Lady Luck: Weekly Digest 1
There is a liquor store on the corner next to a supermarket near my house that sells lotto tickets. If you've been paying attention to the news lately in the super lotto went up $645 million, and I mention this liquor store in particular because it has had super lotto winners twice in my lifetime. The line to get into this store to buy a ticket went out the door and around the ghost of a Hollywood video store. Inside the supermarket itself the line for the machine was only 10 people deep. Never underestimate the influence of luck on the human mind.
1. (Short Story) The Lottery in Babylon by John Luis Borges
I only discovered John Luis Borges recently, when I ripped off part of his other excellent short story "The Mirror of Ink" for my bitter_nakano fic Lethe&Mnemosyne. This is probably my favorite work of his so far; it describes a mythical Babylon where every activity is dictated by lottery game. Terrifying, thoughtful, provocative. Just look at this line here "Look here--through this gash in my cape you can see on my stomach a crimson tattoo...On nights when the moon is full, this symbol gives me power over men with the mark of Gimel, but it subjects me to those with the Aleph, who on nights when there is no moon owe obedience to those marked with the Gimel."
2. (Movie) Intact (Spanish name "Intacto")
The film depicts an underground trade in luck; the premise purports that luck can be amassed and transferred as any other commodity. After loosing his luck, Federico sets out to find the luckiest man alive, the lone survivor of a plane crash, in order to use him to overpower the antagonist in a game of Russian Roulette. The antagonist is an old man who runs a casino, and as you learn later a Holocaust survivor, which should tell you something about the complexity of the plot. What I liked best was the rituals of the underground luck trade, and who participates in them (bull fighters, losers, etc) and how plausible and strange priorities line up once luck becomes a commodity. Highly recommend.
3. (Fic: Inception) I Stive by indysaur
This isn't a story about luck in the way the other two are. The first 4 chapters told in shifting POV from Dom and Mal deal with the arc of their relationship from courtship, marriage, research, pregnancy, to limbo, madness and the fall. The last chapter is a quiet day post-inception Arthur spends in his city, SF, with an unexpected visitor. I really cannot rec this story highly enough, it's everything fanfiction should be; taking an initial concept and fleshing it out not in a bombastic way, not a reiteration, but a genuinely creative interpretation of canon wrapped in flawless writing. Something to look out for is how adult and realistic Dom&Mal's relationship is, the give-and-take of it.
I would also like to state that should a Thor musical ever come out I would like to petition now that "Somebody that I used to Know" be used for Thor and Loki's mournful breakup sing-off. Glee agrees it works great for brothers!
Also Naruto 590 guys, nthcoincident had some really coherent commentary over here.
1. (Short Story) The Lottery in Babylon by John Luis Borges
I only discovered John Luis Borges recently, when I ripped off part of his other excellent short story "The Mirror of Ink" for my bitter_nakano fic Lethe&Mnemosyne. This is probably my favorite work of his so far; it describes a mythical Babylon where every activity is dictated by lottery game. Terrifying, thoughtful, provocative. Just look at this line here "Look here--through this gash in my cape you can see on my stomach a crimson tattoo...On nights when the moon is full, this symbol gives me power over men with the mark of Gimel, but it subjects me to those with the Aleph, who on nights when there is no moon owe obedience to those marked with the Gimel."
2. (Movie) Intact (Spanish name "Intacto")
The film depicts an underground trade in luck; the premise purports that luck can be amassed and transferred as any other commodity. After loosing his luck, Federico sets out to find the luckiest man alive, the lone survivor of a plane crash, in order to use him to overpower the antagonist in a game of Russian Roulette. The antagonist is an old man who runs a casino, and as you learn later a Holocaust survivor, which should tell you something about the complexity of the plot. What I liked best was the rituals of the underground luck trade, and who participates in them (bull fighters, losers, etc) and how plausible and strange priorities line up once luck becomes a commodity. Highly recommend.
3. (Fic: Inception) I Stive by indysaur
This isn't a story about luck in the way the other two are. The first 4 chapters told in shifting POV from Dom and Mal deal with the arc of their relationship from courtship, marriage, research, pregnancy, to limbo, madness and the fall. The last chapter is a quiet day post-inception Arthur spends in his city, SF, with an unexpected visitor. I really cannot rec this story highly enough, it's everything fanfiction should be; taking an initial concept and fleshing it out not in a bombastic way, not a reiteration, but a genuinely creative interpretation of canon wrapped in flawless writing. Something to look out for is how adult and realistic Dom&Mal's relationship is, the give-and-take of it.
I would also like to state that should a Thor musical ever come out I would like to petition now that "Somebody that I used to Know" be used for Thor and Loki's mournful breakup sing-off. Glee agrees it works great for brothers!
Also Naruto 590 guys, nthcoincident had some really coherent commentary over here.