Read-in-Progress Wednesday

[geraineon]

This is your weekly read-in-progress post~

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>*

(Thank you to the anonymous kind person who bought the community a year of paid account!)

Comments

[geraineon]

Continued Three Hundred Years of Longing a bit... starting to enjoy it a little less though. I think maybe I need longer gaps between Mu Su Li's works (I reread Panguan last year because of a read-along I organized) Highlight for spoilers!*because, as much as I love characters in pain and then doing stuff for each other, I also want variety and maybe too much of a thing can get a little tiring... and then it just becomes another one thing and while devoted-to-each-other is great, again, too much of a thing. I think Panguan strikes a nice balance but I'm not enjoying it as much in this novel. The callbacks and tying in stuff is neat though (again, something this author seems to like to do).*

[aurumcalendula]

That's good to know re: Three Hundred Years of Longing (and Mu Su Li's works in general)! I'm planning to read it eventually and it helps to have an idea how to set my expectations.

[silverblade219]

New interview for Fei Tian Ye Xiang : https://www.danmeinews.com/2026/02/02/danmei-author-interview-meet-fei-tian-ye-xiang-arise-zhang/

[aurumcalendula]

I missed that earlier - thank you for mentioning it!

[geraineon]

Thanks for sharing it!

[aurumcalendula]

I caught up on Dragon Subjugation Incantation and Begging the Heavens in Vain!

Highlight for spoilers! *I'm really enjoying seeing Luo Qingci and Ruan Li's romance progressing and how intense thy are about each other (robes are torn open to check for injuries, Ruan Li feeds Luo Qingci her (Ruan Li) heart's blood to heal her, and Ruan Li kisses Luo Qingci for the first time.

Begging the Heavens in Vain is more plot focused, but I suspect there might be more romance progress now that Song Juguang has decided to rejoin events instead of just watching from afar.*

ETA: Also To Embers We Return! I liked finding out a bit more about Han Fu.

[geraineon]

Classic scenes! Thanks for sharing

[duckprintspress]

only c-novel is still me picking away at Daomu Biji in Chinese. I have so many other cnovels on my tbr, but I ended up with a bunch of novels in Libby coming through at once and those have due dates so I have to do them first, sigh.

[geraineon]

What are the books in the queue right now?

[duckprintspress]

the ones closest to the top are (in the order I expect to read them):

Don't You Like Me? by Lv Tian Yi (2 vols)
The Beauty's Blade by Feng Ren Zuo Shu (1 vol)
Dawning by Ice (3 vols)
Love Between Fairy and Devil by Jiu Lu Fei Xiang (2 vols)
My Husband and I Sleep in a Coffin by Wu Shui Bu Du (2 vols)
Soul Vibration by dr.Solo (3 vols)

and there's more from there. So many c-novels coming out. so many.

the problem is, I've been reading a couple not-c-novels that I'm less enthusiastic about and so I've been reading them really slowly, and telling myself that I can't read the next c-novel til I finish these, and well. it's slow going and so I'm not getting to the stuff I'm more enthusiastic about, sigh.

[douqi]

Work is once again trying to murder me, but I did get in 10+ chapters of Jue Ge's The Flame Tree, 2009 CEO romance. Intriguingly, it looks like the subordinate is the cold, aloof one that CEO jiejie has to melt...

[geraineon]

Oh that's a nice flip. Are you enjoying it so far?

[douqi]

On balance, yes. It's more of a 'this is quite interesting' rather than 'I must devour the next chapter IMMEDIATELY' but it's fun so far.

[lee_bella]

Finished Fake Demon Lord (伪魔头) by The One Who Tells Stories Under the Bridge (天桥底下说书的), a self-cest cultivation/wuxia story. It has both humour and angst. I quite liked it.

I've been reading a few self-cest stories lately. One thing I've noticed is that even if the stories have moments of humour, they tend to have a bittersweet tang to them, since the only person the MC can trust and love wholeheartedly is his other self.

[geraineon]

When put that way, it is quite bittersweet. I remember you mentioning the QSH self-cest you read...

[lee_bella]

The QSH self-cest story wasn't as bittersweet as Fake Demon Lord. The MC in Fake Demon Lord suffered so much...

[ehyde]

In theory I'm still reading "Record of the Missing Sect Master" but in practice I am mainly reading Guardian fic (I'm finally watching the drama so the majority of the fic makes more sense now).

I'm also going through my faves and tbr and figuring out what to request for this year's cnovel bookbinding exchange, which, if anyone here is interested in joining, lmk and I can send you an invite! The past times I did this, I requested books I hadn't read before, and I'm debating if I want to do that again or go with some favorites instead (probably do that again. the thing about favorites is I want to design & bind them myself, lol)

[lee_bella]

I've read Guardian the novel but haven't watched the drama. Is the drama worth a watch?

[ehyde]

It's very different! I started watching it right after I read the book and didn't get more than a few episodes; it's more enjoyable now that there's some space between. I feel like drama!Shen Wei is almost a completely different character but you know what, I like this guy too.

Is it objectively good? ...no. The censorship-related changes leave a lot of plot holes (not the relationship as much as the "my scifi is pastede on" that's taking the place of everything supernatural. I don't think they're even trying to cover up the relationship). There's some truly terrible cgi and a lot of monster-of-the-week plots, but it's fun! I was describing it as early-season BTVS vibes and I think that holds true. Worth a watch probably depends on how much time you like to spend watching things and what else is in the running but in general yeah, I'd say it is!

[lee_bella]

I see. Comparing it to early-season BTVS gives me a pretty good idea of what Guardian the drama is like. Thank you for the reply!