I've seen The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden reviewed a few times by some of my favourite BookTubers, but didn't really know what to expect going in - and I'm glad I could be surprised by this book!
It's very much a book in three parts - and the first part really didn't do it for me. I didn't like the characters, I wasn't really interested in the story, and I nearly gave up on it.
But wow - part two was the single hottest lesbian romance I've ever encountered, made particularly effective by the stark contrast drawn between the experience of proximity to someone who repulses you versus someone you're attracted to.
And then - part three - oof! I can't say much about it because I don't want to spoil it, but it definitely brought the depth and the emotion of the story to the fore in some very unexpected ways.
Great book overall, though it took a bit too long to get going and I nearly didn't get to the good stuff!


Rat Queens is a comic series by Kurtis J Wiebe, about a band of female mercenaries going on quests, dealing with feuds against them, slicing up bad guys and getting drunk a lot.
It's pretty funny in places, but also quite crude and very gory.
I also wasn't overly keen on most of the outfits, especially in the hyper-sexualised full-page art spreads at the start of each instalment.
The series was written by men - and it often feels like it's the way certain men wish women would act, rather than being authentic. Several of the illustrators were women, though, so I'm a bit disappointed by that.
I did enjoy it overall - it made me laugh a few times and there were some moments of emotional depth that landed - but I'm not minded to carry on with the series, mostly because it was a bit too gory for me and there wasn't enough to it to get past that.

Here's the final mouse of the SAL:

I did not go downtown today. I had planned ahead and did my usual ‘Saturday shopping’ yesterday. We weren’t supposed to get that much snow, but I thought, just in case. Good thing I did. I had already decided to stay home, but Pip called after he got to work to tell me the roads were a hot mess and that I shouldn’t go out. I didn’t tell him that I answered the phone from back in bed. *g*

I shoveled the sidewalk, did two loads of laundry, hand-washed dishes, finished clearing off/dusting in the dining room, AND THEN GOT OUT my Christmas decorations!! (I can’t believe I have it done earlier than the week before Christmas, lol!), went for a walk with Pip and the dogs, cut up chicken for the dogs' meals, and scooped kitty litter.

I visited mom and stopped at Stewart’s (for gas and milk) on the way home. We had various leftovers for supper. I read fanfic and watched a Hallmark Christmas movie and some HGTV programs. Dr. Pol was my evening background tv.

Temps started out at 28.6(F) and reached 39.9. (By the time I got home from mom’s ~3pm it was already down to 31.1! And the sun was still shining some. I really hate this time of the year.)

We got over 6" of snow (TWC app says 8"), because there was quite a bit more on the sidewalk when I shoveled again this morning. By the time I went down to see mom (after lunch) the roads were clear of snow and just wet, where any remaining snow had melted. And the sun was shining nice and bright, as is often the case after a snowstorm!


Mom Update:

Mom was doing well when I saw her. ( more back here )

Quote:

"Keep good company, read good books, love good things and cultivate soul and body as faithfully as you can"

"Be comforted, dear soul! There is always light behind the clouds."

~ Louisa May Alcott


Cooking Video:

Mel Coop – 3 No Bake Christmas Treats:

https://youtu.be/1jdXBKpiqYA?si=e2lptNUQl1M_fpMy

I haven't been a great friend this month. I've not responded to about 80% of the comments I've gotten since Nov 7th. I've commented on a few posts and that's it. I've read no fanfic and barely any books. I've cleaned nothing. I didn't even realize I was out of insulin until today when I realized after I got back from Jackson. I thought one bag was my short acting humalog but nope it's all long acting toujeo. Now I have to spend time I don't have going back to Jackson tomorrow.

So yeah that's how out of things I am. The only constructive things I did was go to the coffee shop to write (finished another chapter in an upcoming Hazbin wip), hit kroger and cvs for some clove oil (as it occurs to me it can numb my gum and it's antimicrobial). And I managed to change my summer clothes for the winter. I need to ditch about 20 of these old t-shirts.

But there was some joy. Abney Park did something weird and fun a 'choose your own adventure' concert. The fans in the chat told them what game board square to go to as we thread a maze to the space ship and then they'd green screen a background and we had to guess what the song was and then they'd play it. Some of us fans were so damn fast we had the songs before they even gave a clue. It was different and fun.

And it is Science Saturday


Did a NASA telescope really 'see' dark matter? Strange gamma-rays spark bold claims, but scientists urge caution

We May Now Know Why Alzheimer's Erases Memories of Our Loved Ones

Neanderthals cannibalized 'outsider' women and children 45,000 years ago at cave in Belgium

New Diabetes Pill Works as Well as Ozempic For Weight Loss, Trial Finds Probably works similar to Rybelsus which made me so ill

A fossilized foot found 15 years ago belonged to enigmatic human relative that lived alongside Lucy, scientists say

Study Reveals The Anal Sex Techniques Women Love (And You've Never Even Heard Of) No, really and it was a study of thousands

I hit Price Chopper and the Bakery while I was downtown. Later I dropped a book off at the library.

I did two loads of laundry, hand-washed dishes, did some house cleaning (swept kitchen and dining room, further swiffered and mopped dining room, and also dusted some of the furniture in the dining room (still have two items to clear off and dust), went for a couple walks with Pip and the dogs, shoveled the sidewalk, cut up chicken for the dogs' meals, placed a couple of online orders, including Chewy, scooped kitty litter, and showered.

We had leftover turkey and sides for supper. I love Thanksgiving leftovers. I read fanfic. Dr. Pol was my evening background tv.

Temps started out at 30.9(F) and reached 34.5. The forecast called for 1-3 inches of snow during the day and an additional ‘less than an inch’ overnight, but we ended up getting much more than that. Pip shoveled off the deck after we ate (and made sure there was a path to the basement for the garage cats, lol!), and then he blew out the short walking trail. So we all went for a walk in the dark, which is kind of nice when there’s snow on the ground.

ETA: I forgot to include this pic of our visitors last evening!




Mom Update:

Mom sounded okay when I called her, ( more back here )

It's that time of year again! Mine are more like New Year cards as I'm slow to start making them.

If you're on my card list but your mailing address has changed, let me know - replies to this post are screened.

And if you're not on my seasonal cards list and would like to be, also drop me a reply below, with your preferred postal name and address. I send them all over the world, so no worries about that.

FutureLearn

Discover Contemporary Chinese: A Taster Course (Chinese Plus)
Following on from the OpenLearn basic Chinese course, I thought I'd look at this one.  I had hoped it would be a good introduction, but it was well over my head, concentrating on the main courses which the taster was promoting, without providing any assistance.  Even if I'd had some basic Chinese I doubt this would have persuaded me to take a further, paid, course with them.


OpenLearn

Getting Started with German 2 and Getting Started with German 3
Continuing with my aim to at least understand something of German when we're there.  Some of the sections were interesting and helpful, others were not within my general interests, so probably irrelevant, since I'm unlikely to want to know the German for something I don't talk about in English.

Introduction to Planetary Protection
I found this very interesting, although why astronomy appeals to me I have no idea.  It covered all sorts of areas: avoiding bringing potential contamination back from other planets and similar bodies, together with not contaminating planets our spacecraft visit.  In addition there was the clear thought that what we learn from these planets etc should be knowledge available for all and not simply exploited by the powerful.

The Gut Microbiome: Balancing the Body
The importance of what we consume and how it's important to maintain a good balance in our gut microbiome.  Apart from the general biology (which begins to go over my head), there's the effect that other areas can have, including genetics and ageing.  I need to tweak my diet, I think.

If I had a nickel for every episode of Xena where the writers had Ares play the role of Xena's father, I'd have two nickels, which isn't a lot but it is weird. Significantly, 1.20 'Ties That Bind' anticipates some important narrative themes and social stances that the show would continue to develop in later seasons, which gives me more than my two cents to talk about.

[Spoiler warning for 1.20 'Ties That Bind', 3.01 'The Furies', 4.03 'A Family Affair', and 6.04 'Who's Gurkhan?']



In 'Ties That Bind', we glimpse Xena's childhood and observe how Ares operates as an Olympian god, both of which points the show returns to in 3.01 'The Furies'. We also get a glimpse into how and why Xena reverts to warlord-style violence, and how she, Ares, and the narrative recognize that the key to her staying different this time is...Gabrielle. Plot execution could be rougher in S1, and individual character dynamics were not fully fleshed out in some cases, but it's notable when S1 pulls off themes that do harmonize well with later seasons.

'Ties That Bind' does well on a few points here:

( I didn't say it would be easy. )

Quote:


"Make the universe your companion, always bearing in mind the true nature of things-mountains and rivers, trees and grasses, and humanity-and enjoy the falling blossoms and the scattering leaves."

"Go to the pine if you want to learn about the pine, or to the bamboo if you want to learn about the bamboo. And in doing so, you must leave your subjective preoccupation with yourself. Otherwise you impose yourself on the object and you do not learn."

~ Matsuo Basho



Cooking Video:

Food Wishes – Crispy Blooming Onion Fritter:

https://youtu.be/lTHT0Enjsu4?si=rJ40E3DPaaDrRXFa

Didn't really shop unless you count the liquor store (I do). My friend MKF wanted to meet up at Tim Horton's in Athens. We tried to recapture the old Nano energy this year. No one showed up us two but that's okay. We're enough. We're planning to try again in Feb (though that might have to be Saturday afternoons or online). We actually spend more time talking than writing but ah well.

My throat and tooth still hurt. Fun times but I picked up a Skeletonwitch pizza in Athens and taunted my mother with it (I need to buy her one on my way home)

But here's the weird thing. As I left today my landlord's truck was out there with a trailer holding a washing machine...wait? You are putting machines IN our apartment. I DO NOT have one. Now I need to make another phone call. I REALLY need to get my shit together tomorrow and Sunday and clean up this place so I can get him in here.

Also Hazbin Hotel is now officially my most spendy fandom since the Buffyverse (which still wears the trading money for magic beans crown) It needs to have less cool merch.

And now on to the Fannish 50 friday recs. Look, I wrote a thing.


Title: Never Gonna Give You Up

Summary: Angel is gone. Husk disappears into a bottle and stays there until he swims to rock bottom. Determined not to leave Angel with his abusers, Husk sobers enough and proposes his plan to the rest of the hotel. They’ll help him. They may already have plans he was too drunk to notice. All Husk knows he’s never going to give Angel up and desert him.

Rating: teen

Notes: This is open ended (because I’m writing it for a weekly challenge) and certainly won’t be my last speculation on how the hotel crew get Angel back from the Vees.

Content warning – alcoholism and addiction references.

Written for Spikesgirl58’s six word challenge. The words were Faded, Odd, Coherent, Consign, Rise, & Dwell. Also written for the allbingo prompt of Love is putting someone else's needs before your own (a quote by Olaf in Frozen).
Also written for the lyrical titles bingo challenge for the prompt, a meme song. I chose the GOAT of meme songs Never Gonna Give You Up by Rick Astley. Ha, that’s right, I just Rickrolled my whole readership (wearing an Alastor grin right now, or at the very least, Rosie’s).

( Story at above link and under here. Spoilers for the ending of Season 2 )


Dancing In The Dark Hazbin Hotel

Careless Torchwood

Quietly Comforting FAKE

Unexpected Audience Torchwood


There And Gone Torchwood

🪨💥 The Murderbot Diaries

Let the Sorrow Go, Its Half the Battle Hazbin Hotel

Jin Ling's many uncles 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV)魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù

First Steps Toward Freedom Teen Wolf

Drunken Confession Torchwood

Title: Reawakening
Rating: G
Type: Fic
Size/length/word count etc.: 803
Prompt: 041: Dove
Fandom/Ship: The Kingdom; Yang Dongsik | Louis, Jang Yunho | Arthur
Notes/Warnings:
Summary Dreams lead Dongsik to those he’s spent centuries with.

( Read more... )

Find the table with the list of fics here

The Seven Rings by Nora Roberts is the completion of her Lost Brides trilogy, which I've been waiting a year for - and it didn't disappoint! I love the set of characters working together to break the curse in these books - even if they didn't actually properly start working on that until 90% through the third book... I'm sure a lot of readers will have been frustrated throughout this series by the lengthy, drawn-out, mostly mundane nature of the story - but I actually really enjoyed all the stuff with the pets and the characters working on their businesses and the gradual romance and the sailing and the small town community building, etc. The periodic intrusions of the evil ghost were what annoyed me more than anything because it was just so repetitive. A character would be alone in the house, the ghost would frighten or threaten them (often by trapping them in one of the rooms and throwing things at them), they would escape, the other characters would rush round to help and arrive after the fact, and the affected character would explain what happened - over and over and over again, which did get a bit wearing.

And then, when we finally got to the breaking of the curse, it was all over extremely quickly and felt way too easy, with not nearly enough aftermath. Still, those minor annoyances aside, I really enjoyed this whole series overall, and there was a lot to love about how everything got wrapped up in this instalment. I've completed another Nora Roberts trilogy with a very similar format and plot in the interim, so I may not be visiting more of her back catalogue for a while, but I'll definitely give the next trilogy a try when the first one inevitably comes out in November 2026.


The Skeleton Key by Erin Kelly has been on my wishlist for a while, since someone at a reading retreat recommended it to me ages ago - and then I spotted it in a local charity shop last week and immediately read it, since I was looking for a book to round out the month.

It tells the story of Frank Churcher, who writes a book of imagined folklore, with a complex puzzle built into it in the 1970s, which captures the imagination of a group of treasure hunters, who get dangerously obsessed with solving the mystery. This puts various of Frank's family in danger over the ensuing decades, until he decides to stage a media event around the fiftieth anniversary of the book's publication and things derail even further in unexpected ways.

The book is less thriller-y than I expected - in a good way - and much more layered and involving, with a split timeline gradually building up the history of events, and complex family relationships evolving and devolving over the course of the book.

I really liked the main POV character, Nell, Frank's oldest daughter, and the development of her arc with her foster daughter was my favourite aspect of the book. The main mystery was still compelling, though it got a bit too drawn out towards the end. Things didn't resolve the way I was expecting, though, and there were some complex moral aspects to the conclusion that were really interesting.

This kept me engaged throughout and I read it pretty quickly, though I was never tempted to skim.

I literally feel at least 5x better than usual. I don't know if it's because the weather is good or because my hormones are just right, or because the new med is working. I've been on it for 2 weeks, so it's probably the med. WOW. The difference is so striking.

Another poor month, only 6,700 words, bringing my yearly total to just over 110k, so hopefully I will still reach the 120k.

A lot of what I've written has been drabbles, so time to word ratio is poor.  This includes my allbingo Fairy Tales entry, with The Death of Sir Roderick (Sherlock Holmes), a casefic in 9 drabbles.

Nothing more to share this month - there's a couple of ficlets written but not as yet posted to AO3 - they'll be up next month.

And I've just sent my Yuletide fic off to beta.

So, rather like my word count for the month, this is short and sweet!

✨ holiday love meme 2025 ✨
my thread here

continuing the yearly trend of disappearing for ages only to reappear asking for compliments, as i do