I miss con reports

[maygraderhema]

I didn't realize it's been over a year since I posted. Huh.

That said, I miss con reports. Escapade was this past weekend and I couldn't go (reasons blah, blah, blah) but I hope everyone had a blast and I'd really love an old fashion con report overview, or was that really mostly a live journal thing?

In other news, The Mole got me the Heated Rivalry books - the first two? Are there more? and I'm working through them. I can't watch the series but it keeps popping up here and there so I was curious. She got me the old fashioned paperbacks (I don't have an e-reader like Kindle) and I have neither cable nor a TV, so it's more curiosity than anything. But it does read like fan fiction which I find hilarious. Neither of the main characters has really caught my interest and enemies to lovers isn't really my trope but I'm gonna read them both just cause. I'm also painfully aware I need to up the magnification on my reading glasses again, since I'm struggling a bit and the print is not particularly small.

I am mildly surprised at how explicit the books are. I've really not bought many new books in the recent years and mainstream romances were my thing only briefly, when my mother was reading them. I get that this is more of an erotica niche but still...fan fiction in my brain for this level.

I have been re-reading Katherine Kurtz's novels. I'd forgotten kind of, how much I enjoyed them and found to my delight, I still do and the Mole, again, graciously provided me with hard copies of the three main novels because the type face on my old paperbacks really was a challenge to my eyes. They'd also been revised slightly since that original release and it was fun to see what an where. Nothing huge - no major plot points were change. Mostly a freshening of some dialogue as near as I can tell. But I still find them to be marvelous so I may be going through my bookcase for some other forgotten favorites.

What are you reading?

Comments

[kass]

How lovely to hear your voice around these parts!

I haven't read the Heated Rivalry books though I adored the series, and have been devouring fic like mad. The show really does feel like someone translated fic to film. Made just for us.

[halfshellvenus]

It's nice to see you around here!

I've recently finished the last of "The Library of the Dead" YA series. It's set in a near-future dystopic Scotland, and features a black teen protagonist who supports her family by delivering messages to/from ghosts and is invited to work with more scholarly magic. I really enjoyed the whole arc.

I've also been reading Dennis Lehane's Kenzie and Gennaro mysteries, which are really good. And I just finished "Station Eternity" (comedy, mystery, and sci-fi), which was fun. Other standouts from this year were "The Shamshine Blind" (light sci-fi combined with police procedural) and "Blob: A Love Story".

[maygraderhema]

I was telling the Mole that the first book at least reads like some took a whole bunch of PWP's and linked them together with the beginnings of a plot. The second book is supposedly more character, less sex but we'll see.

Neither of which is a bad thing at all. Just, it's resemblance to fan fic is kind of remarkable. Granted, I was never in the Hockey fandom, RPF or otherwise so I have no idea if it's like the mod of something else or just a weird coincidence

[maygraderhema]

oh, those all sound intriguing. I shall have to expand my wish list!

[gwyn]

we missed seeing you so much this weekend. Honestly, my con experience is so quiet and subdued now because of my health that I wouldn't even have much to report! I had intended to go to the HL anniversary related panels and such, but each time I fucked up and didn't make it. I probably did more this year than last, but it was my first time back so I felt like I was barely there last year. I didn't even see the vid show this year!

[maygraderhema]

I admittedly love a quiet con. I'm so much there for the people rather than the panels (Those are fun too). I'm so glad you got to go! I would have love the HL retrospect but alas, I think my traveling cross country days are over.

Still, you and i could have found a comfy couch, some snacks and probably would have had a great time.

[kass]

Apparently the first book in the series, which is about Kip and Scott, was written as original fic, then revised into Stucky fic and shared in Marvel fandom, then revised based on feedback, the fan identities scrubbed back out, and published as original romance. I'm told Shane and Ilya map pretty well to personalities in hockey RPF but I don't know more than that. Part of what I love about the series is how the first few episodes use sex as a form of storytelling -- we learn about the characters through the sex scenes because they're not interacting in other spaces. By the end of the series, we don't need to see the sex scenes because the characters have come to know each other in ways that happen outside the bedroom too.

[the_shoshanna]

Hello, it's so good to see you pop up!

I miss con reports, and also cons. But I am still too COVID-cautious to go back to Escapade.

There are six books in the Game Changers series, each focusing on a different couple in the same universe, except that books 2 ("Heated Rivalry") and 6 ("The Long Game") are both about Shane and Ilya. A seventh book, also about them, will hopefully be out in 2027, but the author is dealing with a significant health issue on top of the logistical and emotional demands of sudden fame, heh, so I'm not pinning my hopes on it. (It was originally announced for 2026 and has been pushed back.) I enjoyed the books very much, but I do like the TV show better than the first two books, which are the ones it adapts. But I did like them and also very much liked the others; Ryan Price, one of the protagonists of book 3 "Tough Guy," is my fave. Season 2 of Heated Rivalry the show will adapt book 6, but will of necessity include bits from other books as well, but no one knows what or how much and Jacob Tierney isn't telling. In the meantime I'm reading a ton of HR fanfic and also watching the show with any friends I can pitch it to.

Which Katharine Kurtz novels are you considering "the three main" ones? I was gung ho for the Deryni series way back in the day but stalled out somewhere around "The Quest for Saint Camber," and I don't think I ever read any of her non-Deryni work.

Right now I'm really enjoying Benny Lawrence's "Rabbits of the Apocalypse," which is a dark dystopian-future novel and also off-the-wall bananas, I have no idea where it's going but I am strapped in for the ride. Plus the author's websiteis headlined "lesbian robot samurai pirates from the future who play chess with lasers while eating pie," and I think we can agree that those are the heroes we need in these troubling times?

[dine]

so great to see you !

I'm mostly reading Heated Rivalry fanfic, but am working my way through a nonfiction history of the US postal service (oddly more interesting that one might think) on kindle.

I've not yet read the book series, but the TV adaptation of the first two is pretty marvellous, and they're on my TBR list

[maygraderhema]

I have Heated Rivalry and The Long Game on my bedside table, so those are the two I'm focused on. They haven't really caught me -- but I'm determined to read them since the Mole so Kindly provided them. I just haven't seen enough character work yet, I don't think, so I maybe should try to catch some clips on you tube or something.

For Kurtz, Deryni Rising, Deryni Checkmate, and High Deryni are the main 3 for me -- the gateway drugs so to speak. I've read them countless times but it's been awhile so it was nice to refresh the engagement. I've read everything she's written, I believe but none of them caught me as well as those three. I did actually enjoy King Kelson's bride - although it was ...fluffier than most of her work but the dynamics were there, and gave some closure to some things I thought needed it from High Deryni. (I also really enjoyed her Gargoyle book. It was just fun.)

I'll have to add Rabbits to my SBR list.

[maygraderhema]

Good to see you too!

I've not delved into the fanfic yet, as I've not seen the series and haven't finished the books (I read a lot slower these days.) but it would be nice if it does catch my imagination. I've been without a fandom for too long!