Reading

Current Music: An early summer rain, long overdue.

Entry tags:

Mo Dao Zu Shi; Chen Qing Ling: Advance and Retreat, by Zdenka.

Fandom: Mo Dao Zu Shi, Chen Qing Ling
Pairings/Characters: F/F; Madam Jin/Yu Ziyuan; Madam Jin, Yu Ziyuan, Jiang Cheng
Rating: Teen and Up
Length: 600
Content Notes: adultery (mentioned), angst, arranged marriage, bereavement, generational trauma, heteronormativity, marriage politics, possible (unexpressed) adult-> minor pining
Creator Tags: 5+1 Things, Drabble Sequence, Zǐdiàn (Módào Zǔshī) - Freeform, Canonical Character Death, Socially Imposed Heterosexual Marriage, Background Relationships
Creator Links: (AO3):

Zdenka
Theme: Female Relationships, Arranged Marriage, 5+1, Mutual Pining, Pining

Summary:

Five times Madam Jin saw Zidian on Yu Ziyuan's hand, and one time she saw it on her son's.

Notes:

Written for femslashfete for the prompt "artifact."

Reccer's Notes: Zdenka manages to cram so much into 600 words: an exquisitely painful soromance fulfillable only through generational proxy, imposed in turn—and the reader has the added pang of knowing what’s going to become of that couple.

Fanwork Links: Advance and Retreat, by

Zdenka.

Entry tags:

Round 175: Female Relationships

Photograph with added text: Female Relationships, at Fancake. Four old Nepalese women sit together on a low brick wall, their feet dangling, most of them barefoot, their shoes kicked off below them. They're dressed in loose patterned fabrics in various shades of red and the mood is relaxed.

Our theme for June is female relationships!

That's any kind of relationship—platonic, romantic, professional, familial, adversarial—between characters who identify as female.

The tag for this round is: theme: female relationships

If you're just joining us, be sure to check out our policy on content notes. Content notes aren't required, but they're nice to include in your recs, especially if a fanwork has untagged content that readers may wish to know about in advance.

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Weekly chat reminder

Please join us for the weekly TS chat on Saturday, May 31st, at 7 pm Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)/19:00 UTC. That could be as early as 12 pm if you’re on the west coast of North America, or 3 pm if you’re on the east coast, or 8 pm in the UK, or early Sunday morning in Australia or New Zealand.

We’re in the usual place: http://us25.chatzy.com/81935648447483. There’s nothing to download or install, just choose a name and a color and click on “join chat.”

It’s a fifth Saturday this week, so it’s time for Pimp Your Fandom. What have you been reading or watching lately that you want to share about, and why would TS fans enjoy it?

See you there!

Entry tags:

SGA: Your Inevitable Unhappy Ending by Helenish

Fandom: Stargate Atlantis
Characters/Pairings: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay
Rating: Explicit
Length: 14,383
Content Notes: mild, essentially harmless exploitation of a baby by Rodney (the baby's well cared for)
Creator Links: Helenish on AO3, dodificus on AO3, dodificus on the Audiofic Archive
Themes: Angst with a happy ending, Kidfic (has a child), Pining, First time, Friends to lovers, AU: fork in the road

Summary: It was easy to imagine fucking Rodney, the way he'd groan and clutch at John's arms and be too bossy about the whole thing; it was easy to imagine the problems it could cause.

Reccer's Notes: This is a cut off from Earth AU with the focus on John Sheppard's angst, pining and denial, but the ending, contrary to the title, is not unhappy. We follow John who's unwillingly and increasingly attracted to Rodney (but initially there's no way he'd ever let Rodney know). John tries to pretend he doesn't have feelings for Rodney while being tormented by jealousy, especially when Rodney temporarily cares for a refugee baby, partly as a "chick magnet". Helenish writes pining, self-deluding John brilliantly and this is another tour de force, packed with plot, UST, frustration, humor, and finally, finally, a happy ending, even though they're squabbling and miscommunicating throughout.

Fanwork Links: Your Inevitable Unhappy Ending on AO3
And the podfic read by dodificus is here

Entry tags:

Unfortunate Timing

So, most of you know that I visit Cindy most afternoons. (She doesn't always feel well enough for a visit.) Somewhere in the past couple of years, we switched from watching Lucifer and me reading fanfic, to me reading novels.

Cindy prefers romantic suspense, or action-adventure-romance. Other genres are okay, if there's at least a little M/F love interest. Sometimes, of course, there's more than a little.

Now, picture this: Cindy's lying in bed. I'm reading aloud, with my voice a little louder than normal, because Cindy's hearing is decreased. Her husband Carl may be shopping, or at the shooting range, but is usually doing housework or woodwork. Occasionally he comes into the bedroom for something he needs, or to tell Cindy something.

So, he's barefoot, walking down a carpeted hall; we don't know he's coming until he appears in the doorway. And, far too often, he appears -- and has heard as he approaches the doorway -- just as I'm reading a slightly (or more than slightly) salacious line.

Yesterday, it was, "Locating a skull had been difficult, Amelia reflected, but finding a codpiece had been considerably more of a challenge." He literally appeared at the doorway just as I said, "codpiece."

*facepalm*

We all had a good laugh; Cindy and Carl aren't at all stuffy, and Carl likes to tease about things like that. (He said, "Yeah, it would be!") But still, I'd rather he walked in a couple of sentences earlier, when I was reading, "It showed another extremely handsome young man dressed in the ancient Italian style."

Good grief! Who knew reading aloud could be dangerous?

(The book is Second Sight by Amanda Quick, aka Jayne Ann Krentz. Set in the late 1890's, a woman photographer is making a series of art photographs of "Men of Shakespeare." The skull was for Hamlet, the codpiece for Romeo. That's not the point of the book, but the mystery centers around photography, so her work is discussed.)

Entry tags:

e-books

Cozy Mystery sale

https://fairfieldpublishing.com/cozy-mystery-sale-may-2025/

For 99 cents, a selection of Cozy mysteries, and some series. As far as I can tell, the sale ends Saturday at midnight, USA mountain time, Greenwich -7. (There's a countdown clock on my page. I have no idea if that's adjusted for different time-zones, or the same for everyone.) Happy reading.

Entry tags:

SGA: How the Millers Relaxed and Learned to Love Rodney by sardonicsmiley

Fandom: Stargate Atlantis
Characters/Pairings: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay, Jeannie Miller, Kaleb Miller, Madison Miller
Rating: Teen
Length: 5753
Content Notes: no AO3 warnings apply
Creator Links: sardonicsmiley on AO3
Themes: Angst with a happy ending, Family, Established relationship

Summary: Sooner or later, Rodney just gets under your skin.

Reccer's Notes:
The angst in this one isn't romantic, as John and Rodney's relationship (shown indirectly) is solid. No, this is about the fraught relationship Rodney has with his sister, Jeannie, who often gives him a hard time in canon and teases or belittles him. In this story we see a series of visits back to Earth where John and Rodney stay at Jeannie's, with John increasingly fed up with how Jeannie treats Rodney and finally letting her know. There's some very nice steely-eyed John here, and Rodney is both a BAMF and absolutely there for his family. The ending is happy, with Jeannie finally fully supportive in return. A great read.

Fanwork Links: How the Millers Relaxed and Learned to Love Rodney (With A Little Help from John Sheppard)

Entry tags:

SGA: Old Soldiers Die Hard by Sholio

Fandom: Stargate Atlantis
Characters/Pairings: Genfic, John Sheppard & Rodney McKay, Original female character
Rating: G
Length: 8103
Content Notes: no AO3 warnings apply
Creator Links: Sholio on AO3, Sholio's own site City on the Ocean's Edge
Themes: Angst with a happy ending, Friendship, Families of choice

Summary: The old guy in Room 30B was about the most disagreeable human being that the nurses had ever met. But he did get visitors, including a retired Air Force Colonel.

Reccer's Notes: This is told through the outsider POV of a young volunteer nurse at a retirement home, writing out what happened - for herself, but she tells it as though talking to her mother, who died some time before. Because of that, it's not at first as angsty as it might be, as she doesn't initially like or care about the cantankerous old guy in room 30B. That changes a little as the story progresses, and of course, we feel the angst even if she doesn't, knowing this is Rodney who's old, increasingly frail, and basically dying, while John, not quite as aged and infirm, watches helplessly. Despite herself, the young volunteer gets invested in Rodney, partly as she has enough spirit to stand up to him, which he likes. Also, before he gets really ill he tutors her in his abrasive way as she's had a difficult life and is studying for her high school diploma hoping to eventually go to med school - but until Rodney helps, she's not doing too well. Eventually there's a happy ending, but not before those closest to Rodney like John, Sam, and Elizabeth have grieved for him and come close to despair. Luckily, Teyla and Ronon are on the case, back in Pegasus. The ending is very satisfying, where we see what becomes of Annie, the volunteer nurse who cared for Rodney and put up with him at his worst.

Fanwork Links: Old Soldiers Die Hard

Entry tags:

Sherlock Holmes: Come If Convenient by rudbeckia

Fandom: Sherlock Holmes (tagged as both books and Granada)
Pairings/Characters: Holmes/Watson
Rating: E
Length: 13,317 words
Creator Links: rudbeckia
Theme: Angst with a Happy Ending, courting

Summary: Watson, finally pushed away by Holmes’s lack of regard for his feelings, has left 221B Baker Street and moved into his practice. Holmes is confused—he did nothing wrong! But when Holmes realises (because everyone who gives him advice tells him so) that he is to blame, he knows he has to do something meaningful to win Watson back.

Reccer's Notes: Watson gets tried of Holmes' mistreatment and decides to leave Baker St. Much angst in the beginning, but also a Holmes determined to get his Watson back, cue the wooing! I enjoyed the inclusion of side characters like Mrs Hudson, Mycroft and Lestrade, and there was also an original character, a woman doctor who works with Watson, that I greatly enjoyed. It is tagged as both books and Granada, but I pictured the Granada lads when reading it.

Fanwork Links: AO3