“Irritated fans produce fanfic like irritated oysters produce pearls.”
— Anne Jamison (via pen-in-hand)

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@marilenalena
“Irritated fans produce fanfic like irritated oysters produce pearls.”
— Anne Jamison (via pen-in-hand)
periodic reminder that the queer liberation library is an awesome non-regional library you can add on libby to access hundreds of queer titles. NO LIBRARY CARD NEEDED. i just found an audiobook for a pretty new release on there with no waitlist. also everyone use libby for your local library too NOW
free!!! queer!! books!! for anyone, anywhere in the USA!
you can browse the collection here
sign up for a QLL card to check ebooks & audiobooks out
& if you love what we’re doing you can toss us a few bucks here so we can keep doing it <3
OMG - really?
really!!! we’ve got 501(c)3 status and everything! turning 2.5 years old next month <3
May New Releases
*The Last Contract of Isako, Fonda Lee (5 May). Corporate samurai space opera.
Death’s Daughter, SA Barnes (5 May). Death’s daughter Jocasta is quietly attending university undercover when he names her as his successor and makes her a target.
Platform Decay, Martha Wells (5 May). The latest book in the Murderbot series, and a full novel.
*The Girl with a Thousand Faces, Sunyi Dean (5 May). Hong Kong gothic about a young woman confronting a powerful ghost. My review.
Radiant Star, Ann Leckie (12 May). A planet on the brink of being absorbed by the Raadchai empire allows one last man to be mummified as a living saint, which has unexpected political consequences.
We Dance Upon Demons, Vaishnavi Patel (12 May). A reproductive health care worker fights both human attacks on her clinic and supernatural attacks after she develops mysterious powers. My review.
Make Me Better, Sarah Gailey (12 May). Horror novel about a vulnerable woman pulled into a community that promises an end to loss.
*Vile Lady Villains, Danai Christopoulou (12 May). The Klytemnestra x Lady Macbeth book. My review.
All Hail Chaos, Sarah Rees Brennan (12 May). Sequel about a young terminal cancer patient who is transported into her favorite series as a minor villain.
The Tapestry of Fate, Shannon Chakraborty (19 May). Second Amina al-Sirafi pirate book.
Palaces of the Crow, Ray Nayler (19 May). A band of children and suspicious crows surviving in Lithuania during World War I.
Mortedant’s Peril, RJ Barker (19 May). A cleric who reads the memories of the dead must solve a mystery where he himself is the main suspect. My review.
Startup Hell, Caitlin Rozakis (19 May). A young witch is just trying to make it in the corporate world when she discovers her boss dead in the process of summoning a demon.
The Fake Divination Offense, Sara Raasch (19 May). m/m fantasy romance about a half giant fantasy sportsball player fake dating a cheerleader.
Bone of My Bone, Johanna van Veen (26 May). Sapphic nun relic road trip in war-torn seventeenth century Europe. My review.
New release masterpost here.
That’s me with the chaos! And I love Martha Wells and Fonda Lee, am especially excited for Tapestry of Fate as I loved Amina, and I will be doing a storytelling panel in July with RJ Barker at Waterstones Leeds. 🎉
I often wonder what happened to authors of unfinished fanfictions.
I hope they’re having a nice life
we absolutely are not and that unfinished fic haunts us to this day
Reblog if that unfinished fic haunts you to this day
Captain vs. Captain
Shane Hollander/ Ilya Rozanov, 65k, rated R, NAWA, COMPLETE
AU: Different Getting Together, Reality TV, Slow Burn, Rivals to Friends to Lovers, Fluff & Humor
Following the internet success of Shane and Ilya's presentation at the NHL Awards, ESPN decided to contract with them to do a whole series. It goes far better than anyone could have dreamed.
-or-
“When you think about it,” Jackie said, when Shane had dinner with her and Hayden a few days later, “hockey’s basically already reality tv.”
Excerpt:
Captain vs. Captain
Shane Hollander/ Ilya Rozanov, 65k, rated R, NAWA, COMPLETE
AU: Different Getting Together, Reality TV, Slow Burn, Rivals to Friends to Lovers, Fluff & Humor
Following the internet success of Shane and Ilya's presentation at the NHL Awards, ESPN decided to contract with them to do a whole series. It goes far better than anyone could have dreamed.
-or-
“When you think about it,” Jackie said, when Shane had dinner with her and Hayden a few days later, “hockey’s basically already reality tv.”
Excerpt:
It was a lovely September day, and Shane was at a mini golf course in Boston instead of training in Montreal. He sighed and looked around at the mini golf course. This one had a zoo theme, with all sorts of fiberglass animal statues towering over and, at points, impeding the holes of the course.
“Hollander,” a voice said, and Shane turned. Of course, it was Rozanov, looking as hot as ever, the sunlight turning his brown curls red-gold, his biceps bulging where his sleeves had been cut off to accommodate them, black jeans so tight it looked like they’d been painted on.
Rozanov smirked. “Thank you for coming to Boston,” he said. Shane suspected he also winked, but it was hidden behind his big sunglasses.
“I lobbied for Montreal, but they want to alternate cities,” Shane said.
Rozanov shrugged. “I am surprised you agreed to this show.”
“Why?” Shane asked. “I have a lot of sponsorship deals.”
“Yes, yes,” Rozanov said. “I see everywhere. Shane Hollander with duck face, Shane Hollander almost naked, Shane Hollander all wet…”
Shane felt himself growing red. He’d protest the ‘almost naked’ description, but it was true. Speedo hadn’t been receptive to the idea of doing a fully clothed ad, to Shane’s disappointment.
“I’m very popular,” Shane agreed, trying to sound nonchalant. “Everyone wants a piece of this.”
“Yes,” Rozanov said, leering. Or Shane thought he was leering, behind the sunglasses.
“It’s good publicity,” Shane defended. “Why are you doing it?”
“I need the money,” Rozanov lied easily. Then he grinned, all of his perfect fake teeth shining bright white. “I thought it would be fun to beat you even more often.”
Shane rolled his eyes. “It’s not a competition.”
“Show is called ‘Captain vs. Captain’,” Rozanov reminded him. “It is a competition. But it is a good name. Funny. And I think you and me both very competitive people, yes?”
READ ON AO3 (bonus SI cover mockup:)
All due respect to Tumblr staff for listening and rolling back a feature that was obviously not what people wanted. Like, doing that is actually commendable.
if you cannot tolerate boredom you will unconsciously create problems to feel alive
Quasi-fondly remembering the shit stirring days of my dopamine-deficient child.
ADHD meds don't just improve grades at school, people, they also turn the battleground back into a home, improve your friendships and possibly save your marriage.
my original Heated Rivalry rec list has gotten stupidly long so I'm officially starting a Part Two. taking this opportunity to change up some of the subcategories, because 1) the Wildcard header was becoming a bit too all-encompassing, and 2) I love organising and efficiency. hot.
situationship era:
In the Clutch by mcshrug (sequel to Buzzer Beater)
Drop the Gloves by mcshrug
head and body to you by naokime
holding tightly when you invite me by thesehands
I Was Raised out in the Cold by LavenderProse
truth covered in security by lisa6
tongues a-wagging by Anonymous
home economics by Anonymous
the wild ecstasies of worship by ruralsaint
liminal boyfriends:
good things come by Ccainao3
Two Man Advantage by LavenderProse
The Long Game and beyond:
Malysh by theribbonsweregreen
here we are and what the hell are we going to do with it by walkingthroughwindows
AUs (one or both not a hockey player):
Russia's Greatest Love Machine by OrYouCouldHaveMine
Spolia Victoris by OpalApparition
AUs (both still hockey players):
Talk About It by some1_around
play destroy by kneeinjury
omegaverse:
Good Losing by chaentics
wildcards:
fall in love again and again by Ehlihr
another uninnocent, elegant fall by Anonymous
Luchik, Darling by chaentics
feb hollanov reclist part 2
alphabetical again
Five Times Ilya Bossed Shane Around During All-Stars Weekend And Nobody Thought Twice About It And One Time They Did by leiascully (mature, 2k)
Ilya keeps telling Shane what to do in front of everyone. Unfortunately, Shane kind of likes it.
forget there's any other place by anonymous (explicit, 6k)
They’d wanted to escape the cage, but they’d been in that cage for a decade and they’d made a home of it. Out in the big wide world, they got homesick.
frequently, secretly fond of each other by milominderbinder (explicit, 127k, WIP)
Shrugging one shoulder far more casually than he possibly feels, Ilya says, “I like both. Is secret, okay?” “Okay,” Hollander says, voice cracking. He doesn’t say anything else. The air’s so heavy around them that it feels like being in the middle of a scrum, the weight and heat of all those bodies pressing down on you. Danger always feels like hockey; it’s the most dangerous thing Ilya knows, except for this. Everything dangerous in his life involves men’s bodies and just how close he can get to them. Closer than he probably should. Nobody knows why Shane Hollander dropped out of the 2009 draft at the last second, and a year later it stuns the whole hockey world when he's signed by the Boston Raiders. Having the two biggest stars in the league on the same line is great for Boston - but playing alongside their worst rival was never exactly in Shane or Ilya's plans. Especially not when staying away from each other starts to feel just as impossible as getting along.
i know where to draw the line by magneticwave ❣️ (explicit, 61k)
“Hollander’s Metros have had a challenging few years, with back-to-back knee injuries and a concussion keeping the two-time Stanley Cup winner and Olympic gold medalist off the ice for three consecutive postseason runs. Hollander is apparently back to fighting trim, but everyone’s wondering if that will still be true come April. The Metros have promised that they’re behind their franchise star one hundred percent, but there are signs they might be hedging their bets. The Metros announced last week that they have penned a deal with San Francisco’s dynamic young Russian star, center Ilya Rozanov. The move has sent shockwaves through MLH, as San Francisco was widely expected to sign a contract extension with Rozanov, who became a restricted free agent in June.”
I'll be Jane by gurlsrool (mature, 7k)
It’s not going viral because Jane’s true identity was exposed—or even because Ilya was blatantly sexting in public. That part’s as expected as Shane doing yoga or any human being on earth breathing. No, the texts are going viral because no one can believe how bad this “Jane” is at sexting. The women of the world are outraged. The men of the world are baffled. No one can understand why Ilya Rozanov, whose abs have their own fan club, is wasting his time on ‘a piece of cardboard that wished to be turned into a real girl’ (this particular joke has 300k likes and counting). Or: After a social media trend mocks Shane's sexting skills, he tries to improve them. It goes about as poorly as you'd expect.
ignoring every omen by guarddog (theslymoon) (teen, 14k)
Julia Prior ☑️ @JuliaPriorESPNI sat down with Ilya Rozanov to talk about what he loves about Boston, what it’s like to play the best hockey of his career, and what comes next. bit.ly/203948 tanHER dillon @kanatacommunisti s2g i just saw r*zanov at the ottawa airport…. theres no way right ↳ vic hates hockey @censelesstired: hollanov realwired: ir81 to the centaurs real or: ilya's last season in boston through the eyes of hockey twitter.
play destroy by kneeinjury (explicit, 12k)
Shane is silent for so long that Rozanov leans, slouching against the doorframe, and raises his eyebrows at him expectantly. “Yes? You are selling bibles?” “You fucked my girlfriend.” It tears out of him. “Ah,” Rozanov drawls, as if the thought is just now occurring to him, “yes. I did.”
struggle pretty by thesehands (explicit, 19k)
Ilya locked his arm around Shane’s throat and drew him up onto his knees. The hold was snug, a real headlock, the kind that would make most men tap out. Shane didn’t tap out, but he stayed very still. His pulse galloped against the juncture of Ilya’s elbow, powerfully enough that Ilya could feel its insistent throbbing. Everything in the room had been pulled taut—the cord of Ilya’s shoulders, the line of Shane’s back, even the air between them had a rigidity to it. Ilya was breathing heavily, panting open-mouthed against Shane’s sweat-damp temple.
“I could fuck you like this,” Ilya said. “I could fuck you right now, like this, not let you breathe, not let you come.”
wait for a different ending by garagepaperback ❣️ (mature, 13k)
Ilya goes to Moscow, and then he goes back home.
70K+ word hollanov fic rec post
do you like long fics? good news! i have some recs for you. please forgive my v short bad descriptions.
back and forth from new york by alphalupi (@poseidonearthshaker) 195k+ | Not Rated | WIP | AU where Shane comes out of his own volition and decides to sign with the New York Admirals. He and Ilya figure out how to make things work. Also a fun social media companion AU piece here.
Borderline by Wintersbane 90k | E | Complete | Zombie apocalypse AU set mid situationship era, Shane & Ilya have to road trip to safety at the Canadian border.
Change Your Win Conditions by Vee (Vera_DragonMuse) (@dragonmuse) 103k | E | Complete | Canon divergent AU where Ilya had a career-ending injury before he & Shane could reconnect at the All Star game in Tampa, set two years later when Ilya is a coach for the Centaurs and Shane signs with Ottawa.
clap when you land by quietafterdusk (@narglesinroses) 78k | T | Canon divergent from TLG, where the Centaurs' plane crashes and Ilya is seriously injured, Shane is there for him while he recovers.
cold war by pucksandpower 106k+ | E | WIP | AU of canon where Ilya is the son of the Russian president and Shane is the son of the Canadian Prime Minister, and they both still play hockey. INCREDIBLE.
courage [it couldn't come at a worse time] by veilofimagination (@veilofimag) 82k | M | Complete | Shane & Ilya break up because Ilya is miserable being closeted but Shane isn't ready to come out yet. Ilya makes a new life for himself, Shane has to figure out what he wants too.
Duty of Care by boopboop 145k | M | Complete | Canon divergent AU. Relationship era Hollanov, where the Hollanders show Ilya how to be loved.
frequently, secretly fond of each other. by milominderbinder (@milominderbindered) 120k+ | E | WIP | AU where Shane is delayed being drafted to the NHL by one year and ends up on the Boston Raiders with Ilya. Team mate situationship!
Miracle by thesevenpercent 115k | E | Complete | Canon divergent AU where the Centaur's plane crashes and Ilya is the sole survivor
something you can fix (26k) and something you can build (97k) by some1_around 123k combined | M | Complete | Canon divergent AU where Shane gets outed (after his texts with Rose are leaked) and he gets traded to the Boston Bears.
Read something 70k+ words that you think I should read? LET ME KNOW!!!
also a poem from the new, unreleased collection. very possibly my own all-time favourite.
AO3 appreciation post!! reblog if you love archive of our own
via Good Good Good News
Thank you to Rachel Reid Jacob Tierney, HudCon, and The Cottage for this dose of hope.
It's hard to say this without sounding like a right wing dickhead, but the thing about progressive spaces is that they may naturally attract people who are always on the lookout for excuses to start a fight. Like you can find yourself faced with someone whose political outrage is totally justified, and whose humanitarian ideals are right on the money, but simultaneously they are carrying a ton of psychological baggage about being wronged and getting revenge, and they will exploit literally any opportunity to live out this psychodrama with anyone in their line of vision. I have thought of several related anecdotes since I started typing this post, but I'll limit myself to the thing that inspired it, which is that I just visited this ultra-lefty cafe/bike shop/community gathering space where I've heard that the proprietor is constantly in a fight with everyone around her. When I paid for my stuff I noticed that there was no tip option, but I thought I had heard something about this, so I snuck away to look at the website and it made me really glad I didn't ask! I think there should have been a really enticing and exciting way for her to say "I've decided to be the change I want to see in the world, so I'm paying my baristas a full living wage, I'm making sure EVERYONE feels welcome and comfortable here, and I'm selling products I believe in!" -- but instead all the web copy sounded more like "You're either with me or against me, you're a fucking piece of shit asshole if you can't handle the inclusive atmosphere here, and by the way tipping is for fascist cavemen and if you ever try to tip someone you are refusing to relate to them authentically and you are enforcing a dangerous and evil power dynamic that should be purged from human society (so therefore I pay my staff well)." Like everything she stood for was totally agreeable, but why did she have to put it like it was directed at her worst enemy, rather than at the kinds of people she wants to attract? If the word on the street is to be believed, the reason for this posturing is that she spends quite a lot of energy making as many enemies as possible, and she probably likes it that way. I guess I'm just reminding myself, and perhaps others, that while one might think of "politics" as being broadly social and theoretical, no individual can fully separate the political from the intimately personal. Even somebody who seems to want to uplift and protect their fellow humans may be getting some perverse inner satisfaction out of that valiant crusade, and you may never realize it until you find yourself in a confusing fight with them.
I ran a LARP for a few years explicitly aimed at being queer friendly and accessible, and eventually cut it short mainly for this exact reason. You wouldn’t believe the amount of abuse my staff and I took for reasons that felt genuinely insane. I got called ableist for telling someone they couldn’t be invincible in my game of make believe, more than once. Defended myself, multiple Jewish players, and a conversion student from accusations of antisemitism based on alleged lore we’d never written / suggested / that simply and plainly did not exist in game. Had a staffer try to talk to someone about how a joke she made was uncomfortable only for this person to retaliate in epic proportions full white woman crocodile tears style, trying to get this staffer removed and eventually escalating into a full public hate campaign when she didn’t get her way. All that’s still just the tip of the iceberg.
Progressive spaces are naturally populated by traumatized people, and unfortunately trauma makes people more difficult. (I’m not excluded in that. No one is.) Running a progressive space is doubly difficult because a lot of left-facing trauma was inflicted by authority, so you’re setting yourself up to be the windmill that someone tilts their displaced rage at. I don’t really know what the solution is, but I do know that this is one of the huge reasons it’s so hard to find community: the people with a bone to pick can’t reach the ones who actually hurt them, but they’ll sure find you along the way, and the safer they feel around you the safer they’ll feel coming after you.
i've made a point that i will never join a serious hobby space that primarily defines itself by its politics, because invariably they explode in short order as everyone inside starts treating whoever runs the place as a ruling class to overthrow, and all discussion collapses into figuring out an exacting definition of their ideology so they can work out who to exclude
i write fiction on a web forum, and for a few years i'd get a DM every few months from somebody leaving to make That Web Forum But Leftistly, and then a few months later I'd learn how that effort exploded.
political spaces are important! but when your social club defines itself by its politics, it rapidly becomes about the politics of who is allowed in the social club. this isn't to say you have to tolerate hate, but a community which can't function in the presence of relatively small and civil disagreement is a bomb waiting for the fuse to be lit