I really need to see DON'T PANIC in large friendly letters right now.
Am back on campus, and am looking over my course schedule and wondering what the everliving hell I was thinking. Especially since the university's new system makes it a lot harder to do the last-minute class-shuffle I'm so accustomed to.
...maybe I'm less screwed than I think I am? We'll see.
oh god I am still not ready to be a senior heeeeelp ( Read more... )
...maybe I'm less screwed than I think I am? We'll see.
oh god I am still not ready to be a senior heeeeelp ( Read more... )
I should let you know that I've already read about 200 pages through the first Temeraire book and I'm absolutely loving it. This stuff is amazing. ♥ And goodness does it even lend itself so well to Hetalia.
Also I agree, the haircut is tres adorable.
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And double-yay for Temeraire! I just finished rereading it as is, uh, evident, and oh gooooooooood I want to write fiiiiiiiic. And yes, the Hetalia crossover potential is ashdfadfasdf;ljals. England. On dragonback. And wait until you see what they do with dragons in other nations! So cool. *sigh* Social commentary/exploration = always better with dragons!
It's strange to wear my hair this short, and figuring out how to style it is a little tricky, but I'm liking it!
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Haha wriiiite it. Oh man I want to read that. :DD England and France bantering at each other on dragonback. And yes just ughadsklf England on dragons unf unf hot. Also I adore that even within the supposed homogeneous culture of the British military the author's still managing to skillfully make social commentary about cultural praxis and coded behavior. It's amazing. And dragons! THE PRETTY PRETTY DRAGONS, I LOVE THEM ALL.
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AND CHINA. CHINA AND HIS MOTHERFUCKING DRAGONS THAT OWN THE ENTIRE WORLD. SO SO HOT YES. And one of the things I like best about Novik's writing is -- not even how well she builds worlds, but how well she builds culture, if that makes sense. Just -- the way Laurence is so clearly a product of his time and how much of his attitudes he conveys in the little things he doesn't even notice (until much later) and how I am fairly sure that Novik knows what a dysjunct she's causing the audience...yeah. Also, the female captains. Goddamn, she does them perfectly and I just. Plus, you know, DRAGONS.
...god I love this series so much it is almost shameful.
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YES. CHINA'S MOTHERFUCKING DRAGONS WHO WILL GRACE AND INTELLECT THE SHIT OUT OF YOUR SILLY ENGLISH INBRED DRAGONS. No, I absolutely understand. The way that she illustrates culture is really gorgeous, because it's not even that the world is so different from how we know it, or even that the practices are all that different! But that she's able to point out "look, this is how you do this if you're from this part of society, this is how someone in a different part of society does the exact same thing." AND YES. THE FEMALE CAPTAINS. FUCKING HELL I LOVE HARCOURT TO DEATH. And the little cadet! Emily! Emily is my hero~! And the dragons, of course.
It's okay, llamrei hasn't gotten around to reading it yet (though I have told her that she must) and I need someone to gush, so your shamefulness is only welcome.
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So once you have read a little bit further in the series I will HAPPILY babble at you about the fascinating things that dragon-human relationships do to the balance of power in Temeraire!verse, but such metacultural talk is really really spoilery and I will shut up now. Um. Harcourt! Harcourt is wonderful oh gosh and I love that she's clearly young but also clearly really good at what she does. And Emily is all kinds of wonderful.
Gush away, seriously! This series, it is made for gushing.
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I actually don't mind spoilers in a series at all. In my personal opinion, it shouldn't make a difference if I know the ending to a story or not, the storytelling should compel me regardless of whether or not I know the outcome. An exciting twist should be exciting even if I know it's coming. But yes, I will be sure to let you know once I have gotten farther along. :|b Though yes, I adore that a) there are female dragons and b) they necessitate a female rider.
I remember in my youth reading a dragon-series that I can't remember the title of where there were female fighting-dragons, but they were only fighting-dragons because they were infertile. And they were tended to by young male cadets. The guilty budding fanfic author in me wanted to write a mary sue story where there was actually a girl among their ranks and Temeraire makes me so happy that such things don't need to be done, the kickass girls are already ( ... )
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Good to know, and I think that's a sensible policy -- I find I'm less spoiler-phobic about things that have already been concluded, but I hate being spoiled for any kind of series that's still ongoing. But a lot of people have wildly varying spoiler policies, so I wanted to err on the side of caution.
That would be Dragonriders of Pern, I think? Oh god, those books. I read them when I was a very young Puel (and I read the Dragonsinger series first, which is why I have any lasting shred of affection towards the things, because the Dragonsinger books are at least a little less icky), and -- they do not hold up. I think the official thing with the greens was that chewing on the fire-producing rocks made them sterile, which was weird because it never did that to the male dragons but there you have it. I think there is a female greenrider a little later, but it is not done well. Also, OH GOD THE SKEEVY GENDER ISSUES IN THAT THING. ( ... )
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It's understandable! ♥ I do appreciate the caution, but yeah. People can spoil me for whatever and I don't care. Sometimes spoilers are necessary to get me reading/watching/playing something.
Actually it wasn't Pern! Though you're making me really glad that Pern never factored into my adolescent years. It was the Dragons of the Argonath series by Christopher Rowley. I can't remember how far I read in it but looking back on it, it was pretty misogynistic because I think the main character slept with at least one woman in every book. And I was reading these things before I was even into high school, lol.
Gosh I know yes. It makes him a tich unbelievable at times for me because he's just. So. Mature. But at the same time it makes for really amazing messages woven into the background when you see that sometimes Laurence has the wrong idea about something and he adapts, but sometimes Laurence has a good idea about how to change things and ( ... )
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Guh indeed, and to me it just smashes my honor-buttons so hard, because Laurence will admit to injustice when he sees it and he will do what he can to correct it, and guh moral conviction, and guh conflict between Laurence's code of honor and the one he's expected to develop and the honor-codes of the people he interacts with and now I am just thinking Julius Caesar and "so are they all, all honorable men" because in this case it is non-ironically true and I think it is fascinating how so many people can have such different kinds of ( ... )
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Also I take back everything I said about Laurence's immaturity being a bit hard to swallow because FUCK IF THE MAN IS NOT HILARIOUS WHEN HE'S FLUSTERED. I wanted to laugh forever at the exchange with him and Emily and her mom who is all sorts of badass and kickass and epic rolled into one. Admittedly, I do not have huge honor and loyalty pings (that's more katmaxwell's department) but I love to see tight laced men get flustered. XD
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