Whatcha Reading? August 2025, Part Two
Aug. 23rd, 2025 08:00 am![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png){kind=small}
smartbitches_feed
Happy Saturday! We’re speedily approaching the end of August. Here’s how we’re capping off the month:
Lara: I’ve torn myself away from Nalini Singh’s Guild Hunter series to try new-to-me authors. I’m reviewing Cynthia St. Aubin’s Love Bites ( A | BN | K | AB ) and Love Sucks. ( A | BN | K | AB ) I enjoyed both (ridiculous) books with some caveats. At the moment I am reading Love at First Fright by Nadia El-Fassi. I usually don’t enjoy books with twee cosy witches. I like my paranormals to have bite. This is a BDSM romance with ghosts though. The witch factor is secondary, so I’m sticking with it. Will report back!
Sarah: I was asked to blurb a book which is a rare request for me, so I am very excited.
It’s called Inequalities of Platform Publishing: The Promise and Peril of Self-Publishing in the Digital Book Era by Claire Parnell. ( A | BN )It’s going to be out later this year – I think October – from the University of Massachusetts Press.
From the book (which I am highlighting the heck out of) “This book investigates the contours of how platforms can act as gatekeepers, creating barriers to entry and equitable participation for historically marginalized authors through their technological, economic, social, and cultural structures.”
Plus I turn a page and think, “Oh! I know them!” Which I love, honestly.
Elyse: I’m reading Briefly Perfectly Human by Alua Arthur. ( A | BN | K | AB ) I have a family member in hospice, and Arthur is a death doula. It’s really helping me navigate the end of life process as it feels like something I’ve never really learned about.
Susan: I’m reading Twittering Birds Never Fly, ( A ) and having fun with it for the mystery/obsessively loyal yakuza BDSM, but also there have been three sex scenes in this volume. That is exactly as many sex scenes as there are bullet holes in one of the participants.
Sarah: It’s important to have balance.
Susan: Need to make sure the blood is still flowing correctly.
Shana: I’m reading Come As You Are by Emily Nagoski. I started it ages ago but wasn’t in the right space to read it. But it’s perfect for me now, I love the mix of science, self help, and feminist rage.
Amanda: I’m going through a manga/webtoon phase. Most of them have been eh, but I’m caught up on Suite Room de Amayakashi Yakuza to Futari Kiri. It’s a romance between a high-ranking yakuza and a hotel concierge. The characters fall in love pretty quickly and it’s a bit smutty (fair warning), but the hero surprisingly isn’t a domineering asshole and is just a sweet, cinnamon roll. It’s very much a “he falls first” scenario.
I’m also reading Butcher and Blackbird. ( A | BN | K ) I have some minor gripes about the age of the heroine, but otherwise I’m enjoying the blend of romance, dark humor, and body horror.
Susan: Oh, I started Suite Room and meant to go back to it! The female lead doing her best to be Unflappable is great.
Amanda: There are only six chapters out so far so it’s a quick catch up.
Kiki: I went to Lovestruck Books with some coworkers this week and picked up the translated version of The Cook of Castamar. I had started the Netflix series and was really taken with the setting and time period and wanted to read the book but when I looked a year or two ago it hadn’t been translated to English—but it has now!
Whatcha reading? Let us know in the comments!
Calling all 90s Kids
Aug. 23rd, 2025 03:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
huxleyenne posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
addme_fandomName: Risa (She/Her)
Age group: Mid-30s
Country: United States (sigh...)
Subscription/Access Policy: I'm hosting a public writing journal centered around original fiction onhuxleyenne. Fanfic/fannish interest is posted on Tumblr/AO3 (same username). My genres are romance, yaoi, and omegaverse. Non-romance interests include psychology, sociology, philosophy, poetry, and general fantasy/sci-fi/horror/dystopian concepts/settings. Anyone 18+ is welcome, on the condition that you play nice. My journal and works are sex positive, queer oriented, and anti-censorship.
Fannish Interests: Fandom history, 90s media (Nicktoons and anime), the bestest video games (FFIX and Stardew Valley are my forever girls), and my guiltiest pleasure of all is WWE/Professional wrestling (it's farking yaoi is what it is, and there's plenty of yuri, too.) I've also dabbled in Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons.
I like to post about: Writing, things I've read that interest me, general thoughts, tips and tricks, meaningful encouragement, words that go beautifully together, and generally, anything people might find valuable.
About Me/Other Info: I can be moody (anxious, depressed, distracted, hyperfixated, you name it) and might go a few days without posting/responding to anything. As most of us do, I have my own struggles and demons to grapple with, so I'm not always in the mood for people. I'd rather channel these emotions into fiction than spew personal trauma.
Age group: Mid-30s
Country: United States (sigh...)
Subscription/Access Policy: I'm hosting a public writing journal centered around original fiction on
huxleyenne. Fanfic/fannish interest is posted on Tumblr/AO3 (same username). My genres are romance, yaoi, and omegaverse. Non-romance interests include psychology, sociology, philosophy, poetry, and general fantasy/sci-fi/horror/dystopian concepts/settings. Anyone 18+ is welcome, on the condition that you play nice. My journal and works are sex positive, queer oriented, and anti-censorship. Fannish Interests: Fandom history, 90s media (Nicktoons and anime), the bestest video games (FFIX and Stardew Valley are my forever girls), and my guiltiest pleasure of all is WWE/Professional wrestling (it's farking yaoi is what it is, and there's plenty of yuri, too.) I've also dabbled in Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons.
I like to post about: Writing, things I've read that interest me, general thoughts, tips and tricks, meaningful encouragement, words that go beautifully together, and generally, anything people might find valuable.
About Me/Other Info: I can be moody (anxious, depressed, distracted, hyperfixated, you name it) and might go a few days without posting/responding to anything. As most of us do, I have my own struggles and demons to grapple with, so I'm not always in the mood for people. I'd rather channel these emotions into fiction than spew personal trauma.
Smallweb Chatter Post
Aug. 23rd, 2025 01:57 amkalloway posting in smallwebHeya, smallweb!
This is an open post to talk about what you're working on, what you'd like to show off, cool resources, things that maybe aren't working so well, etc.
Also please check out previous posts to see what people are up to or if you might be able to help someone out.
smallweb! This is an open post to talk about what you're working on, what you'd like to show off, cool resources, things that maybe aren't working so well, etc.
Also please check out previous posts to see what people are up to or if you might be able to help someone out.
Disney_20in20 - Round 12 - Gravity Falls
Aug. 22nd, 2025 11:10 pmreeby1020 Gravity Falls icons for disney_20in20
Preview:
*Icons are free for use.
*Credit and comments are nice.
( Read more... )
disney_20in20
Preview:
*Icons are free for use.
*Credit and comments are nice.
( Read more... )
[ SECRET POST #6804 ]
Aug. 22nd, 2025 06:21 pmcase posting in fandomsecrets⌈ Secret Post #6804 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
01.
[The Brothers Bloom]
( More! )
Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #971.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
Me-and-media update
Aug. 23rd, 2025 10:15 amchina_shopPrevious poll review
In the Obsessions poll, 9.8% of respondents have one current active fandom, 31.4% have a couple, 25.5% have a handful, and 15.7% have none at the moment. The most common response was "it's complicated" with 37.3%. Seven point eight percent have blorbos but no fandom.
In ticky-boxes, goth butterflies and punk moths came second to hugs, 56.9% to 76.5%. Dream parkour came third with 47.1%. Thank you for your votes! <3
Reading
Audio: Inventing the Renaissance by Ada Palmer, read by Candida Gubbins -- I'm a third of the way through this delightful thirty-hour tour of the Renaissance. No idea how much is lodging in my brain (versus in-one-ear-and-out-the-other-ing), but I'm getting bits here and there. Like, for example, the Renaissance framing of "grace" as heavenly political capital. And theology as it relates to Hamlet. The general tone is very fun. In progress.
Audio: Stone and Sky (Rivers of London) by Ben Aaronovich, read by Kobna Holdbrook-Smith and Shvorne Marks. Having settled Peter into married life, Aaronovich is porting all the relationship stuff over to Abigail. I guess that makes sense. (The case isn't coming together for me, but that might be because I keep falling asleep while we're listening.) In progress.
Library book: A Lady for a Duke by Alexis Hall. Just a few chapters. Historical romance, and I'm pretty sure all the characters are speaking/behaving anachronistically, but I'm looking forward to the reveal. In progress.
Guardian by priest. We've finished the main story, just one short story extra to go. Wow, this has been a ride!
Kdramas/Cdramas
Still rewatching Nothing But Love (AKA Nothing But You), ahhh, I love them so much.
I've also started My Girlfriend is the Man, a Kdrama about a woman with a genetic predisposition to sudden-onset sex swap, who does indeed wake up in a male body. I only just finished episode 1, so I don't know yet how well they're going to handle it, but I'm fairly sure the narrative pressure on the boyfriend is to accept that his girlfriend is still his girlfriend, whatever body she's currently wearing. No idea where they'll take it after that.
Pru and I finished Sell Your Haunted House this week. We're planning to start Love Scout next (rewatch for me), unless I can think of something good (and Korean) with murders/ghosts/cases of the week. Hmm, maybe I should give Mystic Pop-Up Bar one more try... I bounced off it before, but I know several people who loved it.
Other TV
( Cut for length. )
Guardian/Fandom
It's the last weekend of the Guardian novel scheduled readalong, and then we're heading into a slo-mo rewatch of the drama (half an episode per week). If you've been Guardian-curious or thinking of revisiting the show, now's your chance. *lures*
fan_writers is going so well. Love to see so much conversation and interaction over there! If you have thoughts on writing, please feel free to post to the comm, either directly or with a link!
Audio entertainment
Letters from an American (lots, including a great half-hour interview with Gavin Newsom). Half an episode of Sinica, Writing Excuses, a couple of episodes of You Can Learn Chinese, some Eight Days of Diana Wynne Jones, and a couple of episodes of A Life Indigenous.
Plugged-in life
The last few days, I've been experimenting with not spending every waking non-keyboard moment listening to audiobooks and podcasts. I was kind of hoping some silence and/or music would wake up my creative brain, and then ideas would come spilling out my fingertips. So far, it's just created an opening for brain weasels. Pbthpbthpbhtpbhpth!
Writing/making things
I spent Monday morning writing a political submission and then finished my meta post about story middles. I spent Tuesday's writers' hour writing most of this. I am working on a fic, but it's slow going. It's veered into one of my DNWs (D/s). I mean, you know how sometimes you can write your own DNWs, because you instinctively avoid the aspects that actively squick you? That part is working. It's just that neither the Shen Wei in my head nor I have any idea what we're doing, lol. Playin' it by ear. *rattles keyboard*
I threw something verrrry last minute together for thefan_flashworks Twinkle challenge. No idea if that worked.
Life/health/mental state things
I'm okay, just a bit disconnected. The weather's been so cold I want to stay home all the time. I really hate everything our government is doing (not on the same scale as the US, but terrible in its own libertarian way), so by day I'm a mild manner fangirl, but at night I wake up periodically to scrawl angry letters to politicians and/or newspaper editors in my notebook. I should send more of these; I'm always held back by feeling like I don't know enough and need to fact check.
Food
I made two small batches of vegetable dumplings -- Moosewood's sweet potato recipe, and mushroom & coriander adapted from the Omnivore's Cookbook's chicken recipe. I had to use my dumpling press because of my arms, but that worked okay.
Recently made: enchiladas, crispy orange beef (consistency would have been better if I hadn't shoehorned a ton of vege in there too), plus experimenting with crispy tofu in various dishes. A lot of the sauces make the tofu go slimy, but it's so good when they don't.
Goals
My goal for this year is to make goals for next year.
Good things
Guardian stuff -- the readalong, Wishlist!!, the upcoming rewatch, yay! I'm hoping the latter two will combine to get me writing again. Playing with paint pens (drawing butterflies like a six year-old). Sunshine. Cat. Boy. Assimilating my little-worn 'tidy' clothes into my everyday wardrobe so I don't have to shop.
In the Obsessions poll, 9.8% of respondents have one current active fandom, 31.4% have a couple, 25.5% have a handful, and 15.7% have none at the moment. The most common response was "it's complicated" with 37.3%. Seven point eight percent have blorbos but no fandom.
In ticky-boxes, goth butterflies and punk moths came second to hugs, 56.9% to 76.5%. Dream parkour came third with 47.1%. Thank you for your votes! <3
Reading
Audio: Inventing the Renaissance by Ada Palmer, read by Candida Gubbins -- I'm a third of the way through this delightful thirty-hour tour of the Renaissance. No idea how much is lodging in my brain (versus in-one-ear-and-out-the-other-ing), but I'm getting bits here and there. Like, for example, the Renaissance framing of "grace" as heavenly political capital. And theology as it relates to Hamlet. The general tone is very fun. In progress.
Audio: Stone and Sky (Rivers of London) by Ben Aaronovich, read by Kobna Holdbrook-Smith and Shvorne Marks. Having settled Peter into married life, Aaronovich is porting all the relationship stuff over to Abigail. I guess that makes sense. (The case isn't coming together for me, but that might be because I keep falling asleep while we're listening.) In progress.
Library book: A Lady for a Duke by Alexis Hall. Just a few chapters. Historical romance, and I'm pretty sure all the characters are speaking/behaving anachronistically, but I'm looking forward to the reveal.
Spoiler.
The lady in the title is trans and was best friends with the duke before she went MIA at war and transitioned; he thinks she died, and he's now grieving his friend.Guardian by priest. We've finished the main story, just one short story extra to go. Wow, this has been a ride!
Kdramas/Cdramas
Still rewatching Nothing But Love (AKA Nothing But You), ahhh, I love them so much.
I've also started My Girlfriend is the Man, a Kdrama about a woman with a genetic predisposition to sudden-onset sex swap, who does indeed wake up in a male body. I only just finished episode 1, so I don't know yet how well they're going to handle it, but I'm fairly sure the narrative pressure on the boyfriend is to accept that his girlfriend is still his girlfriend, whatever body she's currently wearing. No idea where they'll take it after that.
Pru and I finished Sell Your Haunted House this week. We're planning to start Love Scout next (rewatch for me), unless I can think of something good (and Korean) with murders/ghosts/cases of the week. Hmm, maybe I should give Mystic Pop-Up Bar one more try... I bounced off it before, but I know several people who loved it.
Other TV
( Cut for length. )
Guardian/Fandom
It's the last weekend of the Guardian novel scheduled readalong, and then we're heading into a slo-mo rewatch of the drama (half an episode per week). If you've been Guardian-curious or thinking of revisiting the show, now's your chance. *lures*
fan_writers is going so well. Love to see so much conversation and interaction over there! If you have thoughts on writing, please feel free to post to the comm, either directly or with a link!Audio entertainment
Letters from an American (lots, including a great half-hour interview with Gavin Newsom). Half an episode of Sinica, Writing Excuses, a couple of episodes of You Can Learn Chinese, some Eight Days of Diana Wynne Jones, and a couple of episodes of A Life Indigenous.
Plugged-in life
The last few days, I've been experimenting with not spending every waking non-keyboard moment listening to audiobooks and podcasts. I was kind of hoping some silence and/or music would wake up my creative brain, and then ideas would come spilling out my fingertips. So far, it's just created an opening for brain weasels. Pbthpbthpbhtpbhpth!
Writing/making things
I spent Monday morning writing a political submission and then finished my meta post about story middles. I spent Tuesday's writers' hour writing most of this. I am working on a fic, but it's slow going. It's veered into one of my DNWs (D/s). I mean, you know how sometimes you can write your own DNWs, because you instinctively avoid the aspects that actively squick you? That part is working. It's just that neither the Shen Wei in my head nor I have any idea what we're doing, lol. Playin' it by ear. *rattles keyboard*
I threw something verrrry last minute together for the
fan_flashworks Twinkle challenge. No idea if that worked.Life/health/mental state things
I'm okay, just a bit disconnected. The weather's been so cold I want to stay home all the time. I really hate everything our government is doing (not on the same scale as the US, but terrible in its own libertarian way), so by day I'm a mild manner fangirl, but at night I wake up periodically to scrawl angry letters to politicians and/or newspaper editors in my notebook. I should send more of these; I'm always held back by feeling like I don't know enough and need to fact check.
Food
I made two small batches of vegetable dumplings -- Moosewood's sweet potato recipe, and mushroom & coriander adapted from the Omnivore's Cookbook's chicken recipe. I had to use my dumpling press because of my arms, but that worked okay.
Recently made: enchiladas, crispy orange beef (consistency would have been better if I hadn't shoehorned a ton of vege in there too), plus experimenting with crispy tofu in various dishes. A lot of the sauces make the tofu go slimy, but it's so good when they don't.
Goals
My goal for this year is to make goals for next year.
Good things
Guardian stuff -- the readalong, Wishlist!!, the upcoming rewatch, yay! I'm hoping the latter two will combine to get me writing again. Playing with paint pens (drawing butterflies like a six year-old). Sunshine. Cat. Boy. Assimilating my little-worn 'tidy' clothes into my everyday wardrobe so I don't have to shop.
Poll #33518 Plaguefic
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 29
Covid in fiction
View Answers
I'm okay reading fiction about Covid and related subjects
14 (48.3%)
I'm okay reading fiction that includes mentions of Covid
17 (58.6%)
There are aspects of the pandemic I avoid
8 (27.6%)
I like it when characters mask sometimes
11 (37.9%)
I prefer my reading matter to avoid the subject entirely
7 (24.1%)
It's better in profic / a novel
2 (6.9%)
It's better in fanfic
1 (3.4%)
other
0 (0.0%)
I don't read much atm
5 (17.2%)
ticky-box of gossimer and thistledown
10 (34.5%)
ticky-box of steel girders
9 (31.0%)
ticky-box of half a bottle of flat champagne
4 (13.8%)
ticky-box of battery acid and protest signs
11 (37.9%)
ticky-box of three wallabies at a 1970s disco
14 (48.3%)
ticky-box full of hugs
20 (69.0%)
[food] misc veg salad
Aug. 22nd, 2025 10:59 pmkaberettThe nature of veg box is that Vegetables for which I have no Plan... accumulate. Today's dinner took a bunch of said accumulated veg and made them salad-shaped, and it worked out well enough that I want a record as a reminder for future self that one can just Do This.
( Read more... )
August 2025 Virtual Book Recommendations Event Video
Aug. 22nd, 2025 07:49 pmfantasybookcafe_feedIf you missed the second quarterly Sci-Fi/Fantasy Book Recommendations event with the Ashland Public Library last night, you can catch the video on Youtube here. This included discussion of the following books:
- Lips Touch: Three Times by Laini Taylor; illustrated by Jim di Bartolo
- The Reformatory by Tananarive Due
- The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea by Axie Oh
- Blood Over Bright Haven by M. L. Wang
- The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow
- Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor
- Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress
We also enthused a bit about My Soul to Keep, the first book in Tananarive Due’s African Immortals series.
These are quarterly half-hour long discussions taking place on Zoom on the third Thursday of the month, and the next book chat will be from 6:30 to 7:00 ET on November 20. I’ll mention it again closer to the date, but if you want to sign up early, you can register for November’s event here!
The post August 2025 Virtual Book Recommendations Event Video first appeared on Fantasy Cafe.
Well, you can't tell much from faces
Aug. 22nd, 2025 03:10 pmsovayIt is no discredit to a warhorse of crime fiction like The Gaunt Stranger (1938) that its ending surprised me the most Doylistically. From my twenty-first-century vantage, it may be even more delightful than it would have played at the time.
My chances of coming to it unspoiled then, of course, would have been basically nil. It was the third screen and second sound version of its popular source material, the 1925 Edgar Wallace novel of the same name which had been definitively rewritten following its smash stage run as The Ringer (1926), so called after the alias of its central figure, the elusive master of disguise whose legal identity of Henry Arthur Milton has never helped Scotland Yard get a fix on his movements, his intentions, or his face. "Don't they call him the Ringer because he rings the changes on himself? Why, in Deptford they say he can even change the color of his eyes." What they've said for two years at the Yard is that he died trying to outswim a bullet in Sydney Harbour, but recently his reputation has disconcertingly resurfaced in the Karswell-like card accompanying the delivery of a wreath of lilies to a caddish crook of a London lawyer: "R.I.P. To the Memory of Maurice Meister, who will depart this life on the seventeenth of November. —'The Ringer.'" Copycat or resurrection, the threat has to be taken seriously. The smooth solicitor who doubles as an informer and a notoriously uncaught fence has on his hands, too, the suicide of the previous in his string of pretty secretaries, the Ringer's own sister. The forty-eight-hour deadline runs out on the anniversary of her death. Even if it's just some local villain trading on the scandal to raise a scare, the authorities can't take the chance of not scrambling round-the-clock protection for the victim-elect, devoting their slim margin for error to trying to outthink an adversary they have only the sketchiest, most contradictory clues toward, pointing as much to a runaround as to the unenviable prospect of the real, shape-shifting Ringer, who like all the best phantoms could be standing quietly at the elbow of the law all the while. "King Street! He'd walk on Regent Street. If he felt that way, he'd come right here to Scotland Yard and never turn a hair."
Properly a thriller rather than a fair-play detective story, The Gaunt Stranger has less of a plot than a mixed assortment of red herrings to be strewn liberally whenever the audience is in danger of guessing right; the tight cast renders it sort of the cop-shop equivalent of a country house mystery while the convolutions build to the point of comedy even as the clock ticks down to a dead serious stop. Christie-like, it has an excuse for its slip-sliding tone. Decent, dedicated, even a bit of an underdog with this case landed in his lap by divisional inconvenience, Detective Inspector Alan Wembury (Patrick Barr) sums up the problem with it: "If the Ringer does bump Meister off, he'll be doing a public service." The most extra-diegetically law-abiding viewer may see his point. With his silken sadist's voice and his smile folded like a knife, Meister (Wilfred Lawson) is the kind of bounder of the first water who even in nerve-racked protective custody, distracting himself from the pendulum slice of the hours with stiff drinks and gramophone records of Wagner, still finds time to toy with the well-bred, hard-up siblings of Mary and Johnny Lenley (Patricia Roc and Peter Croft), cultivating the one as his grateful secretary in brazen reprise of his old tricks and maneuvering the other into blowing his ticket of leave before he can talk his sister out of the trap. "Have you ever seen a weasel being kind to a rabbit?" Offered a year's remission on his sentence if he helps the police out, sarkily skittish second-story man Sam Hackett (Sonnie Hale) wants no part of this farrago of arch-criminals and threats from beyond the grave just because he once happened to share digs with the Ringer and drew the short straw of catching a more or less unobstructed view of the man; it accords him the dubious honor of the best lead on the case and he makes sure to state for the record as he resigns himself to the role, "Give my kindest regards to the Ringer and tell him I highly recommend rat poison." The audience might as well sit back and genre-savvily enjoy the ride. Should we trust the credentials of the glowering DI Bliss (John Longden), freshly returned from Australia on the supposed track of the Ringer's widow and grown such a mustache in his five years abroad that even his former collar doesn't recognize him until he's flashed his badge? Since the order for the funereal flowers was cabled from her stateroom aboard the liner Baronia, should we presume that Cora Ann Milton (Louise Henry) smuggled her living husband into the country or that she's the real mastermind of the plot against Meister, effectively impersonating her dead man to avenge his sister? The entrance she makes at the Flanders Lane station is as striking as her dark, insouciant looks or her American accent, too shrewd to be written off as a mere moll; stepping out of the mirror-door that leads so conveniently for a receiver of stolen goods down to the brick-arched river, she gives the locked-in lawyer the shock of a revenger's ghost herself. "Don't worry. I'm alone." Not only because one of his cherished classical records has played instead an ominous bulletin from the Ringer—a cold theatrical voice, as impossible to trace as greasepaint—the proceedings begin to take on a haunted-house quality, not unbefitting a film whose most important character heading into the home stretch is still Schrödinger's dead. At 71 minutes and fluttering out fast, rest assured it will not sober up too much for break-ins, fake-outs, or the dry commentary of Dr. Anthony Lomond (Alexander Knox), the division's irreplaceably cantankerous amateur criminologist who was introduced waving off a request for his medical opinion with the time-honored "Och, Wembury, I'm not a doctor, I'm a police surgeon. Call me in when he's been murdered." Grey-spry, he has a catlike habit of tucking his feet up on unexpected furniture, briar-smoking like a fumarole. Tragedy tomorrow, eccentricity tonight.
( You're the only doctor I've met who puts his faith in patent medicines. )
Despite its programmer values, The Gaunt Stranger has a quirkily important pedigree: in the clever titles of theatrical posters caught in a passing constable's torch-flash, I spotted Sidney Gilliat as the author of the fleetly tangled screenplay and Ronald Neame as the DP who made more out of low light than the studio sets, but did not realize until after the fact that it was the very first film produced at Ealing under the auspices of Michael Balcon. I had known it was the first screen credit of Alex Knox. I don't know what about his face made casting directors want to stick a mustache and at least ten years' worth of stage grey on it, but he was playing middle-aged again when he reappeared for Ealing in a small, astringent, bookkeeperly role in the next year's Cheer Boys Cheer (1939), now regarded thanks to its plot of a small traditional brewery wilily outwitting its heavier-weight corporate competitor as the forerunner of the classic post-war Ealing comedies. By 1940 he had been collected by Hollywood from Broadway and I don't see how not to wonder if under less transatlantic circumstances he might have continued with Ealing into the '40's and their splendidly weird array of wartime films. Or pulled a John Clements and stuck for most of his life to the stage: I have been calling him a shape-changer because it was obviously one of his gifts and his inclination—and in hindsight, something of a joke on this movie—but it makes it very difficult to guess seriously where he could have ended up. In any case, the existence in this timeline of The Gaunt Stranger on out-of-print Region 2 DVD makes me all the more grateful that someone just stuck it up on Dailymotion. It's a modest B-film, not a mislaid gem, but any number of movies of that class have infinitely improved my life. The title pertains in no way to the action. "And don't be so darned sure there's nothing to be afraid of at Scotland Yard." This shadow brought to you by my pretty backers at Patreon.
My chances of coming to it unspoiled then, of course, would have been basically nil. It was the third screen and second sound version of its popular source material, the 1925 Edgar Wallace novel of the same name which had been definitively rewritten following its smash stage run as The Ringer (1926), so called after the alias of its central figure, the elusive master of disguise whose legal identity of Henry Arthur Milton has never helped Scotland Yard get a fix on his movements, his intentions, or his face. "Don't they call him the Ringer because he rings the changes on himself? Why, in Deptford they say he can even change the color of his eyes." What they've said for two years at the Yard is that he died trying to outswim a bullet in Sydney Harbour, but recently his reputation has disconcertingly resurfaced in the Karswell-like card accompanying the delivery of a wreath of lilies to a caddish crook of a London lawyer: "R.I.P. To the Memory of Maurice Meister, who will depart this life on the seventeenth of November. —'The Ringer.'" Copycat or resurrection, the threat has to be taken seriously. The smooth solicitor who doubles as an informer and a notoriously uncaught fence has on his hands, too, the suicide of the previous in his string of pretty secretaries, the Ringer's own sister. The forty-eight-hour deadline runs out on the anniversary of her death. Even if it's just some local villain trading on the scandal to raise a scare, the authorities can't take the chance of not scrambling round-the-clock protection for the victim-elect, devoting their slim margin for error to trying to outthink an adversary they have only the sketchiest, most contradictory clues toward, pointing as much to a runaround as to the unenviable prospect of the real, shape-shifting Ringer, who like all the best phantoms could be standing quietly at the elbow of the law all the while. "King Street! He'd walk on Regent Street. If he felt that way, he'd come right here to Scotland Yard and never turn a hair."
Properly a thriller rather than a fair-play detective story, The Gaunt Stranger has less of a plot than a mixed assortment of red herrings to be strewn liberally whenever the audience is in danger of guessing right; the tight cast renders it sort of the cop-shop equivalent of a country house mystery while the convolutions build to the point of comedy even as the clock ticks down to a dead serious stop. Christie-like, it has an excuse for its slip-sliding tone. Decent, dedicated, even a bit of an underdog with this case landed in his lap by divisional inconvenience, Detective Inspector Alan Wembury (Patrick Barr) sums up the problem with it: "If the Ringer does bump Meister off, he'll be doing a public service." The most extra-diegetically law-abiding viewer may see his point. With his silken sadist's voice and his smile folded like a knife, Meister (Wilfred Lawson) is the kind of bounder of the first water who even in nerve-racked protective custody, distracting himself from the pendulum slice of the hours with stiff drinks and gramophone records of Wagner, still finds time to toy with the well-bred, hard-up siblings of Mary and Johnny Lenley (Patricia Roc and Peter Croft), cultivating the one as his grateful secretary in brazen reprise of his old tricks and maneuvering the other into blowing his ticket of leave before he can talk his sister out of the trap. "Have you ever seen a weasel being kind to a rabbit?" Offered a year's remission on his sentence if he helps the police out, sarkily skittish second-story man Sam Hackett (Sonnie Hale) wants no part of this farrago of arch-criminals and threats from beyond the grave just because he once happened to share digs with the Ringer and drew the short straw of catching a more or less unobstructed view of the man; it accords him the dubious honor of the best lead on the case and he makes sure to state for the record as he resigns himself to the role, "Give my kindest regards to the Ringer and tell him I highly recommend rat poison." The audience might as well sit back and genre-savvily enjoy the ride. Should we trust the credentials of the glowering DI Bliss (John Longden), freshly returned from Australia on the supposed track of the Ringer's widow and grown such a mustache in his five years abroad that even his former collar doesn't recognize him until he's flashed his badge? Since the order for the funereal flowers was cabled from her stateroom aboard the liner Baronia, should we presume that Cora Ann Milton (Louise Henry) smuggled her living husband into the country or that she's the real mastermind of the plot against Meister, effectively impersonating her dead man to avenge his sister? The entrance she makes at the Flanders Lane station is as striking as her dark, insouciant looks or her American accent, too shrewd to be written off as a mere moll; stepping out of the mirror-door that leads so conveniently for a receiver of stolen goods down to the brick-arched river, she gives the locked-in lawyer the shock of a revenger's ghost herself. "Don't worry. I'm alone." Not only because one of his cherished classical records has played instead an ominous bulletin from the Ringer—a cold theatrical voice, as impossible to trace as greasepaint—the proceedings begin to take on a haunted-house quality, not unbefitting a film whose most important character heading into the home stretch is still Schrödinger's dead. At 71 minutes and fluttering out fast, rest assured it will not sober up too much for break-ins, fake-outs, or the dry commentary of Dr. Anthony Lomond (Alexander Knox), the division's irreplaceably cantankerous amateur criminologist who was introduced waving off a request for his medical opinion with the time-honored "Och, Wembury, I'm not a doctor, I'm a police surgeon. Call me in when he's been murdered." Grey-spry, he has a catlike habit of tucking his feet up on unexpected furniture, briar-smoking like a fumarole. Tragedy tomorrow, eccentricity tonight.
( You're the only doctor I've met who puts his faith in patent medicines. )
Despite its programmer values, The Gaunt Stranger has a quirkily important pedigree: in the clever titles of theatrical posters caught in a passing constable's torch-flash, I spotted Sidney Gilliat as the author of the fleetly tangled screenplay and Ronald Neame as the DP who made more out of low light than the studio sets, but did not realize until after the fact that it was the very first film produced at Ealing under the auspices of Michael Balcon. I had known it was the first screen credit of Alex Knox. I don't know what about his face made casting directors want to stick a mustache and at least ten years' worth of stage grey on it, but he was playing middle-aged again when he reappeared for Ealing in a small, astringent, bookkeeperly role in the next year's Cheer Boys Cheer (1939), now regarded thanks to its plot of a small traditional brewery wilily outwitting its heavier-weight corporate competitor as the forerunner of the classic post-war Ealing comedies. By 1940 he had been collected by Hollywood from Broadway and I don't see how not to wonder if under less transatlantic circumstances he might have continued with Ealing into the '40's and their splendidly weird array of wartime films. Or pulled a John Clements and stuck for most of his life to the stage: I have been calling him a shape-changer because it was obviously one of his gifts and his inclination—and in hindsight, something of a joke on this movie—but it makes it very difficult to guess seriously where he could have ended up. In any case, the existence in this timeline of The Gaunt Stranger on out-of-print Region 2 DVD makes me all the more grateful that someone just stuck it up on Dailymotion. It's a modest B-film, not a mislaid gem, but any number of movies of that class have infinitely improved my life. The title pertains in no way to the action. "And don't be so darned sure there's nothing to be afraid of at Scotland Yard." This shadow brought to you by my pretty backers at Patreon.
All Superheroes Need PR by Elizabeth Stephens
Aug. 22nd, 2025 05:50 pmsmartbitches_feed
This guest review is from Danielle Fritz. Danielle is a former librarian who has a special affection for children’s lit and books about the funeral industry. She first cut her criticism teeth as a fanfic writer. A resident of the upper midwest, she’s learned to love beer and tater tot casserole and tolerate long winters. Most nights will find her cuddled up with her pups and wearing out her wrists with yet another crochet project.
…
CW: Mild violence, accounts of childhood abuse, vomiting, PTSD, trauma, and anxiety.
This came up on my radar in a recent Hide Your Wallet. Something about the premise drew me in, though I’m not typically drawn to super hero romances or fake dating tropes, and I quickly purchased a copy. I did see the first Avengers in theaters six times when it came out in 2012, and embarrassingly went to a sparsely attended midnight DVD release party to get myself a copy, so maybe there’s some residual affection for comic book heroes deep in the cold cockles of my heart? But this is not a Joss Whedon special — there are plenty of multi-dimensional non-White characters and far fewer quippy one liners.
Vanessa Theriot is on top of the world. At 34 she heads her own PR firm, and they’ve gotten the opportunity to pitch to a huge potential client. Roland Casteel, aka Pyro, a fiery super hero, is a free agent. At the start of the book, he’s being courted by the two Supernatural organizations that sponsor the Heroes and Villains respectively, the Champions of Earth Collation and the Villains Network of America. It’s similar to an NFL trade. The Champions has selected Vanessa’s proposal as one of several they’re showing Pyro. Her small firm is unlikely to be chosen in comparison to the large corporations also making pitches, but she’s hopeful nonetheless.
Vanessa and her team are confident in their pitch, even if Vanessa herself is on the edge of an anxiety attack ahead of the super’s arrival. But the moment Roland enters the conference room he demands Vanessa vacate, immediately. Something about her presence unsettles the super. Utterly embarrassed and completely terrified, Vanessa flees, clumsily causing a chaotic storm of spilled coffee and dropped paper in her wake.
Cue day drinking in disappointment with her colleagues, being cornered by Roland at the bar, and vomiting all over his sweatsuit.
But the next morning Vanessa is greeted by the CEO of the Champions of Earth Collation, the heroes’ organization outside her door with a 10-year contract. Roland has insisted on working with her PR firm, and furthermore, work directly with Vanessa specifically. He’s especially interested in the Lois Lane clause, which is a brilliant campaign that gives Roland a faux partner to soften his image and build excitement around his personal life. He wants Vanessa to be the Lois to his Superman.
But it’s soon revealed that Roland is under the impression that the agreement means more than just dating. He intends to marry Vanessa.
As he continues to hold my hand and stare at me, his lips tilt down into an uncomfortable grimace. “You never have to talk to anybody in this building—or anywhere else—ever again, Vanessa, but I expect my wife to talk to me and, when she does, to call me Roland, not Mr. Casteel.”
“Your wife?” I glance around, feeling deeply uncomfortable holding his hand like this knowing he has a wife. How did that not come up in our research? “You have a wife?”
He freezes. “Yes. You. Or did you not understand the terms of our deal?”
My jaw unhinges, and my eyes flutter, and my knees go weak, and Mr. Casteel curses as he lunges to catch me.
After some negotiation, they come to an agreement. Vanessa will pretend to be Roland’s girlfriend for 4 years of the 10 year contract. They’ll go to events together, partake in photo ops, etc, and Roland will move into her home. He’s hard-headed, but willing to go along with the changes Vanessa’s team suggests to rehab his image…
…like changing his name from the more menacing “Pyro” to a slightly softer “Wyvern,” and wearing a purple costume that compliments his pink-orange eyes (yes, pink and/or orange depending on his mood, y’all this books has some wild moments).
Roland is a deeply intense character. There’s a hardness to him that’s immediately off-putting. He’s not cold in his intensity, either, it’s appropriately fiery given his super powers. When he first appears, he’s so disheveled it’s alarming — he’s wearing a shirt with a severely stretched out collar, sweatpants with holes in the knees, scuffed boots with the soles practically falling off, his hair and beard are a hot mess. He’s blunt, beyond the point of being rude.
We only get a handful of chapters from his POV in comparison to the bulk of the book being in Vanessa’s, and it’s immediately clear he is utterly obsessed with Vanessa and has no idea what to do with himself. He’s a lot for a character like Vanessa, who had a childhood full of abuse and suffers from long term ramifications, including PTSD and anxiety. Roland’s whole energy can be triggering at times for her. But throughout the text he works hard to understand her trauma and change his spikey nature to become a safe space for Vanessa.
At times, he comes across as demanding or controlling. But this doesn’t turn Vanessa off; in fact, it becomes clear over time that Roland’s commands are usually a means of centering her when PTSD or anxiety starts sending her towards a spiral. It can be clumsy at times, but I considered that his ham-handed behavior might simply be the only way he initially knows how to react to someone he loves being in distress.
I think this could give a lot of readers the ick, but I found it an interesting dynamic that sort of sits between super liberated heroines vs the omega type passive heroines. Vanessa sets boundaries quickly, but she appreciates Roland’s hyper-protective nature and diligent observation of her emotions. After a deeply traumatic childhood, she’s grateful to have a partner who is deeply obsessed with her. It wouldn’t work for me, but it works for her.
I appreciate that we get more backstory from Vanessa beyond “abusive mother” and “suffers from PTSD.” She’s a wiz at all things PR, a very strong business leader, and much beloved by her team. No one seems to look down on her for her shyness or occasionally awkwardness (though a reader might get secondhand embarrassment).
We’re quickly introduced to Vanessa’s large adoptive family, who she’s been with since the age of 12 after coming to them through the foster care system. If I have one complaint about the characters in this book, it’s that there are 5 brothers in Vanessa’s family and they are indistinct and interchangeable. I get reasons why an author would establish a large family for a character, but it’s ineffective to me if they’re kind of just a blur rather than unique individuals, unless the blur is set up for comedic purposes. I think giving Vanessa just two or three siblings might’ve been more effective. But otherwise I like the positive representation of foster families and the presence of her loving parents.
There was some great trans rep through Vanessa’s best friend and chief marketing officer, Margerie. She is a down-to-earth, vivacious character who is extremely competent in their career. We don’t see any transphobia…
…only one instance of Vanessa expressing worry that someone might have reservations about dating Margerie, which are quickly banished. I loved that we got to see Margerie flirt a bit with one of Vanessa’s brothers. There was some great sexual tension and I hope maybe book 3 will focus on them as a couple?
In regards to world building, we’re not getting Tolkien levels of exposition, just enough to grasp what this world looks like with super heroes under contract to corporations. I was definitely left wanting more details about the way these organizations worked, and I’m hopeful the follow up books will give us more insight into how the rival heroes and villains companies operate.
I personally prefer not to be spoon fed world-establishing information. However, we do get some moments where characters just sort of internally dialog with themselves backstory that might’ve otherwise been shown vs told. This mostly crops up when discussing the origins of the supers. Within the first chapter, Vanessa explains how 22 years ago 48 children with abnormal gifts landed throughout the world. Some of these alien children were given to foster families, others were kept in government facilities and examined by the Supernatural Defense Department. It’s definitely a topic that is ripe for exploration in future books. Much like with Superman, there’s more emphasis on framing the “hero” part of these characters over the “alien.”
All in all, this book was a fun romp. There were some truly wild moments of alien biology I won’t spoil, but they were more amusing than horrific. Roland and Vanessa’s tension and chemistry was truly delicious. Their physical relationship was a bit of a slow burn but well worth the wait. As I said, I think some readers might be turned off by their dynamic, but I found the departure more compelling and, while it wouldn’t work for me personally, I was very happy to read how well that dynamic worked for Roland and Vanessa.
Book Review: The Golden Compass
Aug. 22nd, 2025 01:12 pmosprey_archerlittlerhymes and I have for years tossed around the possibility of a buddy reread of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, which I have resisted because I hated The Amber Spyglass so much. However, I finally cracked and we reread The Golden Compass, and it turns out that it’s just as flawless as I remembered it. How? How is it so good? Nothing should be ALLOWED to be this good, particularly not something that is going to go on to have disappointing sequels. First of all, the worldbuilding is just so good. The daemons are a stroke of genius: what child DOESN’T want to have an adorable companion animal who is with you at all times and adores you and also changes shape until you reach puberty, at which point it will assume a shape that reveals your True Nature? And of course we all imagine having cool daemons who are cats or foxes or hawks or whatnot, not boring dog daemons like servants have.
(Pullman: not a dog person.)
But the daemons are only one part of Pullman’s deliciously crafted world. Over the course of the story Lyra moves through a variety of different environments, the stately masculine luxury of Jordan College in Oxford and the homey gyptians boats and the wildness of the North, and they all feel real and well-developed and lived in, with little hints thrown in about life in other parts of the world (like Lee Scoresby’s Texas) that make you feel that here indeed there is a whole world that extends in all directions, and Lyra is just moving through a small part of it.
Also, the plot moves along at a good clip. Pullman accomplishes all this rich, lush worldbuilding so economically, because we’re only ever spending a few chapters in one place before we rush on. I remember the Jordan College section going on forever! But it’s just the first four chapters or so, and then Mrs. Coulter whisks Lyra off into high society, another section that I remember lasting forever (in a good way, I should add; I remember these sections lasting forever because I never wanted them to end), but it’s only a couple of chapters before Lyra’s on the run, having realized that Mrs. Coulter is the head of the dreaded Gobblers who have been kidnapping children for who knows what nefarious end?
And from that point on, the action never lets up. She’s on the gyptian boats, she’s going north with the gyptians to save the kidnapped children, she becomes lifelong friends with an armored bear by telling him where to find his stolen armor, and and and one event after another, yet the pace is not breathless, each event gets just enough time to develop its full impact (the scene where Lyra learns what the Gobblers are doing!) and then we move on.
Excellent worldbuilding, excellent plotting, and amazing characterization, too. Lyra is such a fantastic heroine: lively, cunning, a natural leader, rough around the edges and yet with a great compassion underneath. Her daemon Pantalaimon is a perfect foil, cautious if Lyra is taking needless risks, but indomitably brave in the face of struggles that daunt even the usually fearless Lyra.
But it’s not just Lyra. The secondary characters are so well-drawn too, and as with Jordan College and Mrs. Coulter’s flat, I was often surprised how swiftly their sections passed. For instance, Serafina Pekkala only shows up in one chapter! (Of course, she’s talked about far earlier than that.) She’s so vivid in my memory that I was sure it was more than that. Farder Coram, Mrs. Coulter, Lord Asriel: the book is packed with startlingly vivid characters who have stuck with me for years.
I was, I must confess, hoping just a little to see signs of the flaws that would become so apparent in the later books in the trilogy. But no, whatever went wrong went wrong later on. The Golden Compass is pretty close to flawless. Perhaps its only error lies in ending on a sentence that any sequel would be hard-pressed to live up to. What book could possibly capture the possibility inherent in “she walked into the sky”?