#Jade I can and will loan you this book but also if I don't get it back within a month I'm invading your house | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

writing-with-olive · 11 months

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“ hold the line until somone who actually gives a shit comes” people like you have been saying this for half a century . “Reinforcements” ain’t coming , and the dems use this argument to get away with doing absolutely fuck all every single time they get power because hey look at him he’s worse . Hell half of us our votes are worse than useless from gerrymandering Everybody I know has had enough of being told the sun will come out tommorow if we just eat shit today .

In reference to this post (linked)

So i'm gonna preface this by saying, I hear you. Because this situation is beyond fucked and I wish that everyone would just get their head out of their ass and actually represent in this representative democracy rather than play emperor wannabe. You are right in that the democratic party, especially as it stands now, are not our saviors. And you are right that the maps have been gerrymandered into oblivion.

However, I stand by what I said.

First, gerrymandered maps up until recently had to still look competitive, even if they weren't, in order to get through. What this means is if you get enough people out to the polls, especially people who don't normally vote and were thus not part of the calculations, districts can be flipped. Maps are also drawn based on likely voters, people who have already shown they're consistent about coming out. Therefore, it does not include first-timers; it does not include the youngest of voters.

This is what stopped the red wave. Generation Z voted about 70% blue and came out in record numbers. There will be two years more worth of them during the next election. There is no reason to believe they won't do it again, especially since the state of the country has gotten even more severe. It's not some "hopefully someone out there gives a shit and will magically change their decisions." It's "there's a fuckton of people who already do give a shit and weren't old enough to voice it yet."

Second, I am not saying the dems care. I am not. But they are not the ones about to default on our country's loans and send the world economy into recession. They are not pushing for forms of genocide on trans people. They are not pushing for forms of genocide on the latino population. They are not endorsing outright hate groups. They are not the ones cutting people off from abortion access. They are not the ones banning books in schools. They are not the ones pushing to make guns more and more accessible every time a school gets shot up. They are not the ones who told their followers to seize the capital after they lost an election. No. It's the Republican party that is doing all of that.

This is why I said "hold the line." Not "this will be victory." One election isn't going to make this go away. I wish it would, but it won't. However. Part of the reason it's getting so bad is because the politicians who are making hate and scapegoating core to their career thinks it will work and they will not change unless it is beyond painfully obvious it won't. The bar is on the ground right now. The first order of business is establishing that bringing shovels is not acceptable.

Third, I refuse to sit back, go belly up, and surrender. Using your expression, "being told we just have to eat shit today," it's either that or starving to death. It's not fun, it's not pretty, and I am certainly not saying that you should like it, but it's hard to grow and cultivate some nice crops if you're dead.

Here's the thing. No successful movement in history worked because its members were telling each other "this is useless we might as well give up." That pushes new members away. It stops people from even trying. There's a reason voting rights are so contentious in this country, and it's because if people believe their voice has power, they're going to use it, and that will give it power. I don't think that this post will change your mind. If you are this jaded, 900ish words won't do it. However, I ask that you keep the nihilism to yourself. For all you know, the people who you talk to could be the reinforcements and you do no one any favors by going and stopping them before they get a chance to start. We may be more or less on the same side, but the thing about friendly fire is it ain't all that friendly.

I say "hold the line" because a sense of camaraderie gives people hope. Hope is what fuels change. Part of my job in this fight is to get more people to join. It is about proactively generating reinforcements. And before you say "but posts on tumblr of all places aren't going to do that," I will say that tumblr is only a piece of this. I can make a whole separate post on that if people want, but I firmly believe that if I talk the talk, I gotta walk the walk.

And what if I'm wrong and you're right and none of it's going to change the state of the country? Because of everything else, we have a mental health crisis in this country. Having a longterm goal is huge for people who are trying to find the strength to pull themselves out of that pit. I know this from firsthand experience, and from watching other people grow once they had a chance to find purpose themselves. Giving people the opportunity to care about something, to find connections, that is a worthy goal in and of itself, even if it only helps people on an individual level.

This is all to say, while I hear you and I am not saying you have to change your beliefs, I ask that you do not get in the way of the people who are trying to do something about it.

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loxare · 3 years

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Ok so it's been a week since I finished Iron Widow and I think my brain has calmed down enough to talk about it without it just being incoherent shrieking

Guys

Read this book. It is so good. I am not kidding. If you liked Pacific Rim, read this book. (I've never read of seen Handmaid's Tale, but this book is also full of righteous fury about the inbuilt misogyny of the world it's set in, so read it if you like that.) Just do it. Go. And then come scream at me about it cause I wanna hear that

More Thoughts under the cut cause those are a bit spoilery

I have never read a book with such a feral, unhinged protagonist. Wu Zetian is just such an amazing character. Her murder list starts with one person and once it's empty she is very willing to add to it. She really took one look at the patriarchy and said is anyone going to destroy that and then didn't wait for an answer. She is so incredibly bloodthirsty, but as soon as two (2) entire people showed her love and respect and acceptance, she becomes so soft for them, for a given value of soft. Soft for Zetian is still razor sharp for most people. She changes so much over the book but it's her outlook that changes, as she gains more experience. She is rightfully unwilling to forgive the people who try to hurt and use her and once they fuck up their second chance, that's it. They're gone. It is excellent to read

Li Shimin is such a gift too. Poor baby had such a hard life. He can have a little murder, as a treat. And despite everything! He never gets angry for himself!! He could snap a person in half with his bare hands, and would if they threatened Zetian or Yizhi, but not for his own sake! Deserves the world, deserves happiness, deserves some more self esteem. I keep rereading that scene at the end of their first flight because he's just so shocked and tender and I love it. And the more he learns and the more he finds out that what happened to those girls isn't (entirely) his fault, it's the fault of the systems designed to bleed them dry and he's so furious but still manages to be the least bloodthirsty of the trio

And Gao Yizhi. Absolute sweetheart but I am convinced he's secretly a bastard and I am living for it. He's not even doing a good job of hiding it. Boy knows what he wants and he wants to kiss both his sexy roommates. He kinda takes a side seat, both metaphorically and also literally in the Chrysalis, to the other two for this book but in the sequel he is absolutely going to shine, calling it now (sequel announcement when??). He showed a little of that near the end of the book and it is going to be amazing

And the plot is so amazing. Just. Farm girl plans to avenge sister's murder by killing the murderer could be an entire novel by itself, and has been the plot of a few very good books, but the resolution for that comes in the first hundred pages, and there's more plot after than! And there's also giant robots fighting equally giant monsters thrown in! And then the slow progression of Zetian not caring that she was going to die for her actions, to daring people to shoot her because she's valuable now and they can't afford to lose her yet, to doing everything in her power to ensure she and her two boys survive. Survive and also destroy all the systems keeping women down and also maybe the government, another few things which could be entire novels in and of themselves but are so seamlessly woven into this one

I've read a lot of angry literature but this one is the most visceral. It is furious at the state of things and refuses to let them stay as they are. The systems which are inherently unbalanced, designed to be unbalanced, but kept secret so the changes they effect on the female pilots can be written off as natural. "Women aren't as naturally strong. Women don't go into the fields that pay more, or don't do as good of a job, that's why there's a wage gap." The review thingy on the front cover calls this book a primal scream and it is absolutely correct. Reading through it feels like jumping off a cliff, screaming, with a sword pointed at your greatest foe who's on the ground below you, putting not just your entire weight into it but all the force the planet can exert on you, you can't stop, you don't want to stop, and when you land flawlessly you're just breathless with it

Everything I knew about the world I just read changes in the last three or so pages and I am so mad I don't already have the sequel in my hands. I will have to happily settle for rereading this book cover to cover a couple million times until I do. Predictions: Yizhi shows his true bastard side, Shimin gets a fucking break for once in his life, and Zetian kills god

#Loxie has words #Iron Widow #Jade I can and will loan you this book but also if I don't get it back within a month I'm invading your house

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jadelotusflower · 3 years

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It’s Cold in that Fridge: The Case of Nakari Kelen

Since The Case of Mara Jade has been doing the rounds again, I’ve finally gone back to this post that has been sitting in my drafts for literally years. So let’s honour this absolute badass who deserved better:

Once upon a time, the Star Wars universe was but six films (and a tv series) in the story of the Skywalker family. But beyond George Lucas’ story was an absolute boatload of books, comics, games, and other materials that made up the Expanded Universe. When Disney purchased Lucasfilm and the rights to the Star Wars saga, everything in this universe was decanonised and deemed “Legends” - some aspects of this universe were retained or re-purposed, others sit in Disney’s figurative vault and will likely never see the light of day (and seeing how the ST turned out, maybe that’s for the best).

But this transition between Legends canon and Disney canon was not so simple, because the nature of publishing meant that there were novels approved during the time of Legends canon that would be released in the time of Disney canon. In particular, there had been the planned trilogy “Empire and Rebellion”, set between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, with each novel from the perspective of one of The Big Three.

Razor’s Edge (Leia) and Honor Among Thieves (Han) were released prior to the Great Canon Split of 2014. But while the Luke-centric novel had been planned, it was not due to be released until well after the Split. So Heir to the Jedi (so called as an homage to the Legends progenitor Heir to the Empire) became one of the first books of the Disney canon.

What does this background have to do with Nakari Kelen? Perhaps nothing, but I do wonder how the writing process was affected by the shift from Legends to Disney - was the novel a relic of the old EU with any reference the LFL storygroup didn’t like excised during editing, or was it a trendsetter for the new EU, a Sign of Things to Come?

The most salient point being, of course, that Nakari Kelen - like so many love interests before her - was not allowed to go along her merry way at the conclusion of the novel, but was shoved into the fridge.

If there was one constant of the Legends EU, it was that Luke Skywalker’s love interests couldn’t catch a break. Mara Jade naturally lasted the longest relationship-wise, with almost twenty years of marriage to Luke before some bright spark decided she had to go (as per the aforementioned case study). But before Mara there was Jem, Shira Brie, and Gaeriel Captison (who came close to escaping the curse), and in the Legacy of the Force series they brought back sole survivors Akanah and Callista, only to kill them off for good too (and rather brutally, if I may add).

So perhaps when Kevin Hearne began writing HttJ within the confines of the Legends continuity, he was merely sticking to the status quo, or perhaps once subsumed by Disney they needed to make sure Luke's slate was clean (so to speak). And I can’t put all the blame on Hearne since I don’t know whether it was his idea, or LFL mandated - but regardless it was a poor decision.

The root cause of fridging, imo, is limited imagination. How best to cause your male protagonist pain if not kill off someone they love, or at least have strong feelings for? The answer is of course, easily. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The Luke Skywalker of HttJ is fresh from his victory in ANH, a lieutenant in the Rebellion: young, not dumb, and full of...

Nakari Kalen is an absolute Queen a civilian volunteer and crack-shot sniper who loans her ship Desert Jewel to the Alliance. Luke is immediately attracted to her, they bond over a mutual love of fast ships and leaving behind desert home planets, and engage in the inexpert flirting of two nineteen year olds while also risking their lives several times over.

I want to make it clear: I actually really like this book. It's a breezy read, almost serialised as The Early Adventures of Luke Skywalker, and is ofttimes genuinely funny. And credit where it’s due to Hearne, many of of the supporting roles in the novel are female. Other than Nakari, there's Soonta, the Rodian who gives Luke her uncle’s lightsaber, Sakhet the Kupohan spy, and the Givin cryptographer/math genius Drusil Bephorin. In a genre where male characters are often the default for these kind of roles, it was nice to see, but makes the regressive fridging of Nakari even more egregious.

Luke and Nakari make a good team fighting brain-sucking monsters and Imperials, but more importantly they have fun together - she encourages him to work on his Force skills, and he successfully moves objects with his mind for the first time (leading to Nakari adorably dub him "a little noddle scooter"). It's a very sweet, if brief, relationship, and a respite from the danger of the mission. They spend the night together (leaving the reader to decide exactly what happened behind closed doors), and share a kiss before splitting up to try and escape bounty hunters. No prizes for guessing what happens to Nakari immediately after she received the Skywalker Kiss of Death.

I assume there were two motivating factors for why Hearne and/or LFL couldn't let Nakari live:

1. If she survived, fans would wonder why she doesn't appear in ESB/subsequent material.

I recall this bandied about on forums back at the time of the book's release, and to that I say - so what? Fans are always going to wonder, and try to paper over the gaps in canon, to make up their own headcanons to explain any any perceived inconsistencies. It's certainly no reason to kill someone off.

It is in fact possible for two young people to have a romance that just fizzles, or doesn’t work out for whatever reason - it should not require great maneuvering or explanation. If Nakari doesn’t show up in the next book in the timeline, what about it? The reader is smart enough to assume she and Luke broke up, decided to just remain friends, whatever. But it seems that the only way for a female character to exit stage left is for her to die, which is bullshit.

And actually, there's no reason why she couldn't have shown up again. ESB and RoTJ cover a month and a few days, respectively, of Luke's life - just because there was no mention of Nakari doesn't mean she didn't exist at that time, whether or not she and Luke were an item. She could have made an appearance in a subsequent novel, or Rebels, or the comics - she could have become a recurring character, showing up when the Rebellion needed her, or - heaven forbid - even have her own comic/book/show! Her existence in Star Wars canon didn't need to begin and end with Luke Skywalker, merely to service his plotline and backstory and abandoning the richness of her own.

No, the only reason Nakari had to die was to facilitate this:

It was a blow to the gut, realizing what that sudden absence meant. I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, but I had felt Nakari's life snuffed out through the Force, and into that void where she had shone anger rushed in - anger, and a cold sense of raw power and invincibility...I took a step to join in the hunt but stopped, breathing heavily, unaccountably sweating even though I felt so cold inside and the power of the Force roiled within me... I shook with emotion and power, and none of it felt the way the Force had before...I saw what kind of space it was , a black hole that would always be hungry no matter how much I fed it. I might never feel warm again if I didn't get myself under control.

Luke feels the dark side and is tempted by the boost of power it offers him, but immediately identifies it as dangerous and unnatural. I can understand why Hearne wanted to include this - it is a book of firsts after all: Luke's first solo mission, his first time using telekenisis, and ending with story with his first experience of the dark side makes sense. But it wasn't necessary, which leads to:

2. How to push Luke to touch the dark side without killing someone he has romantic feelings for?

Also, obviously, shite of the bull (or nerf, if you prefer). Even if this brush with the dark side was absolutely necessary for the novel's climax, there's any number of ways it could be achieved. At this point, Luke is fresh from losing important people in his life - Owen and Beru, Ben, and Biggs - lumping another death on top of that a narrative trick for Luke to react not only to losing Nakari, but the others as well. But it's cheap, the first card in the deck, and why not show a bit of imagination? Luke is young and inexperienced enough at this point that any number of things could be the catalyst - the whole book he's struggling with his growing powers, why not try and reach too far in the firefight with the bounty hunters, his anger and frustration with himself in not doing enough trigger the dark side temptation? It would work thematically and doesn't involve a fridging that ultimately has very little payoff.

Because Nakari is killed less than ten pages from the end of the book - afterwards Luke grieves, but ultimately chooses to honour her memory and be grateful for what he learned with her, recommitting to becoming a Jedi. It's all very surface level, and once again a female character's death facilitates a male character's development. Was it so imperative that Luke lost someone he cared about as part of this story? Sure, this was a time of galactic civil war, and it's far from unrealistic that these stories have a high body count, but who to make collateral damage remains an authorial choice, and in this case Nakari Kelen was (a) a female character of color, (b) a love interest of the protagonist - not just of this book, but the entire Original Trilogy.

I don't know to what extent (if any) race had to play in the decision. I'm sure there was a segment of the fandom absolutely livid that Luke Skywalker kissed (and maybe had sex with) a black woman. Was her death LFL hedging its bets, or demonstrative of the general lack of attention/respect they show their characters of colour?

In any case this was a chance to stand out from the old EU and it's fridge full of Luke's dead girlfriends, but instead they chose to introduce and kill off Nakari for the sole purpose of Luke's manpain and character development, and that's gross.

And then there's this:

A grisly yet reliable fact about custom bounty hunter ships is that you can always count on them to have body bags stashed somewhere for the easy transport of their kills. They often have built-in refrigerated storage, too.

NAKARI IS KILLED AND LITERALLY STORED IN THE FUCKING FRIDGE I COULDN'T BELIEVE WHAT I WAS READING.

I really hope this was unintentional on Hearne's part, because yikes. He was halfway there, this book was full of interesting female characters who had agency - Drusil in particular was a delight with her super math and inability to understand human interaction. Nakari was full of life and fun - capable but relatable, showing a different side of the Rebellion and those that suffered under the Empire's rule. Fridging her in her first appearance is considerably more vile, because it reduces her to a footnote of Luke's story, a plot device to Help Him Grow, rather than a springboard to tell more of her own story.

Because Nakari was a compelling character ripe for spinoff potential. I would absolutely have read or watched her continued adventures, juggling missions for her father's Biolabs company and trying to aid the Rebellion, shooting her slug rifle and cracking wise, maybe even finding a way to amplify her mother's song Vader's Many Prosthetic Parts to really stick it to the Empire, or try and free the political prisoners on Kessel.

The old EU was made great by allies and enemies of Our Heroes showing up again to help or hinder them, and/or branching out into their own material. We fell in love with them, and followed their stories even as they diverged from the main saga, eager to read more about their lives.

Nakari Kelen never got that chance. In many ways, she exemplified what Disney Star Wars was to become: an exercise in wasted potential.

#star wars #star wars meta #heir to the jedi #nakari kelen #luke skywalker #fridging #it's cold in that fridge #star wars expanded universe #nucanon

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bookloversreviewer · 4 years

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RUTHLESS KNIGHT (Royal Hearts Academy #2) by Ashley Jade

Release Date: January 23rd

Make sure to vote for RUTHLESS KNIGHT for January’s Most Anticipated Reads:

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Add to Goodreads:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48068800-ruthless-knight

PREORDER TODAY!!

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Royal Hearts Academy is a series of standalones, but you can catch up with the first book, Cruel Prince, right here:

Amazon: https://amzn.to/30l209E

Apple Books : https://apple.co/2XuOM9Y

Barnes and Noble: http://bit.ly/2s1b0VB

Kobo: http://bit.ly/2O44dTJ

Blurb:

Welcome to their kingdom

Cole Covington is the most popular heartbreaker at school.

Every guy wants to be him and every girl wants to screw him.

Except me.

His devastatingly good looks, golden arm, and flirty smiles don't do it for me anymore...because I know what's lurking underneath the star quarterback's gorgeous armor.

At least I thought I did.

Sometimes the most beautiful people...hide the ugliest truths.

And sometimes the only way to save someone...

is to walk beside them through hell.

Sawyer Church is the bible-thumping nerd of Royal Hearts Academy.

Girls pick on her and guys don't notice her.

Except me.

Sweet, curvy, and sarcastic, she's impossible to ignore.

No matter how much I try.

Everyone at school has her pegged as the chubby, Jesus loving geek, but unlike them—Sawyer's real and never pretends to be someone she's not.

Until I ask her to be my fake girlfriend.

Sometimes the most beautiful souls...hide the greatest pain.

And sometimes the only way to save someone...

is to fight for them.

Excerpt:

I open my mouth to speak, but Bianca beats me to it.

“In Cole’s defense, he told me not to hook up with any guys. He never said anything about girls, though.” Smirking, she adds, “Plus, it’s not like he was there. He was too busy hanging out with his new girlfriend, Sawyer.”

On second thought, maybe locking her up in the basement isn’t such a bad idea after all. There would be way less shit for her to stir up from down there.

I can tell the exact moment Jace processes what she said because the little vein in his forehead makes an appearance. “Sawyer? As in Dylan’s best friend, Sawyer?”

“Do you know any other Sawyers?”

“I told you to stay away from her.”

“You also told me not to fuck Mrs. Bennett, but she ended up giving me an A in history.”

“Holy shit. You fucked Cortland’s mom?” Bianca exclaims.

We both ignore her.

“Look,” Jace starts. “Dylan doesn’t want you hanging around Sawyer. Not after what you did to her.”

“I’m sorry, last I checked, I’m a big boy and Dylan doesn’t get to make decisions for me.”

“Yeah,” Bianca cheers.

Jace’s gaze swings her way. “Go upstairs.”

“Whatever.” She fixes her stare on Oakley. “I’m gonna call *** and see if she wants to hang out.”

Oakley makes a low growling sound as she scampers away. When she’s out of earshot, he says, “***** is a sweet girl, Jace. You need to put an end to that shit.”

Huffing out a breath, Jace motions to me. “Yeah, after I put out the other fire.”

“Me dating Sawyer isn’t a fire.”

It’s a motherfucking atomic bomb.

About the Author:

Ashley Jade loves to tackle different genres and tropes within romance. Her first loves are New Adult Romance and Romantic Suspense, but she also writes everything in between including: contemporary romance, erotica, and dark romance.

Her characters are flawed and complex, and chances are you will hate them before you fall head over heels in love with them.

She’s a die-hard lover of oxford commas, em dashes, music, coffee, and anything thought provoking…except for math.

Books make her heart beat faster and writing makes her soul come alive. She’s always read books growing up and scribbled stories in her journal, and after having a strange dream one night; she decided to just go for it and publish her first series.

It was the best decision she ever made.

If she’s not paying off student loan debt, working, or writing a novel—you can usually find her listening to music, hanging out with her readers online, and pondering the meaning of life.

Check out her amazon page and Facebook page for future novels.

She recently became hip and joined Twitter, so you can find her there, too.

She loves connecting with her readers—they make her world go round’.

Connect w/Ashley:

Website: https://ashleyjadeauthor.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Ashley-Jade-Author-788137781302982/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ajadeauthor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ashleyjadeauthor/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14175946

Bookbub:https://www.bookbub.com/authors/ashley-jade

Amazon: https://amzn.to/2RGsIJ9

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