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His clothes are dirty but his hands are clean
I'm getting kinda paranoid that I've lost the ability to enjoy fiction novels.
I've been trying for about a month to get through Arcadia Falls by Carol Goodman. It is about a recently widowed housewife who takes a job at a small private art school in the middle of Bumblefuck, NY, and how she and her daughter try to adapt to life there even though the area is steeped in mystery, intrigue, and probably ghosts. I was very much attracted by the premise - that Our Heroine gets sucked into a real-life fairy tale, one of the really dark Grimm ones, and has to fight her way out and save her daughter. I really like stories in which families fight for each other, and in this story the relationship of a teenage girl and her mother is depicted rather accurately - a lot of resentment and misunderstanding and hurt even when the right thing is intended. I really like the sense of atmosphere in the book, and I rather like the heroine, since she is relateable without being boring, opinionated and rather headstrong.
I just keep on having to put this book down because the little things irk me so much. There are portions of the book that are journal entries from a woman in the 1930's, but the author does NOTHING to distinguish the narrative of the modern-day story with the journal. I know that the language of only 80 years ago wasn't that different from today, but still there should be some change in usage or style to differenciate the women. At one point the story changed into journal without warning, but because there was no change in form or voice, it took me a page until I figured that out. There are also really obvious plot devices that kind of made me roll my eyes - of COURSE the heroine falls for the rugged sheriff, of COURSE a pregnancy plot develops (not with the heroine), and a few other plot points that I can already smell coming and I kinda hope I am wrong. There is already a major plothole, again related to the journal.
Of course I'm trying to remind myself that it might just be a matter of this book annoying me. But I've felt a kind of nitpicky-bug nibbling at all of the fiction I've been reading lately, that bug that ruins the enjoyment of reading a novel because I'm tearing it apart every inch of the way. The only thing that doesn't set off my alarms is young adult fiction, but I don't want to be a person who reads only one genre of books. Maybe I just need to take a break and read Behemoth instead. Anything with Mr. Sharp in it promises to be UTTERLY BOSS.
Now some anime, a medium I am sure I will never fall out of love with:
Sekirei was a recent watch of mine, at the recommendation of fandom. It was on Netflix streaming too, which made it a lot easier for me to follow.
Okay, I have a secret. I actually rather like harem anime. Saber Marionette J, Tenchi, Fushigi Yuugi, Fate/Stay Night...I feel like it is something for a girl to be ashamed of, but it's hard when I think the genre is full of so much goofy stupid fun. I like it the best when there is no resolution for the romance either - that the guy (or girl) learns how to respect everyone in his/her harem equally, and learns what qualities make every character unique and special. Saber Marionette J is easily in my top 5 anime, and Sekirei is the first anime I've seen in YEARS that came even close to rekindling the warm spot in my heart that I have reserved for SMJ.
Sekirei is a harem anime combined with a battle anime - the reason why I started watching it was because someone described it as Pokemon Harem Anime, since the different sekirei warriors have different 'elements' they are in control of, and their masters, the ashikabi, may have more than one sekirei at their disposal. Most of the sekirei are female - very very very busty females, though there are some male sekirei. Most ashikabi are men, though not all of them. Ashikabi and their sekirei are nearly always opposite-gendered pairs, and are connected by a bond of trust and love. They are all put together in a Battle Royal, and only the last surviving sekirei will be allowed to live happily ever after with her/his ashikabi. So there is a lot of heartbreak in here as you realize that to survive the tournament, you pretty much have to destroy the bond of love between two people.
This series is rated MA, and this is because there are A LOT OF NAKED BOUNCING TITS EVERYWHERE. Within the first two episodes there was even a fist fight between two naked female characters in a bath room, at which point I threw up my hands and declared my love for the show. When a sekirei first kisses their ashikabi and gains the full extent of their powers...well it is very O. But besides that, there is a lot of hilarity and awesome in the cast. Kou will kill you with cute. The lightening twins will kill you with awesome. MINORU'S SISTER IS SO AWESOME AND HILARIOUS AND NEEDS HER OWN SERIES ASAP. The ending was a bit weak and unresolved, but that's mostly because Sekirei is an on-going manga still.
Spice and Wolf was the second Netflix streaming anime I've seen lately. While it also had a good dosage of tits, I did not fall as completely in love with it as I did Sekirei. Spice and Wolf is about a peddler, Lawrence, who was trading in a village town when he picked up a hitchhiker, the wolf god of the harvest, Holo, and their Adventures in The Merchant Trade forever. The animation on the series was good, but something was seriously lackluster about the execution. It was far too cold and distant in feel - I know that the main characters are a bit reserved, but there was almost nothing to care about for either of them. There was also far too much 'tell, not show' for my taste, especially since merchant-trade and profit-seeking doesn't interest me. Holo by far is the best part of the anime series, since her attitude is so over the top and she gets a lot of funny lines, plus she gets her share of good badass moments, but it wasn't enough to save it in my regard.
Now I had the suspicion that the Spice and Wolf manga would be better. And it was, by a landslide XD It has the warmth and cheer that I thought the series was lacking, and both Holo and Lawrence are more engaging than in the anime.
Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds ended three weeks ago :< I was actually afraid to watch the finale up until last week. In retrospect I loved the series so much - it was there for me in these three years since I've left college, and saying goodbye to it was like saying goodbye to one of the crutches that was getting me through the past few years. The one thing that's been constant, even though I've moved three times since then.
That being said.......the series should have ended after its Dark Signers arc. It wasn't just an arc that was 'good for a YGO series', but A GOOD ARC IN GENERAL. Probably the most compelling anime arc I can think of - I remember it was week after week of WHAM episodes played to good effect. I'm sure Angie can tell you about me flailing and screaming about the show on Wednesday mornings. I remember being fucking awestruck every week of that arc - I could not believe that a 'mature' YGO had actually worked, and I couldn't believe how much I had come to love all of the characters in it. But after the Dark Signer arc was done, it was like the series blew its load and had nothing left to give. The hundred episodes of the series after that felt like the show was struggling to find the tempo and energy that it stumbled upon with the Dark Signers. A lot of promising sub-plots were lost, and while we got a good amount of crack, there was really nothing that had momentum. The Big Bad of the series was a loser. Give me Divine back. He was a badass. He killed my favorite character and ended up eaten by a dinosaur but he was still the best bad guy the YGO series ever fucking had.
Yu-Gi-Oh! ZeXal is the fourth series of YGO, and just started airing last week. I didn't even bother pretending I wouldn't like it. I fucking love it already. I do have to say, I was shocked that it took the lead character under 20 minutes to agree to a Faustian deal with a gigantic demon door. But the main character, Yuma, is sort of a moron. "ZOMG A POWER THAT WILL LET ME WIN CARD GAMES" "you will lose what is most precious to you" "SURE WHATEVER FLY TO THE STARS!!!"
Also the word ZeXal? THE X IS SILENT. So it is pronounced 'zeal'. WTF
This week I'm going to start watching Natsume's Book of Friends. I got to read the first volume of the manga today and it was really effin adorable. It was like Mushi-shi, but a bit more about wonder and adventure and a good dose of comedy too. It's about an orphaned boy, Natsume, who is able to see spirits and youkai, and has spent his entire life teased and bullied because of it. But he discovers that he inherited a book from his grandmother, her Book of Friends, which has the names of youkai sealed into it, binding them to her bloodline. Natsume gains a ceramic cat bodyguard (FAT ADORABLE CAT WHO WANTS TO EAT NATSUME), and finds out that the Book of Friends might in fact be able to get him the relationships he's always craved.
I've been trying for about a month to get through Arcadia Falls by Carol Goodman. It is about a recently widowed housewife who takes a job at a small private art school in the middle of Bumblefuck, NY, and how she and her daughter try to adapt to life there even though the area is steeped in mystery, intrigue, and probably ghosts. I was very much attracted by the premise - that Our Heroine gets sucked into a real-life fairy tale, one of the really dark Grimm ones, and has to fight her way out and save her daughter. I really like stories in which families fight for each other, and in this story the relationship of a teenage girl and her mother is depicted rather accurately - a lot of resentment and misunderstanding and hurt even when the right thing is intended. I really like the sense of atmosphere in the book, and I rather like the heroine, since she is relateable without being boring, opinionated and rather headstrong.
I just keep on having to put this book down because the little things irk me so much. There are portions of the book that are journal entries from a woman in the 1930's, but the author does NOTHING to distinguish the narrative of the modern-day story with the journal. I know that the language of only 80 years ago wasn't that different from today, but still there should be some change in usage or style to differenciate the women. At one point the story changed into journal without warning, but because there was no change in form or voice, it took me a page until I figured that out. There are also really obvious plot devices that kind of made me roll my eyes - of COURSE the heroine falls for the rugged sheriff, of COURSE a pregnancy plot develops (not with the heroine), and a few other plot points that I can already smell coming and I kinda hope I am wrong. There is already a major plothole, again related to the journal.
Of course I'm trying to remind myself that it might just be a matter of this book annoying me. But I've felt a kind of nitpicky-bug nibbling at all of the fiction I've been reading lately, that bug that ruins the enjoyment of reading a novel because I'm tearing it apart every inch of the way. The only thing that doesn't set off my alarms is young adult fiction, but I don't want to be a person who reads only one genre of books. Maybe I just need to take a break and read Behemoth instead. Anything with Mr. Sharp in it promises to be UTTERLY BOSS.
Now some anime, a medium I am sure I will never fall out of love with:
Sekirei was a recent watch of mine, at the recommendation of fandom. It was on Netflix streaming too, which made it a lot easier for me to follow.
Okay, I have a secret. I actually rather like harem anime. Saber Marionette J, Tenchi, Fushigi Yuugi, Fate/Stay Night...I feel like it is something for a girl to be ashamed of, but it's hard when I think the genre is full of so much goofy stupid fun. I like it the best when there is no resolution for the romance either - that the guy (or girl) learns how to respect everyone in his/her harem equally, and learns what qualities make every character unique and special. Saber Marionette J is easily in my top 5 anime, and Sekirei is the first anime I've seen in YEARS that came even close to rekindling the warm spot in my heart that I have reserved for SMJ.
Sekirei is a harem anime combined with a battle anime - the reason why I started watching it was because someone described it as Pokemon Harem Anime, since the different sekirei warriors have different 'elements' they are in control of, and their masters, the ashikabi, may have more than one sekirei at their disposal. Most of the sekirei are female - very very very busty females, though there are some male sekirei. Most ashikabi are men, though not all of them. Ashikabi and their sekirei are nearly always opposite-gendered pairs, and are connected by a bond of trust and love. They are all put together in a Battle Royal, and only the last surviving sekirei will be allowed to live happily ever after with her/his ashikabi. So there is a lot of heartbreak in here as you realize that to survive the tournament, you pretty much have to destroy the bond of love between two people.
This series is rated MA, and this is because there are A LOT OF NAKED BOUNCING TITS EVERYWHERE. Within the first two episodes there was even a fist fight between two naked female characters in a bath room, at which point I threw up my hands and declared my love for the show. When a sekirei first kisses their ashikabi and gains the full extent of their powers...well it is very O. But besides that, there is a lot of hilarity and awesome in the cast. Kou will kill you with cute. The lightening twins will kill you with awesome. MINORU'S SISTER IS SO AWESOME AND HILARIOUS AND NEEDS HER OWN SERIES ASAP. The ending was a bit weak and unresolved, but that's mostly because Sekirei is an on-going manga still.
Spice and Wolf was the second Netflix streaming anime I've seen lately. While it also had a good dosage of tits, I did not fall as completely in love with it as I did Sekirei. Spice and Wolf is about a peddler, Lawrence, who was trading in a village town when he picked up a hitchhiker, the wolf god of the harvest, Holo, and their Adventures in The Merchant Trade forever. The animation on the series was good, but something was seriously lackluster about the execution. It was far too cold and distant in feel - I know that the main characters are a bit reserved, but there was almost nothing to care about for either of them. There was also far too much 'tell, not show' for my taste, especially since merchant-trade and profit-seeking doesn't interest me. Holo by far is the best part of the anime series, since her attitude is so over the top and she gets a lot of funny lines, plus she gets her share of good badass moments, but it wasn't enough to save it in my regard.
Now I had the suspicion that the Spice and Wolf manga would be better. And it was, by a landslide XD It has the warmth and cheer that I thought the series was lacking, and both Holo and Lawrence are more engaging than in the anime.
Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds ended three weeks ago :< I was actually afraid to watch the finale up until last week. In retrospect I loved the series so much - it was there for me in these three years since I've left college, and saying goodbye to it was like saying goodbye to one of the crutches that was getting me through the past few years. The one thing that's been constant, even though I've moved three times since then.
That being said.......the series should have ended after its Dark Signers arc. It wasn't just an arc that was 'good for a YGO series', but A GOOD ARC IN GENERAL. Probably the most compelling anime arc I can think of - I remember it was week after week of WHAM episodes played to good effect. I'm sure Angie can tell you about me flailing and screaming about the show on Wednesday mornings. I remember being fucking awestruck every week of that arc - I could not believe that a 'mature' YGO had actually worked, and I couldn't believe how much I had come to love all of the characters in it. But after the Dark Signer arc was done, it was like the series blew its load and had nothing left to give. The hundred episodes of the series after that felt like the show was struggling to find the tempo and energy that it stumbled upon with the Dark Signers. A lot of promising sub-plots were lost, and while we got a good amount of crack, there was really nothing that had momentum. The Big Bad of the series was a loser. Give me Divine back. He was a badass. He killed my favorite character and ended up eaten by a dinosaur but he was still the best bad guy the YGO series ever fucking had.
Yu-Gi-Oh! ZeXal is the fourth series of YGO, and just started airing last week. I didn't even bother pretending I wouldn't like it. I fucking love it already. I do have to say, I was shocked that it took the lead character under 20 minutes to agree to a Faustian deal with a gigantic demon door. But the main character, Yuma, is sort of a moron. "ZOMG A POWER THAT WILL LET ME WIN CARD GAMES" "you will lose what is most precious to you" "SURE WHATEVER FLY TO THE STARS!!!"
Also the word ZeXal? THE X IS SILENT. So it is pronounced 'zeal'. WTF
This week I'm going to start watching Natsume's Book of Friends. I got to read the first volume of the manga today and it was really effin adorable. It was like Mushi-shi, but a bit more about wonder and adventure and a good dose of comedy too. It's about an orphaned boy, Natsume, who is able to see spirits and youkai, and has spent his entire life teased and bullied because of it. But he discovers that he inherited a book from his grandmother, her Book of Friends, which has the names of youkai sealed into it, binding them to her bloodline. Natsume gains a ceramic cat bodyguard (FAT ADORABLE CAT WHO WANTS TO EAT NATSUME), and finds out that the Book of Friends might in fact be able to get him the relationships he's always craved.