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pennyarcade_feedThere are a few things I am an absolute sucker for, just suckin' like crazy, and one of them is dice. Or, several of them I guess. It depends on how granular we're being. I thought that I was in remission, but here at PAX I've been thrust into the fire like a hot poker - a hot poker that for some inexplicable reason wants to buy dice.
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senmutKris knows where she would rather be
dorktower_feed
This or any DORK TOWER strip is now available as a signed, high-quality print, from just $25! CLICK HERE to find out more!
HEY! Want to help keep DORK TOWER going? Then consider joining the DORK TOWER Patreon and ENLIST IN THE ARMY OF DORKNESS TODAY! (We have COOKIES!) (And SWAG!) (And GRATITUDE!)
ysabetwordsmith
ysabetwordsmith full_metal_ox posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
metaquotesdissectionist: Back in MY DAY, we had to read Penthouse Forum letters into a tape recorder and put the resulting tape into a first-gen Teddy Ruxpin. Nowadays kids don’t even have to work to turn their teddy bear into a creep.smartbitches_feed
We Solve Murders by Richard Osman is $1.99! This came out last September, but I wouldn’t be surprised if library holds were still pretty long. Maybe snap this up if you impatience is winning out.
A brand new series. An iconic new detective duo. And a puzzling new murder to solve…
Steve Wheeler is enjoying retired life. He does the odd bit of investigation work, but he prefers his familiar habits and routines: the pub quiz, his favorite bench, his cat waiting for him when he comes home. His days of adventure are over: adrenaline is daughter-in-law Amy’s business now.
Amy Wheeler thinks adrenaline is good for the soul. As a private security officer, she doesn’t stay still long enough for habits or routines. She’s currently on a remote island keeping world-famous author Rosie D’Antonio alive. Which was meant to be an easy job…
Then a dead body, a bag of money, and a killer with their sights on Amy have her sending an SOS to the only person she trusts. A breakneck race around the world begins, but can Amy and Steve stay one step ahead of a lethal enemy?
Swordcrossed by Freya Marske is $2.99! Many of us were very excited for this release. Sarah also had Marske on the podcast to talk about it.
High heat. Low stakes. Sharp steel.
The cozy, low stakes of Legends & Lattes meets the scorching bodyguard fantasy of Jennifer L. Armentrout’s From Blood and Ash in this enemies-to-lovers romance where, yes, the swords do cross.
A LitHub most anticipated book of 2024
Mattinesh Jay, dutiful heir to his struggling family business, needs to hire an experienced swordsman to serve as best man for his arranged marriage. Sword-challenge at the ceremony could destroy all hope of restoring his family’s wealth, something that Matti has been trying—and failing—to do for the past ten years.
What he can afford, unfortunately, is part-time con artist and full-time charming menace Luca Piere.
Luca, for his part, is trying to reinvent himself in a new city. All he wants to do is make some easy money and try to forget the crime he committed in his hometown. He didn’t plan on being blackmailed into giving sword lessons to a chronically responsible—and inconveniently handsome—wool merchant like Matti.
However, neither Matti’s business troubles nor Luca himself are quite what they seem. As the days count down to Matti’s wedding, the two of them become entangled in the intrigue and sabotage that have brought Matti’s house to the brink of ruin. And when Luca’s secrets threaten to drive a blade through their growing alliance, both Matti and Luca will have to answer the how many lies are you prepared to strip away, when the truth could mean losing everything you want?
“There’s nothing in fantasy or queer romance that Marske can’t do.”—Sarah Rees Brennan
A Werewolf’s Guide to Seducing a Vampire by Sarah Hawley is $1.99! This is book three in the Glimmer Falls series. For me, this series was too twee for my liking. What are your thoughts?
Ben Rosewood never meant to be bound to a vampire succubus, especially one as sexy-yet-terrifying as Eleanora Bettencourt-Devereux, but he has to admit there are some fang-tastic perks….
Werewolf Ben Rosewood is happy with his life. One hundred percent. Everything is fine. His business, Ben’s Plant Emporium, is thriving, and he’s even expanding the shop. His anxiety disorder is…well, it’s been better, but that comes with the territory of running a business and having beastly urges every full moon, right? As for romance—who has the time? Though his family is desperate to see him settled, Ben is fine approaching forty as a single werewolf. But after drunkenly bidding on and winning a supposedly-possessed crystal on eBay one night, he finds himself face-to-face with a beautiful but angry vampire.
Eleanora Bettencourt-Devereux is a rare breed—a vampire succubus born from two elite European bloodlines during medieval times. But thanks to an evil witch, she’s been stuck in a crystal since she was thirty, forced to obey orders from the possessor of the rock. Eleanora’s been dreaming of breaking the spell and severing the witch’s head for centuries. But did this witch really sell her to someone new, and for only ninety-nine cents?
Eleanora would claw this werewolf’s heart out and eat it, if only the binding spell would allow her to. But Eleanora and Ben soon realize they can help each other with both vengeful and less hostile needs. And why not have a little fun along the way?
The City of Stardust by Georgia Summers is $2.99! This is a Kindle Daily Deal and I gave this one a C. As Jenny in the comments of my review described it, this is a book that is mainly aesthetic and vibes. Summers’s sophomore novel just came out and I’m excited for it.
Slip into a lush world of magic, stardust, and monsters in this spellbinding contemporary fantasy from debut author Georgia Summers.
For centuries, the Everlys have seen their best and brightest disappear, taken as punishment for a crime no one remembers, for a purpose no one understands. Their tormentor, a woman named Penelope, never ages, never grows sick – and never forgives a debt.
Violet Everly was a child when her mother left on a stormy night, determined to break the curse. When Marianne never returns, Penelope issues an ultimatum: Violet has ten years to find her mother, or she will take her place. Violet is the last of the Everly line, the last to suffer. Unless she can break the curse first.
Her hunt leads her into a seductive magical underworld of power-hungry scholars, fickle gods and monsters bent on revenge. And into the path of Penelope’s quiet assistant, Aleksander, who she knows cannot be trusted – and yet to whom she finds herself undeniably drawn.
With her time running out, Violet will travel the edges of the world to find Marianne and the key to the city of stardust, where the Everly story began.
cmcmck posting in common_nature
smartbitches_feed
At some point this year, and I don’t remember which corporate or governmental bullshit event it was, I subscribed to PBS and downloaded the PBS Passport app.
You can stream SO MUCH GOOD STUFF my gosh. Ballet! Antiques Roadshow! Stage performances from recent and distant history! The truly top-shelf visual dopamine of All Creatures Great and Small. I could end this post here and just say, PBS Passport is the greatest, and subscribing is an upgrade to your life.
Also – supporting a rural PBS station goes a VERY long way right now as the administration plays do-si-kiss-my-ass with funding.
BUT. Y’ALL.
Great Performances has begun streaming the 2025 Shakespeare in the Park production of Twelfth Night with a cast that includes, and I am not joking:
The performance was directed by Saheem Ali, and seriously, y’all. We watched the play over two nights, and it was easily one of the best productions I’ve seen.
And I don’t want to brag or anything, but I saw a production in the late 90s at Lincoln Center with Helen Hunt and Paul Rudd. You can watch it in varying degrees of quality on YouTube now.
That performance was also incredible, with music so alluring I bought the soundtrack on CD.
The Shakespeare in the Park production at the Delacorte equally blew my mind – and also had incredible music, much of it sung by Feste, played impeccably by Moses Sumney.
A behind the scenes clip of rehearsal
I’m not a theatre critic by a longshot, though I love live theater productions. I love remixes of Shakespeare that play with era or setting. And I love LOVE LOVE when clearly everyone involved is engaged with their character and the others on stage with an energy and ebullience that to me communicates that they’re really enjoying themselves. Antonio is played by an actor who goes by b. and they were mesmerizing; even with a smaller part and a few lines, their presence on stage had a gravity that was difficult to look away from.
I already watch tv with subtitles, but even with the text at the bottom of the screen, it was difficult to look away from most of this production. The only parts I found more dull were the scenes with Sir Toby Belch, played by John Ellison Conlee. While the other performers gave their delivery nuance and variety, Conlee mostly seemed to have one setting, which was “drunk bloviation.” Granted that’s Belch’s entire schtick, but those scenes were less engaging because of the sameness of the tone.
In addition to different kinds of love and ardor, Twelfth Night explores grief, identity, and gender; this production adds through a few changes an exploration of immigrant experience.
Viola and Sebastian are shipwrecked in Illyria, and some of their dialogue includes translations of the text into Swahili. They’ve washed ashore in a strange place where they are vulnerable, convinced they are now alone in this strange world, and their reunion and dialogue in Swahili at the end made my eyes tear because I didn’t understand it (no subtitles there) but also, I did understand it. I didn’t need to know the words to know the emotion of realizing a person thought dead is alive, and safe, and present and whole. Earlier that evening, I had been reading about the hundreds of people being kidnapped and disappeared by ICE in Charlotte, and clearly that added to my reaction.
The style and flair of the actors, such as dropping into modern speech rhythms for delivery of some lines and adding elements of camp and drag, was delightful. Peter Dinklage is incredible at physical comedy and his Malvolio is both brittle in his insecurities and weighty in his pompousness. There is nothing more funny to me right now than hearing him say “Cross gartered.”
This production lives in my mind alongside the production of Born With Teeth that was playing until recently in London, starring Edward Bluemel (My Lady Jane) and Ncuti Gatwa (Doctor Who). Born With Teeth is about an imagined alliance and rivalry (and mega flirtation) between William Shakespeare (Bluemel) and Christopher Marlowe (Gatwa). The palpable erotic tension was remarkable, but so too was the way in which Gatwa subtly included aspects of Black identity and history into how he interpreted Marlowe’s character. Similarly, Black identity and markers of Black culture – Orsino lifting weights while wearing a durag, elements of body posture and line delivery, for example – suffuse this production with layered meaning in a way that I can’t stop thinking about. I think I’m going to have to watch it again.
So, my recommendation: watch Twelfth Night on PBS Great Performances. It’s terrific. And it reminds me that I will be immeasurably more content if I engage with more theater, more marginalized actors interpreting historical figures and texts, and more PBS.
cimorenesmartbitches_feed
It’s time for our annual Holiday Wishes episodes!
Every year I connect with listeners around the world, where we talk about books, wishes, and bad jokes. So this time of year, my guests are…all of you!
In this set of wishes, we’ve got classics, new mysteries, and series romances. And we’ve got Sapphic yearning!
I have a record number of people signed up to do holiday wishes conversations with me, and these episodes are so uplifting and delightful, I’m extremely excited.
And! There is still time to sign up! If you’re part of the Podcast Patreon or After Dark, you can still pick a time to connect with me.
Listen to the podcast →
If you like the podcast, you can subscribe to our feed, or find us at iTunes. You can also find us on Stitcher, and Spotify, too. We also have a cool page for the podcast on iTunes.
Sponsor us through Patreon! (What is Patreon?)
What did you think of today's episode? Got ideas? Suggestions? You can talk to us on the blog entries for the podcast or talk to us on Facebook if that's where you hang out online. You can email us at sbjpodcast@gmail.com or you can call and leave us a message at our Google voice number: 201-371-3272. Please don't forget to give us a name and where you're calling from so we can work your message into an upcoming podcast.
Thanks for listening!
ysabetwordsmith ysabetwordsmithcrowdfunding Creative Jam. It was inspired by a prompt from readera. It also fills the "Do you trust me?" square in my 10-1-25 card for the Fall Festival Bingo. This poem has been sponsored by janetmiles. It belongs to the Frank the Crank arc in the Big One thread of the Polychrome Heroics series. It follows "The Clearest Signal" and "Set on Continuous Improvement," so read those first or this won't make as much sense. ysabetwordsmithcrowdfunding Creative Jam. It was inspired by a prompt from readera. It also fills the "Dark Side" square in my 10-1-25 card for the Fall Festival Bingo. This poem has been sponsored by janetmiles. It belongs to the Frank the Crank arc in the Big One thread of the Polychrome Heroics series. It follows "The Clearest Signal," so read that first or this won't make as much sense. senmutPeter is with her when she learns
yourlibrarian posting in common_nature
pennyarcade_feed - Die, Die My Darlingsenmut - 30 in 30: Freedom Series (McCaffrey)dorktower_feed - Starter? Set! – DORK TOWER 21.11.25ysabetwordsmith - Scienceysabetwordsmith - Birdfeedingfull_metal_ox in metaquotes - New from Torment Nexus Industries: THE BAD IDEA BEAR!smartbitches_feed - Freya Marske, KDDs, & Morecmcmck in common_nature - A walk along the River Temesmartbitches_feed - Shakespeare in the Park: Twelfth Night on PBSpennyarcade_feed - Die, Die My Darlingcimorene - Broken public health appointment system part 3smartbitches_feed - 693. Holiday Wishes I with Susie, Elizabeth, Alannaysabetwordsmith - Follow Friday 11-21-25: Knittingysabetwordsmith - Notes for "Trying to Be Better"ysabetwordsmith - Poem: "Trying to Be Better"ysabetwordsmith - Notes for "Set on Continuous Improvement"ysabetwordsmith - Poem: "Set on Continuous Improvement"senmut - 30 in 30: Talents Seriesmific in common_nature - Self-seeded giftsyourlibrarian in common_nature - First Snow of the Season