A.R. Jarvis's Blog, page 8

Loves Landscapes Roundup #5

It’s not that I didn’t read this week, it’s that I didn’t write comments for the mediocre or terrible ones. I warned you I would do that.

Accidental Karma by Katie’s Crewman: A sweet, sweet tale of a skater boy and a doctor.

Meridian by Gabbo de la Parra: An intriguing paranormal post-apocalyptic sort of tale.

Mad Passion by Naaju Rorrete: Bit like reading a train wreck, but I enjoyed it, if for all the wrong reasons.

Assassin’s Love: a brief yet good tale of an assassin finding love, which you never would have guessed from the title.

Taking a Risk on Love by K. Mason: A period piece set in France, involving a tutor and his student, which is not usually my thing, but it worked well in this case.

Not Just a Kiss by Jennah Scott: an innocent love story of two snow leopard-shifters; an emotionally abusive, manipulative, and controlling alpha, and the submissive who gives up his pride, sense of self, and chance to earn a place in the community to be with him. Oops, spoiler.

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Let’s talk about that last one for a bit. If your mate goes around insisting that you drop out of the event that would establish your place and social standing for the rest of your lives, he’s not really a good mate. If he claims it’s because he “wants you safe” even though there are hardly ever causalities, he really just doesn’t want you to race. If he points out that being his mate will provide you with automatic status (especially when the society has mixed ideas about what that means), he really just wants to isolate you and be in complete control of your life. If he claims to be helping you practice, but really just sits around watching you all the time, he’s an asshole who just wants to distract and not help you at all. If he promises he’ll keep his hands off unless you initiate something, and then goes petting your cheek and kissing you three pages later, you’ll never be able to trust him to respect your desires. If you see inside his mind and come to know that every interaction involves at least one mental comment about how he has to hold himself back from ‘taking you right there,’ even though you’ve made clear you don’t want him, acknowledge that some day he probably will.

If he repeats his points about wanting you out of The Event even when he says he won’t object, he’s still objecting. And if you are starting to come around to his way of thinking and mention it, only to find that he plays devil’s advocate, realize that that is all he is doing. And if he says he’s going to change and not be like his father, but then consistently fails to do so, accept that he never will.

So if you wake up one morning after having sex with your destined mate, and start to see the world in a ‘different way’ which includes submitting yourself to him and his protection (and to ‘protecting him’), then congratulations; you’ve just been turned into a emotional domestic abuse victim! Good luck sorting that out, and I’m so fucking sorry the gods handed you that for a mate bond.

It also alarms me that an author can write a story that’s basically a check list for NOT GOOD signs in a relationship without realizing it. Is this something that Hollywood drops on us? Romance novels? Eons of gender oppression? Usually it’s just a Thing or two, or a common motif that disappoints, but is clearly used because it’s Expected. Like…men hanging around when they aren’t actually wanted, but then they become wanted. It’s horrible, we should teach men that No means NO. And that was in this story in a way, but the refusal to accept NO was because they were Soul Mates–and it’s coupled with all this other “I just want you safe/will provide for you/you won’t do very well in the Event anyway” crap that just goes way beyond what I can blame on Hollywood or even Twilight, yet is so innocently used…I don’t know, man, I just don’t know.

Loves Landscapes Roundup #4

I feel like I’ve been marking all the stories as being moderate or less that that, which I also feel is a bit unfair. I don’t want to give anyone the impression that I’m not entirely enjoying all of these stories, because I love them. I love that they exist, and I love that so many people have taken the time and effort to write something for free, and something that also (in its own way) supports a cause that everyone of us (well, me and the authors anyway, not sure about you) holds dear. I love that I can come home from a crappy day at work and curl up with a currently endless stream of gay fiction, and know that I’m not alone in loving it.

I also love that there’s such a huge spread of quality in the stories, which might seem weird because I’m so picky with what I read, but it’s not because it means that there’s less regulation in who gets in to write a Thing, and new authors get a chance to be seen, and get support from new fans, and get experience, which is what all authors need (including myself).

So don’t think for a moment that I’m not loving every moment even of the stories I don’t love as much as I love the others.

I would also like to mention that I’ve overall found that more of these stories are worth reading than the ones I read last year, when I think I skipped at least half for poor quality. Perhaps I’m just more determined this year, but it’s encouraging somehow.

I would also like to note that I’ve started putting in links for the best best stories–the ones that you should go read right away. But for the others, here is so you can find them.

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Ashes of Life by Andrew Q Gordon: It started well, but then devolved into mediocrity when the characters spent all their time being bleedingly, cloyingly perfect for each other.

William’s Whimsy by Susan Beck: sweet, slightly odd. Had a few disappointing moments, but overall worth a read.

Until the Bitter End by L.L. Bucknor: A tale of interracial love. Decent, though perhaps not fantastic– which I am running out of ways to say uniquely for each story. Not sure what that could mean, but it seems significant.

Zippadacious by AR Noble: Despite our shared initials, I did not find this AR’s work to be worth finishing. Although I did hit 50%, when my usual give up point seems to be 30%. Take that as you will.

In Your Veins by S.J. Eller: Somewhat improbably sweet, but not outside the bounds of reality. Otherwise decent.

Randy’s Ghost by William Tate: Hmm. Time travel, which is always iffy, and here was awfully scatterbrained. Plus there was way to much angsty fatalism. It was only a little better than okay.

Science and Fiction by Ray Van Fox and Jordan S. Brock: Finally one worth the time spent reading it! And a bit more besides! It is a bit heavy on the technobabble, but the focus is on the sweet romance between the absent minded scientist, and the military medic who finds him in the woods, so I didn’t mind the technobabble, even when it got out of hand.

 

Weekly Round Up #3

Because I was still in a mourning funk this week, I didn’t read a whole lot–well, I did (I sure as hell didn’t write, anyway), but it was an online novel I still need to review, so there’s not a whole lot of these stories to comment on this week.

And looking at my reviews of them (written directly after having read them), it looks like they were on the sorry side as a whole this week. I did especially like two of them for being cute and sweet (Touching Narcissus and A Second Chance for Three)–despite them being less than stellar in terms of technical writery stuff. And Elevation was simply all-around good, of course, but as a whole it’s an underwhelming set of stories I comment on for you today:

Elevation by Jenna Jones: A slow but very good tale of star-crossed lovers (or something like that).

Touching Narcissus by Jamie Fessenden: A ridiculous doppelganger tale. The writing style was…heavy on the telling side, but it was saved by its sheer absurdity.

Dogwatch by Kiernan Kelly: eh.

Taken From Him by Jackie Nacht: Even more meh than the previous one.

All or Nothing by C.J. Anthony: I’m not big on bears or agree gaps, but this managed to be sweet nonetheless.

Never Cry Wolf by Phoebe Sean: A decent story if you like werewolves, especially with destined mates. If you’re not big on weres, then it’s okay, but weak in the plot department.

A Second Chance for Three by Christa Tomlinson: Slightly clunky in terms of prose, but very sweet overall. A heartwarming little threesome.

Fairies and Folk of Ireland

Probably not relevant.

Fairies and Folk of Ireland was written by William Henry Frost in or around 1900, yet for all its age, it’s a rather modern story line. Basically there’s these two families in Ireland, who decide to move to the US, and when they do, their local Rath (uh…kingdom? troupe? hall?) of fairies decide to go with them.

The families settle into New York, and the fair–sorry, the Good People settle into Central Park, but end up trying to switch the children of the two families for changelings. They succeed with the boy, but fail with the girl, and the rest of the story is about how that is dealt with.

So a straightforward, modern What if Fairies Are Real? tale, but set back at least a century.

That’s pretty interesting, and the way the traditional folk tales are interwoven into the story is interesting (as are the tales themselves, although they were borrowed rather than written by the author, and I recognized most, if not all, of them).

But it’s also terribly old-fashioned in the way the girl is oh-so-perfect, and the boy is so terribly smart at math or whatever. Plus the…meat of the story is all in the second half.

And then there was the breaking of the fourth wall stuff–which I realize is comic-book speak, but I can’t think of the term for it in proper writing, but where the narrator who is narrating this third-person tale breaks into the story and talks to the reader. But in this case the narrator seems to mostly be negging the reader. “Oh, you’d be so beautiful if you were only six inches tall; no one could see your imperfections.” Or suchlike. Weird, backhanded insulting compliments that made me wonder why I was reading the damn book in the first place. I mean, if you’re going to insult me for being ignorant about things fictional, I’m going to go talk to my cousins, grandma. Geeze.

I wouldn’t read it again, and I’m not sure I would have read it if I’d known what the content was beforehand, but I don’t really regret having done so, and there’s plenty of things I’ve ‘read’ in deeper skim-mode, so I guess it…was okay.

Into the Wastelands

Into the Wastelands by Gwynn Marssen was another longer story I read from the MM Goodreads group. I didn’t specifically choose this one–the last one I selected because I knew I liked that author, but Into the Wastelands I read because it was the first longer story my kindle presented. I’m not entirely sure what order my kindle put the stories into. I expected alphabetical, but it isn’t, so I suspect by date? or rather time-stamp for when I downloaded them, but I’m way too lazy to check if that’s the case.

And I’m sorry if I’m meandering, but my beloved pet died in my arms yesterday, so you’re lucky you’re getting a post. I am doing much better today, though, thanks, but I usually bounce back from sad things quickly–and with lots of escapism!

But I read this book before I needed to escape.

Oh right, the book.

It’s really good. A post-apocalyptic setting, with some typical stuff from that concept map (wastelands, trying to rebuild society, lots of excluding people and being judgementy). I can’t say that it really broke the genre–it had some unique elements, but it wasn’t groundbreakingly different from it’s closest peers.

But what I can say is that it fully fucking mastered its genre (subgenre?). A vibrant and dangerous, yet still believable world was created and populated with people who were neither good nor evil, but just the way that they are. A quest was begun that might involve gods or might save the world–or it might just be something new from a mangled world that no one understands yet.

So yeah, it was fantastic, and I’m hopefully going to remember to locate and devour the sequel when that exists (the author says it will, and authors never lie about sequels. …right?). And I strongly believe that all and sundry should go read this, too.

Weekly Round Up. 2

My rabbit died yesterday. These were all pre-written, I don’t know how the next week will look in terms of…anything. Currently everything tastes like sadness.

But anyway, here is this week’s Weekly Roundup of Goodreads M/M Romance Groups Love’s Landscape stories:

Game On by Ollie White: This here is an absolutely perfect example of a story that uses too much telling, but is still fantastic. So yes, that can be done (but, no, you probably can’t pull it off yourself).

Indian Summer by D.C. Williams: A short and simple friends to lovers sort of story.

Budding Love by Adara O’Hare: A rather weird but good sci-fi tale of…uh…xenobotany?

Dancing for Diamond by K-lee Klein: a moderate quality tale of second chances, starting over, and making your own way in the world–but not necessarily alone.

Tidewater by Les Joseph: Two guys stuck in a place they hadn’t wanted to be, looking for something better. Or at least a little luck.

Jaden’s Honor by Sassy Lane: I read this, and it was wholly okay. But I would not read it again.

Love the Little Guys by M.E. Sanford: Tiny Top Seeks Tinier Bottom. Sex Ensues.

Blaze of Glory by Jeff Erno: I hate to say anything bad about a story about a soldier with PTSD, but let’s all try to remember that a touch-button issue doesn’t automatically make you a good writer. Even if you do allllllll the research.

Exposed by Bette Browne: a gay-for-you cop story, where neither of those things are all that important. Slow paced, long sex scene when it comes… Nothing special, but not bad.

The Court of Lightning

Rainbows, lightning, same dif.

I believe I’ve mentioned that I’m reading the MM Romance Group’s stories, and explained in too much detail what it is that I’m doing with the shorter stories. Well, I’m also reading the longer tales, and those, being longer, feel like they deserve their own entries.

This longer tale that I read was The Court of Lightning by Amy Rae Durreson. We already know that I love this author, and strongly encourage her to write more gay fantasy novels that I can absorb, so it should come as no surprise to anyone that I LOVED THIS STORY.

There’s a guy, and there’s another guy, and then there’s a few assumptions, and a romance–but more importantly than that there’s a prophecy, some tragedy, some hope for the future, a delicate espionage mission, at least one magic ring, a war to end the world, a pact with the gods, and some awesome fucking world building.

It’s got everything you need in there. Except maybe a sequel where they defeat all the bad guys and save the world. This was just the story of one battle in a long, long war.

But it was amazing, and I strongly suggest you put down whatever pathetic excuse for reading material you’re holding right now and go read this. I AM NOT KIDDING, GET A MOVE ON.

More English Fairy Tales

Sit here and DON’T FUCKING MOVE while I go kill the monster.

In addition to reading the Love’s Landscape stories while, I’m going to try and limit myself to reading fairy tales during the work day–and listening to podcasts, reading other things that come my way, and whatever else it is that I do on my lunch breaks. Which means that I have successfully completed More English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs (on Amazon) now. Amazon mysteriously has the illustrator listed as the author, so I bet there’s some people out there who read English Fairy Tales by J Jacobs and got sad that they couldn’t find the sequel.

Actually I have no idea if I’ve read English Fairy Tales myself, what with all this reading from short-to-long business. Let me go see if I can figure that out… uh, yes, it looks like I read it back in January of 2012. Right then.

Not that it really matters, since they are just two companion books on the same topic.

Anyway, this volume was good overall, although a few of the stories were strange, and a few of them–there was this one (a poem) about how a mother and father were beautiful and in love, but died, leaving their two beautiful children with their uncle and some inheritance. The uncle decided he wanted the inheritance, so he sent the kids to be killed, but one of the potential killers killed the other to save the kids, and hid them in the forest, saying that he’d be back. He didn’t come back, and they–beautiful children–starved to death. And their uncle got karma dumped on his head, lost everything, and died in debtor’s prison. While the guy who tried to save them got hung for a previous crime. And they all lived happily ever after.

Or something like that.

There was also a version of Deerskin (Catskin, I believe) where the girl wasn’t to marry her father, but a creepy old man. Which, yup, okay–but it didn’t have quite the impact. And there was the Black Bull of Norroway, which I hate because it’s the same old misogynist crap as always. And a bunch of dumb-peasant tales, which are not my favorite.

But there were a few I liked, like Tattercoats, which is a very Cinderella tale with a bittersweet twist, or the Buried Moon which is creepy as fuck, and someone should make it into a beautiful creepy movie (I vote studio Ghibli, even if they don’t really do creepy). And the Lambton Worm, which is a dragon story that I’ve either not heard or forgotten.

So yeah. Some good stuff, some bad stuff, some weird stuff. Pretty typical.

 

Weekly Round Up #1

Flower sex. Disgusting.

Every summer the Goodreads M/M Romance Group puts together this giant anthology-thing where people request stories, and then authors write them, and we end up with 200 or so stories posted roughly daily for the months of June-September (I think). There is great variation in content, in length, and in quality, although there’s somewhat of an overall theme–this year it was Love’s Landscapes.

I found the sheer quantity of stories overwhelming last year, and ended up getting none of them until the very end, when I got ALL of them. I actually had this blog while I was reading them, but I didn’t really post much about the stories because holy hell there’s a TON of them. And many are short.

So this year, I decided to wait again (although I think they’re still posting stories even now, so I only got about 170 of them). But I cheated a few times and read some on my phone on my lunch breaks. And I skipped downloading a few of them because they each come with a list of tags, and there’s a certain length vs. number of certain tags that I find is better worth leaving well enough alone.

Then I figured that, instead of making one absurdly long list and publishing it sometime in December when I finally finish all the stories, I should write up tiny summaries as I read the stories, and then post them on a weekly basis. At least with the short tales. Longer ones will still get their own entries.

This will not be a comprehensive list of all the stories. I’ve already mentioned that I’ve read a few, and skipped a few, and served a few real cold (ahhh, sorry, had a Smurfs moment there), and those probably won’t end up in here. Also if I read the stories while away from my recording device of choice, or I forget, or they were just too terrible to speak of, or so wonderful my brain turned into a shower of sparkles, I reserve the right not to share an opinion about them.

I also also will not include individual story links for the short ones because I am lazy. But here is their website so you can find them all despite me: M/M Romance Group

And here is the list of the stories I’ve read this week:

One step at a time by S.N. Kat: a good, sweet tale about accepting yourself for who you are.  It had me at the edge of my seat until the very end, which earned a heartfelt “awww.”

Omissions by Taylor Law: hoooly shiiit this is an intense one. Really good, but deals with some heavy stuff, so be sure to check the warnings before you begin.

Fleece, Fleas, and Flirtation by Ava Penn: A silly, lighthearted tale with some fantastic elements. Wonderfully improbable and adorable.

Woven by Lor Rose: I found this one to be mildly dissatisfying. Partly because of the “to be continued” ending, but also because it could have been so much better overall.

Bird Meets Cage by Anyta Sunday: I like this author, but this story was a bit disjointed. Good, but confusing at times. Plus, clowns.

The Fourth Act by LE Franks: Eh. Couldn’t hold my attention. Too much telling, not enough reason to care.

Blood in the Water by Tami Veldura: Really, really good one about pirates and a curse. And maybe someday a sequel? (she asks hopefully)

Time Trials by Jay D. Clark: started okay, dragged out into boring. Too much preaching to the choir, and accepting characters being Perfect and Good, while the other characters were cookie-cutter evil. Didn’t finish.

It’s You, Then Breathing by Vicktor Alexander: Slow start, but worth a read. Very nice UST. Baseball players in unrequited love.

Weekly Round Up

Flower sex. Disgusting.

Every summer the Goodreads M/M Romance Group puts together this giant anthology-thing where people request stories, and then authors write them, and we end up with 200 or so stories posted roughly daily for the months of June-September (I think). There is great variation in content, in length, and in quality, although there’s somewhat of an overall theme–this year it was Love’s Landscapes.

I found the sheer quantity of stories overwhelming last year, and ended up getting none of them until the very end, when I got ALL of them. I actually had this blog while I was reading them, but I didn’t really post much about the stories because holy hell there’s a TON of them. And many are short.

So this year, I decided to wait again (although I think they’re still posting stories even now, so I only got about 170 of them). But I cheated a few times and read some on my phone on my lunch breaks. And I skipped downloading a few of them because they each come with a list of tags, and there’s a certain length vs. number of certain tags that I find is better worth leaving well enough alone.

Then I figured that, instead of making one absurdly long list and publishing it sometime in December when I finally finish all the stories, I should write up tiny summaries as I read the stories, and then post them on a weekly basis. At least with the short tales. Longer ones will still get their own entries.

This will not be a comprehensive list of all the stories. I’ve already mentioned that I’ve read a few, and skipped a few, and served a few real cold (ahhh, sorry, had a Smurfs moment there), and those probably won’t end up in here. Also if I read the stories while away from my recording device of choice, or I forget, or they were just too terrible to speak of, or so wonderful my brain turned into a shower of sparkles, I reserve the right not to share an opinion about them.

I also also will not include individual story links for the short ones because I am lazy. But here is their website so you can find them all despite me: M/M Romance Group

And here is the list of the stories I’ve read this week:

One step at a time by S.N. Kat: a good, sweet tale about accepting yourself for who you are.  It had me at the edge of my seat until the very end, which earned a heartfelt “awww.”

Omissions by Taylor Law: hoooly shiiit this is an intense one. Really good, but deals with some heavy stuff, so be sure to check the warnings before you begin.

Fleece, Fleas, and Flirtation by Ava Penn: A silly, lighthearted tale with some fantastic elements. Wonderfully improbable and adorable.

Woven by Lor Rose: I found this one to be mildly dissatisfying. Partly because of the “to be continued” ending, but also because it could have been so much better overall.

Bird Meets Cage by Anyta Sunday: I like this author, but this story was a bit disjointed. Good, but confusing at times. Plus, clowns.

The Fourth Act by LE Franks: Eh. Couldn’t hold my attention. Too much telling, not enough reason to care.

Blood in the Water by Tami Veldura: Really, really good one about pirates and a curse. And maybe someday a sequel? (she asks hopefully)

Time Trials by Jay D. Clark: started okay, dragged out into boring. Too much preaching to the choir, and accepting characters being Perfect and Good, while the other characters were cookie-cutter evil. Didn’t finish.

It’s You, Then Breathing by Vicktor Alexander: Slow start, but worth a read. Very nice UST. Baseball players in unrequited love.