Read-in-Progress Wednesday

[geraineon]

This is your weekly read-in-progress post for you to talk about what you're currently reading and reactions and feelings (if any)!

For spoilers:

<details><summary>insert summary</summary>Your spoilers goes here</details>

<b>*Highlight for spoilers!*</b><span style="background-color: #FFFFFF; color: #FFFFFF">Your spoilers goes here.</span>

Comments

[geraineon]

Squeezing in one more Jiang Zi Bei novel before posting her author's spotlight post. I'm reading Wait for Me After School (carrd with details: https://wfmas.carrd.co/#homepage)

At chapter 15! It's cute and yes, JZB has a type of character and character dynamics she likes. It's okay. I like too.

[halfcactus]

The summary is so cute! But the content warnings in the carrd scare me a bit haha.

[geraineon]

So far my experience with JZB is it won't be that bad, but I will let you know when I'm done with it! It is very cute so far XD

[anne]

My current ebook is How to Survive as a Villain! It's so much fun! Next is probably "transmuter," a MDZS fic that my friends are raving about.

Current paper book is still SPL vol 3, which I need to return to the library asap. (Sorry, next person in the queue.) Next paper book is one of my other library books, unless I crack and read Thousand Autumns instead.

[starandrea]

Thanks for the Transmuter rec! That was fun! ♥

[geraineon]

Read thousand autumns, read thousand autumns! (what are the other paper books?)

[anne]

Short story collections by Ann Leckie and Naomi Kritzer, Moonstorm by Yoon Ha Lee, and Journey to the West vol 1 (gotta get that done before the end of the month, so I can get a sticker from the library)

[aurumcalendula]

I read more of Dragon Subjugation Incantation (there were four translation updates this week!). I'm still really enjoying it and can't wait to read the rest!

I also finished reading the last volume of the official English translation of Guardian. It has one more extra than I remember from the fantranslation I read - I'm not sure if it's new or not (iirc the timeloop extra was the most recent one?).

[geraineon]

Nice! It's exciting when a novel you like updates~

Ah... at some point, I need to get back to Guardian. I finished vol. 1 and then stalled there.

[douqi]

I'm halfway through Ning Yuan's 2014 food-themed contemporary novel 食色 (which I'm tentatively translating as Hunger. Lust and really enjoying it! It's both hilarious and sincere and the leads have great banter. Excellent food descriptions too!

[halfcactus]

Are you reading this in between updates of the cyberpunk novel or is the cyberpunk novel complete?

[douqi]

In between! The cyberpunk one is going to run long, I think.

[geraineon]

Hunger, lust, food. Perfect trio XD

[douqi]

Haha. The novel describes the Three Main Lusts as: for sleep, for food, and for sex (in that order).

橋頭樓上 16

[halfcactus]

Read the first chapter or so of 灯神 The Djinn by 深海巨狗... Definitely planning to continue when my brain settles down. The art and paneling are beautiful! And now that I think about it, I wonder where to find similarly short manhua recs...

Only read one chapter of 橋頭樓上, and I'm officially halfway through and even more confused because wtf is going on in chapter 16???

Notes

The writer being HDMM's assistant actually makes more sense, but also not really because we don't know anything about her... Is she Tang Guo or is she one of the people who knew Tang Guo? Not sure if Tang Guo had any real relationships in the murder-suicide GCs. But she had to have been one of them because of the "vegetarian ghost" thing? Which I thought was cute at the beginning but now really grim. ;___;

I should go back and see which diary entries the "I'm sorry" crowd were reacting to, and which users did so. I should probably also go back and check the comments now that I know more about the QSWXC characters...

Was Zhang Ting was the "success" story? And Zhang ge, HDMM's manager is, what, her older/younger brother? Cousin? I remember her having a similar background to Tang Guo, ie. raised by a single mom + grandparents... I can't do math, help lol

And because I can't do math, I'm having major trouble understanding the timeline for all the real-world incidents. 😂

Miao Miao, who is secretly dying, and Miao Xiaowa, who wants to die... I am so worried for them aaaaaaaaaaa

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[geraineon]

I looked up 灯神 The Djinn and wow the art and panelling *is* very beautiful. Will bookmark to keep an eye on it. Thank you!

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[dayadhvam_triad]

I've read The Djinn! The art is just beautiful. And the story is brutal in its own way too... :D;

I inhaled most of 桥头楼上 in one go which saved me from stewing in confusion, but I totally understand why you are because priest isn't making it easy! Suffice it to say there are multiple layers we watch the characters dig through before they figure out "Tang Guo."

The last lines of Ch. 16 made me go ahhhh ;__; it's nothing to do with the rest of the case, but the fact that HDMM thought her assistant had written it based on RL experience, and was afraid antis would dig up everything in her assistant's life, so she refused to admit it was ghostwritten because she was willing to bear the brunt of it... "Anyway, it's not the first time people have spread rumors about me."

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[halfcactus]

because priest isn't making it easy
This is so validating thank you lol

I'm having a "oh, the training wheels are off" experience now that I'm halfway and the book doesn't hold my hand as much now that the set-up is done and the plot is moving. I feel like I have to read between the lines a little more now, which is difficult because I'm still struggling with understanding the text at a basic level. ^^;

And thank you for clarifying the last line because I failed to connect some of those dots. /o\ It does feel like the book that's meant to be reread once you've seen the whole picture? But I don't think I will haha.

I'll probably save The Djinn for when I'm done with this... I'm not sure how much emotional devastation I can withstand back-to-back, but the art is too pretty!

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[douqi]

I read each chapter of 桥头楼上 as it was released, so those weeks I mostly remember as *gif of guy with murder board and red string*

Mostly I let it kind of wash over me instead of trying to figure things out though, because as a survivor of both Lost and the X-Files long-running 'conspiracy' arc, I will not put myself through that again.

Edited to add:I'm looking forward to rereading it once I get the uncensored print edition, because I'm sure it will do interesting things with the formatting that will change the experience (the censored print edition has different fonts and layouts for the novel-in-the-novel, the comments section, etc).

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[dayadhvam_triad]

Oooh, how's the quality of the censored print edition? And though you haven't received the uncensored version yet, have you heard/read anything about what the major changes are between censored and uncensored? The different fonts & layouts sound so interesting :o Sorry for the barrage of questions—I've been thinking about getting a print copy myself...

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[douqi]

So I haven't actually read the censored edition (I don't often read the censored books I buy, except when they have exclusive print-only extras, and I absolutely know it is not rational to buy a book to not read it, but I have extreme pack rat tendencies when it comes to books), but as an object, it's kind of unusual — significantly smaller than standard books, and with an interesting fold-out+cut-out cover situation going on. I posted a couple of pictures here.

I didn't actually know this print edition would be (or would need to be) censored until priest mentioned on Weibo that she'd had to cut and change certain things (the tone and word choice made it clear it's a censorship issue, not merely an editorial issue). I haven't seen any comparisons between the web version and the print version yet, so am not sure what has been changed.

The uncensored one isn't out for pre-order yet, so you will have ample time to get it! The publisher's twitter account is here and as of last month, it looks like they were planning to open up pre-orders in August. Depending where you are, you may need a proxy to buy it and get it sent to you — let me know if you want the details of the one I usually use!

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[dayadhvam_triad]

Thank you for sharing those pictures! What a cool design ♥__♥ This convo spurred me into trawling through the 桥头楼上 Weibo supertopic—I came across a post that points out some of the changes between web and print versions, though it doesn't claim to be a comprehensive list.

Also appreciate the heads up on the uncensored traditional one! I think I'll go ahead and get the censored edition—crossing my fingers that the censorship doesn't extend too far beyond what the Weibo post covered (I like its design a lot, plus I read simplified much better than traditional CN). I've used Superbuy in the past and have found it generally reliable, but still curious to know what you use. /eyes

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[halfcactus]

Thank you so much for the comparison post link! I vaguely remember seeing "this part got deleted" comments on JJWXC but I've been avoiding the comments bc spoilers haha.

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[dayadhvam_triad]

Haha yes, spoilers abound in the comments. Once you finish, it's worth checking out the comments on the last chapters—idk how to describe it, it's very... meta. XD

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[douqi]

I mostly use Superbuy too for mainland orders. For Taiwanese/Hong Kong pre-orders, I use one of these two, depending on the publisher (they each stock a slightly different range of publishers).

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[dayadhvam_triad]

Thank you!

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[halfcactus]

I read so slow I have no choice but to be [conspiracy board gif], but it seems like letting everything wash over me would be smarter haha.

Excited to hear your thoughts when you get the uncensored physicals! I hope any one of the print editions fully maximize the design potential since I don't think it can really lend itself to another medium. (Happy to hear that the censored version plays with fonts and layouts!)

Re: 橋頭樓上 16

[douqi]

Honestly I would love for the Taiwanese publisher to go full on House of Leaves with the design! But we'll see.

[duckprintspress]

I am also currently reading How to Survive as a Villain by Yi Yi Yi Yi. I finished the main story on Tuesday, but I haven't read the extras yet. I thought the last few chapters were a little wonky, but aside from that I've enjoyed it. I wish the sex was better, lmao.

I also started Chapter 7 of LOCH, but the translation for this one is kinda wonky so I'm struggling with it.

I'm going out of town tomorrow for a work thing that'll devour my reading time, and I expect to bring Guardian Vol. 3 with me as my casual reading, so that's up next. It's mostly a re-read for me, tho I never read all the extras, and some of the later chapters I've only read as unedited MTL, so reading a real translation is exciting.

[lunarriviera]

got my guardian vol 3 yesterday and same same, i'm so psyched to read a complete version!

[duckprintspress]

My reading aspirations have been sunk, sigh. I went to the bookstore to pick it up, and they had the regular edition, not the special. They definitely processed my request to change, and my order for the special edition is still pending, so the publisher just screwed up and didn't send them the right stuff.

So now I gotta wait until the right one turns up.

Idk when mine'll be available - report back, I want to hear that it's good! :D

[lunarriviera]

absolutely at random, read kaleidoscope of death and wound up loving it. it's not priest-level writing tbh and i will stand by that assertion, but it was nonetheless entertaining as hell and i truly love ruan nanzhu. classes start this week and i'm making course shells/syllabi and prepping, but i'm probably going to pick up po yun anyway, like someone who has spare time or something…

[lunarriviera]

(oh and i also reread mo du last week. was rummaging around looking for a specific quotation and then woke up three days later lying on the floor surrounded by condiments having read the whole thing. how does this happen)