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

[shipperslist]

I'm about a third through Cyan Wing's Something's Not Right and enjoying myself. I don't know what the hell is going on but I'm curious to find out!

[geraineon]

Glad that this Cyan Wings is working much better for you.

[shipperslist]

This is my fourth Cyan Wings book so far; I really enjoyed Mr. Melancholy and loved I’ve met a ghost, which is why Devil venerable was such a bummer.

[geraineon]

I wonder if it'll help with a different translation because as much as I understand different tastes, it's still a bummer you didn't like Devil Venerable! Who knows, maybe Haitang's tl will be more readable to you?

[shipperslist]

If they only license to the US, there might be no legal way for me to get it, considering how shipping does not work atm...

[geraineon]

Looks like it does ship to other countries: https://haitangbooks.org/faq/

But prices might not be very good.

[shipperslist]

Oh, thanks! Who would've thunk the Inter Webs had wrong information!!11

[dayadhvam_triad]

Someone is posting a translation of priest's 桥头楼上 End of the Bridge, Top of the Tower!! (twitter, tumblr linking to gdoc) According to miaoyea's note, it's fully translated & drafted, 5/31 chapters are already up, and updates are daily. Time to reread \o/

priest posted a new extra for Tai Sui! I was a bit confused at first, b/c in order to move the content of the original 7 extra chapters from VIP to the 福利 category ("benefit" aka free for those who have bought some % of VIP chapters) while still preserving the original chapters (to keep their comments & whatnot), she split the new extra into 7 short sections—so I initially thought they were placeholders for 7 separate extras. XD Anyway, after piecing them together, it's a fun modern-day AU ft. the Tai Sui cast (OR IS IT /knife). edanglars tled it here. It reminds me of how much I like Tai Sui's ending—and also that I need to, uh, properly finish reading it since I skipped a section in the middle... >_<;

Still listening to the audiobook for 3K Workers and rereading scenes here & there. XD <3 I tled a passage I really like, a dream scene sans dialogue.

ok last thought for now! A while back I complained about Qidian authors, in particular one that was recced to me for historical transmigration, because I tried his first published novel and dropped it at the end of the first chapter b/c the MC was UGH skeevy off the bat about his post-transmigration half-sister. Well, I finally caved and looked at his second novel 秦吏, which is set during the Qin dynasty, and I gotta say... wow. Authors can indeed improve. I haven't run into anything as off-putting as I did with his first novel. It's passed the low, low bar of no "harem for the sake of having a harem" + portraying female characters as people. (The number of times I've seen people rec Qidian stuff in this sub-genre and then do default disclaimers of "harem. ignore it" "awful romance. ignore it" "doesn't know a woman in RL. ignore it"... even if I come here for my CN historical-in-the-weeds fiction fix, I can't ignore this shit /weary)

But the real highlight is its Qin Shihuang. I haven't finished the novel yet—it's 3.4M CN characters long, the MC is fine though I don't love him, its prose style is serviceable with occasional standout passages, I need a break—but. BUT. I think 秦吏 has the best portrayal of QSH among all the Qin dynasty/QSH-featured cnovels I've read (or tried to read). This one really gets at his arrogance and ambition, his indulgence and cruelty, his suspicion and trust in a 3-dimensional way. Dunno if I'll finish the whole story, but I'm definitely going to reread the parts where he shows up.

[sam_gardener]

priest posted a new extra for Tai Sui!
Thank you for telling us this! And I'm also really enjoying the End of the Bridge, Top of the Tower translation. I feel so fortunate.

[dayadhvam_triad]

o7!

yeah, I'm really glad someone picked it up for translation so more people in efandom can read it :D

[ehyde]

I read the Tai Sui extra! When I first heard about it I was like "I'll pass, what-if modern AUs are my least favorite flavor of cnovel extra" but. I read it and yeah. Seems about right. Highlight for spoilers!*We already knew Xi Ping read rpf about his friends it makes total sense he'd write it too*

[dayadhvam_triad]

mte, I normally don't care for modern AUs, but then I read it and went OHHH THAT'S WHY THESE LINES ARE ALL IN QUOTES! Highlight for spoilers!*because it's just RPF that Xi Ping wrote! all on his lonesome*

[aurumcalendula]

Ooh! I'm very excited to hear about the End of the Bridge, Top of the Tower translation!

[geraineon]

Yay, nice that 桥头楼上 End of the Bridge, Top of the Tower is getting translated (and fully translated at that).

MC was UGH skeevy off the bat about his post-transmigration half-sister <- this is making me think of the many, many, many skeevy JP transmigration/isekai stories. why is this such a thing.

does QSH appear a lot? (I know, Qin Dynasty and all, but what is QSH's relationship to the main character in this novel?)

[dayadhvam_triad]

\o/!

who knows why it's a thing :( if only it could diaf :((( In retrospect it's telling that most of the recs I saw for this author mentioned 秦吏 and not his first novel... (i regretti, I just figured I'd start in chronological publication order but ended up entering such a minefield)

Yep, QSH plays a significant role in the middle section. The main character of 秦吏 transmigrates into an ordinary Qin soldier Heifu whom we know only from an archaeological discovery of bamboo slip letters (that is: he lived, he fought, he died), so here MC becomes a no-name poor commoner who works his way up through the levels of Qin officialdom. I'd split out the novel into three sections:
1) the early days when it's more focused on local grassroots govt, low-rank military service, etc. (I have to give props to the author for fleshing this out really well; having the transmigrating protag start as a person of little means & influence w/o a family background/connections that can support them is relatively uncommon in my personal reading experience [3K Workers does it too!], and it's leveraged here to explore Qin society & law and how it impacts the population at large);
2) MC making a name for himself in the higher ranks and serving as a minister/general under QSH (this is where I'm at);
3) the fallout and turmoil after QSH's death (meh idk if I will bother with this).

So QSH comes onstage for part 2 and is essentially the deuteragonist. I remember there's a scene from his POV where he thinks about all his generals, ministers, etc. as object tools to be used for such and such function (including the MC), and after reading it I was like ahhh no wonder I saw this QSH passage excerpted in multiple rec posts XD Imo the best way to think about this story is not (only) as a historical transmigration power fantasy but as a means for the author to evaluate Qin in history—its governance, strengths & achievements, weaknesses & failures, and so forth. Evaluated purely as a novel, it's the upper end of so-so; evaluated as an exploration of the historical period, it's absolutely worth checking out. /history geek

[geraineon]

I suppose starting in chronological order means you won't go from having expectations to being completely disappointed since most authors grow in their craft!

The summary you give of this story sounds intriguing enough! I wish stuff a bit more history heavy will get picked up for a good proper translation (but honestly, I don't know how well these stories will do in international market)

[halfcactus]

YESSSSS I'm so happy that someone picked up (and finished translating) Bridge Tower! Excited for more people to read it (and hoping for fanart hehe)

[dayadhvam_triad]

:DDD! I hope for more fanart too, there's a dearth of it on lofter & weibo ;__;

[alterkrmn]

Finished the main story of Married Thrice to Salted Fish. Now I'm reading the extras. I'm on chapter 124. Now I'm thinking about starting Imperial Uncle but before starting that one, I'm going to read a couple of non c-novels.

[geraineon]

Yay, you're done! What do you think about Married Thrice? and what non-cnovels do you plan to read?

[alterkrmn]

I enjoyed it so much! Although I'm not completely done with the extras (I'm on chapter 147).

Spoilers

I really liked Lin Qingyu :D and I also loved the deaths of Jiang Xing... both of them. Another thing I really liked was all the plotting and scheming they both went through to save Lin Qingyu's life... It made me laugh, it moved me (especially when Jiang Xing died as Lu Wancheng and Gu Fuzhou), and I loved it when the (apparently) cold and collected Lin Qingyu was so affected by Jiang Xing's deaths that he didn’t seem like himself.

And the extras are really cute. I really didn’t expect Huaishi to show up in the modern day! I was laughing so hard when he accidentally embarrassed Jiang Xing and Lin Qingyu in front of the "chunis" (I also laughed so hard when I read this term because it's the first time I encounter it in a book and not social media). It's fun reading them being just boys their age ToT

Another rec of yours that I truly enjoy <3

The novels I want to read before starting another cnovel are Human Acts by Han Kang (I'm going to read the Spanish translation by Sunme Yoon) and The Transmigration of Bodies by Yuri Herrera (this is originally in Spanish, the author is Mexican). These books are very short compared to cnovels!! After those two, I'd like to read The Imperial Uncle. There are so many cnovels I wanna read and there isn't enough time (and energy) to do it :(

ETA: I didn't realize that chapter 147 was the last chapter and I finished reading it last night, which means I am officially done! ToT

[geraineon]

<33 It always makes me feel happy to see other people enjoying the things I enjoy!

Imperial Uncle is fun, hope you enjoy that too.

[liliacs]

I'm currently reading To Embers We Return and I'm very early on but I got !!! over the last chapter.

Chapter 13 spoilers

I'm so intrigued by the message Qin Wushang sent to Bian Jin! She agreed to become food for the "demon seed"? She had to stay in Chang'an for another year? I need to know everything.

I'm really enjoying Shen Ni and Bian Jin's relationship, but I'm also curious how it will go... They're already in love and technically married, but they have some hang-ups and the story seems like it's setting up more conflict in their future.

[geraineon]

I'm bookmarking this comment to come back to when I actually read To Embers!

[sam_gardener]

I'm reading the translation of Priest's 桥头楼上 End of the Bridge, Top of the Tower and really liking it so far. I recently reread Mo Du in translation and then I'd go over the original Chinese (with dictionary) after reading a section in English. I may keep doing that with 桥头楼上, at least a bit.

[geraineon]

Seems like a good practice! Are you taking lessons right now, or self-learning?

[sam_gardener]

Self-learning, very slowly. But I try to do a little every day, no matter what, so at least I don't forget what I have learned.

[aurumcalendula]

This week I caught up with Wen Guan and To Embers We Return's translations! I'm enjoying both of them a lot!

[geraineon]

Yay!

[halfcactus]

As withe everyone else, I'm super excited to see End of the Bridge, Top of the Tower translated, and while I'm probably waiting for everything to be posted, I'm glad that the chapters aren't being released all at once. I kind of want a "Dracula Daily" experience for this specific book tbh!

Read the first two chapters of the Guiding the Eccentric Tyrant manhua... It's a danmei set in space and I have no idea what's going on, but I'm fascinated with the scanlator's process and apparent passion for the book. They prefaced their translation by saying that they changed some of the names to sound better in English because the author has bad naming sense, and that they heavily edited the dialogue (adding / removing stuff, and supplementing with novel info) so it makes more sense to readers. Not sure if I'll continue, but I can feel the translator's love haha.

[geraineon]

In space!! I do enjoy space things... but hm, how different are the names compared to the original?

[duckprintspress]

I'm about to start the Rosmei Global Examination, I just have been procrastinating (or, well, I got distracted and read like 5 volumes of Solo Leveling in two days, lmao). I also read the new volume of the MDZS manhua official translation. I can't remember if we're done with flashbacks. I hope we are.

[geraineon]

How do you find the translation for Global Examination so far?

[duckprintspress]

not bad! it's cleaner edited than the other Rosmei title I've read (How to Survive as a Villain vol. 1). It does kinda feel like it's lacking a certain "spark," but I'm not sure if that's not just because I've now read this part of the story, uh. (counts). five times? three times in the manhua and once before when I read the fantranslation.

[larryhammer]

Still c-novel adjacent: finished the first three volumes of Sherwood Smith's wuxia-inspired series Sagacious, and thanks to my bad timing have to stop as the last volume isn't out for a week. Still good, and Sage Empress has a lot of deliberate parallels and contrasts with The Phoenix Feather, which was fun.

To take up my time till then, I'm reading the first volume of Nishitani Aya's Digital Devil Story trilogy, titled Megami Tensei -- which was adapted as a video game. So, yeah, the inspiration for Shin Megami Tensei as well as Persona and all the other spinoffs. Only just started, but a strong opening.

[geraineon]

I didn't know SMT games is based on a book. I should check it out. I really liked a number of the SMT/Persona/DDS games!

[larryhammer]

It looks like the whole trilogy was used as source material for the original MT game? I'm not clear on that, as I haven't actually played the NES original (I have the SMT: Old Testament remake for SNES but haven't gotten to it) nor the whole trilogy. But summoning demons by computer, Loki as a big bad, and a bunch of other stuff, including the first book's title, is definitely all there in the games.

[silverblade219]

Dinghai Fusheng Records (Manhua vol 1) and Tianbao (Novel vol 1)! I am enjoying both so far but lol Li Jinglong has such bad luck.

Also earlier this week I was at a small bookstore near work and they specifically pointed out to me the Tianbao novel on the new release table. They even said “It’s just like all the other books you have liked recently!”

[geraineon]

Haha, is this a bookstore you frequent a lot, to have them know your preferences in books?

[silverblade219]

Lol yeah, have been stopping by a lot recently after work. And have been making small talk with this employee in particular, who sometimes shares recommendations with me.