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:

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Comments

[geraineon]

Just been rereading things and watching a lot of dramas (I started on the Side Story of Fox Volant... let's see if I make it further than any other attempts with all other adaptations because I get really annoyed with the main character).

[douqi]

The main character annoys me so much!! How DARE he not appreciate Cheng Lingsu the way she deserves.

[anne]

Jun You Ji Fou/Art Thou Ailing, in order to see if I want the Rosmei edition. Alas, I do! Sorry, budget!

[geraineon]

The problem of when more and more titles gets picked up for official tl... hopefully more libraries will stock

[dayadhvam_triad]

Keeping up with 穿越成宋徽宗公主, which just finished an arc involving internal rebellion and an attempt to clean out some military corruption during a lull in external conflict (the Jin-Song wars), and I saw a few readers worrying that the depiction of the uprising would draw censor hammer attention, esp. as the comments got quite heated at times. It's not like novels haven't covered rebellions before??? esp. when it's so clearly delineated as pre-20th-century history... maybe some opaque ref to 20th-century stuff flew over my head idk.

(speaking of censorship—very :o to see the NYT cover the Haitang writers' arrests & prosecutions that have been happening since last year. :( BBC had an article too but that one's more trashwrong)

I'm also following 穿着龙袍穿越了!, about a guy dressed in emperor cosplay who timetravels to the late Eastern Han right when things are going belly up. This story's more lulzy entertaining with the protag doing his very best to fake it as the "real" emperor vs. the other two options, though one's already gaslighted himself out of the running (self-PUAed per cnet lmao)

last but not least I gotta note the ~1-year mark since I started reading 3K Workers and consequently fell down a deep, deep, deep hole ahahaha :') it spurred me to actually get a JJWXC account and spoiled me for other stories in the genre orz

[halfcactus]

Ah, I was just wondering how your webnovels were doing so I'm pleased to see updates haha. Yike at the comment section, that sounds tense.

A friend screencapped the BBC article for me and yeah, unsurprised with how they wrote it. (Ty for the archive link for the NYT one!)

[geraineon]

I was pretty surprised to see it covered by BBC, didn't realize it got covered by NYT too! Thank you, and yes, it's definitely a better write up about it.

Are readers perhaps a little affected by author suppression/persecutions I wonder..., re the worry about rebellion bringing down the censor hammer.

[forestofglory]

I read the intro to a book of translated Ming dynasty plays about the Generals of the Yang Family -- but then I didn't actually read any of the plays. Partly because the intro suggests that there aren't many women in these plays even though later adaptions do feature lots of women. But I still might read them at some point

[geraineon]

Oh no... Hm, this makes me more curious about the plays. Because I remember for the adaptation, a major plot point is that the men all died/otherwise cannot serve in the military

[headstone]

Continuing down the home stretch of Remnants of Filth, which I expect to finish in the next day or two since I have some time to spare and I've just got the last two volumes to go. It's my impression that the last volume is mainly extras, anyway.

The box of Rosmei preorders I placed in March arrived this week—I might do a little writeup of the books, what the editions are like, the merch they include, etc, and link it to the comm, if it's of interest? I didn't order everything so some will be missing, but I've got a few of them.

[dayadhvam_triad]

I'd be interested in that writeup! curious about Rosmei's editions /eyes

[geraineon]

+1 I'd be interested in the write-up!

[anne]

Yes, I'd love to read that!

[douqi]

Started xianxia baihe This Cultivator Disgusts Me, which is billed as powerful demonic cultivator/pure saintly orthodox cultivator with some twists. After slogging past the seemingly mandatory opening scene of the demonic cultivator slaughtering her way through the orthodox sects (I have read SO many such beginnings... authors please get a bit more creative I beg), it's getting more entertaining. The saintly female lead has literal plot armour, so every time the demonic cultivator tries to kill her (we're up to Attempt #100 by Chapter 4), the attack bounces back on her with a vengeance: she dies, and the timeline resets.

[halfcactus]

Ahahahaha the reflect/reset mechanic is really making me imagine a montage of failed assassinations. Do either of them remember?

[geraineon]

XD that sounds comedic, and kinda reminds me of a recent cdrama, A Dream Within A Dream with the montage of deaths (though in this case, she's trying to avoid the deaths which keeps happening because she's trying to avoid getting married as plot demands)

[llonkrebboj]

Cnovel adjacent, I'm continuing to read 诗经讲评之风人深致 alongside Shijing/Book of Songs at a snail's pace, and learning words in traditional and simplified chinese (many are still in use today !!!!). It's slow going because I'm very easily distracted xD

By the TL for this song for example! https://www.tumblr.com/fwoopersongs/787103960535367680
It's also cnovel adjacent because this is the theme for season one of the audiodrama for 默读/Silent Reading by priest. (I have never finished modu xD halfcactus is entirely to blame for this 😂 with their fanvid https://archiveofourown.org/works/66758812)

[halfcactus]

LOL the JitD / Modu distractions

[dayadhvam_triad]

oooh congrats on finishing the song tl! /saves to look at later I will get around to continuing 默读 one day... ONE DAY...

[geraineon]

We should... do a watch party for this show XD

I want to watch it but somehow the mood is never there.

[halfcactus]

Found out from this comm's free-for-all post that the donghua adaptation of Lord of the Mysteries is finally out so I just watched the first 2 eps. No idea what's happening yet but enough things are happening that I'm entertained in a "reminds me of a videogame" way (ep1 particularly reminds me of Persona 3). The main character is less OP than expected, which is nice - it's a transmigration story but he doesn't seem very familiar with this world or its events. And I love the ending theme Dark Dream, sung by Curley Gao, I've had it on repeat for the past couple of days.

[llonkrebboj]

!!!!! Just saw some lovely gifs of this go past on tumblr! They tagged it guiyi zhizu so the title connection didn't quite register 🤣 I might check it out and leave the reattempt at watching An Ancient Love Song (Apparently it stuck the landing!) for later.

[dayadhvam_triad]

! A relative recced Lord of the Mysteries to me alongside 穿进赛博游戏后干掉BOSS成功上位 as her top two favorite webnovels. While we have very different genre preferences, I really enjoyed the latter when I finally read it, so I guess it's time to go check out this donghua and give the novel another try~

[hazevi]

I binged Golden Terrace and I'd overall say it was quite a pleasant read and am currently reading the extras! I definitely think there were some points that could have been expanded upon and there was a point in which I thought that Mr. Yan Xiaohan was a little too deep in his love-addled (恋爱脑 lmao) state despite the author saying it too haha. Still cool :3

[duckprintspress]

I feel this so hard. I really like Golden Terrace but I think the pacing is its biggest flaw, there were things I really wish they'd gone into more depth on. Maybe it's just the war historian in me but I especially wish we got more of their separation as like. on-screen events unfolding.

[duckprintspress]

I've been super busy the past week because we're leaving on a family trip this coming Tuesday and so we're trying to get the house all straightened and cleaned, and that's been devouring my free time, but while I haven't been able to read any C-Novels, I do have a question for anyone who sees this:

Which do you think I should bring on our 1-week vacation?
- First two volumes (of 3) of Lip and Sword by Jin Shisi Chai (https://www.goodreads.com/series/359109-lip-and-sword)
- First two volumes (of 7) of Yuwu by Meatbun Doesn't Eat Meat (https://www.novelupdates.com/series/yu-wu/)

[geraineon]

... Uh. Yuwu I guess? Because two vols out of three might mean that it ramps up and then you're stuck.

But two volumes out of seven might mean it's still building up?

I've not read either so idk!