Roundup (15/03)

[jaggedwolf]

Reading

No One Can Pronounce My Name by Rakesh Satyal

I have mixed feelings on this one. I liked all the characters. Harit, Ranjana and Prashant were well-drawn and treated with a lovely sense of kindness by the narrative, and I was especially fond of Ranjana. I liked where they all ended up, too, I think I just wasn't fond of how they got there - there was a time-skip at the end that made things feel rather rushed, and while that mostly worked for Ranjana's arc, not getting to see Harit's development after the conference or Prashant making his way back to Kavita felt disappointing. I did really appreciate every new PoV, though, and the way they were fleshed out, which I think only raised my expectations more for the ending.

Next up, Sirens Of Titan. I have no idea what it's about because I'm reading it for a book club at work, so we'll see how that goes.

Other Media

The Starship Iris finale came out the other week and I was very charmed by it, as I expected. All my feelings were thrown on this too long reaction post. Only addition is that I went in to the finale expecting to find a canon-divergence point where the plan fails for some "X years later" fic writing, and instead I find myself writing post-season ensemble shenanigans. I'm already looking forward to season 2!

I finished listening to the sci-fi podcast We Fix Space Junk, where heiress Samantha is in trouble with the law and ends up on repairman Kilner's ship. The two of them are heavily in debt to Automnicon, a corporation that seems to own half the galaxy. Kilner is my favorite, because of course she is - a jaded cyborg who is still surprisingly kind at times. Samantha and Kilner have a lovely, hilarious opposites-working-together dynamic, and I find myself craving some ship fic. There is zero fic of any kind for this fandom. I'll probably end up requesting them in exchanges in hopes of changing that. I have written a small ficlet that I'm debating on cleaning up and posting to AO3 solely to get the fandom wrangled, but eh.

Watched a full episode of Critical Role live for the first time in a while and man, I continue to be so fond of Beauregard. That moment of her knocking the charm off Yasha with Yasha catching her fist and softly saying "sorry" while Beau comically tells her to help the others? Very good content, I would like Ashley back because suddenly I miss the awkward not-really flirting. (Also, Beau can punch at range now! With lightning!)

Also poor Tal, his face looked serious as hell when Cad died, and though it went fine I can't help but feel like it was a waste of resurrection diamonds because Nott did not need to shoot that arrow when she did.

I've also been following along with Cosmoknights - the webcomic's being updated regularly with the full graphic novel out in the fall. I'm enjoying all the colors and the world-building, and I'm curious to see where it goes from here.

Writing

I...apparently have written 7 TSCOSI ficlets since the last time I posted about ficlets here, so I'm just going to link the ficlets page and call it a day.

Switched over from the Dragon Age Fusion AU fic to the post-finale fic for TSCOSI, so between those two, wanting to finish that half-written Critical Role fic and planning to sign myself up for Fandom 5k, I will hopefully be occupied for quite a while, fic-writing wise.

Random Links

The Female Chef Making Japan’s Most Elaborate Cuisine Her Own - I thought this was a sweet profile of a chef's journey to opening the most prominent kaiseki restaurant in Japan, complete with her wife being the sous chef of said restaurant.