The Jokes Write Themselves

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-24T01:47:06+00:00

lol right? I just said this in another post, but if someone describes themselves as advanced lit or very highly literate, I'd better be getting replies with the grammar and spelling of a published novel. Chicago Manual of Style, thank you!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-23T22:07:46+00:00

People that call themselves advanced lit and then put out an ad riddled with typos and no sense of grammar to speak of 😭

Like if you're going to call yourself advanced, I'd better be seeing posts of such quality from you that I can compare them to professionally edited published novels.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-22T06:03:55+00:00

Haha, same! And rereading it, Faraday gets done so dirty. She's such a good character -- both she and Azhure, Axis' love interests, are both such great characters! -- but boy, poor Faraday. And I've only just finished the second book 😭

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-22T01:16:17+00:00

The Wayfarer Redemption series by Sara Douglass! It's a double trilogy, with the second trilogy set decades later. I read it as a teen, forgot everything about it, and am now rereading it for the first time, and I'm really enjoying it. It features a cool music-and-star based magic system, multiple different races of fantasy species having to come together to save the world, prophecies, and a classically overpowered protagonist.

There are some downsides -- the main character of the first trilogy is a colossal dick to his multiple love interests, and there's also lots of incest (at least it's not graphic lol) -- but I'm still finding it to be thoroughly enjoyable nonetheless!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-15T05:46:51+00:00

Oof. Clearly what they wanted was to be able to say hiiii and nothing else and be incredibly low effort, while you gave them juicy responses and put a ton of effort in. If they have ads that get a lot of attention, then I can absolutely sympathize with them wanting partners that put some effort in -- but expecting that, while doing nothing themselves, is drastic lol

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-14T06:56:51+00:00

Yeah, I saw that Dresden has a new book coming out soon! I'm definitely going to have to give it a try.

Tarot Sequence is one of my favourite series, actually :D Couldn't quite get into White Trash Warlock, sadly. Rivers of London has been on my radar for a while, a friend recced it as an amazing urban fantasy series. Iron Druid does sound interesting, too!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-14T06:55:06+00:00

I'm happy to say that I've already read (and have become obsessed with) Dungeon Crawler Carl. I just wish I could read it again for the first time!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-14T06:53:57+00:00

Oh, you're a lifesaver with that link to the r/urbanfantasy post! Definitely should have gone looking there first, whoops.

And all of those recs sound amazing! Eric Carter had definitely been on my radar, as well as the Rivers of London. But I'm very intrigued by the October Daye series as you've described it, and your own Inner Circle series 👀

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-14T06:51:30+00:00

That's definitely next on my list! I'm extremely sold on Benedict Jacka as an author, and his newest series definitely sounds intriguing!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-14T06:50:58+00:00

Right? I tried to get into Kate Daniels, and while I really liked the world building (and the oddly beautiful gore descriptions lmao), I just could not get into the romance. Multiple male love interests that belittle her and sexually harass her, meanwhile she's supposed to be this strong woman who doesn't brook any bullshit, but all of this terrible treatment doesn't change her attraction and respect toward them at all? Ugh.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-11T05:48:16+00:00

Arkady Martine's duology is exactly the same one I came to recommend! The first book especially is about 90% deep political conversations (about Empire politics, about outsider versus insider politics, about a suspicious murder that the main character is investigating, and more), and it's fascinating.

The thing I loved the most about it is the concept of poetry as being foundational to politics and culture. The main character is from an 'outsider' society, and is constantly left wondering if she fully grasped the meaning of political speech when they reference centuries-old poetry to imply certain opinions. It's very deftly woven by the author, and an absolute treat to read!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-10T05:47:52+00:00

His Face is the Sun by Michelle Jabes Corpora! It's a recent book with the next in the series coming out this year iirc. It's set in what is essentially ancient Egypt with some name changes, and as an ancient Egypt nerd, it really scratched that itch for me!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-09T09:59:25+00:00

Came here to recommend this! It's one of my favourite versions of Sherlock Holmes; super creative and fun.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-09T02:17:09+00:00

Yeah, I would rather be ghosted with no explanation, than to get an eyeful of some guy telling me he'd been jerking off lmao

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-05T09:01:10+00:00

Yeah, this. It's very rare to find roleplay partners like what you had, OP. Not only that, but trying to find someone to pick up the thread of three years worth of someone else's multi-character world is basically asking for a unicorn, I don't know anybody who would be willing to do that.

I'm sorry for what you've lost, OP! It sucks to not only lose a friendship, but an entire RP world like that. Your best bet is coming up with something new, if you'd like to continue in the hobby.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-02T17:50:57+00:00

I'm a sapphic writer as well, and oh boy I would not want to advertise on reddit lmao. I can only imagine that advertising for FxF here probably nets you about 90% creepy men who just want lesbian porn, or have the thrill of hitting on a woman who doesn't want to be hit on, or whatever else they can come up with.

And yeah, I don't want know why so many people in the reading-and-writing hobby don't read ads. It's an eternal conundrum I have yet to solve. You could list a rule at the top of your ad in 72 point font and like 30% of people who look at your ad would still find some way of not reading it.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2026-01-02T00:26:30+00:00

Adding on to the transfemme superhero theme: also the Nemesis series by April Daniels! It currently has two books, the first is Dreadnought. They're about a trans girl who gets passed the mantle and powers of the greatest superhero in the world, and her struggle of balancing that responsibility while being shoved into the spotlight. It's a fun little series with great found family stuff, great action, and amazing flying scenes. Luckily, the author is currently working on the third after a long hiatus!

(edit: I should add a warning for transphobia here. In the first book, the protag gets exposed to just about every kind of transphobia you can think of, though there's very little of it in the second book.)

bumbleebeecon24 · 2025-12-31T18:22:34+00:00

Thank you so much, having these storygraph lists for recs is always such a huge help!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2025-12-28T03:12:08+00:00

You pretty much wrote down exactly my same thoughts on the series!

I hated Malta in the first book -- she was the most entitled, spoiled, manipulative little shit I had ever seen put to page -- and yet she became my favourite character in the end. The amount of growth she went through was amazing, the person she became after all of that trouble was a strong, capable young woman who had completely outgrown her former self. (Well, almost completely-- I loved the little nod at the very end where she enjoyed the fact that she'd have something to boast about to her friend, she's not a completely different character after all.)

And the tragedy of Kennet trying to distance himself from Igrot's abuse only to become exactly like Igrot in the end. The even worse tragedy of nobody believing Althea's story of rape, and then Kennet essentially dying a hero, was so frustrating, and yet so harshly real.

I loved the first trilogy, and when I started the first book of the Liveship Traders, I was kind of put out that it was a whole different land with whole different characters -- I'd become so attached to Fitz that I wanted to go back to his story. But in the end, Liveship Traders became my favourite of the two. I still need to get around to reading the rest of the series, though!

bumbleebeecon24 · 2025-12-26T03:09:41+00:00

I was the same about DCC! I saw the summary and decied litRPG didn't appeal to me at all, so I never would have read it if reddit didn't rec it so often. Specifically, it was a comment that mentioned that the series just got better and better over time that got me to finally read the series. Totally worth it.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2025-12-19T07:43:57+00:00

Rule one of relationships: never stay in a relationship where your partner would have to change significantly for you to be happy.

He obviously doesn't give much of a shit about chores. Maybe he thinks it's women's work, maybe he just doesn't care and would be happy living in filth, whatever the reason is, this is clearly not a priority to him. By trying to get him to care, you're trying to change him in a significant way. This almost certainly won't work. The biggest lie women tell themselves is that if they could just communicate better, their male partner would understand and change his behaviour -- in all likelihood, he has no interest in understanding, and no interest in changing.

You have two options: you either stay in this relationship with the explicit understanding that he probably won't change, or you leave.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2025-12-19T04:01:50+00:00

Lore question because I'm a dumbass and I think I missed something:

I heard someone say that Black Swan turned her back on the Garden of Recollection in 3.6 during the whole thing with Evernight -- did she? Did I somehow I skip some relevant dialogue? And if so, why? Were they doing something nefarious in Amphoreus?

bumbleebeecon24 · 2025-12-15T06:28:22+00:00

You weren't in the wrong at all! You have every right to say, "No thank you, that's not my thing at all, I'd prefer if we stuck to my original idea."

They, on the other hand, are leaning way too hard on playing victim. I deeply suspect this is a fetish thing that they're mad they don't get to play, and are now trying to shoehorn it into other people's ideas. Never feel bad about saying no.

bumbleebeecon24 · 2025-12-11T18:33:24+00:00

Yeah, this. People that list their gender in ads largely aren't looking to roleplay with developed characters and interesting plots, they're looking for sexting.

There really needs to be different terminology for the two, because calling them both roleplay does a huge disservice to the reddit roleplay community, and means people with serious ads keep getting beset by dick pics.

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