Reading

I'm hearing from various quarters that pre-orders of The Creator's Grace have now arrived in the US (they arrived in the UK some time ago), so thought I would, once again, put up an interest check to see if anyone would like to do a read-along.

Please let me know in the comments whether you'd be interested, when would you like it to start, and what kind of format you'd like this to be in. Feel free to DM me also if you don't want to comment publicly.

this batch of reviews includes spoilers for: little eyes - samanta schweblin, the poet empress - shen tao, inheritance - christopher paolini, twisted love & twisted games - ana huang.

( It was a necessary cruelty. )

• oscar piastri - BUNNY 🐰

bunny 100% i know the f1 cfan farming sim game has him as a koala due to australianosity i assume but he is 100% bunny to me. maybe a case for bunnycat could be made but i'm trying (and failing) to not assign everyone cat it's not my fault cat-sona is so prevalent amongst my faves. the nose scrunch and hair-trigger blush is just so bunny. bnnuy even. clipped it for ellen during the singapore gp but crofty calling oscar "not a happy bunny" on live tv has only further cemented the oscbunny-shaped psychosis in my brain.

• max verstappen - lion / cat 🦁🐱

successful self-branding on max’s part for sure, but like (least objective voice ever) from an objective standpoint… look at the evidence. he is a lion. predator animal on the hunt. maneater!!! idk. cfans have assigned him pufferfish which is haha funny for jokes and whatnot but he is literally the most lion to ever have lioned To Me…although he turns into unserious silly orange cat quite often esp outside of the car.

• charles leclerc - mouse / cat / mousecat 🐭🐱

… i mean self-evident as fuck, but popular fanon assigned serval also works. cfans ubiquitously call him kitty/cat/any variation of the above and it’s so cute. i agree rt x10000. the mousey quality to his face is more on the side of disney cartoon mouse as opposed to like. Rodent. not that there’s anything wrong with Rodents. arthur, for example, is more rodent.

• george russell - snake (/POS x3) 🐍

georgie is sooo snake-coded to me like obviously physically ie beautiful venomous white snake with neon blue green eyes… beguiling reptile creature. and then personality-wise as well with the *vague hand gestures* which is /pos to me i like snakes i’ve always loved snakes!!! george horse is also a consideration, as well as deer/gazelle maybe due to his long legs and general air of ummm creature that spooks easily.

• ollie bearman - BEAR snake 🐻 🐍 

ollie has built-in nominatively determined animalsona for free, and while he is pretty much embodying bear to me in all the ways that matter (tall, pacific ocean sized shoulders, cheerful teddybearsona) there's also an element of snake habitat finance major to me.. even if kimi is allegedly the true business major between the two of them like it's literally about the vibe. 

• kimi antonelli - lamb baby deer 🐏 🦌 

obviously he is so new and guileless baby animal creature but also his canines are so sharp... and the definitely impure carnal way he has been locked in on max lately... #if a lamb was a carnivore

• lewis hamilton - otter 🦦 panther 🐆 

maybe i’m too susceptible to propaganda but the cfans ate with this animal assignment. he is so otter! compact and cute and inscrutable. i see panther being used quite a bit too. 

• carlos sainz - dog 🐶

giant wet dog eyes. probably something like a labrador? a black lab. 

• carlos alcaraz - puppy 🐶

dogs afff rt the guy who said carlos is like one of those dogs that loves his plushie soooooo much he tears it to pieces and then tilts his head in confusion and cries. overeager overexcited cuppydog. who kills you. /pos <3

• jannik sinner - fox 🦊

obviously fox bc of the orangosity, but he also got those baby deer legs and glass ankles… like if a fox was a deer and wished to become a boy.

• alex de minaur - mouse 🐭🐁

i assume this is self explanatory. more rodent-y than charles imo. like charles is cartoon mouse and demon is one of those mice you find at petco. if that makes sense.

• elena rybakina - fish / bird 🐠🐦

i know this one is also company/self-assigned but it's working it works. she's literally so fishy to me with her blank stare and resting expression (that isn’t quite a pout? i think she would need lip filler for that but i don’t want that we have enough botox baddies on tour thank you). bird is just vibes i don’t need to explain my poetry iykyk. maybe a little bunny as well her teeth are so charming when they show in the 2sec of smiles per tournament. rybotkina <3

• alexandra saint mleux - deer / bird / (swan) 🦌🐤🦢

yes im including wags tf i look like. someone with a job? anyway alexandra bambi princess confirmed and bird honestly didn't settle in for me until her wedding ig story pic of mouse/bird in the ferrari but it is true that alex is bird... her beak! and then posture elegance etc etc all very swan coded.

a few more fmvs i have recently enjoyed, sports tiktok edit edition.

quick aurafarming edit appetiser roundup:

• max verstappen x maneater (+ sequel) - mandatory viewing thee teammate eater this series deserves heritage listing it’s so culturally indispensable. would not be the mv33 stan i am today without the formative influence of these edits and i can’t wait for vol 3 ft yuki and isack. you wish you never ever met her at all!
• ferrari x dna - loyalty for charles and royalty for lewis well so true
• ferrari x victory lap 5 - MY TEAM #MYTEAM
• maxseb x cool for the summer - this is such a generic powerscaling statsbro edit but idc my oshis are that goated. truly the 4x world champions two bulls in the red bull logo in question
• lewis hamilton x minecraft - merc lewis dominance we miss you… this edit concept is so awesome
• sebastian vettel x head shot - spawned a thousand remakes but none as clean as the og
• markseb x beez in the trap x what’s going on - ok this is entirely jokes but this edit did make me hysterical for like a good week after i first saw it genuinely one of the funniest videos ever made
• jannik sinner + elena rybakina x sticky rice - #nohetero (for once in my life) but loveee to see my two oshis coolly and separately aurafarming their way to winning of course

TENNIS

sincaraz + janole x brutus
i cannot believe this doesn't have 500000000000000000 views i genuinely think this is the greatest jannik sinner edit of all time if not the greatest tennis edit of all time. shot selection and song selection and lyric/scene matchup all immaculate. this is exactly how i see jannik: ambitious underdog who relentlessly slaughtered his way to the top with steely methodical focus. like that's myyyy tennis terminator :')

the sincaraz part is solid but the janole is SO unreally good the narrative of novak being killed by his successor made in his own image, seeing his end come at the hands of his younger self… the ending splice of novak jump serve into jannik jump serve set to "i wanna be YOU" had me standing up and screaming like yes the son devours saturn!! other insane narrative moments of note:

• “or am i just wishing i could be like you” + carlos kissing the rg trophy
• “the people would see me too as a poet” + jannik winning a point with carlos’s signature drop shot
• “my name would be known” + jannik touching djokocaraz’s names above his own on the wimbledon victors board
• “with a heavy heart i'll drive this dagger into the heart of my enemy” + carlos dropping his his racquet trying to lunge for a return
• "this death will be art" + djokosinner net embrace

F1

sico x girl so confusing
this is thee girl so confusing edit i honestly don’t think there is another sports yaoi that can pull this song off like sico my two sides of the same coin mean blonde german girls. people do say they’re alike people do say they’ve got the same hair and they do have a strange antagonistic~supportive relationship where seb is german on german criming nico first in a silly impish fun and jokes follow the leader (schumi) way and then in a homewrecking moodmaker kind of way but nico gets a few hits in too especially once he’s in the silver war merc rocketships although he tries to keep it diplomatic in front of the cameras like the pr princess he is. but despite the various catfights seb still defends nico’s right to the wdc saying he deserved it because seb saw how hard nico worked for it and he plays along with nico’s psychological warfare attacks on lewis when prompted by nico. who else could understand but seb?

really love:

• “maybe you just want to be me” + seb kissing a trophy: seb being the youngest grand prix (and then wdc) winner at the time vs nico still having the record for most race starts before winning a wdc like i just know nico (guy so desperate to win he almost destroyed himself for it) held a fair deal of envy about how fast seb started winning and how much he won.
• “we don’t have much in common” + cycling through the various men they are both linked to ie mark/jenson/lewis. missing schumi but he’s there in spirit in the earlier footage of seb bullying nico lol.
• “can’t tell if you wanna see me falling over and failing” + footage of the infamous [nico vc] [giddy as hell] [smiling and clapping and cheering] Seb putting it in the wall at his home race which he has never won one of the darkest days of his career. nico’s cheerful delivery cracks me up every time.

bearnelli x no 1 party anthem
this is kind of a nothing edit but it’s in this post because i want to talk about the opening clip, which is genuinely the most evil bearnelli footage of all time. which is funny because bearnelli is not really an evil ship or a serious ship, people want them to be baby brocedes so bad and they just aren’t it’s a middle school breakup at best. like that’s silly summer flingtuationship that fizzled out once the group project ended and now ollie has spedrun enemies to lovers hooking up with gabi in monaco (possibly as part of longer term gambit to plus one his way into max’s inner circle) and kimi has a wdc to win so he drc about that rn and it’s fine they’re like normal coworkers but there was actual crack in bearnelli prema content it’s insane how much chemi they had!!! idgaf that it was government sponsored fanservice propaganda sss tier fujobait i was the fan who was serviced i was the fujo taking the bait and that’s always going to be myyyy shippppp. anyway back to the evilness of the opening clip: 1) ollie calling kimi over in italian 2) kimi saying “but we’re gonna hurt ourselves” but even as he says it he’s already going over to ollie 3) ollie chivalrous hoverhands ready to steady kimi in case he loses his balance but kimi doesn’t need his help 4) they didn’t get hurt. it was too early for that.

lestappen x everything is romantic
this is also kind of a nothing edit but first of all everything IS romantic and i like the interpretation of “fall in love again and again” being the same moment from different angles. and the little flashback to inchident right at the end made me smile. myyyyy fated rivals real true love ship.

charles leclerc x viva la vida
it’s so weird how blurry this edit is haha by the end i can’t even see anything. i am always in some way thinking about bahrain 22 charles running through the paddock towards his team as the ambient roar of cheering grows louder and louder. oh charles how you make me dream.

I think Sharp Downpour (暴锋雨) might be relevant to folks' interests.

( Read more... )

Time (时光, pinyin: shiguang) is Ning Yuan's realist tragic baihe novel, begun in 2011 and completed around 2017. It's unusual for several reasons: first, it's Ning Yuan doing realism in a way that's reminiscent of Niu Er Er (i.e. she manages to suppress her usual tendency to slip melodrama into the closing chapters), and second, the nature of the tragedy itself.

The one-line pitch for this novel: it's the 1990s Chinese version of the k-drama Reply 1988 (my favourite of the Reply series), but more brutal, and with queer women as its focus. Spanning 1997 to 2017 (twenty years in which China saw a massive amount of upheaval and economic, social and cultural change, which the novel fully leans into), the novel begins with protagonist Wang Yutong and her childhood friend and later sweetheart Qi Yin as high school students. Their fathers work in a state-owned car factory located in the south of China (almost certainly Fujian, where Ning Yuan is almost certainly from), and their families live in the surrounding compound (which also has all the amenities you'd expect of a small town, though not at a particularly luxurious level). Wang Yutong has loving parents who've done their best to provide for her materially, but Qi Yin has a much more difficult life. Her father is an alcoholic who is often abusive to her and her mother, and her mother is quadriplegic as a result of an accident whom many neighbours believe to have been caused by her father. At the start of the novel, Qi Yin's father dies, and she becomes primarily responsible for the care of her mother at the age of thirteen.

( some spoilers, though this isn't the kind of novel that's substantially affected by spoilers )

So for something that offers a completely different take on romance from much of the baihe genre, for a compelling sketch of China's socio-economic development between 1997 to 2017 and its effects on (especially) the working class, for a sobering reminder of why a strong social welfare state is necessary, I highly recommend this novel.

I read the Chinese original of the novel here on JJWXC.