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moonlit-tulip · 7 months

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What's your favorite ebook-compatible reading software? Firefox EPUBReader isn't great, but I'm not what, if anything, works better.

Very short answer: for EPUBs, on Windows I use and recommend the Calibre reader, and on iOS I use Marvin but it's dying and no longer downloadable so my fallback recommendation is the native Apple Books app; for PDFs, on Windows I use Sumatra, and on iOS I use GoodReader; for CBZs, I use CDisplayEx on Windows and YACReader on iOS; and I don't use other platforms very often, so I can't speak as authoritatively about those, although Calibre's reader is cross-platform for Windows/Mac/Linux, and YACReader for Windows/Mac/Linux/iOS/Android, so they can serve as at least a minimum baseline of quality against which alternatives can be compared for those platforms.

Longer answer:

First off, I will say: yeah, Firefox EPUBReader isn't great. Neither, really, are most ebook readers. I have yet to find a single one that I'm fully satisfied with. I have an in-progress project to make one that I'm fully satisfied with, but it's been slow, probably isn't going to hit 1.0.0 release before next year at current rates, and isn't going to be actually definitively the best reader on the market for probably months or years post-release even assuming I succeed in my plans to keep up its development. So, for now, selection-of-ebook-readers tends to be very much a matter of choosing the best among a variety of imperfect options.

Formats-wise, there are a lot of ebook formats, but I'm going to collapse my answers down to focusing on just three, for simplicity. Namely: EPUB, PDF, and CBZ.

EPUB is the best representative of the general "reflowable-text ebook designed to display well on a wide variety of screens" genre. Other formats of similar nature exist—Kindle's MOBI and AZW3 formats, for instance (the latter of which is, in essence, just an EPUB in a proprietary Amazon wrapper)—but conversion between formats-in-this-broad-genre is generally pretty easy and not excessively lossy, so you're generally safe to convert to EPUB as needed if you've got different formats-in-this-genre and a reader that doesn't support those formats directly. (And it's rare for a program made by anyone other than Amazon to work for non-EPUB formats-in-this-genre and not for EPUBs.)

PDF is a pretty unique / distinctive format without any widely-used alternatives I'm aware of, unless you count AZW4 (which is a PDF in a proprietary Amazon wrapper). It's the best format I'm aware of for representations of books with rigid non-reflowable text-formatting, as with e.g. TTRPG rulebooks which do complicated things with their art-inserts and sidebars.

And CBZ serves here as a stand-in for the general category of "bunch of images in an archive file of some sort, ordered by filename", which is a common format for comics. CBZ is zip-based, CBR is RAR-based, CB7 is 7-zip-based, et cetera; but they're easy to convert between one another just by extracting one and then re-archiving it in one's preferred format, and CBZ is the most commonly distributed and the most commonly supported by readers, so it's the one I'm going to focus on.

With those prefaces out of the way, here are my comprehensive answers by (platform, format) pair:

Browser, EPUB

I'm unaware of any good currently-available browser-based readers for any of the big ebook formats. I've tried out EPUBReader for Firefox, as well as some other smaller Firefox-based reader extensions, and none of them have impressed me. I haven't tested any Chrome-based readers particularly extensively, but based on some superficial testing I don't have the sense that options are particularly great there either.

This state of affairs feels intuitively wrong to me. The browser is, in a significant sense, the natural home for EPUB-like reflowable-text ebooks, to a greater degree than it's the natural home for a great many of the other things people manage to warp it into being used for; after all, EPUBs are underlyingly made of HTML-file-trees. My own reader-in-progress will be browser-based. But nonetheless, for now, my advice for browser-based readers boils down to "don't use them unless you really need to".

If you do have to use one, EPUBReader is the best extension-based one I've encountered. I have yet to find a good non-extension-based website-based one, but am currently actively in the market for such a thing for slightly-high-context reasons I'll put in the tags.

Browser, PDF

Firefox and Chrome both have built-in PDF readers which are, like, basically functional and fine, even if not actively notably-good. I'm unaware of any browser-based PDF-reading options better than those two.

Browser, CBZ

If there exist any good options here, I'm not aware of them.

Windows, EPUB

Calibre's reader is, unfortunately, the best on the market right now. It doesn't have a very good scrolled display mode, which is a mark against it by my standards, and it's a bit slow to open books and has a general sense of background-clunkiness to its UI, but in terms of the quality with which it displays its content in paginated mode—including relatively-uncommon sorts of content that most readers get wrong, like vertical text—it's pretty unparalleled, and moreover it's got a generally wider range of features and UI-customization options than most readers offer. So overall it's my top recommendation on most axes, despite my issues with it.

There's also Sigil. I very emphatically don't actually recommend Sigil as a reader for most purposes—it's marketed as an EPUB editor, lacks various features one would want in a reader, and has a much higher-clutter UI than one would generally want in a reader—but its preview pane's display engine is even more powerful than Calibre's for certain purposes—it can successfully handle EPUBs which contain video content, for instance, which Calibre falls down on—so it can be a useful backup to have on hand for cases where Calibre's display-capabilities break down.

Windows, PDF

I use SumatraPDF and think it's pretty good. It's very much built for reading, rather than editing / formfilling / etc.; it's fast-to-launch, fast-to-load-pages, not too hard to configure to look nice on most PDFs, and generally lightweight in its UI.

When I need to do fancier things, I fall back on Adobe Reader, which is much more clunky on pretty much every axis for purposes of reading but which supports form-filling and suchlike pretty comprehensively.

(But I haven't explored this field in huge amounts of depth; plausibly there exist better options that I'm unaware of, particularly on the Adobe-reader-ish side of things. (I'd be a bit more surprised if there were something better than SumatraPDF within its niche, for Windows, and very interested in hearing about any such thing if it does exist.))

Windows, CBZ

My usual CBZ-reader for day-to-day use—which I also use for PDF-based comics, since it has various features which are better than SumatraPDF for the comic-reading use case in particular—is an ancient one called CDisplayEx which, despite its age, still manages to be a solid contender for best in its field; it's reasonably performant, it has most of the features I need (good handling of spreads, a toggle for left-to-right versus right-to-left reading, a good set of options for setting how the pages are fit into the monitor, the ability to force it forward by just one page when it's otherwise in two-page mode, et cetera), and in general it's a solid functional bit of software, at least by the standards of its field.

The reason I describe CDisplayEx as only "a solid contender for" best in its field, though, is: recently I had cause to try out YACReader, a reader I tried years ago on Windows and dismissed at the time, on Linux; and it was actually really good, like basically as good as CDisplayEx is on Windows. I haven't tried the more recent versions of YACReader on Windows directly, yet; but it seems pretty plausible that my issues with the older version are now resolved, that the modern Windows version is comparable to the Linux version, and therefore that it's on basically the same level as CDisplayEx quality-wise.

Mac, EPUB/PDF/CBZ

I don't use Mac often enough to have opinions here beyond "start with whatever cross-platform thing is good elsewhere, as a baseline, and go on from there". Don't settle for any EPUB reader on Mac worse than the Calibre one, since Calibre works on Mac. (I've heard vague good things about Apple's native one; maybe it's actually a viable option?) Don't settle for any CBZ reader on Mac worse than YACReader, since YACReader works on Mac. Et cetera. (For PDFs I don't have any advice on what to use even as baseline, unfortunately; for whatever reason, PDF readers, or at least the better ones, seem to tend not to be natively cross-platform.)

Linux, EPUB

For the most part, my advice is the same as Windows: just go with the Calibre reader (and maybe use Sigil as a backup for edge cases). However, if you, like me, prefer scrolled EPUB-reading over paginated EPUB-reading, I'd also suggest checking out Foliate; while it's less powerful than the Calibre reader overall, with fewer features and more propensity towards breaking in edge cases, it's basically functional for normal books lacking unusual/tricky formatting, and, unlike Calibre, it has an actually-good scrolled display mode.

Linux, PDF

I have yet to find any options I'm fully satisfied with here, for the "fast launch and fast rendering and functional lightweight UI" niche that I use SumatraPDF for on Windows. Among the less-good-but-still-functional options I've tried out: SumatraPDF launched via Wine takes a while to start up, but once launched it has the usual nice SumatraPDF featureset. Zathura with the MuPDF backend is very pleasantly-fast, but has a somewhat-unintuitive keyboard-centric control scheme and is hard to configure. And qpdfview offers a nice general-purpose PDF-reading UI, including being quick to launch, but its rendering backend is slower than either Sumatra's or Zathura's so it's less good for paging quickly through large/heavy PDFs.

Linux, CBZ

YACReader, as mentioned previously in the Windows section, is pretty definitively the best option I've found here, and its Linux version is a solid ~equal to CDisplayEx's Windows version. Like CDisplayEx, it's also better than more traditional PDF readers for reading PDF-based comics.

iOS/iPadOS, EPUB

My current main reading app is Marvin. However, it hasn't been updated in years, and is no longer available on the app store, so I'm currently in the process of getting ready to migrate elsewhere in anticipation of Marvin's likely permanent breakage some time in the next few years. Thus I will omit detailed discussion of Marvin and instead discuss the various other at-least-vaguely-comparably-good options on the market.

For general-purpose reading, including scrolled reading if that's your thing, Apple's first-party Books app turns out to be surprisingly good. It's not the best in terms of customization of display-style, but it's basically solidly functional, moreso than the vast majority of the apps on the market.

For reading of books with vertical text in particular, meanwhile, I use Yomu, which is literally the only reader I've encountered to date on any platform which has what I'd consider to be a sensible and high-quality way of handling scrolled reading of vertical-text-containing books. While I don't recommend it for more general purposes, due to awkward handling of EPUBs' tables of contents (namely, kind of ignoring them and doing its own alternate table-of-contents thing it thinks is better), it is extremely good for that particular niche, as well as being more generally solid-aside-from-the-TOC-thing.

iOS/iPadOS, PDF

I use GoodReader. I don't know if it's the best in the market, but it's very solidly good enough for everything I've tried to do with it thus far. It's fast; its UI is good at getting out of my way, while still packing in all the features I want as options when I go looking for them (most frequently switching between two-page-with-front-cover and two-page-without-front-cover display for a given book); also in theory it has a bunch of fancy PDF-editing features for good measure, although in practice I never use those and can't comment on their quality. But, as a reader, it's very solidly good enough for me, and I wish I could get a reader like it for desktop.

iOS/iPadOS, CBZ

YACReader has an iOS version; following the death of my former favorite comic reader for iOS (ComicRack), it's very solidly the best option I'm aware of on the market. (And honestly would be pretty competitive even if ComicRack were still around.) I recommend it here as I do on Linux.

Android, EPUB/PDF/CBZ

It's been years since I've had an Android device, and accordingly have very little substantial advice here. (I'm expecting to move back to Android for my next phone-and-maybe-also-tablet, out of general preferring-open-hardware-and-software-when-practical feelings, but it'll plausibly be a while, because Apple is much better at long-lasting hardware and software than any Android manufacturers I'm aware of.) For EPUB, I recall Moon+ reader was the best option I could find back circa 2015ish, but that's long enough ago that plausibly things have changed substantially at this point. For CBZ, both YACReader and CDisplayEx have Android versions, although I haven't tried either and so can't comment on their quality. For PDF, you're on your own; I have no memories or insights there.

Conclusion

...and that's it. If there are other major platforms on which ebook-reader software can be chosen, I'm failing to think of them currently, and this is what I've got for all platforms I have managed to think of.

In the future... well, I hope my own reader-in-development (slated for 1.0.0 release as a Firefox extension with only EPUB support, with ambitions of eventually expanding to cover other platforms and other formats) will one day join this recommendation-pile, but it's currently not yet in anything resembling a recommendable form. And I hope that there are lots of good reader-development projects in progress that I currently don't know about; but, if there are, I currently don't know about them.

So, overall, this is all I've got! I hope it's helpful.

#Archive #Social #Ask #Ebooks #Infodump #the short summary of why i want to find a web-based epub reader is:#currently i'm learning to read japanese.#one of the natural next steps for me to take in the japanese-learning process is to start reading actual books.#i have some very useful browser extensions—yomichan and jpdbreader—which make reading japanese in-browser more convenient than elsewhere.#(jpdbreader in particular is probably the best training-wheels-ish japanese-reading tool i've found to date.)#however i can't use firefox extensions in non-firefox reader apps such as calibre #and browser security limits are such that i can't use them on other extensions' associated webpages either #thus i need to find a non-extension-based website i can get to display my japanese books so i can then read them with those extensions.

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sadaveniren · 2 months

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Fun facts about Maya’s new book!!

She doesn’t have a publishing deal (yet?)

However do you know this Sada? You might ask. Well it is quite simple dears. First: she didn’t list any publisher, which is a difference from how -say - Lottie announced her new book.

There is also nothing that comes up when you search for Maya or the book, and there’s nothing in any trade magazines about her book being picked up.

On top of that, her illustrator? He only made his IG account 6 hours ago. He is in fact a real artist but the account she tagged is brand new.

Just some fun facts 🤗

#listen I’m not saying that she - herself - intentionally dropped this today #but there is no publisher #and she’s got no release date #so #draw your own conclusions #that said self-publishing on Amazon is 100% valid #I in fact just got my first royalty payment from an ebook I put up back in 2019 #a whole FIVE CENTS #hopefully Maya will be just as successful 🤗

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brownsugar-dreams · 2 years

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Free e-books

I have no clue what’s wrong with my messaging. I see the messages asking about where to access the e-books I’ve talked about in previous posts, I just can’t reply. Making this post, bookmark it for access in the future. You can now save your favorite files to your account and access them on the go.

48 Laws of Power

Mirror Work

The M in Man is for Money

The Power of Now

Creative Visualization

Ho Tactics

& More!

http://www.brownsugardoc.com/

#sugar bowl #read free ebooks #sugar lifestyle #ebookdeals #goddess energy #sugar baby tips #heaux tips #brown sugar baby #sugar dating #spoiled heaux #heauxlife #daily motivation #podcast #free book

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rusquared · 3 months

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wonder if yen press will translate the extras too (since they're directly translating the ebook, i believe).... since there's no existing eng translation of the ebook, just of the original webnovel...

#aka: i need the extra 1863 bits because i hear theyre delicious #but also lol. me talking about volume 5 of the ebook when we dont even have a PREORDER DATE for vol 1....

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dirtbra1n · 7 months

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yeah blood transfusion post gave me visions. making do

#SICK and TIRED of DOING WORK #unrelated to shirahama miseries Could i please just be allowed to preorder the ebook of volume 6 jeweler richard. i’ve been trying for #MONTHS!!!!!!!!!!#back to shirahama miseries though. fight futilely against cruel fate shirahama kyouji. Tear yourself apart in the process!!!!!!! and also #WIN at BASKETBALL!!!!!!!!!!!! okay other stuff to do. placing this in your hands and it’s squelchy and wet Sorry #dating sim au

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brynwrites · 2 years

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Happy Release Day to Bite Your Neighbor!

M/M Vampire Romance ✨ Humor, angst, slow-burn thirst.

Wes knows the local pharmaceutical company killed his mom, but to get proof he has to trade them a vampire for their shady experiments. What luck that one has been sneaking through his window nightly to feed...

How to Bite Your Neighbor and Win and Wager is a slow-burn paranormal mm romance full of laughter, angst, and thirsty pining. It is perfect for fans of fangs and scientific interpretations of vampirism, with a medium spice level that heats up further in the free bonus content.

This is my favorite project in probably forever, so I'm incredibly excited to share it with ya'll starting here and continuing with two more books (featuring new couples in the same city) in 2023! I hope you enjoy these absolute disasters as much as I have.

BUY NOW (or read on KU)

More buy links

#writeblr #my wips #queer books #queer representation #queer reads #mm romance #queer vampires #gay vampires #lgbt fantasy #lgbt romance #bite your neighbor #guides for dating vampires #the ebook is only available on amazon but if this is a problem for you please let me know!!!

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moonshine-nightlight · 7 months

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DSM Print Update

So, after a bunch of confusion today, I figured out that Amazon doesn't allow you to do pre-orders for paperback/print versions of books (at least not self-published books)

I was really hoping to get a print pre-order link out to you guys this weekend.

I'm trying to figure out if I should just move up the publish date, but I'd been counting on that extra few days of buffer for anything last minute that might go wrong.

I'll make a decision soon and let you all know!

Thank you for your patience!

#dsm #don't shoot the messenger #self-publishing #publishing #amazon #i hav no idea why they don't let you #but after being very confused while trying to figure out how to do it #i reached out and confirmed that u literally can't #u just submit the print version and within 24-72 hrs it goes live #and u can move up an ebook release but only more than 3 days out from the initial publish date #also i made a website #its been a busy day

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e-louise-bates · 7 months

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Just snarled, "That is NOT an incorrect word choice, bite me," at Word's automatic grammar check, so yeah, edits of MMD are going great.

(I'm only on here now because my human editor (note to self: turn OFF the darn automatic grammar check) left me some comments for changes that absolutely should be made but I don't wannaaaaa so I'm having to take a little break while I convince myself to just DO IT)

#the great magic most deadly rewrite #so close #I might not get the paperback out by the november 1st release date #depends on how well proofing and what not goes with ingramspark #but the ebook should almost certainly be ready by then #I am actually almost through with the edits #which is why making major changes now is so difficult #I'm so close to the finish line! I just want to be done!#but I also want it to be done right #so here I go #back at it

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thealieninhiding · 8 months

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Kate: A Story Inspired by The New Hit Series Dates

Written by Jamie Chan

Big thank you to Sarah Nicholson who uploaded this ebook to Scribd in 2013

The anthology to which story this belongs takes the characters from the television series Dates, and helps you get a little deeper into their lives. Each story follows a character – sometimes into a dark and dangerous place. Not all of them are about a backstory. Some of them begin where we leJ the character on the screen; some of them are about a character’s fantasy world. All of them explore their character’s sexual and emotional life, and all of them have a dose of humour. They also give you exclusive access. Sometimes, things get graphic. This is Kate's story.

She lies on her side, her silky black hair spread across the white pillow.

She wraps an arm around me and pulls me close, her eyes sealed tight, a weak smile on her glistening face.

I'm addicted. The smell of her pulls me back to the morning we woke up together in that hotel room.

And as her eyes begin to open, I quickly close mine; flip abruptly onto my back and edge towards my side of the bed.

My body sinks into the attress as I drift off with the memory of Erica.

"It's Erin," she says pointedly.

Her words jab at me and I recoil, pulling the sheets up around me. After a stretch of silence, I grunt, pretending I'm halfway into a deep sleep; too tired to muster an appropriate response. Nor do I feel the need to. After all, I'm not being asked a question.

"Not Erica. Erin," she presses, unsatisfied.

Now I'm annoyed. Nothing displeases e more than being repeated to; it's worse than repeating myself.

"Well, which do you prefer?" I ask casually.

"I prefer my actual name," she says tersely.

I feel the sheets tug tight as she turns to switch on her bedside lamp. A flash of crimson orange penetrates my eyelids like I'm under a microscope.

"And who do you think about when you're with your husband?" I reply calmly, not moving.

My brows pinch into a furrow as I reluctantly open my eyes. Reality pulls into focus. The room is dimly lit, the air warm and musky, the windows still dark. I bury my head into the pillow: the smell of freshly warmed linen, edged away by the stink of sweat, sex and alcohol escaping from our pores.

I know she cleans this room with every time I leave, changing the sheets, matching the duvet covers with pillowcases. I like that she does this; the room is beautifully clean again, like I was never here.

After nearly a month of sleeping together, there's not a trace of me in this room.

I offer a strained apology as I reach for my jeans. I fish around in my pockets before straightening myself out on the bed, a fresh cigarette hanging off my lip.

"Honest mistake," I add with a deliberate double-flick of my lighter. She hates it when I smoke, but the sadistic side of me compels me to do it anyway - just to see if I can get away with it. You see, I figure, if someone can still find a way to tolerate me, to desire me, in spite of myself, then perhaps I'm not so fucked up after all.

"Kate," she starts."

"I know. I know..." I say, cutting her off.

I hop out of bed in a huff as though she's in the wrong for inconveniencing me. I walk to her side of the bed, ram my feet into her slippers and hastily wrap myself in her red robe. I scuff across the room to the balcony. I light the cigarette inside and take a long drag, warming up my insides before I step out into the crisp night. Being forced to smoke outside stirs the vindictiveness in me. So I leave the door open.

I'm not much of a spoker in truth - I don't like the way it makes my fingers smell - but lately I find myself rather drawn to it. At times, relying on it. A cigarette after tawdry, adulterous sex, erase one bad deed with another.

I run my fingers over the 'Smoking Kills' label on the box, turn and catch Erin shuddering in the sheets I have made cold. I remind myself that I'm not supposed to care, But I do. And after a moment, I shut the door behind me.

I take one last drag on the cigarette and hold it longer than I normally would. As I exhale, I watch the white smoke hang lost in the air before the night swallows it. I stare blankly into space, just as lost, not sure which way to go - but sure I don't belong here.

I need to keep moving.

I step back into the bedroom. Erin and I stare at each other. She gives a hollow smile, crawls out of bed and makes her way to the bathroom. She swings the door shut then gently pulls it back open a crack. It's not closed, but it's not quite an invitation either. The water comes on, the sound of the bath being drawn.

"Can you bring my robe?" Erin calls as I pull my shoes on and quickly gather my things.

I glance around the room, lifting the bed covers and shaking pillows to make sure nothing is left behind. I tiptoe to the door and gently shut it.

Leave. That's what I should have done six weeks ago when I last saw Erica. But there was an innocence to her, and untarnished purity in her love for her family, and her approach to love in general, that made me want to protect her, to be a better person for her. All the things that might usually have turned me away kept me there, and I have not been quite the same since. Even now I can't shake her off. Erin, usually my best distraction, is not helping.

I can't get Erica out of my head.

The cab turns onto a quiet tree-lines road, each house indistinguishable from the next. I catch my reflection in the rear view mirror; my eyeliner smeared, hair disheveled, evidence of a night stretched into a shameful morning. The driver pops into view and we exchange looks. He holds my gaze and I feel his judgement.

"Do you need directions?" I snap.

He looks away, disengaging. Before I can open my mouth again, he slaps the meter off and the cab grinds to a halt. Outside, the glint of my house number catches my eye and I realise I'm home. I look up at the mirror again, wanting to apologise, but the driver is glaring out the window. I tuck a twenty through the slot and jump out before he can count my change. He pulls away before the door fully closes.

I stand before a house I do not recognise as my home. Odd, considering I've lived here for nearly twenty years. It's the house I grew up in, the home I left when I was eighteen. Since then, the only substantial communication I've received from my parents was a birthday card, which simply read: 'We're giving you the house.'

I still have the card, a generic bunch of balloons on the front and a price sticker on the back. I keep it tucked away in a safety deposit box. The return address on the envelope is the house address. I'll never know whether they intended that to be ironic, or somehow symbolic.

I waited a good six months before I even took a stroll past the house. I had to make sure my parents weren't still in it, despite all the questions I had for them. But I guess sometimes it's better to let the pot simmer down to nothing than to stir it up innecessarily for answers I know I won't like.

By the time I got up the courage to try my key in the lock, it was obvious they were long gone.

The house glistens like new after the paint job it recieved this week. The once-gunmetal grey door now shines red, the white gates are now black, and some freshly laid cobblestone steps separate the two. I don't love the red but I know I don't have to. In a season's time I'll change it again.

A 'Wet Paint' sign hangs on the gate, flapping in the wind. I yank the sign off and the new paint peels away with the tape, exposing the original white below.

Shit.

I pull out my mascara and apply the waxy black coating, slowly at first then aggressively, until the bristles on the wand flatten. I lean back and scrutinise my work. Black and shiny again.

I push the door open. The smell of fresh paint quickly grates on me. I wedge a week's worth of post under the door to keep it ajar. I survey my new furnishings, modelled on the front cover of the latest Habitat catalogue. I poke around the house, counting to make sure all the pieces I ordered are here and in place. I throw myself on the new couch with my shoes still on - as one might carelessly treat a hotel room. I feel that nervous excitement that comes with change, but it is tinged with impending diappointment. I know the thrill will wear off quickly. Soon enough I'll be ready to change it all again.

My therapist claims this is a reaction to abandonment; that my urge is to constantly create change to mantain a life devoid of attachments and commitments. She's good. Too good. It's hard to allow someone to see through you. And it's even harder to pay that person large amounts of money to point out the flaws you go to great lengths to hide.

I'll put my money towards my spring wardrobe instead. I'm not going back to her.

Running my hands along the painted walls, I work my way through the house and into the kitchen. I stop by the pantry door. It's old and it sits unevenly above the floor. It’s been painted Crème Fraiche like the rest of the house. As wonky as it is, I don’t have the heart to replace it. A spectrum of emotions boils up in me every time I see that bloody door. It creaks when I open it. The sound takes me back. Every day after school, I would return home to a game of hide and seek. My mother would hide in the pantry when she saw me coming up the driveway. Even though I knew exactly where to find her, there was always a speck of fear in me that she might not be there. We’d laugh and laugh; we’d cry tears of joy, until the day when our roles were reversed and it was me who was done hiding.

My days meld into nights, filled comfortably with work and plans I make, then breaks with friends. Today I drag myself up the familiar steps to my house carrying my Sainsbury’s bags full of ready meals. I guess the shiny, new paint does make the house look inviting, and for a moment I forget that I’m about to eat the same cold pasta salad I’ve eaten every day for the past week.

Fourteen. I pull back the flimsy plastic cover of the pesto pasta salad. With the pot resting precariously on my chest, I eat lying down on the couch. Fourteen pine nuts. I weed them out one at a time. It’s a guessing game that has morphed into a kind of pathetic sport for me – one which I find far too amusing and win far too often. Not to mention, I’m allergic to pine nuts. Not anaphylaxis allergic, but itchy-in-awkward-places allergic.

Typical. Always drawn to the things I know are bad for me.

My phone buzzes. A new text message. Could it be her? This pesky thought rampages though my mind more often than I am proud to adit, and causes my emotions to flutter, then sink. It's foolish, I know, because I know it's never her. Yet despite that, I scroll to her name in my inbox just to be sure.

'I'm really sorry' - the last message she sent me.

I recieved it mere minutes after she walked off that morning. To meet her brother I assume. To grovel and to take back her words. Then go back to dating men. I wouldn't be surprised if she's match-made and engaged already, with a ring in one hand and a life-long prescription to anti- depressants in the other. Convinced she can live happily ever after, all the while wishing she was with me instead.

The dreamy side of me chimes in, cranks it up a notch. And maybe we’ll meet a few years later, destiny pulling us to the same taco stand one afternoon ... that instant attraction we felt the first time we met seizes us, paralysing us, rendering us immobile as we drift across the sky through the window of an empty hotel room where we make love …

"Christ! What is wrong with me?" I burst out loud. I chuck my salad carelessly onto the coffee table. Pine nuts and pasta bowties litter my buffed wood floors. I squeeze my eyes tight as though somehow, that can push her out of my mind. I'm bored. I'm bored! I need a quick fix, a distraction.

I need a shiny new thing to play with.

I stand before my window, flipping through clothes I'm begging to regret buying. Clothes that seemed like a good idea at the time. Midriff hoodies are never a good idea. Neither are cashmere hoodies, no matter how soft and cosy they feel.

I have trouble getting dressed these days; find it hard to look at myself in the mirror and be happy with what I see. I’ve been shopping online a lot lately, with no particular style or purpose in mind, besides a lazy attempt to reinvent myself. I figure if I look different, perhaps I’ll feel different. The clothes never drape quite as nicely on my normal-sized frame as they do on the models, though. I throw on some dark jeans, a crisp new shirt, and my lucky knee-high riding boots. I apply some foundation, introducing some long lost colour to my face. Not too much make up. I don’t want to look like I’m trying too hard. I run a brush through my hair, then tie my hair up into a loose bun.

The night is brisk. I tuck my hands into the pockets of my jeans for warmth. But the pockets, for reasons I’m sure are sexist, are shallow and I find myself wedging a fist, stretching my jeans and causing them to bulge in all the wrong places.

Perhaps I should have put a little more thought into my attire for the evening. Or perhaps I should have asked the cab driver to take me straight to the venue - not two streets short of it. But I want my arrival to go unnoticed. As I start to get the sniffles and search in vain for a tissue I know I do not have, I'm not so certain all this masquerading is worth it.

With a ten pound note curled up in my hand, I take a deep breath, and step into the bar. It’s well into the evening and I am immediately flushed with the warmth of all the bodies in the room. This must be what Christmas morning feels like in lesbian paradise. I smile for the first time today.

I pay my money and present my hand for the obligatory nightclub stamping.

“Oh, we don’t do that anymore,” the hostess, an attractive brunette wrapped tight as a shrimp dumpling in a gold sequin dress, asserts a little too loudly. “The ink rubs off on clothes after a little bit of dancing,” she explains, with a playful swivel of her hips. I can hear her dress stretching in agony.

"I see... sure..." I reply, as I start to walk away.

"You haven't come by in a while have you?" she continues, now staring at me a little curiously.

I turn back to her, perturbed by her determination to pull me into a discussion about the merits and pitfalls of hand-stamping.

"You don't remember me, do you Kate?" she says, then clasps her hand on her chest: "Sharron."

Faces and names flash through my mind as I try to search for my file on Sharron.

"Remember about a year ago at the gala..."

"You're the party promoter," I finally recall. The memory of a quick dalliance followed by incessant phone calls starts to trickle back.

"Party planner," she corrects. "I plan parties - like this one!" She waves her arm, gesturing to the scope of the event. Ladies' nights in London. They're a dime a dozen. And unfortunately, I've picked the wrong one. I start to look around for faces I recognise.

"Not a bad job," I say in a concerted effort to be pleasant. "Constantly surrounded by formidable women. I think I might have dodged a bullet," I add jokingly - but not joking.

"Guess that bullet came full circle," she quips, smiling suggestively. "Good to see you. I'm liking the new look, very au naturel." She blatantly eyes me from top to bottom, before turning to the next guest in line.

I flash her a nasty grin, then quickly head upstairs to the bathrooms. I need a mirror. I reach the second floor landing. I skip up to the next flight of stairs.

And there she is. Staring straight at me.

Erica stands in the cloakroom queue about twenty feet away. Her hair drapes across her shoulders and over her red silky short-sleeved top. She looks good in red.

She smiles, and I force one in return.

I glance over at the bathroom door and wonder if I can make it there before I have to engage in coversation with her. She waves me over. I walk over slowly, tucking loose strands of hair behind my ears as I suss out an appropriate greeting.

"Hi," I think I say, but I can't hear myself above the music.

"We were wondering who was running up those stairs!" Erica laughs casually. I pull back and shrug innocently.

"Well, you know me... always in a hurry," I say a little louder, and with a knowing smile. She frowns momentarily, then smiles back. I know she's making all the right references.

"It's good to see you," she says sweetly.

I question whether this is true, but before I have the chance to formulate a suitably smart-arse retort, she leans in and hugs me. I hug her back, keeping some distance at first, but she pulls me in tight and I am reminded how good she feels in my arms.

"It's good to see you too," I whisper in her ear.

My body relaxes into her. I close my eyes as I start to feel the room spin. All I can hear is the sound of our hearts beating in sync.

"Babe, give me your coat." The Asian girl queueing in front of Erica turns around to face us. Erica lets go of me, a little jarred; I can tell she was clearly just as lost in the moment as I was. Before Erica has a chance to make introductions, the girl turns to me with her hand outstretched.

"Hi. I'm Jen."

Who's this bitch? She's looming a good four inches above me, sinewy under a black lace shirt that's see-through in all the right places. Her hair is short framing high, chiseled cheekbones. She flashes a friendly smile. Her teeth are perfect.

She could just be a friend. A straight, genetically blessed, and unavailable friend with a coke habit, on a weekend away from rehab. I hope.

"Kate," I say as I take her hand. It is warm and soft. I notice her beautifully groomed nails, short and manicured. Of course. My heart starts to beat faster. My hands ball into fists. I hate her. But mostly I hate Erica for putting me in this position.

"Jen... now is that with a 'G' or a 'J'? I have Asian friends who get really creative with spelling," I say.

Erica sweeps in. "Take this," she says.

She tries to hand Jen a fiver from her purse while throwing me a look to back off.

"I got it babe," Jen responds. Those teeth of hers sparkle again. She gives Erica a reassuring squeeze on the arm before she walks off with the coats.

I turn to Erica.

"So is she your cousin?"

She narrows her eyes at me. "Are we being rude already?"

"You two look alike. Tall, thin, similar hairline. I bet you share a last name," I press.

"Do you even know my last name?" she challenges.

I shrug, my eyes trained on her. She looks away, nervous. I sense her giving in a little. But before I can respond, perfect Jen with her perfectly timed entrance waves Erica downstairs.

"I'll see you downstairs." She turns to me with those focused eyes. I am not sure if that's a question or a statement. So I nod.

Disparaging thoughs course through me as I lean against the wall inside the bathroom cubicle. I can't believe Erica is seeing someone else. And if she is openly dating women, why wasn't I the first person she called?

Perhaps I should have been in touch with her before now. Should I have checked in to see how she was? My stomach churns at the thought of her embracing another woman.

Perfect Jen. Jen, Jen, Jen.

A light tap on the cubicle door.

"Just a minute," I reply curtly.

I tear off a few squares of toilet paper, dry my nose, then fall back onto the wall of the cubicle. The last thing I need is to be rushed.

The whole night feels like a mistake. There is a reason I prefer to meet women online, a reason why I stopped going to these ‘lesbian nights’. Week after week, the same faces start to pop up. Faces I don’t want to see. Faces with questions I don’t want to answer. I haven’t thought this through well at all. Coming here tonight, it was impulsive and reckless.

I hear the same light tapping against my door. Peering through the tiny gap where the door meets its hinges, I see a slither of red.

Could it be her?

"Just a sec!" I respond hastily this time with a much gentler coice. I give my reflection a once over on the surface of the metal toilet paper dispenser, run my fingers through my hair, check my smile. I take a deep breath, my insides fluttering, then I slide the latch and open the door.

It isn't her. Instead, it's a woman in her forties; arms crossed, livid. I find bathroom behavior to be a good measure of character. A useful test to see how one responds under pressure. I'm guessing this woman did not come here to make friends tonight.

"I know you weren't really using the toilet," she says bitingly, as I cross to the sink. "I saw the way your feet were facing... I can tell," she adds.

I make eye contact with her in the mirror.

"That's creepy. You should fix that habit," I reply calmly.

I love girl talk.

I cradle my hands under the tap. The warmth of the water ripples through me. I look at myself in the mirror, steadily. Something switches on in me.

I go downstairs slowly, but with confidence now, scanning the lounge for her. It doesn't take me long to spot her in the centre of the room, tucked in close to Jen in a small circle of women. Jen, flashing her teeth with every other 'e' she pronounces, is telling a story. The others listen and laugh.

A girl works her way across the room towards Erica. They hug like friends. Good friends. She looks happy. She's trying to be happy. And I realise that's all I want for her.

For myself? A stiff drink would do for now.

I ease my way towards the bar, settle into a stool and signal to the bartender. She's cute. I look around the room. Everyone is engaged in surface-level conversation. Empty smiles, unecessary hand touching, arm brushing - small gestures that chip away that wall between 'complete strangers' and 'strangers who completely want to sleep with each other'.

Isn't it strange how being physically alone at a singles' night somehow renders you unapproachable? I whip my phone from my back pocket and refresh my mailbox with a swipe of my thumb - over and over, like I'm skimming an email, like there are countless things jostling for my attention.

"What can I get you?" the bartender asks.

"Shot of whisky, please. Actually, make it a double," I correct myself, smiling.

Pretty face, sexy body, a bit young for what I'm looking for maybe, but I don't care. As she fills my glass, she glances my way. I can tell she is interested.

I feel a hand on my shoulder, the grip firm but gentle. I know it's Erica. I hope it's Erica.

"There you are," she whispers softly.

I smile. It is Erica.

The bartender returns with my drink resting on a folded napkin. She looks to me, then to the napkin; then to me and to the napkin again, before walking away. I pick up the drink, knowing full well that the napkin with the bartender’s number scribbled across it will unfold in front of Erica.

"You don't waste any time," says Erica.

"Neither do you," I say, returning the jab. I hand my credit card to the bartender.

"Shall I start a tab?" she asks.

"No," I reply, slipping the napkin into the pocket of my jeans.

"Are you leaving soon?" Erica asks.

"I am. A bit knackered." I pause, and then I add: "Didn't get any rest last night," a cheap shot that makes me feel cheap. I turn to her but can't bear to keep my eyes on her for long. I retreat to my drink. I take small sips, a measured move, unsure how many more times I may need to use my drink as a prop to divert my gaze.

"I'm glad I saw you," I say, my eyes fixed on the rim of my glass. "You seem to be doing great." "I'm doing... okay," she corrects.

"Jen seems great."

"Jen is great," she corrects again.

“Cheers to Jen,” I say, as I bring the whisky glass to my mouth to prevent myself from saying something inappropriate. I take another big sip and let it trickle down my throat, making sure I feel the sting.

"Jen's just a friend."

Why did she admit that? I let silence fill the space between us, curious to see where she'll steer the conversation now. But she's just as patient, settling into the empty barstool next to me.

"You should ask her out," I instigate, looking straight at Erica.

"We dated for a little bit," she admits. "But we decided we were better suited as friends."

I nod, trying to appear calm, unmoved.

"I guess that means she's fair game..." I say with a cocky smile. Erica looks at me hard, not the least bit amused. I retreat into my drink again.

"Why do you do that?" She asks earnestly.

I laugh, hoping to soften my attack, but the conversation has already turned into a confrontation. I throw back the rest of my whisky, then I grab her Peroni to wash it down. I set it back down roughly on the counter in front of her.

"I need to get going," I say.

No goodbyes, hugs or apologies. I walk off and I do not look back.

No cabs. I stand in the street, impatiently looking both ways. Never a cab in sight when you need one. Just as I start walking to the street corner, I hear her call my name.

"Kate!"

Erica stands in front of the door, rubbing her bare arms for warmth. I look back at her, unsure what to do.

"Wait a second!" she cries.

I walk back to her. She extends a hand out towards me and I pick up my pace. That fluttering sensation returns. I hurry towards her.

"You forgot your credit card." She presents me with something plastic and shiny. I am a fool. I take it from her, mutter a thank you then quickly turn back into the empty street. But I feel her linger behind me.

"What did you expect?" She says. I don't respond. "I texted you. You never replied," she continues between chattering teeth.

"You should get back in there," I urge.

“You don’t think I go to these things hoping I might find you?” she presses. I hang my head, shoulders slump, my body articulating what I cannot with words. I see her shadow move into mine.

"If I go back in to grab my coat, will you wait for me?"

I look up and down the street, craning my neck, trying to spot signs of traffic.

"You'll have to walk about eight streets over to catch a cab. You can call one from my place. It's closer.

I could call one from inside the bar too, but... I look up and down the deserted street. I guess this way I can make sure she gets home safely.

"Sure," I respond with a casual shrug.

She looks at me questioningly.

"I won't leave," I add. She smiles back before dashing back into the bar.

A taxi pulls up to the kerb in front of me. A couple of young, overly eager girls in skimpy clothes and pinching heels jump out. Off to make mistakes they won't remember by the morning, no doubt. The last girl brushes past me as she steps from the cab.

"Are you coming or going?" she asks. I look to the door of the bar. A sinking feeling. How long does it take to find a coat?

I sit inside the cab as it drives off, unsure if I’ve made the right decision. Erica sits close. A little too close. Realising this, she shifts to her side of the seat, leaving a suitably polite, platonic gap between us.

The warmth of her body moves away from me and is replaced by cold regret.

We sit in the cab together in silence, the quiet broken every now and then when I breathe hot air onto my cold fingers. Erica reaches over and takes my hands in hers. Her body gravitates back towards mine, closing the gap.

It feels comfortable. It feels right, like two jigsaw pieces clicking together. I feel the excitement start to build in me again, the same hope that has disappointed me one too many times tonight. So I keep my hand loose in hers, eyes on my window, counting houses to numb my mind, not ready to believe or trust any of it.

The cab stops.

"This is me," Erica says, still clasping my hands. I tighten my grip; she notices but pulls her hand away and reaches in her purse for money. She hands a note to the driver then opens the door. I lean back in my seat, certain that I will take the cab home. But Erica reaches for my hand. "C'mon," she says,

Erica lives on the first floor of a three-storey building. I can barely keep pace as I walk from the pavement to her door. I shuffle my feet tweice on the doormat before entering.

Her flat is small but charming, her décor a clash of cultural influences. There are half-open boxes everywhere. I assume this to be the aftermath of the fall-out with her family, a topic I want to steer clear of.

"Red or white?" she asks.

"White. Always," I reply. Stained teeth are not attractive.

"You'll have to forgive the mess," she calls from the kitchen. I'm sort of... in transition at the moment."

I know a thing or two about transition.

"It's fine, really..." I tiptoe around the boxes, finally settling myself on the arm of a couch covered with freshly folded laundry.

"There's more space in my bedroom," she calls.

How convenient. I push the bedroom door open. Sure enough, it is sparse in comparison to the rest of her flat. A nearly made queen-size bed sits on one side of the room, an empty bookshelf, a desk, and a half-filled wardrobe on the other.

I sit on the edge of her bed, pull a pillow close and inhale. That scent again.

I hear Erica come in. She sets two wine glasses down on the bedside table. I feel the mattress shift under me has she crawls to lie next to me. I open an arm and she curls into me, resting her head on my shoulder. Her face nestles up against my neck.

She smells good, feels good, and I start to feel scares.

"I promised myself I wouldn't sleep with you tonight," I whisper, my head touching hers, hoping she'll give me a reason to break my promise.

Silence. Seconds stretch into painfully quiet minutes.

I lean in and kiss her - long, and hard. She kisses back, but I feel her lips soften and pull away. "I called you a cab. It'll be here in fifteen minutes," she finally responds.

That hurts.

"Probably best," I finally reply, swallowing hard as I feel anger build up in me.

I can't believe her audacity. "Why did you bring me here?" I snap, pulling away from her. I stare at her, but she won't meet my gaze.

“It felt right,” she starts, finally looking at me. “I’ve probably made more wrong decisions in my life than right ones. I mean, even the right ones ... I’m not always confident they are right for me. But this feels right.”

Perhaps we would make the perfect couple. She's selfish and I'm a fool. Like a car she's taken for a test drive, and accidentally scuffed. Twice.

"You have things you need to sort out," I say condescendingly, as I pull myself off her bed.

"So do you," she replies firmly, taking me by surprise.

I walk around her room. “You could start by putting your clothes up on some hangers? I have bits of furniture you can have, unless you prefer to live out of cardboard boxes?” I offer, gently kicking the one nearest to my foot. “This could be a home. A good one.” I smile hopefully, but she just looks back at me, not reacting.

I look around, from the bookcases two-toned black and gray with dust, to the empty closet and half-filled boxes. I reflect again on the migration of all her possessions to the living room. I look back at her, then to her bare bed and empty night table, its drawer hanging half-open.

“You’re not unpacking, are you?” I lift a photo frame wrapped in bubble wrap from one of her boxes.

"No," she says, propping herself onto both elbows to face me. "I'm leaving."

I try hard to smile, but my face just twitches as the truth starts to sink in. And soon, I realise I'm trembling. I stare at her, trying to make sense of it all in her eyes.

But I can't break through. And then I realise the answer is in front of me. What's staring back at me is conviction.

"When?" I finally say.

She hesitates. "Soon," she replies, clearing her throat, and I begin to wonder if she's lying or just being evasive.

"Where?" I ask pointedly as though I have a right to know. "Back home?" I add with a smirk, trying to be clever at the risk of being insensitive.

Home would be better than any place she might say.

But she tilts her head towards one shoulder, mouth zipped tight and shakes her head - no, not budging.

I hear laughter, bursts of controlled husteria, which I slowly identify as my own. She doesn't say a word, but turns away from what I'm sure she recognises as sadness masked beneath uncomfortable laughter.

A car horn sounds. "That's your cab," she says, getting up but keeping a respectful distance from me. Sensing her hesitation, I step towards her and pull her in for an embrace. She steps into me, hugging me tight, neither of us quite ready to let the other go.

I rest my forehead against hers, wishing I could read her mind. We kiss. Short, long, both of us pulling away then leaning in for more like the snap of a rubber band that's been stretched too far. How could she leave? How can I?

"You should go," she says in hushed tones, her arms coming undone. But I can still feel her breath against my neck, the contour of her body against mine.

"But if I have a say in this?" I ask. My eyes are shut but I can see her, clear as day.

Then finally, she whispers, "Stay".

A car horn sounds again. I open my eyes, then narrow them into a squint – at the intrusion of a morning that has come knocking far too soon. Outside the window, I see men muscling boxes into a van, boxes I know belong to Erica.

I shut my eyes, hopelessly attempting to retreat from reality. I stretch my hand across the bed, but only the cold of empty sheets greets me. I bury my head in the pillow and breathe in deep. Every pocket of space inside me burns then chars, like the end of a cigarette after a long drag. Floorboards creak, the sound of a loud engine idling outside. I keep my eyes shut trying to ignore the sounds of movers as they empty Erica’s flat into the van. I curl into the pillow and sheets, not wanting to wake up. Then I feel the warmth of her body lying next to me.

I know the conversation that awaits me, the courtesy of a goodbye she needs to say. The engine rumbles louder with impatience. But I keep my eyes shut, not wanting to be left with the sight of her walking away.

Hours pass before I open my eyes, confident that she is no longer in the flat. I grab my jeans to pull on, and an envelope falls out from a fold. I stare at the blank envelope with trepidation at everything it could possibly mean.

I sit on the pavement outside Erica’s house with her pillow resting on my lap. I rest my head on the pillow, staring sideways at the envelope, preparing myself for all the possible things I could find.

A letter saying goodbye; a bill, perhaps, for the extra hours the movers had to spend working around me; or worse, the envelope is mine but I’ve conjured up this idea that Erica might have left me something to hold onto. I open the sealed envelope delicately, and pour the contents onto my shaky hand.

It's her braided bracelet, the one she bought off the road in Tuscany, and the one I was certain she would take away with her.

Light as it is, I suddenly feel the weight of all that it meant to me. I slip the bracelet around a panel of her old white fence, and begin to return home, to what I know is safe and certain.

But then I turn back and retrieve the bracelet. I run it between my fingers, then tuck it into the tiny pocket of my jeans. It's tattered and old, just as I remembered it.

Yet for the first time in as long as I can remember, I feel shiny and new.

#Katie McGrath #kate foster #dates 2013 #dates episode 4 #dates 2013 ebook

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fictionadventurer · 8 months

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I like reading your history posts. You make history interesting.

If you haven’t already could you do one on Lucretia Garfield and her tangled love story?

I have talked about it a bit, but I'd love to go into more detail. Perhaps the best thing I can do is link you to this article by Michelle Krowl from the Library of Congress, who happened to be my favorite recurring guest on Presidential, but I'd also like to give the quick, chatty version of my understanding of the story.

James and Lucretia Garfield are the definition of a slow-burn love story. They met each other in high school, and then again when they both attended the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute (a kind of prep school) and became interested in each other though they had very different personalities and upbringings. Lucretia's father helped run the Eclectic Institute. James could only afford to go there by working as a janitor (at least until his second year there, when they gave him six classes to teach). Lucretia came from an extremely reserved family where you didn't show emotions ever. James' family was loud and emotionally open and openly affectionate. But the two of them shared a love of literature and learning, and in 1853, James tentatively started the courtship by sending her a letter, and by 1854, they were engaged.

But it was a very slow and painful trip to the altar. James left for college after they got engaged, and since he was a handsome, gregarious, and openly affectionate guy, he attracted the attention of other women. Lucretia, being shy and reserved, didn't know how to express the emotions she felt about her fiance, especially via letter. At one point (though I can't quite figure out exactly when this happened), James told Lucretia he was worried she didn't truly love him. Lucretia (in a move that could inspire a whole new fanfic trope) responded by handing him her diary, which contained years' worth of entries where she poured her heart out. After reading the private emotional turmoil that she'd been too reserved to show, James was finally convinced that she loved him.

But he wasn't quite sure that he loved her. Like I said, he was an emotionally open guy, and wasn't sure that she would be warm and gushing enough to satisfy his need for affection (he was a bit needy). He got involved with another woman, and when Lucretia found out about it, she wrote him this heartbreaking letter where she forgave him for his transgression, assured him that she still loved him, but begged him to break it off if he loved the other woman more than her, because, "to be an unloved wife, O Heavens, I could not endure it".

But that's exactly what she became. Despite their doubts (both worried they were marrying more for duty than love), they finally wed in 1858. In their first five years of marriage, they spent twenty weeks together, because James was constantly off dealing with his political career, and later, serving in the Civil War. Their young daughter died, they kept spending time apart, and they just couldn't seem to connect with each other.

The low point came when James had an affair with a widow when he was off fighting in the Civil War in 1864. James confessed the affair to Lucretia, and she forgave him, asking only that he break off the relationship. Her strength in dealing with her heartbreak over this finally made James realize what an awesome wife he had--and it probably helped that they were finally able to live together when he started his political career in Washington. By 1867, they were writing each other letters about how desperately and deeply they loved each other, and they were deeply in love for the rest of their lives.

Which makes his tragic early death by assassination all the more heartbreaking. But at least they got a few years of happiness to make up for some of the suffering they went through to get there.

#answered asks #history is awesome #presidential talk #me: oh good i finally have time and motivation to answer this ask #me: i should check the ebook about garfield's life for details #my phone: your loan was automatically returned on the due date #me: grrr #so this is vaguer than i'd like but i hope it gets the point across

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vulpinesaint · 8 months

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desperately trying to remember if there are any books i read this year that i cannot find on my library borrowing history or simply cannot remember. i am so bad about remembering books. LITERALLY REMEMBERED ONE AS I'M WRITING THIS POST. anyway i am attempting to compile a list of books that i've read this year so that i can reference it without having to forget everything. wish me luck. i have fifteen titles on there right now but i can't shake the feeling there's something i'm forgetting

#checking my shelf of books i got for school??? idk #none of this is helped by the way that i have seven thousand books waiting to be read right now and all of them are on my mind #and several of them i am partway through. but i cannot put bell hooks all about love on my list yet i just can't #opened this is how you lose the time war today. not liking it super much but it's not even 200 pages so we'll pound through it #and then my three books from merc (princess bride and two books from the fight club guy)#and all about love. and interview with the vampire #WITCHER NOVELS!!! I READ WITCHER NOVELS AGAIN!!!! adding two more books to my list #god i'm not even through blood of elves yet. awful. this is why i can't keep anything up i forget my ebooks exist as options #then i should read that book about eleanor roosevelt that my grandma got me. as a token to her dskfjghs #wanna reread the hours! have a physical copy just for that so i can annotate #gotta finish the once and future king.#all that to say that there are many books that will be on this list once i actually sit down and read some of them #have to remind myself that i Am actually doing good i'm at over a book a month rate. this is fine #two books a month rate! actually!#shout out to library due dates for being a fantastic motivator #seventeen books on the 'read' list this year. this is fine bracken. you're doing good #realistically this is SO much better than previous years 😭 good stuff. just gotta keep reading #valentine notes #list that would have been so useful to have when we were doing that book recommendation thing

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everydaydg · 3 months

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That wierd time manga was on the 3DS eshop

Available only in Japan and France

Dokopon Choice

While looking for MH Stories on hshop (not gonna sugarcoat it, that was what I was doing)

I ran into something that caught my eye... a strange name Ive heard of every MH game on the platform so something was off when I saw a name I didnt recognize.

MH Flash... huh?

It coudnt be a game considering it was literarly 75MB and there were like 7 different volumes

looked it up and realised that was a manga... I thought it was going to be some sort of tie in bonus, like a series of 3D videos, because I never heard of anything like the 3DS having actual manga publications but...

No that wasnt the case actually, it was just a whole issue of Monster Hunter Flash

The menu did leave me asking some questions. it didnt look like something capcom themselves made, instead a platform that was made by a third party which lead to the question

"are there more of these?"

yes. there were.

And so I present to you one of the neatest things ive ever ran into while looking into the 3DS's catalogue

The French and Japanese eshop's selection of digital manga!

"どこぽんちょいす" - "Dokopon Choice”

Sadly its french equivalent had no such name holding everything together

No this is not homebrew, no this isnt a joke. This happened.

Where do I begin...

The 3DS has a neat history with ebooks

There were two services that provided ebooks on the system, these being: HONTO for 3DS and Dokodemo Honya-San. both exclusive to japan.

Honto had a more general ebook line up. no manga

Honya-San was kinda like that but you also had a whole lot of manga baby

So where does Dokopon Choises fit into this?

Well Dokopon Choise was the name for standalone releases of things found on Honya-San

Imagine it this way, in Honya-san, releases are treated like DLC

Through Dokopon its treated as its own app.

Purchases of Dokopon apps and Honya-San books are treated as separate so you could end up buying the same thing twice (its actually aknowledged on every dokopon release on the eshop, be careful that you dont buy the same thing twice by accident)

Both were managed by Librika, a digital book distribution company

That leads the question as to why I didnt make this post about Dokodemo Honya in general as that service has alot of things to talk about

Well Honya-San didnt make it out of japan... The only one that got out of japan was Dokopon Choise which is why I want to focus on it.

its an incredibly neat oddity for the system

Some day Ill have to do more propper research on HONTO for 3DS but for now lets focus on the french manga

So Japan makes sense but... France? why france of all places

Well from what ive read, apparently out of most countries in Europe. France had the largest audience for manga, which made something like this profitable.

Even then because of the small selection that made it over, it mostly feels like a small experiment more than anything

The french eshop had the following series:

Nisekoi

Professor Layton

Little Battlers Experience

Rock Lee (Manga spinoff)

Blue Exorcist

Monster Hunter Flash

Inazuma Eleven

Beyblade Metal Fusion

Beyblade Shogun Steel

List of series originally found on GBAtemp by user "Asia81"

I did go ahead and verify this list and indeed. this was everything that came out of this in france.

All of these with various amounts of volumes released. I believe the series with the most volumes on the service was that of beyblade metal fusion at a whopping 11 Volumes

What an odd bunch. France never got Dokodemo Honya san in any shape or form. only these series.

I wonder if the experiement worked out in any way.

Something I find wierd is that some of the ones here never got a Dokopon release in Japan. They most likely were stuck on Honya San

I sadly dont have any pricing information on these, there is alot I havent been able to find about the french releases... I hope some day more about these comes to light

So what about Japan? well to start, the selection was waaayy bigger

98 volumes of multiple series made it into the eshop. Thats quite a substancial increase.

(The following list is comprised (mostly) by the localised names of the series for the sake of making it easier to read. Romaji will be provided for some so they are easier to look up

and so you can see a few familiar names -w-

its also organized in order of release on the service)

The JP selection was:

Attack on Titan

Love's Reach

Magi

Detective Conan

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Screaming Lessons

DRAGON BALL (colored version)

Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha ViVid

Monster Hunter Flash

FAIRY TAIL

Yozakura Quartet

Chihayafuru

HUNTERxHUNTER (colored version)

Sweet Devil Laugh - 甘い悪魔が笑う

Today, Our Love Begins (Kyō, Koi o Hajimemasu)

Grandpa Danger

Kuroko's Basketball

Kitchen Princess

Hiyokoi

My Little Monster (Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun)

Hell Girl

Hell Girl R

Thermae Romae

Stardust Wink

MONSTER HUNTER EPIC

Ro-Kyu-Bu!

Lotte's Toy!

Spice and Wolf

Ayakashi Hiougi - あやかし緋扇

The World God Only Knows

Monster Hunter Orage

1st grade, 5th group, Ikimono-gakari - 1年5組いきものがかり

Kings of My Love - Oresama Kingdom

Hozuki's Coolheadedness - Hōzuki no Reitetsu

Kenichi the Mightiest Disciple - Shijō Saikyō no Deshi Kenichi

Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches

BLACK BIRD

Space Brothers - Uchū Kyōdai

We Were There - Bokura ga Ita

Tonari No Atashi - 隣のあたし

Shugo Chara!

Kids on the Slope

Inazuma Eleven

Lucky☆Star

Super Mario-kun

Blood Lad

Fate/kaleid liner Prisma Illya

Sgt. Frog

Gakuen Basara

Nobunaga Concerto

Mushishi

Monster Hunter Play Manga

To Love-Ru (color version)

Prince & Hero - Ouji to Hero

Jimikoi

2.5D Boyfriend - 2.5 Jigen Kareshi

iShoujo - i・ショウジョ (color version)

I”s

Aoha Ride - Ao Haru Ride

Ane Doki

Ichigo 100% (color version)

Tokyo Ghoul Remastered Edition

Hatsukoi Limited.

Nisekoi

MY GOD thats alot more stuff than the french eshop

Something I would like to note is that these were sold as multi packs on the eshop. Tonari no Atashi has a Vol.1-10 pack which retailed at ¥4,400

The prices for the packs with multiple volumes are all over the place but they tend to float arround ¥1,800 to ¥5,125

Price depends on the amount of volumes offered and the series.

Jimikoi and 2.5D boyfriend were the cheapest of the entire lot at ¥400 and ¥880 respectively

And the most expensive release was in fact Tokyo Ghoul Remastered at a whopping ¥7,000 for Volume 1-14

Source

The list here did not include prices because most of these had multiple... multi packs like dragon ball.

Dragon Ball had like 1 pack for every arc and that would have been a pain to keep up with. maybe some other time I will go ahead and organize that info.

Something I found interesting is how the file size for the JP manga are considerably bigger than that of the french releases, most likely due to the french releases not being in multi packs.

The French releases were 75 MB a pop. No multi packs to my knowledge.

While the japanese releases often go over 200 MB. Most likely due to having most of the volumes in one singular download.

Keep in mind that the list here is only for what was on Dokopon Choise. Dokodemo Honya-San had even more things... but sadly due to the nature of it being a digital platform and its downloadable content not being shown on the eshop... I cant find more info on what was on the service...

Most I have is tweets of people talking about the service.

I found a tweet that showed how JOJO was on the service, ive seen tweets mentioning people reading nichijou on the service too

Photo by Twitter user: TOUTO_jojoDR

Original Tweet

I also sadly I cannot check on the application itself due the service shutting down and no clear archive of this stuff being out there. some day ill find a way to look more into this

Dokopon Choise got new releases from 2013 all the way to 2016.

Last release being Nisekoi in Japan.

I sadly dont have data on when they released for french audiences, I just have data on the JP releases.

All of the releases under Dokopon Choises were removed from the eshop in January 31, 2019

Source

and subsequently, Dokodemo Honya-San got removed in 2020

Users could buy manga up to February 28, 2020

And they could redownload their stuff up to July 30, 2020

Source

Luckily for anyone who purchased content on the 3DS, they had a chance to move their 3DS library to their web library.

Honya San wasnt only on 3DS, same as HONTO, it had a web client under the name Dokodemo Bookstore

To my knowledge it seems like users who still have the app, on their 3DS, with downloaded books can enjoy them just fine.

And despite Librika merging with MEDIA DO in 2019, it seems like Librika still operates their digital bookstore to this day on mobile platforms.

What an odd piece of nintendo history isnt it.

I thought I was going to make a short post for once but no I ended up having to do a bunch of research for this. Because if I didnt... who was going to talk about the damm book services on 3DS.

I think making the list of manga on the service was the worst part.

But yeah! I recommend giving these a shot! even if you dont understand japanese, its still really cool being able to show off manga on your 3DS outside of the homebrew manga reader.

Ima leave this off with two silly tweets about boobs being uncensored on the release of Dragon Ball on the platform lmao.

"What the Hell! The 3DS is increasingly becoming a wonderful piece of hardware that creates special fetishes in children!!"

That is going to live in my head rent free for a month LMAO

#Dawg why the fuck is Ro-Kyu-Bu here #get the fuck outta here #Anyway hoo boy! man this was a joy to research #Its always fun finding out fun things on handhelds like this... even if that list of titles was an absolute pain in the ass to write.#I would have added release dates but man I was so tired by the end of making the list lmao #Did you know librika was also responsible for distributing manga on the PSP's PSN #I found that out while looking into them hahaha #3DS #anime and manga #ebooks #nintendo 3ds

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