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natehoodreviews · 3 years

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2020 Year End Compilation

Dune, Frank Herbert

As epic, ground-breaking, and bombastic as advertised. What Tolkien did for fantasy with The Lord of the Rings, Herbert did for sci-fi with this one book. No, I will not be taking questions at this time.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Richard Bach

This...is about Buddhism, yes? Or is it about Jesus? No, no...definitely Buddhism.

The Ballad of Black Tom, Victor LaValle

Now this is the kind of cultural appropriation I can get behind! A black reclamation of The Horror at Red Hook, one of Lovecraft’s most atrociously racist stories, it does Cthulhu Mythos cosmic horror better than anyone I’ve read since the Master himself. This might be the perfect horror novella.

Dune Messiah, Frank Herbert

If the first Dune was a symphony, Dune Messiah is a kazoo jingle. This book absolutely killed any enthusiasm I had to continue reading the Dune series. (Plus, that scene where Paul gawks at his naked sister while she trains was super friggin’ creepy, Frank!)

Scoop, Evelyn Waugh

What Catch-22 did for the industrial military complex, Scoop does for sensationalist journalism. (Astute readers, however, will notice that colonialism is the book’s main target.) In context, "LOVELY SPRING WEATHER BUBONIC PLAGUE RAGING" is one of the funniest sentences ever written in the English language.

Lovecraft Country, Matt Ruff

Probably should’ve been a collection of thematically related short stories, as the bits and pieces never quite combine together into a cohesive framing narrative, but those bits and pieces are occasionally extraordinary. The chapter Hippolyta Disturbs the Universe is so good I might punch Matt Ruff if I ever meet him.

The House on the Borderland, William Hope Hodgson

Love me a good astral night flight to the limits of space and sanity! Also, RIP Pepper. You were a very good boy.

A Cook’s Tour, Anthony Bourdain

Kitchen Confidential might have Bourdain’s philosophy, but A Cook’s Tour has his soul. This is Angry Tony, Curious Tony, Compassionate Tony, Bitter Tony, Tony before a decade on the road sanded off his edges, Tony enamored and repulsed by the world he’d always read about and dreamed of (especially Vietnam). This book made me realize all over again just how much I miss him.

The Adventures of Augie March, Saul Bellow

The most exhaustingly erudite and overwritten of all the “Great American Novels” I’ve read. Forget Hemingway—this is what people are making fun of when they talk about pretentious male writers writing stories about men bouncing from bed to bed and woman to woman as they navigate existential crises. The only part I enjoyed was the first chapter about Einhorn, AKA A Portrait of the Grifter as a Great Man.

The Mysterious Stranger, Mark Twain

One of the most superb and effective horror stories I’ve ever read. And it is a horror story. If the folks at The Satanic Temple ever catch wind of it, they might officially adopt it as their holy book.

The Street of Crocodiles, Bruno Schulz

Schulz’s words are an almost one-to-one aesthetic match with Jan Švankmajer’s images. This book is one of the only truly unique and original works of prose I’ve encountered since Joyce’s Ulysses.

Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse

A decent enough primer to South Asian philosophy and religion. Rapidly paced and cleanly written.

Ten Billion Days and One Hundred Billion Nights, Ryū Mitsuse

My copy of this book proclaimed that it was "the GREATEST Japanese science fiction novel of all time." I can't speak to that, but it's easily the most confusing and frustrating (that I've read, anyhow). I mean, if an extra-universal being decided they wanted to wipe out human life on earth, why install a series of religious prophets over thousands of years in order to stoke mankind's self-destructive impulses and not just...kill them all with their space tech/magic? Work smart, not hard, aliens!

The Pisces: A Novel, Melissa Broder

The misanthropy and authorial self-loathing in this book are positively radioactive. Between the E. L. James prose (”My existential c**k”), the blithely sociopathic protagonist (she kills a helpless dog so she can sleep around!), and the queasy contempt for women suffering severe psychological issues (and for people who don’t have them), this book inadvertently reads like an impassioned polemic against sex-positive feminism. Or at least it would if it had any self-awareness. No amount of name-dropping Sappho and other ancient Greek writers can mask how grotesque and selfish the characters are.

A Handful of Dust, Evelyn Waugh

Was Waugh going through a traumatic break-up while writing this one? This book has one of the greatest woe-is-me masochistic downers of a third act in modern English literature.

The Nasty Bits, Anthony Bourdain

I wish I could climb inside those El Bulli and Masa chapters and live there forever—I may never recover from how Tony described his lips as "tumescent" in the presence of truly great sushi. And his short prose story "A Chef's Christmas"? Surprisingly moving. Had me sniffling on the subway.

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Tedium and monotony with devastating purpose and power. Never have bowls of watery gruel sounded so tantalizing.

Botchan, Natsume Sōseki

A fascinating look at turn-of-the-last-century Japan where school teachers aspire towards samurai, iced water is an expensive treat, and...um...might-makes-right military fascism is clearly on the rise. The book valorizes its heroes winning the day by beating the crap out of people physically weaker than them. Yeah...

We Have Always Lived in the Castle, Shirley Jackson

Damn near perfect; the Jackson story I’ve been waiting to read. And for the record, anyone who tries to claim Merricat as some sorta feminist anti-hero for bucking patriarchal domination needs to be reminded that she murdered her whole family and gaslighted her older sister into being her own personal homemaker.

Shopgirl, Steve Martin

A less charming, less interesting companion piece to Martin’s joyous L.A. STORY (1991), it’s nonetheless surprisingly psychologically complex and unexpectedly horny. To its credit, it has the single funniest sex scene I’ve ever read.

Angle of Repose, Wallace Stegner

I feel like admitting that I not just liked but loved this novel is like admitting that I also enjoy watching VHS reruns of golf games from 1986. I can feel myself growing older and smelling of mothballs and Werther's just thinking about it. But this is a marvelous book about family, tragedy, and the long shadow history casts on us all. In its own quiet, understated way, it’s breathtaking.

Babel-17, Samuel R. Delany

I’ve always thought that Delany was better at elucidating interesting ideas than he was in actually telling stories, and this book did nothing to change my mind. The world-building, character portraits, and explorations of the nature of language were fascinating, but the story is clumsily told and it works towards an unsatisfying anti-climax considering the intra-galactic stakes. Still, the scene where Rydra teaches the Butcher the concept of "You” and “I” is one of my favorites I’ve read in any science fiction story in the last several years.

Less, Andrew Sean Greer

Ah, this one snuck up on me. Not as funny as it probably thinks (or hopes) it is, but it’s amusing and pleasingly melancholic. Good comfort reading. That said, there’s no way it deserved the Pulitzer more than Lincoln in the Bardo.

Deliverance, James Dickey

Rugged masculinity won’t save you in the face of uncaring nature because rugged masculinity can’t save you. The rare novel that’s excellent in its own right and somehow raises one’s esteem for its film adaptation in the process as it reveals to you just how much it actually got right.

A Single Man, Christopher Isherwood

More than just a portrait of a psyche, it’s an angry screech at straight 60s America from the perspective of a British transplant who never quite swapped tea for coffee. The last twenty or so pages are divine.

Stand on Zanzibar, John Brunner

Combining the scope of a sprawling sci-fi franchise, Tolkien-esque world-building, and the custom patois of Anthony Burgess, this is one of the single most ambitious novels I’ve ever read. Unfortunately it frazzles out in the last third because Brunner is clearly more interested in the world and characters he’s created than the actual story—the ending reeks of sudden anti-climax. But this is a staggering, truly staggering achievement of imagination.

The Sheltering Sky, Paul Bowles

If Lieutenant D’Armagnac had been the protagonist instead of a supporting character I probably would’ve loved this book instead of just liking it. I found his position as a colonial officer in the waning days of the French Empire much more interesting and conducive to encapsulating the existential ennui and emptiness Bowles was gunning for than the experiences of his American innocents abroad.

The Magus, John Fowles

Headline: “Local Eccentric Billionaire Ruins Charlatan English Teacher’s Life in Name of Experimental Theater”

Shameless: A Sexual Reformation, Nadia Bolz-Weber

If this book was distributed to all American youth groups it would save lives. Literally.

The March, E.L. Doctorow

Though a rich read, it never quite equals the sum of its parts. I wish Doctorow had devoted full novels to Arly and Will, the bumbling Confederate soldiers who keep switching sides as the tides of battle turn, and the medical patient who loses the ability to remember the past after a railroad spike gets lodged in his brain after an explosion. “It’s always now!” is a line that haunts me.

Nostromo, Joseph Conrad

The first couple chapters fooled me into thinking that this book would be more heavily allegorical than the realpolitik examination of South American colonialism that it ended up being. Ah well, my hopes for proto-magical realism were not to be.

The City & the City, China Miéville

Miéville may have tried to write a love letter to classic detective stories, but he wasn’t quite able to match their sense of narrative propulsion. Entire chunks of this book stalled like someone tried to race a car with the parking break on. But the world-building is so stunningly creative and original one could barely care. There were scenes with the Breach that gave me goosebumps.

Cannery Row, John Steinbeck

Who else but Steinbeck could combine such humor, cultural insight, and historical sweep in a series of loose community vignettes essentially about a group of friends throwing a party? (A short passage kvetching about how Americans of a certain generation knew more about Model T-Ford coils than clitorises is one of my favorite reading moments of 2020.) If there weren’t moments of intense sorrow, I’d say it was a breezy, sunny masterpiece of comfort writing. But they’re there, and they elevate the sum total to something truly transcendent.

Spider Kiss, Harlan Ellison

A prescient piece of vindictive nastiness. The fact that Ellison predicted the ur-story of the corrupt rock star’s rise and fall from grace in 1961—before the Beatles, before the Stones, before Elvis became a fat, bloated parody of himself—is a work of prognostication worthy of Nostradamus.

Web of the City, Harlan Ellison

What begins as an unusually vicious street gang story ends as a noirish detective yarn worthy of a place in any pulp connoisseur’s book shelf. Loved the central character’s internal struggle against reverting back to his old violent ways while tracking down his sister’s killer. The scene where he interrogates a junkie by forcing him to go through withdrawal would make Donald Goines queasy.

The Secret Agent, Joseph Conrad

The most accessible Conrad novel I’ve read, and also the most philosophically sophisticated and explicit. His depiction of London as a miasmic cesspool of chaotic randomness was superb, as was his characterizations of Verloc as a self-important coward and the Professor as a delusional psychopath. Furthermore, I loved how he depicted the various levels of the British government and authorities as being constantly at each other’s throats, going over each other’s heads to pursue their own selfish, clandestine goals at the expense of the other.

The Cosmic Puppets, Philip K. Dick

On the surface, this appears to be one of Dick’s most mindlessly silly and entertaining books—it feels at times like a juvenile Stephen King doing his best Roger Zelazny impression, particularly the scenes where the good god's army of cats and bees fights the evil god’s army of spiders and clay golems. But a closer look reveals one of the more melancholy and desperate works of schizo-fi in Dick’s whole canon. It’s heartbreaking to think of him pounding away on this novel high on meth in his closet, convinced that if he just tries hard enough he can wipe away the false reality around him like Ted Barton does the mirage that’s replaced his hometown.

Down and Out in Paris and London, George Orwell

A startling gallery of gutter grotesques. The London chapters were compelling in their own right, but they didn’t hold a candle to the sequences examining the Parisian hotel industry. I actually sought out this book out because it was one of Anthony Bourdain’s favorites, and it’s easy to see why: it combines a stunningly realized sense of place with a worm’s eye view of French bistro cooking. Despite being uniformly enraging and revolting, it made me want nothing more than a nice French dinner once I got out of quarantine

The World Jones Made, Philip K. Dick

This really should’ve been two books instead of one: one about the precog dictator and another about the custom-bred human Venusians. Both are fodder for fascinating stories, but together they just don’t work. I also would’ve appreciated a deeper look into Relativism—it’s the most interesting philosophical/religious movement in a Dick novel since Mercerism. That said, there are inspired passages, particularly the ones explaining how the precog witnessed his own birth and death a year before either happened.

The Voyage of the Space Beagle, A. E. van Vogt

If a certain Jacob Kurtzberg had gotten his hands on this book at some point, it wouldn’t surprise me, as it does more than just predict Star Trek, it predicts a lot of what would come to be known as “Cosmic Marvel.” (What is Galactus if not a combination of Ixtl and Anabis?) You can definitely tell it’s a fix-up novel, which isn’t necessarily a sin, but van Vogt fumbles the trying together of the disparate parts into a cohesive whole. All the internal ship politics stuff struggled to keep my attention. But the creature encounters struck the perfect blend of pulpy violence and hard science technobabble.

Timequake, Kurt Vonnegut

A messy, unfocused, scattershot, self-indulgent bouillabaisse of half-cocked philosophy, masturbatory metafiction, half-remembered personal anecdotes, and crackpot sci-fi. It’s also one of the most poetic and heartbreaking autobiographies I’ve ever read. All hail Vonnegut, the Great American Cynic with a heart of gold and a pocketful of Pall Malls.

Martian Time-Slip, Philip K. Dick

Though obviously based in no kind of real-world science, the idea that autistic people experience time differently from others and that they might one day be controlled as living, breathing time machines is one of Dick’s best. And in another way, one of his most tragic in that it imagines a future where disabled people have to be commodified as something useful to industry and the economy to be deemed worthy to exist. The book’s plot is a bit too complicated for its own good, but I like the narrative ambition on display.

Dandelion Wine, Ray Bradbury

Never you mind that I didn’t grow up in late 20s Illinois: this book is the story of my childhood, much as I suspect it’s the story of everyone’s childhood who reads it. This might be the most poetically melancholic book I’ve ever read, and I don’t say that lightly. Every page or so I’d come across a line or passage that was so beautiful it’d make my heart hurt. The prose itself feels oddly reminiscent of Bruno Schulz, or at the very least reminiscent of how Schulz synthesized his memories into fantastic fables. But whereas the Poland of Schulz’s youth was strange, alien, and foreign, the America of Bradbury’s youth is comforting, familiar, and oddly timeless. An American masterpiece.

The Sky is Falling, Lester del Rey

I can’t believe del Rey invented isekai anime in 1954. What a visionary!

Culinary Reactions: The Everyday Chemistry of Cooking, Simon Quellen Field

Did you know that, scientifically speaking, cakes are foams??

Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro

Punishingly sad and lovely. Its sci-fi setting is incidental to Ishiguro’s explorations of grief, guilt, and jealousy.

The Door into Summer, Robert A. Heinlein

Reading this book is a powerful reminder that Heinlein was one of the best and most imaginative storytellers in all of science fiction...and one of the grossest when it came to issues of personal freedom and sexuality. I wonder if he ever realized that his libertarian politics were borderline Randian Objectivist and his sexual obsessions almost pedophilic? And if he did know, did he care?

Movies are Prayers, Josh Larsen

No book has made me more excited about the possibilities of film criticism as an art since I first discovered Roger Ebert’s Great Movies collections. Superb.

Henderson the Rain King, Saul Bellow

Gah...it would be the literal White-Savior-in-Darkest-Africa book that would end up being the only Bellow I sorta liked. But what can I say? I found Henderson’s spiritual yearning intensely relatable. And that scene at the beginning where he tries to rediscover a quotation about forgiveness by rooting through his father’s books, emptying the dollar bills he used as bookmarks onto the floor in the process, will stay with me for a long time.

Reflections on the Psalms, C. S. Lewis

Lewis just couldn’t help himself, eh? Even in a consideration of the Psalms he veers off-subject to espouse on Christian apologetics for half the book. Ah well, his insights into the Psalms themselves are worth the read, even if his ramblings on Christianity aren’t as structured or interesting as they are elsewhere.

Under the Volcano, Malcolm Lowry

Overwritten and—forgive the pun considering this is a book about an alcoholic—dry. With its multiple layers of symbolism, stream of consciousness narration, shifting POVs, and the niggling sense it gives off that on at least some level the book was written to show off the extent of its author’s intelligence (and the vastness of their reference library) it reminded me a good deal of Joyce. Unfortunately it had none of the Irishman’s humor or levity. At the very least it’s given me an excuse to revisit the John Huston movie.

Song of Solomon and Beloved, Toni Morrison

Read these two books of trauma and freedom—one a folk tale, the other a ghost story—back-to-back. Afterwards I went for a long, long walk in Prospect Park, watching and loving, truly loving, all the trees, animals, and people I saw.

Pictures at a Revolution, Mark Harris

What truly sets this book apart from other excellent and scrupulously researched film history books is that it’s “plotted” and written like a heist novel. On the one side you have New Hollywood mavericks striving to sneak things past censors and foolhardy producers and on the other you have Old Hollywood fossils flailing about and trying to mitigate the fallout of disastrous or ill-advised boondoggles like Doctor Doolittle (1967). One of the few history books I’ve read in the last few years that could be called legitimately entertaining.

In Cold Blood, Truman Capote

You can’t put words—let alone thoughts and dreams—into the mouths of historical figures and still call your book nonfiction. This is an intensely researched bit of true crime historical fiction. And in that respect, it’s one of the best I’ve ever read.

Welcome to the Monkey House, Kurt Vonnegut

A hit-or-miss mix of Vonnegut’s trademark philosophical sci-fi and more languid melodramas written for women’s magazines. The highlights: “Harrison Bergeron” is Ellison-esque; “Who Am I This Time?” is heart-warming; “All the King’s Horses” is ingenious; “D.P” and “The Manned Missiles” are exquisitely sad; “The Euphio Question” is hilarious; the title story should’ve never left Vonnegut’s typewriter.

Sula, Toni Morrison

The curious story of an anti-Christ, a savior who unites a community through hating her instead of through loving each other. Morrison creates an odd moral vacuum in which her titular character exists, allowing her to thumb her nose at all manner of social conventions and manners and be beatified for it. Also, I wish Shadrack was a more central character.

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, Philip K. Dick

My, this was a curious one. The more I tried to follow what was “happening” the more confused I got. The less I tried to follow it, the more I understood. Not sure if these are good or bad things.

Sailing to Byzantium, Robert Silverberg

I am so, so thankful that Silverberg never tried to explain exactly how the people of the 50th century reconstructed long-dead cities nearly overnight; that would’ve made this hard sci-fi instead of fantasy sci-fi. And with that change it would’ve probably lost much of its wistfulness, its melancholy, and its beauty. What a sublime novella!

What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank, Nathan Englander

The stories here range from alright to superb (the title story packs quite the last paragraph wallop), but the two best—"Sister Hills" and "Camp Sundown"—are marvelous explorations of how past tyrannies and atrocities continue to infect and curdle lingering and current generations of Jews. However, I doubt that Englander’s tendency to shrug off Jewish abuses of Palestinians in Israel will do much to endear this collection in the decades to come.

The Boat Rocker, Ha Jin

It’s eerie how much this book correctly predicted Mainland China’s takeover of the world media and news apparatus. Here is a book that understands that, unlike in most Western fiction, the more outrageous and surreal things get in Chinese life, the more realistic and grounded they are. I kept expecting the book’s stakes to explode into something reminiscent of spy thrillers, but despite working with an eye for the movements of entire civilizations and countries, Jin keeps them small and intimate enough that they never feel exaggerated.

Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, Fannie Flagg

Idealized but never, never sanitized, Flagg’s vision of early twentieth century Alabama is one of the coziest depictions of the American South I’ve ever read, gentle, melancholy, and warm. Flagg’s choice to tell much of it in flashback creates a necessary distancing from the brutal realities of the period, from the Klan to socially-accepted spousal abuse. There’s a glow to this book and its characters that I found irresistible.

The Heart of the Matter, Graham Greene

This is the third of Greene’s novels I’ve read, but the first of his more deliberately “Catholic” novels. It took me some time to figure out whether or not I was enjoying it. I think I can finally say that, yes, I did enjoy the book, as I found Henry Scobie’s slow, pointless self-destruction profoundly tragic. But compared to some of the other Catholic (and British Anglican) novelists I love, I found it a bit too maudlin for me to ever care to revisit.

Letters from Atlantis, Robert Silverberg

Another beautiful and melancholy time travel novella from Silverberg. Here Silverberg finds purpose and meaning in a quasi-Vonnegut nihilism that I found quite lovely.

Swamplandia!, Karen Russell

This book was so close to becoming a personal favorite of mine. I loved everything about the world and characters Russell created and rejoiced over her vision of a mythical Florida that could rival the Old West and Puritan New England as a setting for American legends. But then it suffers from one of the most astonishing losses of nerve I’ve ever encountered in any book as Russell decides in the last 50 or so pages that, no, Florida’s swamps aren’t haunted, there are no ghosts, and there is no magic. Instead, the swamps are populated only by hunters, the homeless, and child molestors like the Birdman who, after Russell spends about 100 pages building up as this mysterious Everglades psychopomp, unceremoniously rapes the 13-year-old protagonist. Maybe Russell was trying to say something about the realities of grief and loss in the face of the fictions the grieving construct for themselves, but her method was so shocking, so needlessly hateful that it scuttled all the collected goodwill I had for the book.

Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri

So here’s a funny thing, but I actually read the last of the stories in this book—The Third and Final Continent—in high school AP English alongside a number of other shorts by a wide variety of international authors. I remember thinking Continent was the most placid and boring of all the stories I read, yet it’s the only one of them I can remember almost thirteen years later. I suppose there’s a power that gently hums beneath Lahiri’s tranquil, plain prose, as the other stories in this book were similarly staid yet engrossing. I wonder if I’ll remember the rest of them in thirteen years?

The Fox Was Ever the Hunter, Herta Müller

Man, am I glad I stuck with this one. I almost gave it up after reading the first half which was comprised largely of seemingly unrelated vignettes and images. But these eventually coalesced into a suffocating depiction of life under a late Communist regime, and Müller’s recounting of its downfall in the last act was fantastic and harrowing.

Einstein’s Dreams, Alan Lightman

Found this one oddly boring. Once the novelty of its concept wore off, I found myself wishing there was a stronger thematic follow-through and a better structure than its meager interludes. Maybe if the alternative dimensions had been grouped in certain orders? From the most normal to the most bizarre? From the most comedic to the most tragic?

The Chalk Man, C. J. Tudor

In case there was any need for proof that Stephen King is a class act, it’s that when he was handed a copy of The Chalk Man he gave it an enthusiastic recommendation quote instead of immediately suing C. J. Tudor for plagiarism. The Chalk Man is basically It set in modern England with ideas and entire scenes (like the disastrous coffin incident at a funeral from Salem’s Lot) taken from his other books. All of which would be more tolerable if the book itself was interesting, but it’s such an uneven hodgepodge of ideas and inconsistencies—so wait, were the main character’s prophetic dreams real or not?!—that it’s difficult to see beyond its influences.

Howards End, E. M. Forster

I enjoyed this much more than A Room With a View, possibly because I found it much more cynical and sinister in its depictions of class relations and bourgeois selfishness, and possibly because I found myself sympathizing with Leonard Bast and his plight more than I usually do characters from this era of English literature.

Vulcan’s Hammer, Philip K. Dick

Dick beats John Brunner to the Shalmaneser punch almost a decade early in this book. But in Dick’s Gnostic worldview, any being that can know everything is a god, and any god that isn’t God is inherently evil and must therefore be destroyed. Lest this sound overly esoteric, one should know that the book is actually one of Dick’s most lucid and propulsive with a third act that’s one of the most exciting he ever wrote. It also helps that the world of Vulcan’s Hammer is one of his most insidiously terrifying even before the not-God begins its reign of terror. Nowhere is this better demonstrated than in an early scene where a class of schoolchildren are tricked via a simple game into revealing the identity of one of their classmates who spoke out against the world government so she can be taken away by the authorities.

Runaway, Alice Munro

Man…women can’t win for losing, huh? Beautifully sad stories made even sadder by Munro deliberately setting them in environments either hostile towards or absent of faith.

Podkayne of Mars, Robert A. Heinlein

I’m not surprised at all that Heinlein originally intended for Podkayne to die and for her brother Clark to live: in Heinlein’s philosophy, as the smartest, cleverest, and most self-sufficient, Clark was obviously the real hero of the novel. (Likewise, his superiority not only forgave his cruelty and selfishness, it transformed them into virtues.) Still, the book is one of Heinlein’s most entertaining adventures, even more than most of the Scribner's juveniles he deliberately wrote for young readers. I just wish, to paraphrase John W. Campbell, he’d written it without his other hand “in his pocket.”

Death Is a Lonely Business, Ray Bradbury

Like the very best pulp detective stories by Chandler, Hammett, or Cain, this book is more concerned with creating a surreal, oneiric sense of atmosphere and place accentuated by desperation, melancholy, and sadness than it is in telling a cohesive story where all the narrative odds and ends come full circle. Bradbury’s nixing of the genre’s nihilism in favor of an optimistic climax suffused with joie de vivre was a masterstroke.

The Halloween Tree, Ray Bradbury

Delightful. We need more stories about rambunctious schoolboys being scared silly.

We Can Build You, Philip K. Dick

I guess we should be thankful that when Dick’s early literary aspirations collapsed he turned to sci-fi to pay the bills, not romance. Yeesh…

Farewell Summer, Ray Bradbury

Pretty but slight. Bradbury’s editors were probably right to cut it from Dandelion Wine. Liked the bit about the magical traveling erections though. You need to be a guy to understand.

Tar Baby, Toni Morrison

In the movie of this book that exists in my head, the Streets are played by Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner-era Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, Son is Daniel Kaluuya, and Jadine is Lupita Nyong’o. Also in this movie, the entire book takes place in the mansion on the island, because the novel seems to lose its focus slightly whenever it takes diversions to New York or Florida. It was fascinating to see Morrison really dive into the psychology of white characters for a change, and the scene where Margaret’s abuse is revealed is one of the finest of her career.

Southern Reach Trilogy, Jeff VanderMeer

The first book in the trilogy, Annihilation, is like Lovecraft meets Solaris, gothic horror meets sci-fi. (Imagine my surprise to learn that the superb Alex Garland adaptation essentially transformed it into a slasher!) It broke my heart to find that the two sequels were subpar at best, with the second book Authority being particularly dull. I can’t believe VanderMeer thought we’d be more interested in this “Control” schmuck than Area X. If Annihilation was a brilliant innovation on Lovecraft, this book is like a microwaved Stephen King pastiche. The third book Acceptance is better, but mostly because of the chapters devoted to Saul, the future Crawler. To be honest, I wish VanderMeer had skipped writing the two sequels and instead released the Saul passages as a stand-alone prequel short story.

The Three-Body Problem, Liu Cixin

There’s something intensely melancholy about Cixin’s vision of Trisolaris as a place of perpetual societal birth, death, and rebirth that’s reminiscent of the sad sweep of rising and falling civilizations in Asimov’s Foundation series. That said, despite the occasionally opaque technobabble, I found this book much more readable and enjoyable than that esteemed series.

Underworld, Don DeLillo

What is this sprawling, disparate doorstop of a novel about? Well, it’s essentially “about” the essential interconnectivity of all things through decay. I’m not 100% sure DeLillo’s panoptical pointillism worked as he entirely intended, but whenever I found myself exhausted by his logorrhea he’d hit me with a passage so stunning and breathtaking it renewed my interest in the whole shebang. Good writing, here.

#2020 in Review

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atruththatyoudeny · 5 years

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Monthly Reads | May 2019

Happy 28th! If you want to promote your fic or your artwork head on over to @kingsofeverything and send Lauren a message! She’s doing self recs - fics and art - today. Thank you to all of you amazing authors who brighten my world with your words ♥ Here are all the fics I read and loved this month:

Let Our Hearts Collide || crinkle-eyed-boo (KimmieRocks) || While You Were Sleeping AU - 90s - mistaken identity - fake/pretend relationship - coma - amnesia - pining - grief - 76k When Harry, a lonely transit worker, saves the life of the handsome commuter he's been secretly pining for, an innocent mistake results in Liam Payne's family believing that Harry is engaged to their son. In the Paynes, Harry finds the big family he's always longed for...and a love he never saw coming.

Can't Help Falling || Anonymous || open ending - 15k The one where Harry's a workaholic, until best mates Liam and Niall drag him away for a holiday to Ibiza.

24K Magic || Justalittlelouislove || famous/not famous - drug use - 32k A fic based on 24k Magic by Bruno Mars, in which Harry's a mess and famous, Louis is a mess and not, Liam and Zayn are probably hiding something, and Niall is a horrible flatmate.

For You I'd Bleed Myself Dry || amomentoflove || vampires - past abuse - slow burn - angst - depression - anxiety - 50k Harry is cold. His bones ache. Every movement draws a whimper from his cracked lips. The stone underneath him is practically like ice. He’s numb, but can clearly feel the sharp pains on his neck every timeHe visits him. Below the icy cold, the achy bones, and the pain on his neck, Harry Styles is pissed. There’s a fire burning in his mind and the anger for the man who keeps him imprisoned is the fuel. He despises him, the man who feeds from him and is a daily reminder that Harry’s suffering won’t end. The man who keeps Harry so weak that he can barely move most days. Harry’s waiting for the day when his owner will go too far and finally kill him. Death must be better than this cold hell he is in. It won’t happen, though. He has a way of keeping Harry’s heart beating. So for now, all Harry can do is wait for death to come. He’s been waiting for years.

Consequences || allwaswell16 || amnesia - exes to lovers - getting back together - injury recovery - angst - 74k Two years ago Harry let his powerful family come between him and the love of his life, something he deeply regrets. Louis has tried to move on from their devastating break up. Sometimes, he even thinks he has. It only takes one moment to freeze them back in time.

The Fire and the Fate || dimpled_halo || A Star Is Born AU - depression - alcohol abuse/alcoholism - addiction - drug abuse - famous/not famous - angst - hurt/comfort - break up - post-break up - getting back together - 56k An A Star is born au with a happy ending. Harry is a troubled musician about to reach the end of his rope when he finds Louis singing in a club one night. He’s instantly mesmerised by the man with blue eyes and breathtaking voice.

And That's The Tea || 2tiedships2 || a/b/o - soulmates - strangers to lovers - friends to lovers - 27k The one where Louis loses his soulmate before even getting the chance to meet them, and he is in no way prepared for the kind of distraction his new friend Harry proves to be.

I Must Confess (I Still Believe) || objectlesson || High School - Catholic School - Girl Direction - coming of age - self-discovery - self-doubt - self-acceptance - angst - pining - slow burn - internalized homophobia - 44k Harry is the new girl at an all girl Catholic Girl's School, and Louis is the unattainable, dashing senior who changes her forever.

Like A Siren In The Night || whoknows || a/b/o - light dom/sub - 24k “There is an infestation in my home,” Louis hisses, righting himself quickly and pushing his way past Harry, heading directly for the kitchen. He’s rather haphazardly dressed himself, a coat thrown on over a loose flannel shirt and black pants, slippers on his feet. Harry resists the urge to sigh, closing the door and trailing behind him slowly. “What kind of infestation?” For all he knows, Louis is going to claim that there’s a ghost infestation. Harry has no idea what the end game is here – all he knows is that Louis has found at least three complaints a week to bring up since he’s been living on Harry’s property, and he’s been living here for six months. It’s way too many fucking complaints, is what Harry is saying. Especially when most of them are ridiculous to start with.

Let Me (Be Your Girl) || dimpled_halo || Girl Direction - cheating - pwp - 6k Louis hires Harry to help her find out things about her husband. What she doesn't expect is to discover some things about herself in the process.

Come together || bottomlinsons || college/university - One Night Stands - miscommunication - angst - pining - 11k Harry and Louis slept together three weeks ago, and haven't talked. Their coming group project is gonna change that.

Tonight's not over (come over and stay) || louistomlinsons || famous/not famous - fluff - 17k Harry is a famous singer and louis is a student who just wants to write his novel

Born Ready For You || taggiecb || Sequel to That's What I'm Here For - children - adoption - family drama - 2k Harry and Louis' life gets turned upside down once again with an unexpected visitor.

Getting high in mine || bottomlinsons || meet-cute - drug use - 4k Getting home from a festival is miserable by any method, but a three-hour train ride is truly the bottom of the barrel. This time, though, with the help of the cute guy sitting on the floor, it might not be so bad.

The Daddiest Place on Earth || lovelarry10 || Social Media - Disney World & Disneyland - strangers to lovers - 23k Louis. Harry. Instagram. A whole lot of confusion and a whole lot of laughs...

I Won't Give Up So Come And Get Me || runaway_train || strangers to lovers - Blind Date - 15k The one where Louis meets Harry and it all just seems too good to be true...

Picking Up The Pieces || Halos_Boat || strangers to friends to lovers - angst - slow burn - emotional hurt/comfort - 72k Harry just signed his second set of divorce papers. He felt like his life was over, like he had nothing left. Then he meets Louis.

Ready, baby? || jaerie || pain kink - rope bondage - earrings - 1k Harry gets an earring. Louis is the one to do it. Or a pain kink drabble.

Impress Me || lightswoodmagic (sarah_writes) || Chefs - homelessness - fluff - 5k Harry's a new chef who can't cook to save himself, but when he meets Louis, he learns more than he thought possible

Drunk in Love (last thing I remember) || MrsStylinson || fluff - pining - banter - 22k The one where Louis wakes up, naked, in a stranger's bed and has no idea how he got there. Maybe it's foul play. Maybe it's just the kindness of a handsome stranger amused by his drunken antics.

Take The Bitter With The Sweet || rainbowslovehl (Larrymateforlife) || Coffe Shops - fluff - pining - 7k Liam recruits Louis to spy on the 'rival cafe', which Louis is less than enthusiastic about but it does lead him Harry, the pretty barista who works there.

Harry Poppins || jacaranda_bloom || strangers to lovers - kid fic - hurt/comfort - past character death - fluff - 32k When Louis’ best friends pass away he finds himself with an instant family. Maddie and Thomas are wonderful children but take an immediate dislike to every nanny that sets foot inside their house. After nanny number six is summarily dismissed Louis is at his wit’s end, that is until an unusual man arrives on their doorstep. Harry Styles is like nothing any of them have ever encountered before, and perhaps, exactly what they’ve been looking for all along.

You Bring Me Home || reminiscingintherain || Saving Mr Banks AU - fluff - 22k The one where Louis wants to turn Harry's book into a film, and Harry's very picky about what happens.

Big, Bright World || || pining - jealousy - slow burn - cheating - miscommunication - 35k It really was just a little crush in the beginning, nothing to be worried about. Louis had never really liked anyone he'd worked with in the past, but he was sure he could control himself. Little did he know that over time his 'little crush' would develop into a blazing inferno of Hell-fire proportions. Every day, Louis' feelings became more intense, more immediate, each little smile and gesture and silly flirtation mounting up into something palpable, with a life of its own. Louis felt it every moment they were together. The only problem? Harry was engaged to someone else and had been from the moment Louis started working at Visionary.

Barren Souls || Snowy38 || Dystopian - mpreg - angst - emotional hurt/comfort - 37k It's 2907 and things are different. Organic men and women are no longer fertile and only genetically modified humans are permitted to procreate. The sexes have equalled, men are able to give birth in these dire times and roles have been created to both sire children ('Stud') and carry them ('Provider'). Public displays of affection are a criminal offence and the procreators cannot get emotionally attached without severe consequences. Harry has hit 19, the legal age to bear children. He's looking forward to producing babies for his host family and he's just had his placement confirmed. All that's left now is to meet the Stud who'll impregnate him. It might tug at his heartstrings thinking about the beautiful babies he'll be carrying who he'll have to let go but he's trained for this. He's spent his whole life preparing. Being a Provider is a special job and Harry's one of the chosen.

In a sky full of stars, be my Northern lights || Anonymous || strangers to lovers - fluff - travel - 13k It's one of those nights there's nothing on the telly that Louis absently scrolls through Tinder. After swiping left on a bunch of profiles he comes face to face with a picture that stops him in his tracks. The picture is..almost sweet. It’s a boy with brown curly hair, wearing a very low cut yellow blouse, paired with a black jacket. He’s got a smile on his face and his tongue sticking out, but it’s not in any way lewd or suggestive. He just looks like he’s having a good time, and something about the innocence of it has him swiping right rather than left. He’s barely checked the other pictures on the boy's profile before Tinder confirms that he’s got a match. The shots are so different from the pictures Louis is used to on Tinder - half naked boys who are smoldering at the camera - that he can’t help but smile. It quickly turns into a frown when he opens up the message he’s just received. Harry: Hello! Harry: Thank you for swiping right Harry: I have a proposition for you

#28th appreciation #1d fanworks appreciation day #fic rec #my reads #my fic rec #monthly reads #1d fanfiction #larry fics

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gwentoryfics · 5 years

Text

Hot for Teacher, Part 2.

REPOSTED FROM MY ORIGINAL BLOG, GWENTORY.

Genre | College Student x College Professor Smut AU

Pairing | Hongseok x Reader x Hyunggu (Kino)

Words | 12k

Summary | You never realized how much one drunken night could color the rest of your college experience until you discover that the handsome stranger from your cousin’s wedding is also the new professor at your university.

Warnings | Swearing. Needlessly sexist and traditional parents. Plenty of angst to go around. Explicit smut. Fingering. Oral (female receiving). Playlist includes songs with explicit lyrics.

Parts | 1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • More Coming Soon AO3 | 1 • 2

Playlist | Spotify • Youtube

Note | Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays, my little peaches! Thank you for all of your kind words regarding this series, and thank you for your patience as I worked to put this together. Lots of life changes happened in the last few months, including moving to another state and adopting a pup (who is yet to be housebroken). I’ve been very busy, but I’m thrilled to finally update! Oh, and pro tip: I will only ever post fics & asks on this blog, so please feel free to turn on notifications to make sure you don’t miss Part 3!

On Monday night, you get to R&B Ensemble rehearsal ten minutes early to make sure you have time to warm up a bit on your own. A handful of students are already in the room, and you spot Kino chatting with a girl, whom you assume to be another vocalist. He waves as you walk by, and you wave back. Boy, he's got cheekbones for days.

Tucked back by the keyboard is the bassist with his long limbs and brooding aura, a face that is somewhat familiar to you - you can't quite place it, though. He has a sharp jawline and mussed up hair, a leather jacket thrown over the back of his chair. He fiddles with his amp before plucking out a funky bass groove, completely in his own world.

You walk in his direction, heading for the keyboard and shooting out a simple greeting as you take your seat. "Hey."

He glances up, nodding once in response before returning his attention to his instrument. He must not be much of a talker, which is fine by you. You flip on the keyboard and begin cycling through scales and modes to get your fingers warm, sure to keep the volume low so as not to disturb your new bandmates. As you move onto some arpeggiated jazz chords, you notice a tall, loud presence burst in through the door.

"Ayyyyy!" Wooseok Jung calls out, startling the poor girl that had entered right in front of him. He drops his headphones so they hang around his neck, and he chucks his drumsticks right past you, where one hits the sound-proofed wall and the other bounces off the bassist's chest with a dull thud.

"Damn it, Wooseok, you piece of shit." The bassist hurls the stick right back at him, and Wooseok catches it effortlessly.

"My man, Yuto. I didn't know you were in on this." Wooseok traipses over to your corner of the room, goofy grin on his face. He holds a fist out for you to pound. "Hey girl, what's up."

"Hey, good to see you." You bump fists. You had a class with Wooseok last year - first level aural skills - and although you wouldn't exactly call him a friend, it seems you both remember each other.

"Have a good summer?" He asks you as he takes a seat at the drum kit, sticks spinning between his fingers. You may never know how he fits all of that leg behind the drums.

You nod. "I worked all summer at the record store in my hometown, and that was a blast. Did a couple gigs at some open mics, too. You?"

"Ah, nice!" Wooseok clicks the sticks against the rim of the snare drum. Come to think of it, you haven't realized until today that he's a drummer. It makes sense, though, considering the fact that he was always tapping rhythms on the desk in your previous class. "I was up here taking summer classes. I tell you what, music theory is not my friend. I can't read clefs for shit. Give me the most intricate rhythms you can find and I can handle that, no problem. But give me a set of pitches and a marimba and I'm lost. I don't know how you do it."

You laugh with a short shrug, dramatically tossing your hair over your shoulder. "Just my natural talent, I guess."

A grin splits across Wooseok's face, cute and genuine. "Well aren't you a lucky little duck." The warmth of his smile makes you blush, and you have to look away from him.

He’s right, though; you definitely got lucky with your musical skills. Your parents started you in piano lessons at a young age, so you started reading music right around the same time you started reading words. It's second nature to you now.

A thought occurs to you, and you meet his eyes again. "You know, I could help you with theory if you want."

"Really?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Dude, you would be a lifesaver. That would be awesome." Wooseok breathes a sigh of relief. "And in exchange, I can… teach you about drumming or something, I don’t know. I’ll owe you. Whatever you want."

Sounds fair to you. You give him a sharp nod. "Deal."

"Deal," he agrees, shooting you another brief smile before turning to Yuto. “Yo, Yuto. Throw down a line. Let’s jam.”

"Throw down a line?" Yuto immediately questions Wooseok's choice of words, eyeing the drummer critically.

"Yeah, a bass line. Hit me with it."

"Who talks like that?" Yuto mumbles the question rhetorically and starts plucking out a groove. Once his rhythm and tempo is established, Wooseok comes in with a simple drumbeat to keep it moving.

You don't know much about bass, but you know the pitch of the strings and you understand that each fret marks a half step (thank you, music theory). It takes you a minute, but you’re able to determine that he's in the key of D. You start plunking out some chords until you fall into the pocket of the groove, finally finding the correct chord progression.

"What key?" A girl on the other side of the room asks, slipping the strap of her electric guitar over her shoulder.

You start calling out chord names as you work through the progression until it seems she's got the hang of it, and then you improvise, letting your fingers follow the melodies in your head.

This is it. This is your absolute most favorite thing in the whole world. Surrounding yourself in music, collaborating and creating, expressing your spirit through the piano- er, keyboard. Riding the waves of jazz and soul and R&B gives joy to your life in a way that nothing else can. This feeling is what you live for.

Mid-jam, the teacher comes strolling in, and she grooves the whole way from the door to the front of the room, looking absolutely elated at the impromptu music you’ve all created. Wooseok calls out a five, six, seven, and... to signal everyone to stop at the end of the phrase, and the teacher claps a little too enthusiastically.

"Oh. My goodness." She beams. "I think this is going to be a fabulous semester."

After rehearsal, you catch up to Kino as he tucks his sheet music into his backpack. The long hair on top of his head falls in his eyes, but it could never hide those cheekbones.

"I had no idea you could sing like that. That Bruno song is perfect for you!" You stand next to him, and he looks up from his seat with a wide smile. You mean every word; his voice absolutely blew you away. He especially stands out in the group because he's the only male vocalist this semester, but there's something special about the quality of his voice that gives you goosebumps when he sings.

"Thank you! I'm really excited about it. I love Bruno Mars." He grins, glowing. "And what about you? It's like the keys are part of your soul. You're really freaking good, you know that?"

"Thank you, Hyunggu." You emphasize his birth name, which the teacher had brought to your attention during roll call.

Kino rolls his eyes, smile suddenly gone from his lips. "I don't like that name."

"Sorry," you laugh quietly. "Why Kino, then? If you don't mind me asking."

"I picked it for myself. It's like... a stage name." He stands, gathering his things. "I kind of wanted a fresh start for college, so I'm reinventing myself, I guess."

"I can respect that." As the two of you head for the door, you turn back over your shoulder and call out to the friendly giant to confirm the plans you had made. "Wooseok, see you Thursday, yeah?"

The tall drummer points his sticks at you, shooting another charming smile your way. "Thursday."

When you're out of the room, Kino asks, "Are you friends with him?"

"Not exactly? I'm going to tutor him in music theory."

Kino hums quietly. "He seems like a handful."

"He does, doesn't he," you laugh. "We'll see how it goes."

The two of you wave goodnight to the security guard in the lobby of the music building before heading out into the illuminated city. A slow smile touches your lips as you look around.

Moving here for university has been one of the biggest adventures of your life. Up until you began school last year, you had never spent much time in such a large city. It’s clear to you now that this is where you’re meant to be; the city energizes you, awakens your senses, and opens up creative doorways you never realized existed. You’ve never felt so true to yourself, so connected to your surroundings.

Everything here had been so perfect until Professor Yang showed up. You feel your smile fade. If he taught at literally any other university, it would be no problem at all. You could look back fondly on your night together instead of labeling it The Biggest Mistake Of Your Life.

There’s really no point in getting worked up about it, though. Maybe it won’t be a big deal after all. Maybe you’ll talk to him tomorrow, just like Minseo wants you to, and it’ll all be fine. Or you could just ignore each other the whole semester - that might work. You’ll just silently drool over him from your spot at the back of the classroom, trying not to be distracted by the naked memory of him while you take notes. If only he hadn’t been your professor…

If you had crossed paths again under any other circumstances, you would undoubtedly chase down the chance to sleep with him again. Although you are skeptical of your ability to seduce him while sober, you want nothing more than to relive that night with him over and over. Hell, you might even go on a proper date with him, if he asked you.

The thought makes your cheeks burn. You’ve got it bad.

In the end, it’s all just a fantasy. You’ll never sleep with him again, you’ll never go on a date. He’s your professor, and you are his student. Even if you weren’t taking his class, it would be inappropriate to be involved in any sort of romantic capacity. There’s no way that you can be together, and that’s that.

You hate that you actually feel sad about it.

“Whoa!” Kino’s hand grabs your elbow, yanking you back onto the sidewalk as you start to cross the street, too distracted to notice the oncoming traffic. “Be careful!”

You’re snapped back into the present, watching as a taxi flies by. It would have easily taken you out if you had continued walking. You really need to stop thinking about Professor Yang before you get yourself hurt.

“Are you alright?” Kino’s voice is tight with concern as he holds onto your arm.

You force your smile. “Yeah, sorry. I was just in my head about some things. I promise I’m not usually so distracted while walking.”

His hand lingers on your arm for a moment as he scans your face, and the corner of his mouth lifts as he lets you go. “I sure hope you’re not or you’re going to be in trouble without me around.”

The light changes, and you both safely step into the crosswalk. “But you know, if I got hit by a car, I could probably sue for enough money to cover my student loans,” you joke.

“Only if the driver is at fault,” Kino is quick to correct you. “If you’re the one that causes the accident, you can’t get any money from it. But nice try.”

“Damn. There’s never an easy solution.”

“Truth.” He chuckles. “Maybe we should have gone to business school or medical school to get a degree that would actually give us financial security.”

With a groan, you roll your eyes. That sentiment is all too familiar. “You sound like my parents.”

“Mine, too.” Kino sighed. “They wanted me to be a doctor. Yours?”

“Secretary to a CEO. What kind of sexist bullshit is that?” You frown. “My family is very traditional in the sense that they believe men should be in charge, whether it’s in business or in the family. Women are just there to assist.”

“Wow. That’s unbelievable.” Kino turns to you as you wait to cross another street. “I mean, you don’t seem like you would want to be a CEO, considering your obvious passion for music, but I think you’re definitely capable if you worked for it.”

His sincere encouragement brings a genuine smile to your face. “Thanks, Kino. That really means a lot to me.”

“You’re welcome.” His cheekbones pop out as he grins. “I’m sure your parents will come around eventually.”

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. I mean, the whole secretary thing was already an improvement from their original wish for me.”

“Which was…?”

“Farmer’s wife.”

“What?” Kino burst into laughter. “That’s impossible to imagine.”

“Well I grew up on a farm, so it’s not that big of a stretch.”

“Really?”

You nod, safely crossing the street as the light changes. “Yeah. I’m from a really small town a few hours south of here. My family runs a wheat farm. My mom taught me how to cook and sew and everything, as if we were living in the nineteen-fifties. They didn’t even want me to get a degree at first because they thought it was unnecessary.”

“So how did you end up here?”

“I begged and pleaded until they finally caved. I asked for a chance to pursue something I really love. This is my one shot, so I really have to give it my all. I don’t think they’ll give me another chance. If I screw this up, they’ll probably try to marry me off to the neighbor boy or something.”

“We can’t have that.” Kino’s sweet smile radiates as he looks over at you. “I’m rooting for you, _____.”

Your chest fills with warmth. You’re so thankful to have made friends at school that are supportive of your dreams, and you’re glad to find that same support in Kino. “And I for you.”

Together, you veer off to the left, away from the glittering skyline of the city. You ask, “So where are you from? Is your family nearby?”

“Very near, actually.” He gestures vaguely south. “I grew up on the south side.”

"Ah." You hide your frown, but your curt response gives you away. You've heard all kinds of rotten things about the gang-related violence of the south side, and you can't imagine someone like Kino surviving in that kind of environment.

"It's not as terrible and dangerous as you probably think. It's got a bad reputation, but it's not all rotten."

You just nod. "So, wait, do you still live there? Aren't you headed the wrong way?"

With a shake of his head, he replies, "No, I'm living on campus, at Plymouth. Part of my whole fresh start, you know? Had to get out of the house and experience living on my own for a while."

Plymouth is across the street from your own dorm. "I'm at Turner!"

“We’re basically neighbors,” Kino comments.

As your buildings start to come into view, you realize how close they actually are. And how your room actually has a very direct view of Plymouth.

“Please tell me you don’t live on the east side of the building.”

“I do, actually. Why?”

You laugh. “I’m going to have to start closing my blinds whenever I get dressed.”

His eyes grow wide. “Have you been giving my whole dorm a peep show for the last week?”

“Maybe?” You cover your face with your hands as you continue to laugh, embarrassed. This summer’s sexual awakening may have persuaded you to live a bit more adventurously… Is Kino blushing?

“Don’t worry, I never noticed.” He spoke softly. “So don’t feel uncomfortable.”

“Okay,” you murmur with a quiet chuckle, surprised that you’re not terribly concerned with what he may or may not have seen so far. You turn the corner, headed for the entrance to Turner Hall, and Kino keeps up with you.

"Oh, hey, I was wondering..." He starts, pulling his cell phone out of his pocket. "Since we're in a lot of classes together this semester, maybe we could swap phone numbers? You know, in case either of us wants help with homework, or is going to miss class or something."

"Good idea!" You agree, pulling up in front of the building's entrance. You fish your own phone from your backpack and bring up the 'New Contact' screen before swapping phones with him. Once you've traded numbers, you pocket your phone. "Well, city boy, I'm gonna head inside now. I'll see you later?"

He nods, waving as he backs away. "See you, farm girl."

You watch as he crosses the street, heading for Plymouth. Something about him makes you feel at ease, and you have a feeling you'll end up spending quite a bit of time getting to know him this semester. With all of the classes you share, you're going to see him nearly every day of the week, and he seems pretty eager to be your friend. You wouldn't mind that.

Turning to head inside, you fish your room key out of your wallet, swiping it at the security desk as you pass by. As you call the elevator, a familiar dark figure appears in your peripheral.

You turn to greet him as the elevator door opens. "Hey, Yuto."

He nods silently, and you both file into the elevator.

"I didn't realize we live in the same building." You press floor nine and wait for him to make his selection, but he doesn't budge. "...Or the same floor?"

"Small world," he murmurs quietly, seemingly unfazed.

An uncomfortably awkward silence fills the small elevator, and you absentmindedly toy with the strap of your backpack as you search for something to talk about. "Are you excited about our set list?"

He shrugs so minutely you hardly even notice. "We've got some good music."

It doesn't really seem like he wants to talk to you, and you're not one to push him into a conversation, even though it's painfully awkward. You just hum quietly and let it be.

The door glides open, and you both head left down the hallway. He stops at the door directly across the hall from yours. Without a word, he disappears into his room.

How neighborly.

"Minseo, I'm freaking out." You paced in the small hotel room you had both chipped in on, just a floor above your destination for the night. "Am I seriously going to do this?"

"Relax, would you?" She sat calmly atop the queen sized bed, watching as you almost lost your balance from turning too quickly. "It's not like this is your first time."

"But it's my first time with a random guy. Can I even do that?" You froze in place. "Am I even allowed to do that?"

"_____! Of course you're allowed! You're an adult!" Minseo sprung up from the bed and grabbed you by the shoulders. "There is nothing wrong with you going downstairs and sleeping with a man you just met. If that's something you want to do, then I fully support it. You should let yourself have some fun."

You let out a small, frustrated whine. "I want to. Sweet baby Jesus, I want to."

Her hands moved up to cup your face. "Okay. You're gonna be fine."

Nodding, you exhaled slowly. "I'm an adult. I can do this."

"Yes! That's the spirit." She patted your cheeks before turning you around and walking you towards the bathroom. "Now go jump in the shower."

"Shower?"

"You don't want to show up all sweaty, do you?"

"Am I sweaty?"

"Go freshen up." She pushed you into the small bathroom. "But don't get your hair wet. Just make sure you're clean down there."

Your eyes widened and you realized she was right - it wasn't a bad idea to shower for the sake of below-the-belt cleanliness. "Okay."

"Good girl. Try not to fall over in there." Minseo encouraged you as she shut the door.

Five minutes and one off-key ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ shower concert later, you emerged from the bathroom a new woman. You felt as fresh as you smelled, and the steam from the shower had helped clear your mind a bit - but not everything was perfect.

Wrapped in a towel, you held your dress and underwear in your hand, and a pout crept onto your face. "Minseooooooo."

"What's wrong, dear?"

"I'm clean, but my clothes aren't."

She pried her eyes from the television, which was playing some trashy reality show, and she gestured for you to come towards her. "Let me see the dress." You handed it to her and she looked it over, sniffing it here and there. "I mean, it's not like dry-cleaners fresh, but it doesn't reek. There's not much you can do about that anyway, since we obviously didn't pack a change of clothes."

You pursed your lips. "I guess you're right."

"Nix the underwear, though."

"What?" Your cheeks flamed. "No underwear?"

"You heard me." She plucked the panties from your hand and tossed them over her shoulder into the corner of the room. "You'll feel gross putting dirty underwear on after you've showered, right? And besides, he'll think it's super hot that you're commando."

"Or he'll think I'm a slut. What if he likes nice girls that enjoy wearing underwear? Hm?"

"Honey, he wouldn't have invited you to his room if he wanted a nice girl who likes underwear." Minseo took your hand affectionately. "It’s okay to be slutty."

You furrowed your brow at her for a moment before a sly smile touched your lips and you let out a small giggle. "Am I turning into a slut?"

"Only if you want to, dear."

"I might want to. I might want to be a slut for Hongseok." You burst into a ball of laughter, absolutely giddy.

"Alright." Minseo laughed too, handing you back your dress. "Put this back on and get ready to slut it up."

By the time you and Shinhye enter the science building on Tuesday morning, you've almost entirely rid yourself of the dread gurgling low in your gut at the thought of seeing him. You tell yourself that it's just another class, he's just another teacher, and you will survive this. Sipping at the coffee Shinhye insisted on stopping for, you do your best to keep a level head.

Minseo’s advice rings in your ears. Tell him that you’re not going to say anything about what happened. Tell him that you want him to treat you normally. That’s what you want, right?

When you had called her last week, she had easily convinced you that talking to him about the whole situation would be a good idea. But now that the day of confrontation has arrived, you’re simply too chicken to even consider saying a word. Besides, you weren't entirely sure how coherently you'd be able to talk to him while sober, given the fact that you still swoon a little every time you look at him.

When you step into the classroom, you hardly glance in Professor Yang's direction. He's seated at the desk, typing away on his laptop. You focus on your seat at the back of the room, preparing for another few hours of being ignored, but before you can make it too far you hear him call your name.

"_____."

The sound sends a delicious ripple through your limbs, and you turn your head at a sloth's pace, afraid to make eye contact. He casually waves you over to his desk, as if it's no big deal that he just acknowledged you and that he wants you to come over so you can presumably talk one on one.

Shinhye continues on to her seat after giving you a curious look, and you turn back, making your way over to Professor Yang. He's fixated on his computer as you walk over, but he glances up at you ever so briefly when you reach his desk.

His voice is low as he acknowledges you. "Stop by my office after class. I think we need to talk."

A lump fills your throat and you're unable to speak. You really aren’t able to avoid it after all.

He peeks up at you again, probably curious because of your lack of verbal response, so you nod. He picks up a stack of papers and hands them to you. "Please pass these out to your classmates."

You take the packets - it's today's lab paperwork. He gestures to the rest of the class as if to say well, go on then, and you frown. You don't expect him to be friendly with you, but frankly he's coming across kind of rude and bossy, and that doesn't sit well with you. Begrudgingly, you do as he asks and distribute the packets.

When you return to your seat, Shinhye is quick to ask, "What was that about?"

"He just wanted help passing stuff out." Not totally a lie.

"I didn't realize you were such a teacher's pet," she teases.

"I'm not a teacher's pet. He asked me, so what could I do? It's not like I begged him to let me help."

"Whoa, relax. It's just a joke." Shinhye chuckled, adjusting the circular frames that rest on her nose. "It's not like you to be so uptight."

You take a deep breath, getting your head on straight. You need to be normal around Shinhye. With a plastered on smirk, you tease back. "That's your job, right?"

Shinhye purses her lips, but you can see the smile in her eyes. You laugh.

"Aw, come on, I love youuuuu."

"Yeah, yeah," she brushes off your affections, pushing you away when you lean in to coo over her. "Love you, too."

You smile. You may have to keep her in the dark, but her friendship will surely be one of the only things that can keep you sane through the rest of the semester.

It took a solid five minutes of pacing in front of his hotel room door before you finally worked up the courage to knock. Your stomach twisted in knots as you rapped your knuckles against the wood, checking for the thousandth time that the little door number definitely said 417.

You were really doing it. You were really getting ready to probably sleep with someone you just met. You had never done anything like that before, but it was about time you grew up and had a sense of adventure, right?

Any semblance of confidence you had slowly started to fade as you realized the door was not opening. Had you waited too long to come over? Was he already asleep? Were you at the wrong room altogether? Had he intentionally given you the wrong number? Why would he do that?

You tried knocking once more, but still no one answered. Disappointment swelled in your chest, tugging at your heart - you were surprised by how much you cared. He was just some guy, anyway. But it hurt to think that you may have just been rejected. After all, the fear of rejection had kept you from approaching him in the first place.

After another minute of waiting, you decided that you needed to move on. He wasn't going to answer the door. You headed for the stairwell, resigning yourself to a night with Minseo instead.

As you reached for the door to the stairs, the elevator next to you opened and a loud group of people spilled out. You assumed they were all coming up from the wedding, judging by their attire. And to your delight, one of the last people off the elevator was exactly the gorgeous man you had been waiting for.

You met Hongseok's eyes, a slow smile stretching across your lips. Perhaps not all hope for the night was lost.

He slid his hands into his pockets with a coy smile, his tux jacket draped over his arm. "Going somewhere?"

"I thought you gave me a phony room number," you confessed, tongue lazily forming the words. Wow, you definitely drank more than you should have.

"I would have to be crazy to do that to you." His gaze traveled down your figure, lingering on the hand that gripped the door handle. "Still want to come over?"

Nodding, you tried your best to contain your nervousness and look cool as you released the handle, letting the door close quietly.

He cocked his head in the direction of his room, a relaxed smirk on his lips. "Let's go, then."

You followed him back to room 417, and he opened the door, stepping aside to let you in first. Despite the wave of nervousness that washed over you, you felt ready. Eager, even. You let your hand casually brush against his leg as you slip into the room, desperate to touch him again.

His hand darted out to capture yours - rough skin but a gentle touch. Your feet froze and you turned back to meet his piercing gaze, your heart suddenly pounding in your chest as the door closed behind him.

What should you do? How did hook-ups usually work? Chat first and then work your way up to the main event, or just dive in head first? You were clueless. You knew that you wanted to rip that damn shirt off of him, to press yourself against him and get lost in the feel of his skin. But you didn't want to be too forward and make things uncomfortable.

Taking his time, Hongseok approached you slowly, smoothing your hair and lifting your chin with his knuckle, fingers still wrapped around your wrist. Heat blossomed in your core as you looked up at him, thinking he might just go for it and kiss you. Maybe he was as impatient as you felt. Maybe he needed to have you, too.

He leaned in, but he didn't aim for your lips. He targeted your ear, murmuring softly and tickling you with his breath. "You're cute."

Warmth spread rapidly across your cheeks and you quietly stuttered, "Th-thank you."

But it was just a tease, hardly even a taste of how it felt to be close to him. He backed away, pulling you a bit deeper into the room before releasing your hand. "Mind if I play some music?"

You shook your head carefully, resisting the urge to take his hand back. "Not at all."

As he fished out his cell phone and plugged it into the speakers that sat on the desk, you looked around the room and took a seat at the edge of the bed. It wasn't a particularly fancy hotel, so the room was pretty basic. Just a standard queen size hotel bed, a dresser, TV, and a nightstand on either side of the bed - pretty much identical to the room you and Minseo reserved upstairs. An open gym bag sat on the floor, which you assumed he was using for his overnight stay.

"You said you like Marvin Gaye, right?" He typed into his phone, smiling to himself.

His song selection started playing, and you immediately recognized the first few notes as the opening to ‘Let's Get It On’. You couldn't help but laugh because of the cheesy song choice, hoping that he wasn't seriously trying to set the mood with that one. "Really? 'Let's Get It On'?"

He laughed at your critical reaction, sweet eyes crinkling at the corners. "Too forward?"

"You think?" You kicked your legs, too short to reach the floor from where you sat. "Try again."

"I'll admit, my knowledge of old school R&B is not what it should be. I'm more of an old rock fan." He scrolled through his phone in search of a better song choice.

You jumped up from the bed and strolled over to him, accidentally bumping against his arm as you plucked the phone from his hands. He felt warm and he smelled delicious, so you didn't make an effort to move away. Your brain was too fuzzy to care about personal space.

"Let me play you something. If you want sexy music, I know sexy music," you drawled, searching for the specific track that you had in mind. Hongseok slid his hands into his pockets, letting you do as you pleased. He didn't back away either, so you assumed he didn't mind the close proximity.

Finally, you found the song despite the many typos in your search: 'Tell Me Something Good' by Rufus, featuring Chaka Khan. You played it, and your hips instinctively started rolling when the funk guitar started. "Usually people think of R&B as being the sexiest music, but funk is highly overlooked and underrated."

When the vocals came in, you held his phone up to your mouth like a microphone and sang along, backing away from him to roll your body and put on a show. It briefly crossed your mind that you would never normally act that way. That was exactly the type of idiocy you were trying to avoid by dodging Hongseok earlier in the night. But at the end of the day you loved yourself some karaoke when you were drunk. You couldn't help but sing along, even if you sounded terrible.

"Hey!" Hongseok called after you with a chuckle, reaching for his phone as you danced away from him. He successfully grabbed it from you, preventing you from disconnecting it from the aux cord.

Never mind the lack of microphone; it just freed up your hands to run down your body, over your curves as you sang. "You refuse to put anything before your pride / What I got will knock all your pride aside..."

He watched you intently, a slight smirk on his lips. Maybe you didn't look as ridiculous as you thought you did. Or maybe he was just drunk enough to be into it.

You reached for his tie, pulling him towards you as you kept singing. "Tell me something good / Tell me that you love me, yeah..."

"But I hardly know you," he remarked, hands finding your hips.

With a fluttering of your eyelashes, you responded teasingly, "Oh, you don't believe in love at first sight?"

"I do," he smiled down at you, thumbs digging into your hips. "But only because I saw the way you looked at me and I knew you had fallen head over heels."

"Cocky piece of shit," you laughed, throwing your arms over Hongseok's shoulders as you danced together. "The thing is, though, you're not exactly wrong. I mean, you got me to show up here, which would have been impossible for anyone else."

"And I didn't even have to try. Look at you," Hongseok scanned your face, and you knew you must have looked like a girl in love. He was beautiful and you couldn't help your adoration. "You're in deep."

You let out a dramatic sigh. "What ever shall we do? I'm a lost cause."

"You may not be the only one."

There was something unbearably warm in his eyes as he said it, and it made your pulse race. He obviously didn't mean it; he's no more in love with you than you are with him. It was impossible that either one of you felt love for the other. It could only be blamed on lust, an inexplicable attraction between the two of you that left you weak in the knees with craving. But even so, it was fun to play pretend.

His breath gently rippled across your face. "You know, I was actually surprised to see you when I got off the elevator."

"Really?”

"It just seemed like you might talk yourself out of it."

"Well, I did. That's why I was at the stairwell," you admitted with a laugh.

Hongseok’s hands wandered over your ribs and across your back as he pulled you in closer. "Because you didn't want to see me?"

"Because you weren't there." You felt your cheeks growing warm, but you forced yourself to hold his gaze. "I was disappointed because I thought I wouldn't get to, you know, see you tonight. But I wanted to. Want to," you corrected yourself. "I do."

"I promise," he murmured, lips curling into a mischievous smile, "you won't regret it."

After class, you make an excuse to Shinhye about how you need to visit with an advisor in the building so that she would leave without you. She is completely unassuming as she accepts your excuse, and you feel a pang of guilt for lying to her. You'll make it up to her soon; you promise that much to yourself.

You easily locate Professor Yang's office, and you're surprised that you feel the familiar nervous butterflies in your stomach as you knock on the wooden door. It's so similar to the night you spent with him, even though now you're meeting under completely different circumstances.

But just like that night, the door doesn't open, and you have to wait for him to show. You lean against the wall, trying to steady your breathing and calm your racing heart. There's nothing for you to even be antsy about; you're just anxious about what he'll have to say. He'll probably just tell you exactly what you want to tell him - that you should both pretend nothing happened, and carry on as usual. Fingers crossed that you'll both be on the same page and there won't be much discussion.

As you stand there waiting, you start to ponder other possibilities. Surely he's not going to make some sort of proposition? What if he wants to sleep with you again, but this time with the risk of getting caught? He did ask you to meet him in his very private office… maybe he didn’t intend to talk at all.

He’d unlock the door and let you inside, casual as could be. But as soon as the door would shut, he’d grab you by the hand and throw you back against it, trapping you between the wood and his heat. His lips would crash into yours as if he has hungered for you since that night, his hands rushing to feel the skin that hides beneath your clothes. You’d wrap a leg around his hip, desperate to feel the friction of his bulge against your core.

You’d beg him to take you then and there: against the door, on his desk, down on the floor. As long as you could have him again, that’s all that would matter.

The thought of it makes your heart race and your mouth dry up, but you squash the fantasy before you can convince yourself that it’s a good idea. As exciting as it may be to think about, you know better this time. You're not going to sleep with him again. And if he has any sense, he'll stay the hell away from you.

Professor Yang eventually appears in the hallway, and you stand up a little straighter, hyper-aware of every inch of space between the two of you. He looked great, of course, with his collared shirt that had a single button undone at his throat and his hair swept up to the side. But you will not sleep with him.

He barely even greets you before unlocking the door and heading in first. You follow him, and he instructs you to close the door behind you. He doesn’t turn to you, doesn’t grab you or kiss you. That’s a good thing. That’s for the best.

You take a seat across from him at his desk. His office is small and scarcely decorated, with only an acoustic guitar propped up in the corner of the room. The deep mahogany finish is gorgeous, and you wonder if it’s an instrument that Professor Yang made by hand.

He relaxes back into his chair, hand covering his mouth as he looks at you. And he really looks at you, long and hard, as though he's trying to peer deep into your heart. It's incredibly nerve-wracking to be looked at in such a scrutinizing way, especially considering that he's hardly even glanced at you until now.

"What are the odds..." He mumbles quietly.

You realize that he still hasn't quite accepted the situation the two of you are in, and that makes you feel a little less alone. "I had no idea this would happen."

A line forms between his eyebrows, hand falling from his mouth. "You want me to believe that?"

You give him a similarly cynical look. "Excuse me?"

He sits up, anger evident in his piercing gaze. "You must have known! So why did you do it? Because you thought I'd give you a better grade this semester? That I'd be easier on you?"

Taken aback by his accusations, your jaw drops. "What? That's ridiculous! I would never-"

"Please, don't try to act all innocent. I can see right through it."

"I didn't know! How could-"

"Come on. You don't recognize me from any of last year's convocations? You had to have been there to hear me introduce my class."

Who the hell does this guy think he is? To sit there and accuse you of something so... so slimy and then refuse to hear you out! You won't stand for it, even if his commanding tone does send a shock of tingling adrenaline straight to your core.

He may still be the most attractive man you've ever seen, and you may still be feeling flustered by being in the same room as him... but regardless of those things, you can't let him walk all over you like this. He could do whatever he wanted to you at the hotel, but not here. This is real life, not a one night stand.

Every ounce of shyness within you disintegrates as you grit your teeth, preparing to defend yourself. "I am not that kind of girl. I am an intelligent and hard-working student, and I would never do something so disgusting.”

He starts to say something, and you rise to your feet, not yet finished. “Don't interrupt me again. I never saw you at last year’s convocations because I had to miss almost all of them for personal reasons. Those absences were all approved by the music office, if you feel so inclined to verify with them. And I don't know what on Earth makes you think this is all something that I set up - if you'll remember, I very clearly did my best to avoid you at the wedding. You were the one that approached me, not the other way around. Don't get that skewed. This is all your doing."

Professor Yang doesn't look too eager to ease up. "You were playing hard to get."

"I was trying to keep my sanity!" You lean over his desk, infuriated by the argument. "I couldn't think straight around you, you're so fucking attractive, Jesus Christ."

You cringe when you realize you've lost your filter. You did not mean to say that- not out loud, not to him.

He just sits there, quietly watching you with that same empty expression you've seen from him all week. He clenches his fist tightly around a pen, and you feel yourself deflate the longer he looks at you. But you don't sit down, telling yourself to stay strong and stand your ground.

Eventually he speaks up, and his voice is even as he says, "I think it would be best for you to drop my class."

"No."

"I urge you to reconsider."

"Absolutely not." You feel a surge of pride in yourself for standing up to him. "This is not how you do your job, Professor. You don't get to bully me out of your class just because you don't want me there. I signed up for your class and I intend to see it through to the end. And if you treat me unfairly, I will report you."

"You won't," he answers calmly, coolly challenging you.

He's right, it's an empty threat. But you stick to it. "Yes, I will."

Professor Yang sighs exasperatedly. "You won't, because if you report me for unfair treatment, then we'll both be placed under a microscope. Someone will find out about what happened between us this summer, and we'll both get in trouble. I'll lose my job and you'll be expelled."

You'll be expelled? That's news to you. The reality of the situation hits you like a punch to the gut. You can't afford to lose your status as a student here; your parents would never forgive you. They already aren't too happy about the fact that you're pursuing a degree in music. If you screw yourself over by getting expelled, that’s the end of the line for you.

He continues. "So don't think that you can blackmail me into boosting your grade or giving you special treatment, because I'm not the only one that will face severe consequences. Get that idea out of your head right now. You can't threaten me like that. Oh, and don't even think that I'll boost your grade in exchange for sexual favors. That is not going to work on me."

Your jaw drops. "Oh my God, are you even listening to me? Who do you think I am? Seriously! I'm not going to try to sleep with you for extra credit. I'm an honest student."

"I'm only covering our bases to let you know what is unacceptable." He picks at the stem of the pen’s cap, lifting it with his thumb and releasing so that it clicks in a steady rhythm that is nothing short of irritating.

“Well this could go both ways, couldn’t it?” You cross your arms over your chest. "What's going to stop you from pursuing me? What's going to keep you from lowering my grade if I refuse your advances?"

"What even makes you think I would pursue you?" He says it like he wants his words to hurt you, as if he's trying to make you feel that you're not worthy of his attention. But it's pointless; his actions have already proven otherwise.

You are so gorgeous that I might actually believe in love at first sight.

He had said that to you. It was a baseless, drunken confession, but the fact remains that he has been attracted to you once and he could be attracted to you still.

Let's be drunk and in love, then.

You had said all sorts of embarrassing things to each other, and your cheeks burn as you remember. You shift your weight, scanning his face as you force yourself to respond. "It wouldn't be the first time. And from what I remember, you enjoyed yourself an awful lot that night."

It's a long, quiet moment. You can practically see that night replaying in his mind, seductive images of you flashing in his eyes. It doesn't make you uncomfortable to know he's probably remembering every curve of your naked body; it boosts your confidence that he's been momentarily flustered by the memory of you.

The pen in his death grip falls to his desk, and he folds his hands in his lap, looking haggard. "If you choose to stay in the class, I promise that I will treat you fairly and I will not make any advances towards you. I promise that you will finish the class with an unbiased grade. However, I think you should seriously consider dropping the class, for both your sanity and mine."

For both your sanity and mine.

You can't quite tell what he means by that. Does he expect you'll continue to be at each others' throats for the rest of the semester? Or on the contrary, is he saying it might be difficult to refuse the temptation of each other if you're forced into the same classroom once a week?

Regardless of the truth behind his words, you're unwilling to budge on the matter. You calmly return to your seat, collecting your thoughts. "All due respect, but I really don't want to drop. I have a very genuine interest in your class, and I've been looking forward to it since I signed up. I don't want to sacrifice my education because of this."

"Then I will remind you that you have another two weeks to withdraw if you change your mind, and I won't bring it up again."

You both fall quiet, and you hate the feeling of regret bubbling in your stomach. You shouldn't have slept with him. You knew it was a bad idea but you went and did it anyway. And what makes it even worse is that now one of the best nights of your life is colored with regret. You want to remember that feeling of being so alive without immediately hating yourself for your poor decision making skills.

He pulls you out of your puddle of self-loathing as he asks, "Have you told anybody about this?"

You shake your head, but realize immediately that you're wrong. "Actually, my cousin knows. The one at the wedding that sort of instigated this whole thing."

"Expected. But you haven't said anything to anyone about the current situation?"

You take a deep breath. "I called that same cousin a few days ago. She knows you're my professor and everything. I just had to say something, I was going crazy."

"Is she a student here too?"

"No, she's not."

"Okay. You can't tell anyone else though, understood?"

You frown, a crease forming between your brows. "I won't, jeez. You're acting like you're the only one that has something to lose. I'm not out to get you. I'm scared, too."

He rubs his temple. "I'm sorry. I just want to make sure we're protecting ourselves."

Your ears perk up at the word sorry. So he is capable of apologizing! "An apology for earlier would be nice, too," you grumble.

"For what, exactly?"

You frown. "For falsely accusing me of setting this up."

"I don’t know for sure that those accusations are false."

"You're kidding." Your blood boils. You had no idea that you've spent all this time fawning over such a prick. "Why don't you believe me?"

"That doesn't really matter, does it? What matters is that it doesn't happen again. Understood?" He easily evades your question, raising his eyebrows inquisitively.

"Rest assured, you are safe from my relentless pursuit." You roll your eyes, voice dripping with sarcasm, and you grab your bag, ready to leave. There’s nothing else that can be done here. "I'll do my best not to unintentionally seduce you, you poor helpless thing."

"You don't have to be childish."

"You don't have to be a dick, but here we are." You resist the urge to kick his desk. You can't remember the last time you felt so frustrated. You stare each other down until you finally break away from him, turning to head for the door. Clearly he's not going to apologize, so there's no point to sticking around any longer.

"Wait, _____. One more thing."

You hate the way your whole body electrifies at the sound of your name. Screw him and the way his perfect mouth forms the damned syllables.

"I hate to ask, and maybe I don't even want to know... but how old are you?"

Frowning, you answer. "Nineteen. Turning twenty in like, two months."

"Nineteen?!"

You grip the door handle and look over your shoulder at him. "Yeah, nineteen."

"Oh my God, you're a baby." He drags his hands down his face. "Nineteen? Really?"

You ignore his baby comment; making a fuss over it would only prove his point. "How old did you think I was?"

"At least twenty-two or twenty-three. I mean, Christ, you were drinking at the wedding. I didn't realize you were underage."

"Don't say that I'm underage, that makes it sound like you screwed a teenager."

"Well technically I did. Nineteen. God dammit, shit..."

You crinkle your nose, realizing that you never really considered the age gap between the two of you. "And how old are you?"

"I'm twenty-six."

Seven years. He's seven years older than you. That's kind of a lot. "Like... just turned twenty-six?"

He nods, speechless for once, like his voice just gave up. So, closer to six-ish years. That's not... awful...

"For what it's worth, I didn't realize that I was screwing a senior citizen so-"

"Don't." He cuts you off, raising his hand in warning. "Don't do that. Don't start getting sassy, don't start joking around with me. Just don't."

Another sassy remark is readied at the tip of your tongue, but you hold back when you notice that he almost looks pained. Why does he look pained?

You let it go and turn the knob, yanking the door open. "I'll see you next week, then."

He nods, unwilling to meet your eyes, and you close the door behind you.

You stomp the whole way down State Street to the music building, steam shooting from your ears after your 'meeting' with Professor Yang.

Curse him and his stupid asshat attitude. Screw him for being devilishly handsome and for being the world's biggest dick. How could you have slept with someone like him? How could you let yourself get into this mess?

You get to the main office on the third floor, and the reception desk is regrettably empty. You peek around for a student worker, but there is no one to be found. Even the doors to the professors’ offices are closed, implying that they are away or otherwise unavailable.

Huffing, you grab a pen from the cup on the reception desk and scribble a message onto the notepad sitting there. You explain in perhaps too-colorful language that you are in desperate need of photocopies of your approved excuse cards from last spring’s convocations, and you leave your cell phone number so that you can be contacted when said photocopies are available.

The anger that clouds the corners of your vision starts to dissipate as you tuck the note under the computer mouse for the student worker to find later. You're frustrated by everything Professor Yang has said to you, and you're frustrated by the fact that even what you believe to be an easy fix is not instantaneously possible. If you can just get the damned excuse cards to him, then he would have to believe you when you say you're clueless. Right? He'd probably never admit it, but you just need to know that he knows that you're telling the truth. You can't stand being called a liar.

You pull the cell phone out of your backpack as you trudge towards the stairs. What you really need right now is to hang out with someone and distract yourself from the bullshit with Professor Dickface. You want to call Shinhye, but you know that she'll be on her way to her next class shortly. And then you think of Kino, whose phone number you snagged after rehearsal yesterday. Maybe you should see what he's up to.

You call him, only momentarily thinking it might be weird to call instead of texting. But before you have a chance to second guess, he picks up.

"Farm girl! Hi." You can barely hear him over the rush of wind, but the nickname makes you smile.

"Hey. You busy?"

"Not exactly. Why?"

"I just need to get my mind off of something and I was wondering if you might want to hang out."

"Sure! Where are you?"

"Music building. You?"

"On my way there, actually. I was going to snag a practice room to start working on some stuff for R&B ensemble. Do you want to practice with me?"

You smile, releasing a careful sigh. "Yeah, let's do that."

As you step down the last stretch of stairs, you see Kino coming through the revolving door, his hair a mess from the wind. He spots you and waves, ending the call and pocketing his phone. He meets you at the stairwell. "Hey."

"Hey." You point upstairs. "Shall we?"

Together, you head back up and wind down a hallway to find an empty practice room. Thankfully you snag one with a baby grand instead of one of the dinky upright pianos.

"So, something's bothering you?" Kino inquires, dropping his backpack onto a chair and rifling through it in search of his music.

"Yeah, but I don't really want to talk about it, if that's alright." Well, it's not that you don't want to talk about it, it's just that you can't. Well, shouldn't. Won't.

"I hear you loud and clear. We'll just make some music, and if that doesn't help you feel better, we'll go get milkshakes or something. Milkshakes make everything better." He raises his eyebrows at you as he sets his music on a stand.

You nod, sliding onto the piano bench. "That sounds great. Maybe we should get milkshakes regardless."

"Honestly, I am one-hundred percent down for a milkshake. Have you been to the ice cream shop down on Thirteenth?" He groans when you shake your head. "Okay, then it's a done deal. We have to go."

"I will not refuse." You smile, feeling lighter already.

You rehearse together for nearly an hour, and you let the music completely occupy your mind. You don’t think about Professor Douche-Cock; you don’t think about the way he infuriates you and you certainly don’t think about your still overwhelming attraction to him. For that hour, your mind and soul can breathe.

"What's on your mind?" Hongseok's voice flowed over you, a gentle creek warmed by the hot summer sun.

Humming quietly, your eyes fluttered shut and you inhaled deeply, taking in the sweet, fresh scent of him, his cologne mingling with the alcohol on his breath. "You."

"Me?"

The two of you had long since lost track of the music, swaying lazily and dancing way too close. You felt so absorbed in the grip of his hands and the solidness of his body under those damn clothes and you could no longer think straight. You needed to touch his skin, to feel his lips. His face was mere inches from yours - far too much of a temptation.

"You, your lips, your hands, your..." You trailed off with a sly grin. "I'm thinking about everything you're hiding under your tux."

"What a coincidence," he murmured, his fingertips dragging over your exposed back. "I can't stop imagining how you'll look when your dress is finally on the floor."

Your heart raced. He finally admitted to what had been implied all night - that he wanted you naked, that he would get you naked. Of course, that had been your plan all along, but hearing him verbalize it made you quiver with excitement. You needed him... you were desperate.

"When are you going to kiss me?" You couldn't stop the words before they spilled from you of their own volition. But regardless of the unwarranted sentiments, you felt a bold smile form on your lips.

Hongseok chuckled, amused. He pulled you in tighter, the tip of his nose brushing yours as he leaned in. "Wouldn't it be too easy if I just gave you what you wanted?"

"I really don't care." You touched your forehead to his, challenging him. You knew he wanted to. He had to.

His shallow breath fanned over your face as he cupped your cheek. “Neither do I."

A rush of adrenaline burst through your veins as Hongseok closed the gap, finally pressing his lips to yours. Each kiss laced with passionate desire, he held nothing back as he kissed you once, twice, a thousand times over. Your hands traveled up into his soft hair as your lips crashed into his, and he securely grabbed your waist, tugging you towards the bed.

Hongseok sat on the edge of the mattress and you eagerly climbed up onto his lap, straddling him and sighing softly when you felt his hardening length between your legs. You could tell that he had a lot to offer.

He grabbed your wrists and redirected your hands to his tie, and your mouths never separated as you worked to slide the material out from his collar. You quickly moved onto the buttons of his vest and shirt, and he reached around you to tug at the zipper of your dress, both of you completely consumed with the overwhelming need to press skin against skin. You only pulled away when you finally ripped open his shirt, wanting just a moment to take in the sight of him.

He was extremely muscular, as you had expected, and it was almost intimidating how utterly perfect his torso was. You ran your fingers over his rippled abdomen, entranced by the dips and peaks of each muscle. His skin was hot to the touch, and it sent a delicious shock through you.

"How..." You started a question, but you didn't really know where it was going. With a gorgeous face and perfect body, Hongseok was simply too good to be true. You were awestruck, your hands coming to rest on the solid curve of his pecs.

"You haven't even seen the best part yet." He rocked his hips ever so slightly, reminding you that there was even more left to reveal.

"You're so cocky," you giggled, shrugging off the straps of your dress as he peeled the fabric away. You might have been more shy about stripping if you had been sober, but your wine-induced haze made you more than ready to be rid of the damn dress.

"I think you'll find I have good reason to be." His eyes flashed and he pressed another long kiss against your lips. He tasted of bourbon and promiscuity, and you wanted all of it. You were drunk on him. All you wanted was to kiss him for all of eternity.

Hongseok's rough fingers ran along the bare skin of your sides as he pulled your dress down around your waist. With your dress half off, you felt wildly exposed, but in the best possible way. His lips separated from yours so that he could get a look at you the way you had with him.

As his eyes scanned down from your face to your chest, you couldn't help the slight blush that came to your cheeks. It was embarrassing to be looked at that way, but it was also thrilling to watch him drink you in.

"You are absolutely gorgeous. Have I told you that yet?" His eyes met yours, a sweet smile touching his lips despite the darkness of his blown-out pupils.

"Don't think you've mentioned it," you murmured, barely able to get the words out before he crashed into your lips, his hot tongue pressing past the seam. You gladly accepted it, yanking his shirt off of his shoulders and pressing yourself harder against him. His strong arms wrapped around you completely, trapping you in his heat as your tongues wrestled. The kiss was sloppy and messy, but you were too distracted by wanting him to care.

As Hongseok continued kissing you, his hand slipped between your bodies in search of your breast, carefully massaging it and running his calloused thumb over your nipple until it stood up for him. He twisted the sensitive bud between his fingers, drawing a pleasured gasp from you. You had never considered yourself to be especially sensitive to physical touch - not any more than the next person, anyway - but Hongseok threw all of your senses into overdrive, driving you wild with the simplest of touches.

You ground your pelvis against his desperately, and his lips trailed along the skin just under your jaw as he worked his way down to your breast. You arched your back to give him better access, shuddering when his teeth grazed over your neck and collarbone. How could you feel so good already?

Hongseok's mouth latched onto your breast, and he sloppily lapped at your nipple while pinching the one still in his hand. It made the room spin; you were so lightheaded with pleasure you could hardly stand it. Panting heavily, you dug your fingers into his impressively muscular back, cursing yourself for keeping your fingernails so short. He seemed like the kind of guy who might like getting scratched up.

You continued rocking your hips as his mouth moved to your other breast and his hand traced up your thigh, sneaking under the skirt of your dress. Every inch of skin he traversed felt like a mile, taking far too long to reach the juncture of your thigh and your hip. You grinned wickedly as he felt for the strap of your nonexistent underwear, his tongue even pausing its ministrations as he realized that you were, in fact, completely bare beneath your dress.

With a soft groan, he slipped his other hand under your dress, fingers splayed across the round curve of your ass. He released your nipple from his mouth and his fox eyes flashed as he focused in on your face. "You are full of surprises."

"All good, I hope." Your chest tightened as you smiled at him, and your drunk self dared to think you might be falling in love.

"Only the best," he murmured lowly before capturing your mouth in another passionate kiss, his lips embracing yours as he gave your ass a squeeze. You rocked your hips fervidly, desperate to feel some sort of relief, and he caught you off guard when he lifted you, his forearms sliding under your thighs for support. Surprised, you laughed against his mouth and held tightly onto his shoulders. Jesus, he was strong.

Hongseok stood with you in his arms, turning around so he could lay you down on the bed. His lips stayed on yours the whole way down. He hovered over you, propping himself up with one arm, his other hand running over your thigh. His callouses scratched your skin and you purred at the sensation. You wanted those hands all over you.

His knuckles tracked along your inner thigh until his fingers discovered your folds, and you felt him smirk against your lips. You were dripping just from kissing him, and you were sure he approved. Softly, he traced your folds with the pad of his finger and his thumb teased the area around your clit.

You whimpered, squirming with anticipation as he circled your sex. He was such a tease, taking his time and slowly unraveling you. And it was working; you were falling to pieces and he had hardly even touched you.

Hongseok pressed a single finger past your entrance and his mouth moved south to your neck, giving you space to moan. He nibbled at the base of your throat before sliding his tongue up the length of it. "I want to taste you," he murmured into your neck, a quiet growl in his voice.

His simple words made you clench around his finger; you would love that more than anything. Breathy, you said, "Yes, please, do whatever you want." You completely gave yourself up to him, a bundle of nervous energy electrifying your gut. Anything he wanted to do to you, you would gladly receive.

Without hesitation, Hongseok kneeled between your legs, and a chill ran through you at the absence of his heat. He looked beautiful with hair tousled from your fingers and his lips pink from your kiss. How on Earth had you ever gotten so lucky?

His eyes scanned over your body as his finger slid out of you, his hands urging your skirt further up your hips before refocusing his attention on your clit. You gasped as he made contact, your legs jerking at the jolt of pleasure.

A smirk fell on his lips as he toyed with your most sensitive spot. “You are so hot, oh my God…”

You weren’t really sure if you should respond - or if you were even capable of responding - but Hongseok’s lips were suddenly on your folds and your mind went completely blank. His tongue prodded at your entrance before working its way up to your clit, and when he started sucking you swore you were blinded with pleasure.

You fought the immediate tension that coursed through you, not wanting to get wound up too quickly and end it too soon. This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and you were convinced you’d never again find someone as gorgeous and fucking amazing at oral as Hongseok. You had to enjoy it.

Hongseok massaged your folds as he continued eating you out, and you couldn’t help but pinch your nipples, amplifying the ripples he sent throughout your body, careful not to take it too far. You whined as you twisted them and he lapped at your clitoris, his finger sliding inside of you once more. You were filled with sensation, and nothing could have been more perfect.

“That’s… aa-aahhh… ohh…” You tried desperately to encourage him, but words were difficult to come by. But he must have understood; he kept up with that same tongue pattern, stroking two fingers carefully against your walls. Sooner than anticipated, he brought you right to the edge. “Hong… Hongseok, yes… plea-oh…”

He didn’t change his pace, didn’t change pressure. He just continued in exactly the same manner until you broke, a series of short, squeak-like moans coming from you as an incredibly powerful orgasm washed over you. He pressed a flat tongue against your clit as you climaxed; you felt so full and warm and beautiful.

When your pulse was no longer racing he released you, and you hummed quietly. You eyed him as he stood, his chin and chest wet with your arousal and his erection straining against his pants: an absolute Adonis if you’d ever seen one.

You were speechless, grinning up at him like a fool. Everything felt so good. How could a human make you feel that way? He might have actually been a god.

Hongseok helped you sit up, and lifted the dress up over your head so you were fully in the nude. Wiping at his chin, he smirked and then reached for his belt buckle. “I hope you’re not too tired. After all, we’re just getting started.”

Post Script | Thank you for reading! Part 3 will be posted Saturday at 8pm.

Update | Read Part 3 here!

THIS IS REPOSTED FROM MY ORIGINAL BLOG, GWENTORY. All future content (including HFT Part 4 and onwards) will only be posted on GWENTORYFICS. Thank you!

#hongseok #yang hongseok #hongseok smut #yang hongseok smut #hongseok scenario #pentagon smut #pentagon scenario #hyunggu scenario #kino scenario #kino angst #hyunggu angst #hyunggu #kino #kang hyunggu scenario #yang hongseok scenario #hot for teacher #hft

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edwxrdkenway · 6 years

Text

Anime Recommendations part 2

guess who’s back for more anime recommendations. some asked for more so here I am. part 1 can be found here btw if you’re new

Note that I only listed underrated or forgotten animes that I watched and enjoyed every minute of it and you may be too

91 Days

Lets start with some heavy stuff y'all

91 Days is set during the Prohibition era and tells the story of the protagonist Angelo.

As a child Angelo has witnessed the death of his family who all have been slaughtered by a mafia family. Losing everything he holds dear, he leaves both his name and hometown behind, adopting the new identity of Avilio Bruno. Years later he finally has his chance for revenge when he receives a mysterious letter prompting him to return to his home town and to kill all who are at fault for the tragedy of his family.

(idk I thought that this one is famous but turned out that only a few watched it?? that one is so good idk ??)

Zankyou no Terror/Terror in Resonance

(Idk why people thing this is underrated?? That one watched almost everyone when it aired??)

This one is also a heavy anime so be prepared. (I’m not joking be prepared)

Tokyo has been hit by a terrorist attack that has devastated the city and The only evidence of the culprits is a cryptic video uploaded to the Internet. Unbeknownst to the authorities is that the terrorist masterminds are two teenaged boys: Nine and Twelve who should not even exist. Their plan: to "wake up the world" with their heinous plans of destruction, with their fingers on the trigger.

btw im not pluffing their names are nine, twelve and one is even called five

Death Parade

Imagine that after death, there is no heaven or hell, only a bar.

Yeah you read right a bar. A bar that stands between reincarnation and oblivion. There, Decim will challenge the deceased to a random game in which his/her/they fate of either ascending into reincarnation or falling into the void will be wagered. Whether it's bowling, darts, air hockey you name it, each person's true nature will be revealed in a ghastly parade of death and memories, dancing to the whims of the bar's master. Welcome to Quindecim my friend.

(BTW do not be fooled by the opening if you decided to watch this, I warned you)

Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun/My Little Monster

Ok here some light stuff ^^ Tnkk is a shoujo and one of my fav shoujo tbh.

Shizuku Mizutani, (who kinda looks like Maka from Soul Eater somehow) is only caring about her grades but her cold view of life begins to change when she meets Haru Yoshida, a troublemaker. Sounds like those typical story lines but behold. He’s not much different from her. He also understands little about human nature and does not have any friends. Much to her surprise, he proclaims that she will be his friend and immediately confesses his feelings towards her upon meeting her.

This one is very funny and not that cliché shoujo you would expect and I binge watched it in a day and would recommend 11/10 bc Haru is a precious cinnamon roll who should be protected at all costs

I mean just look at him-

Psycho Pass

Another heavy one (I think I have another type lol).

This anime is set in the 22nd century where the Sibyl System, a very powerful network of psychometric scanners, actively measures the minds and mentalities of civilised populations. With other words if you are a bad person you do not go to jail, nah you will be eliminated.

Into this world steps our main heroine Akane Tsunemori. However, as she works alongside bae I mean Shinya Kougami, she soon learns that the Sibyl System's judgments are not as perfect as her fellow Inspectors assume.

This got 2 seasons and a movie and let me tell you you better watch this because this one will get you hooked !!

Tokyo Ravens

Romance? Check. Magic? Check. Mystery? Check. Very underrated? Double Check.

Onmyodou magic was once a powerful technique which was used by the Japanese during World War II. Later, infamous onmyoji Yakou Tsuchimikado performed a ritual, which goes horribly wrong and the result of this becomes what is now known as the "Great Spiritual Disaster", an incident which haunts the entire Japanese continent to date.

Our boy Harutora, who is a member of the Tsuchimikado's branch family once promise Natsume, the heir of the Tsuchimikado's main family and Yakou’s reincarnation, to protect her as her familiar. However, turned out Harutora has no talent for magic and chooses to live a normal life instead. But when a prominent member of the Onmyou Agency attempts to recreate the same experiment which led to Japan's downfall, he decides to make good on his word and fight by Natsume's side.

Your lie in April/Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso

Here I introduce you to a masterpiece that will ruin you. Like literally ruin you. I'm not even exaggerating, I told my best friend to watch this and she did not talk to me for 2 days.

Our boy Kousei Arima was strictly taught how to play the piano and meticulously follow the score by his mother, to the point where he dominated every competition he entered with ease and he became one of the best piano players. However, after his mother suddenly dies everything went downhill and had to quit the music industry.

Two years later, Kousei lives a monotonous life with his childhood friends supporting him. But he still continues to cling to music, although performing is still an impossibility for him. This is until his unexpected encounter with our girl Kaori Miyazono, a violinist who performs freely without the dictations of a score. A story of friendship, love, music, and a single lie, Kousei's life begins to change and gain color as Kaori helps him to take up music again.

(note: if you decide to watch this pls do not hate me)

Boku dake ga Inai Machi/Erased

Another dark one nice. Our protagonist Satoru Fujinuma has a special gift. He finds himself sent back several minutes before an accident occurs. He has taken advantage of this mysterious phenomenon to save many lives.

However, when he is wrongfully accused of murdering someone close to him, he is sent back to the past once again but 18 years in the past. Soon, he realizes that the murder may be connected to the abduction and killing of one of his classmates Kayo Hinazuki, that took place when he was a child and he tries to prevent the death of his classmate while protecting those he cares about in the present.

Idk why I decided to watch this but let me tell ya my poor heart was not ready while watching this. I recommend this 11/10.

Kyoukai no Kanata/Beyond the Boundary

ok so pls drop everything what your doing and go watch this if you didn’t. pls do yourself a favor.

KNK is about Mirai who is the sole survivor of a clan of Spirit World warriors with the power to employ their blood as weapons. Yeah you read right blood is their weapon. As such, Mirai is tasked with hunting down and killing creatures called youmu, who are basically manifestations of negative human emotions. One day, Mirai comes across Akihito Kanbara, a rare half-breed of youmu in human form. In a panicked state, she plunges her blood saber into him only to realize that he's an immortal being. From then on, the two form an impromptu friendship that revolves around Mirai constantly trying to kill Akihito, in an effort to boost her own wavering confidence as a Spirit World warrior.

I’m not biased I swear but this anime is so aesthetically pleasing im livin-

Ok so thats it. Like last time I did not include popular anime series that like 99% of us watch/ed like boku no hero academia/my hero academia, tokyo ghoul, gintama, satsuriko no tenshi/angels of death, cells at work, black clover etc.

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moody-blues-requiem · 6 years

Note

What is your opinion on the main Passione members? Like ranking them best boi to worse boi and why.

how could you make me rank them like this..... I love them all but. Here goes:

1. Abbacchio: Listen, I have a huge crush on Abbacchio. He’s one of my top Jojo waifus, if not #1. I like guys with long hair, I love his cold but loyal attitude, I wanna snuggle up to him even though he’s probably not a cuddler. I love him.

2. Narancia: My angel baby, my adopted son. I would do anything for Narancia. I love his energy and enthusiasm and the fact that the manifestation of his soul is a purple airplane. What a good kid.

3. Mista: I’m almost surprising myself typing this, but now that I’m thinking about it, Mista is really an all-around good guy. He’s so laid back, but can still tackle mafia work with ease. He’s got some great quirks, and his stand is awesome. I’d wanna go out for lunch with him.

4. Bruno: He’s a little tough in his methods sometimes, but has a heart of gold that I appreciate. He’s a good guy, the kind of person that would give you the advice that you don’t want to hear but you need to hear it anyways.

5. Fugo: Araki did him dirty by excluding him from the manga so early on. I feel like Fugo is towards the bottom of this list just because he wasn’t very present in the manga. I don’t like his quick temper but the fact that he apologizes quickly (at least, he did to Narancia) kinda makes up for it. Also his stand is super cool.

6. Giorno: Lemme start by saying, I don’t hate Giorno, I love all of the mafia boys a lot. But he’s at the bottom, because, well. I know it’s the whole foundation of the story and his morals are good but isn’t it weird for a 15 year old to want to overthrow the boss of the entire Italian mafia? I don’t trust like that. Something about him is just a little off-putting.

#jjba #vento aureo #va #lasqudrahoe

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graveyard-cuddles · 6 years

Note

the main jjba part 5 boys for the ask meme thingy!

Oh fuck yeah

Gio: I enjoy him a lot. I think he’s a great Jojo and Gold Experience is a cool af stand both design and ability wise. Unpopular opinion: I don’t think he gets enough credit for being supportive of his team mates tbh like yeah he’s cool and calculating but also understands people pretty well and what they need to get through a situation. He’s very empathetic. I don’t really ship him with anyone in particular but Giomis is cute. I think we can all agree we all wish he had a cameo in Stone Ocean, especially during the last few chapters.

Bruno: MY HEART AND SOUL. MY ABSOLUTE SUNSHINE. I seriously have such love for him like he’s so weird and quirky yet still intimidating and hard as hell. But also so passionate about doing the right thing and so protective of the group. Even his character design is just so adhfjf GREAT. Every single fight he was a part of was SO GOOD. Sticky Fingers is one of my fave part 5 stands overall. I def ship him with Abba bc suffering. Unpopular opinion I guess is I don’t feel as though he’s exactly as emotional tactile as a lot of the fandom makes him out to be. He’s much more pragmatic. He’s such a good boy I JUST WISH HE WASN’T DE AD.

Abba: ANOTHER LOVE OF MINE. MY GOTH HUSBAND. He’s criminally underrated in my opinion. Like when I first read VA I was kinda “meh” in the beginning about Abba but he grew on me so much. He is so loyal and low key cares SO MUCH about the group. I love him but I just wanna shake him some times and tell him he’s not a terrible person because his self loathing makes me sad. I tend to ship him with Bruno. I kinda wish both he and Moody Blues got more fights/big moments in the manga and the Man in the Mirror fight is a good example of why.

Fugo: Gonna be honest I didn’t really care very much for Fugo first time I read the manga. I loved Purple Haze because of how badass and cool looking it was but Fugo stabbing my baby with a fork took a lil while for me to forgive lol. I’ve warmed up to him a lot though and I honestly just feel so bad for this poor kid. I really don’t feel like him staying behind was selfish on his part. It was a seriously fucked up, deadly situation and he was literally only like, 16 at the time?? Like really, don’t judge him lol. I don’t really ship him with anyone?? Unpopular opinion: I actually think it would have been really cool and interesting to have Fugo stick with the group but eventually betray them the way Ariaki originally planned. It would have been a total gut punch but kinda cool I think.

Mista: I LOVE THE STINKY BOI. He’s so funny and badass and just??? cute???? and Sex Pistols??? ADORABLE???? Listen his favorite music is the carpenters and he loves sappy romance movies like pretty woman and but also talks about cannibalism and other weird random shit we would seriously get along so well. I honestly can’t think of anything else to add I just adore him.

Narancia: A HANDSOME BOY. AN INTELLIGENT BOY. A BOY OF MANY TALENTS. I love my sweet orange BBY he values his friends and loved ones so much and fights so hard to protect them. He’s so loyal and fearless and only gets stronger over the course of the story. His soul is a manifestation of a lil purple airplane and he loves pizza and he can’t do math and I’m convinced I may actually be his mother. Either way I want to adopt him. SO GLAD HE’S ALIVE AND WELL. :))))

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itzryyo · 7 years

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I am currently on a bus heading into the city for a field trip and am trying to maintain my sanity while also attempting to distract myself from the fact that I didn’t go to the bathroom before we left and traffic is real.

Someone asked me the other day, “So, like, what is your obsession with Drake all about?” My first reaction was to answer their question with a question and ask “uhh…why aren’t you obsessed with Drake?” To be fair, they were justified in asking me because I have a propensity to be incredibly all-or-nothing when it comes to my affinity for certain things (i.e., Chick-Fil-A, the Mets, Titanic & The Dark Knight to name a few.) I’m not really sure where it comes from, MOM, but it’s been that way my whole life. While I don’t have a vast array of interests, the things I am interested in, I commit to whole-heartedly. However, when it comes to music, we are talking about an entirely different entity.

While TV shows, films and books can influence, art can inspire, and sports can invigorate, I contend that nothing touches the soul the way music does. When I’m in a good mood, Bruno Mars or Justin Timberlake will enjoy that mood with me. If I’m feeling melancholy, it’s much easier to have Boyz II Men or Dru Hill help me out than it is to plop down on the couch, put on “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” and commit to watching the whole thing. You know exactly what I’m talking about. You know what it was like when you heard “Burn” by Usher for the first time and he, word for word, expressed exactly how you felt about your current, 3-week-old high school relationship. Yes, we all wanted to be Spider-Man the first time we saw it in theaters, but do you still feel that way if, for some God-forsaken reason, TBS is airing it on a random day off? Probably not. But what about if “Bye-Bye-Bye” comes on the radio randomly while you're driving in the car? I guarantee you are gracefully moving your right arm from right to left while opening and closing your hand just like Justin, J.C. and the rest of the boys did. Whether your music is on shuffle and that ONE song comes on or you have listened to “Someone Like You” for the 32nd time in a row, music infiltrates the soul and is an uncanny medication for the heart.

Okay, but there's a lot of really good music, Ry, why the fix on this particular artist? I'm glad you just asked [in my imagination.] The power of music lies in one's ability to relate to it. I'm honest enough to admit that I have a tendency to think my opinions are unerring. I'll quickly discredit an artist or band because I personally don't like it, but to completely discredit another's experience or admiration because of my subjectivity is irresponsible and ignorant. I will never understand an artist like Future. I was disappointed when Drake did an entire album with him. But I've talked with people who have explained that (when they can understand what he's saying) they really relate to his songs. More power to 'em. A lot of people don't like Drake. I've heard (and argued) many people who dislike him for a myriad of reasons ranging from being "soft" to "not struggling enough" to "sounding the same on every song.” I can't make anyone like the guy and that's not why I'm even writing this in the first place. Remember: Traffic. Middle-schoolers. Full bladder. Voila.

Reverting back to a previous point, music invades and harps on human emotion. I grew up with a variety of musical tastes because I was raised by an all-white family while almost all my friends were minorities. My uncle introduced me to Pearl Jam, Nirvana, The Doors and The Beatles. My mom played “American Pie”, Goo-Goo Dolls, Alanis Morisette, Sheryl Crow and Matchbox 20 on our road trips to Ohio in the summer (she also can rap “Public Service Announcement” and “Rapper’s Delight” word for word.) My dad blasted The Fugees, Jagged Edge, Ginuwine and Joe, while my friends and teammates got me well-acquainted with Jay, Mobb Deep, Dipset and DMX. This plethora of music has made me appreciative of all musical genres. Thanks to Apple Music and Spotify, all these artists are accessible with the touch of a button.

If I had to choose, R&B and Hip-Hop would be my first two choices on what to listen to for the rest of my life. D-Block on my way to basketball practice and Brian McKnight while I fell asleep. “Fortunate” by Maxwell when I had a crush and “What They Want” by DMX and Sisqo when they rejected me. This was the routine growing up.

I was sitting in my bedroom as a 9th grader the first time I heard “Cry For You” by Jodeci. If I put it on right now, I would feel the exact same way that I did the first time I heard it. So when Drake made a song referencing one of the greatest R&B groups of all-time, let alone one of my favorite songs, the connection grew stronger.

Finding an artist who tapped into both genres with equal prowess was a dream come true for me. Add to that dual threat an artist who is biracial, grew up a single child in a single-parent household, raised by a white mother, and now you’re starting to reflect my actual upbringing. The funny thing about growing up biracial is that there never really seems to be a middle ground. Within the black community, I never felt “black” enough, as though it was my own doing that I was raised by a white mother; as if somehow it was my responsibility to earn my blackness more than those darker than I was, and until that validation was given, I couldn’t fit in. Flipping to the other side, when your entire family is white and your tan doesn’t go away in the winter, you stick out. I couldn’t style my hair like my uncle Jim’s. My little cousins never got asked if they were adopted. I was an anomaly for actually knowing the words to “Iris” by Goo-Goo Dolls. Considering all that, when Drake says “I used to get teased for being black and now I’m here and I’m not black enough, ‘cause I’m not acting tough or making stories up ‘bout where I’m actually from,” it hits home and it hits home hard.

I didn’t grow up with any male presence consistently in my life. I taught myself how to shave. My mother taught me how to play sports. Nobody taught me how to fight, or “be a man.” I learned the definition of strength by seeing the women in my life bounce back from heartbreak and hardships. I also learned how to be really in touch with my emotions. I am a feeler. I feel every emotion in every crevice of my heart. So when this same biracial artist, who was raised by a single, white mother, explodes onto the hip-hop scene but is making emotional music, I cannot help but look up to him. When every attack and knock against this same biracial artist is that he’s too “soft” and is “too emotional,” my confusion swells. “What do you mean ‘too emotional’?!” Ironically enough, the very same people who bludgeon Drake’s music due to its overt honesty and raw emotion are probably the ones who can relate to it more than anyone else.

Yes, the trap music is entertaining, but I can guarantee you that most of the men slandering Aubrey’s name have made more drunk calls to their ex (thanks Marvin’s Room) in a few months than they’ve ever pushed drugs, been gang affiliated or actually held a gun. Does this mean that those artists that promote that at the forefront of their records don’t reach people? Absolutely not. Kendrick Lamar, Jay-Z, Big Pun and others grew up around gangs, drugs and violence and speaks on things I have never seen or experienced in such a way, but there are plenty of people who have, which is the beauty of this whole music thing.

Back to Aubrey. In a world immersed in the superficial, is not authenticity a breath of fresh air? Hasn’t the complaint in the hip-hop community always been a lack of credibility from certain rappers and artists? So now, we have someone who owns their identity, not trying to be something that he isn’t, and he’s not welcome here. So when Drake (referencing his friendship with Lil’ Wayne) says, “Weezy been on the edge, you n*****s just need to chill, if anything happen to papi, might pop a n***** for real,” people balk at the claim. Why? Because he makes R&B music and that is apparently synonymous with weakness. I don’t like guns and I am not a promoter of violence, but I’m a believer in defending the people closest to you. This is also a reflection of the frailty of masculinity in the 21st century, but I can’t let my ADD take me there.

“But Ry, he isn’t real hip-hop. He talks white!” What do you think my friends used to say to me all the time growing up? The. Same. Damn. Thing. So yes, I appreciate Drake “talking white” in interviews because that’s the voice he was born with. I can’t help the way my voice sounds and it’s ridiculous to think I’d have to change it to meet a social standard. In a culture that watches, critiques and pounces on every single thing people do, Drake has never once strayed away from embracing all of the cultures he was introduced to growing up. He didn’t make apologies for making songs like “Doing It Wrong” and putting them on the same album where he put “Lord Knows.”Also, “Shut It Down” and “Uptown” are distinguishable, but not mutually exclusive. They both came from the same artist and they both hit when you put them on.

I spent an inordinate amount of time growing up trying to establish which race I wanted to affiliate myself with full time. This artist and this music shattered that notion. From breakups to ball games, homages to family and anthems for friends, there is no area of life where there isn’t a soundtrack to go with it. That is a very comforting feeling for someone who struggled with having to choose between which culture to embrace. The dichotomy of having to choose one or the other was onerous but having someone burst into the industry that showed me, through their music, that it’s okay to fully embrace both was liberating. Is every song a hit? Um, actually…okay, maybe not every song. Was Views a great album? Eh, not my favorite. But that’s the beauty of music. You get to go on that journey with an artist and watch them grow and explore and hopefully, their last album doesn’t sound anything like the first, because that’s what growth is (Hi, Kanye fans).

It doesn’t really matter what he puts out these days because as a fan, I’m always expecting the best and as a person, I’ll always be grateful for the lessons I learned from the music. As a fan, I’ll always want more. More emotion, more vulnerability, more bars and More Life.

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wydblue-blog · 7 years

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hi babes, i’ve been gone for a few days and have been drunk every single one of them, god bless st. patty’s day, but there’s a lot of new ppl and i’m an oldie here/admin just finna tryna reach out n plot w everyone, so below is a cheat sheet of all my babies, message me if u wanna plot (still need to get back to some ppl) or like this n i’ll come to u!!!!!!!!

blue silver rockwell (ashton irwin fc); 21, sophomore, vp of kappa alpha lamda, scorpio, film studies major. blue’s parents actually met at nyu, basically had a one night stand, realized they were pregnant and a month later decided to get married; their careless and tbh kinda reckless lifestyle passed down to blue. he’s beyond chill, but has abandonment issues up the ass, esp now that he found out that he had a twin (sage) that he thought was his cousin while growing up (their parents were just too immature and young to take care of two kids tbh), plus at 6 months blue’s grandpa on his mum’s side passed away, they didn’t rly know him but inherited his crazy amount of money and he spent most of his life traveling so until he was finally 19 and demanded to just stay in ny and go to uni he didn’t have stable relationships, so now he thinks everyone is his bestie and is scared of ppl leaving. still, has no mean bone in his body and loves w all his heart, has maybe frowned once in the last 5 years, married to wyn, the actual love of his life, just takes everything in stride and doesn’t worry if he doesn’t have to.

rocky emerson fairchild (richard harmon fc); 20, sophomore, pres of nu sigma phi, leo, human kinetics major. tbh if his family didn’t have the receipts, they’d probably think rocky was the nicest person on the planet. he’s been hurt and rejected by so many ppl that he doesn’t know how to love rly any more unless you’re a fairchild, but even that’s hard. their dad was shit and abusive to them, their mum was too tired to rly try and do something about them, and his older brother (leo) who he legit worshiped ran away, so growing up fcking sucked. but his older sister (luna) and adopted brother (bruno) pretty much saved him, they’re the ppl he loves the most in this world tbh. fiercely loyal to those he’s actually let in and absolutely vile to anyone else it’s a mystery that he hasn’t been sent to jail for being a sociopath ngl, but it’s just a way to protect himself from being hurt again since he’s got a good track record of that.

*greer albany parker (tyler blackburn fc); 23, junior, member of theta beta pi, pisces, bio med major. tbh greer is probs the biggest cry baby and most anxious mess u will ever meet, god bless his soul for making it this far. he has all of maybe 4 friends but that’s all he needs to be happy. grew up in a loving family until his mum passed away, his dad then became an alcoholic and verbal abuse soon turned to physical, the only thing they rly talked about and got along was when greer talked about military school (which he joined just to make his dad happy/follow in his footsteps) but it did nothing but give him anxiety so bad he had to be hospitalized after passing out during a drill. he ran away from cali after saving money to buy a shitty car and maybe $8 in his pocket, the sweetest most hard working boi u will ever meet who doesn’t think he deserves love and has literally ruined relationships bc of it, but if he trusts u it’s genuinely an honour. pls just love him he needs it.

jesse myrtle torrence (sam claflin fc); 23, senior, member of psi delta, gemini, law major. dumb??? actually so dumb but in the best way possible, jesse means well and is a bit of a fuckboy tbh, will hit on u 100%, but he just likes to have fun and will respect u if ur not down. he has a twin (hunter) who is legit his entire world, when his family didn’t accept her when she came out to them and banned her from seeing her gf he refused to let her run away from home on her own and they both just ditched everything, were legit homeless for 2 years and worked their asses off to save up money for community college then worked even harder to get into nyu. he’s so dramatic, literally the most dramatic person you’ll ever meet, he’ll sneeze and think he’s got some sort of tumor i swear. he’s not very good when it comes to trusting others but he’s working on it and literally wants everyone to be his friend so always feel free to slide into his dm’s.

*sherwood lance king (grant gustin fc); 21, sophomore, member of psi delta, capricorn, physics major. if you were to ask sherwood what time it was he’d probs just shrug and say ‘whatever time you want it to be, it’s a social construct’. is a true believer in all things science, loves to do random weird side projects and will probably interview you five times a week bc of them, is constantly busy and constantly trying to come up with new scientific theories and discoveries. doesn’t really get social cues and is sometimes obscenely rude without even noticing/meaning to but he’s actually a sweetheart. he loves his sister (bellamy) and lil brother (isaac) w all his heart but when it comes to his twin (chaol) it’s a little hard, chaol put everything on pause after he came back from the army (which sherwood was extremely upset by since chaol hardly said anything) to take care of their ailing mother and while sherwood wants to reach out to his twin he doesn’t know how. tbh this kinda goes for any sort of social interactions sherwood has tho, he’s painfully oblivious and can be so obnoxious it’s annoying but he’ll make a good friend once u make it clear that ur interested in actually being friends.

*ted ‘teddy’ james morgan (nick robinson fc); 18, freshman, pledge of kappa alpha lamda, aquarius, sociology major. my weird ass lil weed smokin people lovin hippie. laid back, no worries, in love with everyone, dresses and talks like he’s from the 80′s since his fave things to say are ‘wicked’ ‘bitchin’ ‘radical’ and ‘vibes’. not too long ago he was with his older brother (wyn) when they got into a car crash that ended up killing their little brother rex, and he’s still not over it and hasn’t forgiven wyn fully yet since he feels like the role of older brother has been stolen from him, but he super loves his sister (lux), basically worships the ground she walks on (was the same with wyn until this moment). studying humans cause he just wants to make peace and understand everybody, would have 1000 bf’s/gf’s at once and just let everyone love him always if he could, doesn’t really have any sense of direction with life but just knows that when he’s high he can’t be sad, so he hasn’t admitted it to himself but that’s a big reason why he smokes sm. is harmless and will love u.

*are the ppl that i rly need more plots for but ofc i am 1000% down for almost any plots w all my ppl!!!

#nyuooc #nyuplots #abuse tw #drugs tw #alcohol tw #i think that's all of them just in case #pls come love me

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topfygad · 4 years

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Inside Varun Grover’s Travel Journal

Author Varun Grover unleashes his travelling soul on this chatty trade about his love for Benaras, Egyptian baklava and the Calcutta of his childhood.

Varun Grover is at first a traveller, who makes time to discover a metropolis even when travelling for exhibits on a decent schedule. Photograph Courtesy: Deepak Kattar

Varun Grover dons many hats—satirist, author, lyricist, comic—however via all of it, one factor is assured, his mastery of language. His tales have enthralled in Masaan and Sacred Video games, lyrics have resonated in Dum Laga Ke Haisha and Gangs of Wasseypur, and his comedy? It’s a scorching knife slicing via butter.

“You’ll be able to’t be a author when you don’t observe,” Grover recounts in a telephonic interview. Whether or not it’s his insightful feedback as part of the satirical collective Aisi Taisi Democracy or a poignant scene of two lovers sharing pizza at Assi Ghat in Masaan’s Benaras (a metropolis Grover considers residence), his writing displays a searing mind. In a dialog that prolonged nicely past the half an hour I had requested for, I learnt that Grover seeks out good meals with a ardour that warmed my foodie soul, and is at all times comfortable to swap journey suggestions, as will be seen in these edited excerpts.

How does travelling have an effect on your writing?

Writing is all about observing and residing via totally different experiences. If I observe nicely and keep open, tales are born in my thoughts. In the end, being a author is about having a world view and understanding how individuals sort out each the political and the social.

Which place has at all times captivated your creativeness?

Benaras. I lived there and studied at IIT-BHU for 4 years. The town’s tradition and chaos has stayed with me. Everytime I am going again, I uncover one thing new about Benaras—a unique place or a brand new ritual that has been adopted for a whole lot of years. Three years in the past, on my final go to in October, I found a centuries-old travelling Ram Leela. It’s staged in several components of the town. As an illustration, the college gates of BHU are a stand-in for Lanka on this model. The town has many, many layers and the foremost one for me is meals. It is usually the very first thing I discover in anywhere I go to.

Internationally, Egypt fascinated me. The historical past in India typically dates again 500 or 700 years, in America it could be 200 years, however in Egypt it goes way back to 4,000 years. Generally our information would say stuff like, “That is actually new, it’s only 800 years outdated.” We noticed tombs, caves and the Valley of the Kings in Luxor. Egyptians are additionally fascinating storytellers. The nation was historically a well-liked cease on a number of historic commerce routes from Europe and Asia, so all people appears to be nonetheless promoting one thing, even when they’re tall tales. Everyone seems to be a kissago or daastango in Egypt, from the tongawaala and the taxiwaala to the shopkeeper.

What Egyptian meals did you relish?

I’ve had baklava in Turkey and Dubai, however the most effective and freshest is in Egypt. There’s a store in Cairo, near Tahrir Sq., known as Abdel Rahim Koueider. You enter the store and are transported 500 years into the previous. They make 70 kinds of baklava, with quirky names akin to “bulbul’s nest.” In Luxor, I additionally dined on fish that was freshly caught from the Nile and that was scrumptious.

Egypt’s completely roasted pistachio baklava with quirky names like bulbul’s nest (prime left) have a maintain on Grover’s coronary heart and abdomen; The Valley of the Kings in Luxor, Egypt (prime proper), captivated him for its millennia-old historical past; He found the draw of avenue meals in Singapore (backside proper) throughout a piece journey; A latest journey to the USA led him to identify seals (backside left) in San Diego. Photographs By: Oykuozgu/Shutterstock (baklava); Leonid Andronov/iStock/Getty photos (monument), T.Dallas/Shutterstock (avenue meals); Photograph Courtesy: Varun Grover (seals)

Going again to Benaras, do you suppose there is a component of fetishisation whereas writing about that metropolis?

Benaras has at all times been seen via the eyes of the white man. You want time to interrupt via the clichés that now we have been fed via this gaze. The town isn’t just concerning the solar rising on the ghats or a ship experience within the Ganga. It’s about small stuff just like the outdated haveli of Bhartendu Harishchandra, the daddy of Hindi literature, who wrote the primary Hindi play. No vacationer goes right here, despite the fact that the haveli has been restored and is in good situation. Within the outdated a part of city, there’s one other collector of outdated LP information from the 1930s and 1940s together with uncommon recordings of Begum Akhtar and people from the Benaras classical music gharana. The town has preserved this stuff. It’s a must to stroll round to find it. And you will need to additionally keep at the least 5 days. Once I went there six years in the past with my spouse Raj Kumari, and he or she was going for the primary time, she had solely two days. I attempted to point out her probably the most non-touristy aspect of Benaras, however she didn’t prefer it. She felt it was too soiled; she hoped for a higher metropolis. We went once more three years in the past for seven days. Then she additionally fell in love with the town.

What are your reminiscences of travelling as a toddler?

We used to reside in Dehradun, and my aunt lived in Calcutta. I went to the town for the primary time in 1989, after I was 9.We had a 30-hour prepare journey, which was actually epic and we stopped at so many new locations. I had by no means been out of north India. To see the vast, open rice fields of Bengal was one thing else. I tasted contemporary coconut water for the primary time in my life. Calcutta appeared like such an enormous metropolis. I nonetheless really feel Bombay will not be as large as Calcutta was in my creativeness at the moment. It stays certainly one of my prime three meals cities in India.

We used to additionally take frequent journeys round Dehradun. Sahastradhara, which had sulphur water springs, was a beautiful place the place we regularly took lots of our visiting members of the family.

Once you’re on tour, do you make time to discover a spot?

I at all times attempt to both go a day early, or wait an additional day, or as many days as I can handle. I discover a native—both a good friend, or somebody who has come to see the present—and exit with them. No journey is full with out strolling via a metropolis.

Considered one of Grover’s fondest childhood reminiscences is his journey to Calcutta—the primary large metropolis for a nine-year-old boy from Dehradun. It nonetheless is certainly one of his favorite cities in India. Photograph By: Radiokafka/Shutterstock

Household getaways for Grover additionally meant frequent journeys to the recent spring city of Sahastradhara, now an overcrowded spot. Photograph By: Mdsharma/Shutterstock

Is there a metropolis that you just found whereas touring?

I didn’t know a lot about Singapore and its meals tradition. I didn’t count on the entire metropolis to be one large khau galli. That was a tremendous discovery.

You’ve stated in a single interview that you just discovered Spain the least racist, and France probably the most intimidating place.

India operates on a lot chaos that order will be intimidating. France is simply too orderly… there are other ways to greet individuals within the morning and night. In case you don’t get it proper, individuals take offense or decide you. I’m positive it’s part of their tradition and so they discover some that means and pleasure in it, however Indians are usually not so formal. I don’t know whether or not it’s racist or my very own inferiority advanced in a really white nation however individuals judging you for an absence of manners will not be a pleasant expertise. Once I crossed over from France to Italy, however, I used to be delighted to see of us not obeying site visitors indicators.

Do you go to a particular place to write down?

I reside in Kandivali in Bombay, which is pretty peaceable. Generally I am going to this place in Uttaranchal known as Sonapani. It’s a homely resort close to Mukteshwar that I really like. I additionally like going to Goa as a result of I really like the ocean and seafood. Often, I discover a spot in south Goa, away from the bustle.

Mumbai (prime left), Sydney (prime proper), New York (backside left) and Spain (backside proper) are a few of Grover’s favoured journey spots. Photograph By: Tuul & Bruno Morandi/Photolibrary/Getty photos (Mumbai); Bezikus/Shutterstock (Spain); Andrew Watson/AWL Photographs/Getty photos (Sydney); Photograph Courtesy: Varun Grover (New York)

In Sacred Video games, there’s a robust sense of place. Was {that a} aware writing determination?

Our writers, each in season 1 and a couple of, needed to maintain it very genuine. We discovered that there was an anda bhurji stall close to Kyani Bakery that was standard. Bombay has these unusual issues—5 – 6 anda bhurji locations which have a cult following. These spots lend the town its character.

What are a few of your favorite journey books?

One is a Hindi guide, Volga Se Ganga, by Rahul Sankrityayan. He’s probably the greatest journey writers India has had. It’s fiction however rooted in journey, historical past and anthropology. This guide has impressed me to see the world.

One other fictional favorite is that this novel known as Netherland by Joseph O’Neill. It’s set in New York, and is a few bunch of Asians and a Trinidadian who play cricket in New York. Not too long ago I used to be in New York, and I noticed a bunch of individuals really enjoying cricket and I felt my journey had come full circle. The opposite guide I like to recommend is Kashi ka Assi by Kashi Nath Singh, a personality sketch of Benaras. I used to be residing in Benaras after I learn it and the guide has unlocked so many secrets and techniques concerning the metropolis for me.

In case you needed to give individuals one important journey tip, what would that be?

Keep away from touristy locations and also you’ll by no means be at a loss. Even when you say that you just went to Paris and didn’t see the Eiffel Tower, that’s tremendous. No matter you probably did as a substitute will certainly be higher.

As a songwriter, do you affiliate standard locations with songs?

Let’s see… To Benaras, I might dedicate “Pal Pal Dil Ke Paas,” for Lucknow “Ye Kya Jagah Hai Doston” from Umrao Jaan and for Bombay, this track known as “Zeher Hai Ke Pyaar Hai Tera Chumma,” from Sabse Bada Khiladi.

Dine on a breakfast of kachori, sabzi, jalebi at Chachi Ki Dukaan, reverse Ravidas Gate, Lanka (Chachi died on the age of 100 just a few years in the past, however her sons are nonetheless working the store).

Attempt the apple pie at Vatika Pizzeria in Assi Ghat. It’s a bizarre suggestion however you may be pleasantly stunned.

Among the finest lanes for sweets is Thatheri Bazaar forward of Chowk space (near Godouliya). The bazaar has outdated candy outlets and sells theatre props too.

Ramnagar Ki Lassi is super-famous and a must-visit. Ask anyone and they’ll direct you to the place; it’s alongside the highway from Ramnagar Fort foremost gate in the direction of the Ganga.

The rabri and lassi at Khandu Sardar, a small store on the finish of Thatheri Bazaar, subsequent to Gopal Mandir, is divine (Khandu Sardar, Nangu Sardar and Lussan Sardar had been the pioneers of milk-based sweets in Benaras).

Having studied in BHU for 4 years, Benaras is residence to Varun Grover, and his suggestions are ones that gained’t be present in common guidebooks. Photograph By: Lowpower225/Shutterstock

Raja Ram Lassi is the most effective lassi within the outdated metropolis. The store opens for less than 4 to 5 hours a day as they run out of curd shortly.

Pathakji Ki Thandai, additionally in Thatheri Bazaar, has the most effective thandai. Ask for the particular of the day, which is usually some seasonal fruit-based thandai. Bhang is free.

Style the murabba at Shreenath Murabba in Thatheri Bazaar. They even have murabba ready with bamboo shoots.

You will need to strive gulab jamun at this unnamed nook store proper reverse BSNL foremost gate, Lazarus Street, Varanasi Cantt Railway Station. The place serves scorching gulab jamuns with contemporary thick cream and an non-obligatory spicy masala on prime.

Have malpua at Shree Krishna Sweets in Maldahiya and kachoris in Loha Mandi.

For kheer kadam and rasgullas, go to Sudhir Sweets in Bengali Tola.

A typical Benaras snack is a dish made with toasted bread, coated with butter and spicy masala on prime, which you’ll have at Panditji Ka Slice, close to the turning off Lolark Kund.

For that quintessentially Benarasi litti, go to Loha Singh Ka Litti-Chokha in Maldahiya. He provides cashew to the litti, although littis are delicious even with out these add-ons.

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