book. Or Maddox's.)
Basically, Kane is the keeper of Disaster and when the book opens, he's been rescued from the unspeakable torments of hell (short version - he got raped and vivisected. Luckily, GS balances between giving us enough detail to know what happened and going too descriptive and making me lose my lunch). His rescuer? One Josephina Aisling, a half-Fae who tells him that now she saved him he has to do a favor for her - kill her, because life with her insane and evil family is insupportable and she is cursed and cannot kill herself. Yeah, not happening.
The rest of the book has a pretty awesome and fast-paced plot, but I am here for the main couple, and what an awesome main couple they are. This couple hits every one of my romance novel kinks, so hard they are still ringing. He angsts and teeters on the edge of sanity, she snarks and is ridiculously common-sense. You can tell they are a match made in Dangermousie heaven. They are both deeply wounded in different ways and they heal each other and support each other and care for each other and just have each other's back no matter what.
The thing is - something Showalter gets that I think a lot of other PNR authors don't - even with all his trauma and understandable issues - Kane is a deeply good person, and so is Josephina. They do the right things or try to. I've never been fond of 'if it wasn't a novel, this person would be a psychopath locked up forever' type of hero or heroine that some PNRs like and it is just so refreshing to have people I can actually love as protagonists.
We also get cameos by a lot of the usual cast of characters, and more than a cameo by William (I need him to have his own book and for his true love to be Gilly. Pls pls pls PLS! I am willing to bribe!) Oh, and we meet who Torin and Cameo will likely end up with - Cameo's guy is someone I actually hoped we'd see again back when he first appeared so I am excited. But not as excited as I am for poor tormented, no-touch-with-anyone Torin - his pairing seems to be promising oodles of delicious angst, just how I like it.
Anyway, to sum up - there is nothing about this book I didn't love, except that it ended.
Now I am off to reread some of the other Lords books :)
2. I Hear Your Voice eps 13-17.
His face when he finds out she likes him!!! (And his little v/o that he waited for that for 11 years!) And every indifferent or harsh word she says is belied by what she is thinking - that she likes him, she wants to keep him by her side. I died. But of course, he can’t reveal to her that his mind-reading ability is back so he has to pretend he has no idea.
Soo Ha’s face when he thinks that Hye Sung would hate him if she knew that Killer Psycho killed SH’s dad (and thus set the whole chain of events in motion that led to Hye Sung testifying and Killer Psycho seeking revenge against her) because Dad somehow was responsible for Killer Psycho’s death.
Oh, kid! Don’t listen to psycho’s head games. But his very basic decency is what makes him give such weight to Killer Psycho’s statement. Sure, the Killer Psycho believes it (because SH can read minds so Killer Psycho can’t lie to him) but this is a man who is a large number of homicidal fries short of a happy meal - in his world, SH’s Dad could be at fault simply because he told the wife that her husband was a lunatic, she tried to leave and Killer Psycho offed her. Who knows.
All I know is that there was no excuse for bashing in Dad’s head and certainly no excuse trying to kill his target’s wounded and terrified eight-year-old. And Hye Sung will take that view too. But Soo Ha has been abandoned so many times (and HS’ little ‘must get him out of my mind’ phase didn’t help), and add that constant threat of abandonment to his sense of decency and responsibility - yeah.
Oh God, the amount of adorable is insane! He cooked her breakfast! All that and he cooks! This is how you know he is fictional. And then he tells her that he is going to wait for her outside so she should eat and not skip meals just to avoid him (because she was doing her usual ‘I am not hungry’ thing).
When she freaked out about bugs (which turned out not to be anything) and jumped on his back. LOL. Oh when she gave up on her stand-offish plan, rationalizing that he’ll leave as soon as he recovers his memory (yeah, yeah, you just couldn’t resist any longer) and the way he lights up when she asks him to have breakfast with her.
And the way they slip back into their effortless sync at the breakfast table and the happiness…
At this point, I’d gladly sacrifice the rest of the cast of characters to Psycho Killer’s bloodlust as long as my OTP gets to live and stay together.
So, yeah, how’s that Denial Island doing, Hye Sung? Not so good?
Cuteness...
Ship shippedy ship ship...
This scene in ep 14 was really hearbreaking - I totally understood why Hye Sung was upset, but my heart also broke for Su Ha, who somehow internalized he is a monster and this is bringing it all back. Luckily, Hye Sung did accept him and take his hand, in more ways than one…But yeah, when he almost knocks :(
asjsjdsfskfjkdfjlejgldgjg!!!!
I totally cheated. I was only on the first half of ep 13, I didn’t have ep 14 subs yet, but I couldn’t help it, I peeked at ep 14 and then…my husband came running up the stairs to see why I was screaming.
AHHHH!!! OMFG! It could NOT be more perfect. Drama, I love you SFM!!!!
This - was worth everything. That was such an epic confession from her - both realistic about all the obstacles but also about how much she loves him (when she says that her resenting his powers would hurt him and she would hate that - my heart!)
And when she took his face between her hands so he would look into her eyes so he could both read her thoughts that she loves him AND hear her admit it out loud that she loves him OMFG.
That is so huge.
Whatever else may or may not happen from that now obsolete leaked ending, it’s pretty clear SH/HS are the total OTP and she is never ending up with Cha.
Cuteness:
More cuteness...
Yoon!!!!
All the shippiness and handholding of the ep. When they saw the detectives and he dropped her hand so people wouldn’t see (because I think she was a bit embarrassed earlier) and she deliberately grabbed his hand back in front of them - eeee!
Su Ha’s nightmare is freaking me out - please please don’t be a foreshadowing. Anything but a HEA is unacceptable for these two wonderful darlings.
(The nightmare was hella pretty until all the blood though…)
OMFG what what what what what what OMFG
What really got me about ep 17 is that no matter what Psycho Killer does, in his twisted experiment to prove that even the best person can become a monster (and thus his being a monster is OK), Su Ha refuses to become a monster himself - he may break (and Psycho Killer comes close to breaking him), but he will still be himself - being a monster is a choice, and one he refuses to make.
And I loved that he is not even willing to die any more either - before, he was willing to die to protect Hye Sung, but now he doesn’t want to die because it would make her sad and he wants to rescue her and be with her. He wants to live - because he is finally living and not just existing, because he matters to someone. Oh, Su Ha, how far you’ve come!
Another thing that got me so is how HS and SH can cope with anything that gets thrown at them unless the other one is in danger and then they just fall apart - Hye Sung survived being kidnapped and wounded by the Psycho Killer and stayed at the scene rather than going to the hospital but when she thought Su Ha was killed is when she crumpled to the ground. And Su Ha held it all together until he saw HS unconscious being carried to an ambulance and then he snapped - he was keening and it was barely human, and he was fighting everyone and anyone between him and HS, friend or foe, instead of getting seen to his not-inconsiderable injuries and I just…something in my eye, OK? Especially the looks on their faces when they see each other and cling, with not a millimeter between them. Their reunion - I pretty much died. This has been brought to you by my ghost. But the way they smile and touch (oh so tenderly!), holding each other in that hospital bed, both battered but healing each other emotionally in front of our eyes? That was perfection.
Sure, the first half of the ep was slow (IMO) and the conflict for the last ep seems manufactured - the perils of an extension this close to the end, I am sure. But does it really matter? Not one bit, not when the OTP is this perfect, this amazing.
(Also, this will probably make no sense to anyone, but the ending of the ep with the hospital and all reminded me of the end of Tabitha McGowan’s The Tied Man).
3. The Blade and the Petal gorgeousness.
My biggest crush in Blade and Petal is not the (admittedly yummy) Uhm Tae Woong but the BAMF of all BAMFs, the fiercely smart, terrifying, uncompromising, intense and magnetic Yeon Gaesomun, the future military dictator of Goguryeo, who killed King Yeongnyu and took over (he installed a puppet king, but he was the real ruler), and then defeated the Tang during its invasion into Gogureyeo.
The character is pretty cool to start with (and I love the writing making him a complex figure - the story is sympathetic to the King but also shows Yeon has a point about appeasement with the Tang not being the right course, even if his methods aren’t necessarily appropriate), but Choi Min Soo is slaying in the role. His screen presence is beyond insane. All he has to do is to silently stand still in a scene and everyone else fades into background noise.
I am rooting for him to eviscerate the royal family - I like the royal family just fine but I cannot help it - Yeon Gaesomun in this is so overwhelming that I think he should get whatever he desires.
4. I got to the last ep of I Miss You.
So, I cheated and peeked at the end of IMY and EEEEE! A true OTP is the one who is willing to get shot for each other? I loved the way it narratively paralleled the horrific kidnapping that wrecked their childhood and altered their lives - back then, Jung Woo was a child and he ran away leaving Soo Yeon behind but now he is a man and not only did he not run away despite Jun giving him repeated chances to live, but he jumped in front of a bullet for her. It’s not just love that motivated him, but it was also redemption…Even if he died then, he would have felt content, I think, but luckily the writers weren’t sadists…
5. Flower Boy Ramyun Shop adorableness...
Holy Fuck! I think I found my next binge kdrama.
When she asks him if he thinks she’ll close her eyes just because he’s kissing her again and he replies “I am not done yet" and really goes for the kill, I sort of died.
I need this in my life.
Former lady teachers/former guy students = OTP, per kdrama world. I am on board. (Since she isn’t his teacher any more, this is practically the ultimate in wholesomeness per kdrama :P)
What has Jung Il Woo been up to btw? He hasn’t been in anything since being so awfully wasted in the Moon that Embraces the Sun. Come back on my screen!
1. Gena Showalter, The Darkest Craving - I have a highly complicated relationship with the PNR subgenre - the vast majority of PNR romances make my brain burn, and not in a good way. But occasionally I come across a book which reminds me why I keep reading them - because when they are good, they are ridiculously good and very little can match how happy they make me.
Enter the Darkest Craving, Gena Showalter's latest entry in her 'Lords of the Underworld' series, and a book that had me giggling, sniffling, shrieking and fanning myself.
LOVE LOVE LOVE.
I really enjoy the Lords series (as I said, a lot of PNR sets my teeth on edge, but this is a rare series where no book does that, though I like some of the entries in the Lords world more than others), but I don't remember the last time I adored a book in that series so. (OK, OK, I lied. Paris' book. Or Maddox's.)
Basically, Kane is the keeper of Disaster and when the book opens, he's been rescued from the unspeakable torments of hell (short version - he got raped and vivisected. Luckily, GS balances between giving us enough detail to know what happened and going too descriptive and making me lose my lunch). His rescuer? One Josephina Aisling, a half-Fae who tells him that now she saved him he has to do a favor for her - kill her, because life with her insane and evil family is insupportable and she is cursed and cannot kill herself. Yeah, not happening.
The rest of the book has a pretty awesome and fast-paced plot, but I am here for the main couple, and what an awesome main couple they are. This couple hits every one of my romance novel kinks, so hard they are still ringing. He angsts and teeters on the edge of sanity, she snarks and is ridiculously common-sense. You can tell they are a match made in Dangermousie heaven. They are both deeply wounded in different ways and they heal each other and support each other and care for each other and just have each other's back no matter what.
The thing is - something Showalter gets that I think a lot of other PNR authors don't - even with all his trauma and understandable issues - Kane is a deeply good person, and so is Josephina. They do the right things or try to. I've never been fond of 'if it wasn't a novel, this person would be a psychopath locked up forever' type of hero or heroine that some PNRs like and it is just so refreshing to have people I can actually love as protagonists.
We also get cameos by a lot of the usual cast of characters, and more than a cameo by William (I need him to have his own book and for his true love to be Gilly. Pls pls pls PLS! I am willing to bribe!) Oh, and we meet who Torin and Cameo will likely end up with - Cameo's guy is someone I actually hoped we'd see again back when he first appeared so I am excited. But not as excited as I am for poor tormented, no-touch-with-anyone Torin - his pairing seems to be promising oodles of delicious angst, just how I like it.
Anyway, to sum up - there is nothing about this book I didn't love, except that it ended.
Now I am off to reread some of the other Lords books :)
2. I Hear Your Voice eps 13-17.
His face when he finds out she likes him!!! (And his little v/o that he waited for that for 11 years!) And every indifferent or harsh word she says is belied by what she is thinking - that she likes him, she wants to keep him by her side. I died. But of course, he can’t reveal to her that his mind-reading ability is back so he has to pretend he has no idea.
Soo Ha’s face when he thinks that Hye Sung would hate him if she knew that Killer Psycho killed SH’s dad (and thus set the whole chain of events in motion that led to Hye Sung testifying and Killer Psycho seeking revenge against her) because Dad somehow was responsible for Killer Psycho’s death.
Oh, kid! Don’t listen to psycho’s head games. But his very basic decency is what makes him give such weight to Killer Psycho’s statement. Sure, the Killer Psycho believes it (because SH can read minds so Killer Psycho can’t lie to him) but this is a man who is a large number of homicidal fries short of a happy meal - in his world, SH’s Dad could be at fault simply because he told the wife that her husband was a lunatic, she tried to leave and Killer Psycho offed her. Who knows.
All I know is that there was no excuse for bashing in Dad’s head and certainly no excuse trying to kill his target’s wounded and terrified eight-year-old. And Hye Sung will take that view too. But Soo Ha has been abandoned so many times (and HS’ little ‘must get him out of my mind’ phase didn’t help), and add that constant threat of abandonment to his sense of decency and responsibility - yeah.
Oh God, the amount of adorable is insane! He cooked her breakfast! All that and he cooks! This is how you know he is fictional. And then he tells her that he is going to wait for her outside so she should eat and not skip meals just to avoid him (because she was doing her usual ‘I am not hungry’ thing).
When she freaked out about bugs (which turned out not to be anything) and jumped on his back. LOL. Oh when she gave up on her stand-offish plan, rationalizing that he’ll leave as soon as he recovers his memory (yeah, yeah, you just couldn’t resist any longer) and the way he lights up when she asks him to have breakfast with her.
And the way they slip back into their effortless sync at the breakfast table and the happiness…
At this point, I’d gladly sacrifice the rest of the cast of characters to Psycho Killer’s bloodlust as long as my OTP gets to live and stay together.
So, yeah, how’s that Denial Island doing, Hye Sung? Not so good?
Cuteness...
Ship shippedy ship ship...
This scene in ep 14 was really hearbreaking - I totally understood why Hye Sung was upset, but my heart also broke for Su Ha, who somehow internalized he is a monster and this is bringing it all back. Luckily, Hye Sung did accept him and take his hand, in more ways than one…But yeah, when he almost knocks :(
asjsjdsfskfjkdfjlejgldgjg!!!!
I totally cheated. I was only on the first half of ep 13, I didn’t have ep 14 subs yet, but I couldn’t help it, I peeked at ep 14 and then…my husband came running up the stairs to see why I was screaming.
AHHHH!!! OMFG! It could NOT be more perfect. Drama, I love you SFM!!!!
This - was worth everything. That was such an epic confession from her - both realistic about all the obstacles but also about how much she loves him (when she says that her resenting his powers would hurt him and she would hate that - my heart!)
And when she took his face between her hands so he would look into her eyes so he could both read her thoughts that she loves him AND hear her admit it out loud that she loves him OMFG.
That is so huge.
Whatever else may or may not happen from that now obsolete leaked ending, it’s pretty clear SH/HS are the total OTP and she is never ending up with Cha.
Cuteness:
More cuteness...
Yoon!!!!
All the shippiness and handholding of the ep. When they saw the detectives and he dropped her hand so people wouldn’t see (because I think she was a bit embarrassed earlier) and she deliberately grabbed his hand back in front of them - eeee!
Su Ha’s nightmare is freaking me out - please please don’t be a foreshadowing. Anything but a HEA is unacceptable for these two wonderful darlings.
(The nightmare was hella pretty until all the blood though…)
OMFG what what what what what what OMFG
What really got me about ep 17 is that no matter what Psycho Killer does, in his twisted experiment to prove that even the best person can become a monster (and thus his being a monster is OK), Su Ha refuses to become a monster himself - he may break (and Psycho Killer comes close to breaking him), but he will still be himself - being a monster is a choice, and one he refuses to make.
And I loved that he is not even willing to die any more either - before, he was willing to die to protect Hye Sung, but now he doesn’t want to die because it would make her sad and he wants to rescue her and be with her. He wants to live - because he is finally living and not just existing, because he matters to someone. Oh, Su Ha, how far you’ve come!
Another thing that got me so is how HS and SH can cope with anything that gets thrown at them unless the other one is in danger and then they just fall apart - Hye Sung survived being kidnapped and wounded by the Psycho Killer and stayed at the scene rather than going to the hospital but when she thought Su Ha was killed is when she crumpled to the ground. And Su Ha held it all together until he saw HS unconscious being carried to an ambulance and then he snapped - he was keening and it was barely human, and he was fighting everyone and anyone between him and HS, friend or foe, instead of getting seen to his not-inconsiderable injuries and I just…something in my eye, OK? Especially the looks on their faces when they see each other and cling, with not a millimeter between them. Their reunion - I pretty much died. This has been brought to you by my ghost. But the way they smile and touch (oh so tenderly!), holding each other in that hospital bed, both battered but healing each other emotionally in front of our eyes? That was perfection.
Sure, the first half of the ep was slow (IMO) and the conflict for the last ep seems manufactured - the perils of an extension this close to the end, I am sure. But does it really matter? Not one bit, not when the OTP is this perfect, this amazing.
(Also, this will probably make no sense to anyone, but the ending of the ep with the hospital and all reminded me of the end of Tabitha McGowan’s The Tied Man).
3. The Blade and the Petal gorgeousness.
My biggest crush in Blade and Petal is not the (admittedly yummy) Uhm Tae Woong but the BAMF of all BAMFs, the fiercely smart, terrifying, uncompromising, intense and magnetic Yeon Gaesomun, the future military dictator of Goguryeo, who killed King Yeongnyu and took over (he installed a puppet king, but he was the real ruler), and then defeated the Tang during its invasion into Gogureyeo.
The character is pretty cool to start with (and I love the writing making him a complex figure - the story is sympathetic to the King but also shows Yeon has a point about appeasement with the Tang not being the right course, even if his methods aren’t necessarily appropriate), but Choi Min Soo is slaying in the role. His screen presence is beyond insane. All he has to do is to silently stand still in a scene and everyone else fades into background noise.
I am rooting for him to eviscerate the royal family - I like the royal family just fine but I cannot help it - Yeon Gaesomun in this is so overwhelming that I think he should get whatever he desires.
4. I got to the last ep of I Miss You.
So, I cheated and peeked at the end of IMY and EEEEE! A true OTP is the one who is willing to get shot for each other? I loved the way it narratively paralleled the horrific kidnapping that wrecked their childhood and altered their lives - back then, Jung Woo was a child and he ran away leaving Soo Yeon behind but now he is a man and not only did he not run away despite Jun giving him repeated chances to live, but he jumped in front of a bullet for her. It’s not just love that motivated him, but it was also redemption…Even if he died then, he would have felt content, I think, but luckily the writers weren’t sadists…
5. Flower Boy Ramyun Shop adorableness...
Holy Fuck! I think I found my next binge kdrama.
When she asks him if he thinks she’ll close her eyes just because he’s kissing her again and he replies “I am not done yet" and really goes for the kill, I sort of died.
I need this in my life.
Former lady teachers/former guy students = OTP, per kdrama world. I am on board. (Since she isn’t his teacher any more, this is practically the ultimate in wholesomeness per kdrama :P)
What has Jung Il Woo been up to btw? He hasn’t been in anything since being so awfully wasted in the Moon that Embraces the Sun. Come back on my screen!