#catnet

[neurodivergent-fangirling]

Six Books for Dead Boy Detectives Fans

I know a lot of people are happy to read fanfic in between writing letters to Netflix demanding a second season of our favorite show, but I thought I’d put together this list to help tide us over. These books span different age demographics, genres, and time periods, but they all strike a few notes of that chord that makes Dead Boy Detectives resonate with so many of us. Feel free to add your own recommendations in the comments and reblogs!

Cemetery Boys by Aidan Thomas A queer coming-of-age story featuring magic, troublesome ghosts, teenage drama, and a murder mystery, this one reminded me a lot of DBDA when I read it. The main duo, Yadriel and Julian, bear a striking resemblance to the straitlaced (but not straight) magician and cheerfully chaotic brawn we know and love, and Yadriel’s cousin Maritza is a delightful strong female character to round out the trio.

Rules for Ghosting by Shelley Jay Shore No murder mysteries in this one, but there’s a lot of drama between the characters. We get an extremely messy found family as well as an extremely messy bio family, and the story tackles a lot of difficult subjects and different kinds of grief in a sensitive but hopeful manner reminiscent of DBDA. And yes, there are literal ghosts as well as metaphorical ones.

A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske If I had a nickel every time I fell in love with an Autistic-coded gay British Edwardian-era magician named Edwin, I’d have two nickels. Edwin Courcey isn’t Edwin Payne, but they have a lot in common, including a love of books, childhood trauma, and a determination to do the right thing even when it’s hard. Rounding out the cast are the stubbornly optimistic Robin Blyth, the practical Adelaide Morrissey, and the adventurous Maud Blyth—and yes, both Blyth siblings need a lecture about their impetuous tendencies. I love the way neurodivergent characters are written in this book, as flawed people who truly care about others, much like in DBDA. This book (and its sequels) also offer good world building, fantastic imagery, excellent banter, murder mystery, magical conspiracy, queer romance, and found family—what more could you ask for?

Catfishing on CatNet by Naomi Kritzer I know this one is science fiction not fantasy, but it really feels like DBDA in a way that’s difficult to pin down. We get a cast of neurodivergent queer teens, a good balance of humor against darker topics, fabulous dialogue, a suspenseful mystery, a slow-burn romance, a few surprisingly nuanced and sympathetic antagonists, all against the backdrop of small-town America. There’s also an AI with a fondness for cat pictures and a scene where the kids hack the school’s lesson materials to make it provide accurate LGBTQ-inclusive sex ed. But I think the real heart of the story is the loneliness, the friendships and community the characters find. This one is dear to my heart and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter by Theodora Goss Returning to the realm of supernatural mystery—and to London from over a century ago—we have this story about women monsters reclaiming their narratives while solving a series of murders. Daughters of Jekyll, Hyde, Rappacini, Moreau, and Frankenstein come together and strike back against the mad scientists who wronged them. There’s also an appearance made by Sherlock Holmes. Readers hoping for canonically queer characters will be disappointed, but book two features lesbian vampire Carmilla and American spy Irene Adler.

Witch Week by Diana Wynne Jones This is the only children’s book on this list, as well as the only book from a series with no canon queer characters. But the world where magical history is censored and accusations of witchcraft lead to arrests, even for minors, certainly feels familiar. This boarding school might be co-ed, but it rivals St. Hilarion’s with its tendency for the adults to turn a blind eye to the bullying and the pranks gone too far. Magical shenanigans abound and unlikely friendships form as the children discover their abilities and scramble to stay one step ahead of the inquisitors. Technically, this is book four in the Chronicles of Chrestomanci, but it really is a stand-alone novel, and probably my favorite in the series.

Happy reading! And remember: our stories matter.

[svenmantsik]

CATNET3000 - TalTech game jam game

A short platformer game (1026×800 px)

2024

Incomplete little platformer game about letting go of the old internet, made in the Godot engine, as a group effort. You play as a cursor in the form of a cat and platform through a tactile 2000s website before it collapses as it gradually goes offline.

(the animations / sprites I made for the game: player character, spinning CD collectible)

CatNet3000 is playable and downloadable on itch.io.

We named our group Team Hyppekass as a sort of reference to Tiigrihüpe, which was the initiative that brought computers and internet access to Estonian schools.

Sven Mantsik (@ seitsmes_mnt, me): I did the sprite art, sprite animation, some lore writing, and itch.io page design.

Caroline Pajusaar (@ artsycreaturez) - background art, level design.

Karu Kaljuste (@ libakary) - programming, game design.

Anni Hõ (@ 4nnih6) - audio, game design, writing.

Made in 47 hours during the TalTech GameCamp game jam of March 2024, theme: "Into the Unknown." It got 6th place!! (Out of 28 games.)

This game is still very incomplete with a few things missing and a lot of things not working. It's not really completable.

Here's an overview of some animations, assets and backgrounds that didn't make it into the game. There's also development and planning sketches.

Development sketches / plans I wrote:

Some more of the assets (and one background) I made:

[neurodivergent-fangirling]

It’s such a silly thing to be annoyed over—and I’m not annoyed about it, not really. Just sort of… frustrated? Fondly exasperated? Something like that.

See, back in 2023 I decided to analyze all my favorite romantic arcs and try to work out what pieces I liked and didn’t like and what it was that made a love story good, in my completely subjective opinion. Some pairs had a lot of good material—Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase, Crowley and Aziraphale—while others stories offered a few key contributions—The Last Binding trilogy, the CatNet series (which is more about friendship than romantic love, and that’s part of why I liked it)—and others that had just been my favorites forever and I couldn’t overlook them—The Princess Bride, Stardust, the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. I took notes. All of the stories had flaws or things I didn’t like about them, but I thought if I cracked the code, I could outline what the best ever love story could be and maybe someday try to write it.

And then in 2024, Dead Boy Detectives came along and decided to top them all.

It’s just not fair. How can any romance compete with Edwin Payne and Charles Rowland? Like, even if you’re just looking at the friendship, it’s still the most hardcore devotion and beautiful dynamic ever. They’ve been together for decades. They won’t let anything separate them. They trust and respect each other and are so freaking kind (and you’d be surprised how many so-called love stories don’t feature a basis of mutual trust or respect and actually demonstrate a lot of cruelty—but that’s a rant for another day). Their banter is top-notch. They know each other so well it’s like they can read each other’s minds. I could go on.

And of course, we’ve got Charles literally walking into Hell to save Edwin. More than that, we have that scene in episode six when Edwin tries to confess his love and Charles thinks he’s saying he’s in love with a different guy and is still completely supportive of his best mate coming out to him. And then there’s that scene on the stairs. “You’re the most important person in the world to me.” Even if Charles doesn’t love Edwin the same way (and we don’t actually know one way or another yet and that’s beside the point I’m trying to make here), he’s still going to be there for him no matter what.

How can any love story compare to that?

I know. Crowley and Aziraphale were together for a lot longer and faced down Heaven and Hell together. Percy and Annabeth gave up immortality for each other and braved the Underworld and Tartarus together. Both of those couples have some of the best dynamics—love based in friendship, partnership of equals, excellent banter, extreme levels of devotion. But Payneland still outshines them.

I am amazed and thrilled that we got such a good story (and one with positive queer neurodivergent representation, no less). But I am still just the tiniest bit miffed that now the standards are raised to even more impossible heights.

(I mean, I could write a fantasy love story where the characters take turns rescuing each other, face down the gods/ armies of Heaven and Hell, turn down offers of power/ immortality/ a peaceful afterlife, brave Hell/ Tartarus, walk through fire, run into a murderous hedge maze, come back from the dead, let themselves get captured by pirates/ bureaucratic angels/ evil stalker wannabe dictators, destroy the villains with the power of love, get their memories stolen but still remember each other, and every other thing on my list, but I think that might be a bit overkill. Also, what makes a good love story is more than just what the characters go through to be together; it’s about how they interact when they’re not in peril, too.)

[neurodivergent-fangirling]

Does anyone have any book recommendations that feature main characters who are Autistic, Aspi, or ADHD, and somewhere on the LGBTQ+ rainbow spectrum? Tagging my favorite neuroqueer (or neuroqueer-coded) fandoms in the hopes that more people will see this.

[neurodivergent-fangirling]

Please Recommend Books to Me

I've been asking every week for book recommendations for Pride Month, but so far I haven't received any. Maybe I need to ask more directly. I mean, I figure, this is Tumblr, we're all fans of something, some of us must like talking about our fandoms, right? This is blanket permission to spam me with way more than I wanted to hear about your favorite book/ movie/ show/ game/ musical/ podcast/ comic/ radio play/ any other type of media you love. Like, I've read some good books, and recommended them. But I want to read more!

I'm going to include my favorite fandoms in the tags in the hopes that will help more people respond. Sorry/ not-sorry.

[neurodivergent-fangirling]

Pride Month Book Recommendations Part Three: Neurodivergent Main Characters

Happy Pride Month! This year, I’m celebrating by recommending books with LGBTQ+ main characters. The first three weeks each highlight a different intersectional subcategory, and the fourth week will be for general recommendations.

This week, I’ll showcase books featuring neurodivergent queer main characters. Like my other recommendations this month, these are all books I’ve read and enjoyed that feature happy endings. Feel free to add your own recommendations in the comments and reblogs!

Catfishing on CatNet by Naomi Kritzer If I can have your attention to scream about only one book this month, this one is it. I will never shut up about CatNet. Ever. I am absolutely obsessed with this series and this book is one of my all-time favorites ever. It’s a near-future Teen thriller featuring a cast of neurodivergent queer characters and an AI that likes cat pictures. It’s got a slow-burn romantic subplot but the main focus is on the developing friendship. It’s a story about fandom and the internet and loneliness and finding community. It’s got a truly terrifying villain (no superpowers required) and some surprisingly sympathetic antagonist characters. It’s also got a scene where the kids hack their small-town school’s lesson materials to make it provide accurate LGBTQ-inclusive sex ed, which is delightful. The story doesn’t focus on any character’s journey of being neurodivergent or queer—the representation is just there, and it feels authentic. It’s honestly one of the first times I felt like I saw myself in a story and… to say it rewired my brain chemistry would be an understatement. Also, the sequel, Chaos on CatNet, is just as good. I only wish this was a trilogy. If you only read one book I recommend, please read this one.

A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske If I had a list of “only four books I get to keep with me if the world ends”, this one is right after CatNet. But it was close. This was also insanely good and resonated really strongly with me. I mean, maybe I just like friendship-based love stories coupled with mystery and danger featuring plenty of excellent banter. Maybe I just like seeing characters who are Aspi-or-Autistic-coded who struggle with socialization and really care about people and also like to talk about their special interests. (We’re not fracking stereotypes!) Freya Marske also does a really good job with the fantasy worldbuilding, and I am in awe of how her descriptions blend imagery and figurative language to concisely convey personality. This is the first in a trilogy, and I’m delighted to say that each book gets successively better—but the first one is still my favorite. And Edwin Courcey is most of the reason (but I love Maud Blyth as well).

The Outside by Ada Hoffman I read this one for a book club a while ago. It was good. I think it’s pretty cool how the pantheon of gods works in the science fiction setting. This was the first book I read that had an explicitly Autistic female character, and I like that there’s more than one. It’s the first in a series, but I haven’t read the rest.

The Extraordinaries by TJ Klune I read this as a teenager and loved it. I related to the ADHD fanboy protagonist so much. I reread this as an adult and… I guess reading tons of fanfiction with neurodivergent queer characters made me more particular? That said, this is a fun story, and its predictability doesn’t detract at all from the enjoyment. And I’m happy to read more queer superhero stories, so it’s a good thing this is the first in a trilogy.

Daniel Deconstructed by James Ramos I enjoyed reading this book, even though it didn’t resonate with me as strongly as some others. That’s purely subjective—the main character’s Autistic experience is different from my neurodivergent experience, just as his fandom experience is different from my own (LARP vs attending conventions). We also get nonbinary and asexual representation in the supporting cast, which I appreciate. It’s a good high school romance that subverts a lot of tropes.

I should note that the Aiden Thomas novels mentioned in week one also belong on this list (you cannot convince me those characters are neurotypical and I love them for it).

What are your favorite books (or other media) that feature neurodivergent queer main characters? I’m always looking for more stories!

Links to other Pride Month Recommendations: Part 1: Trans and Nonbinary Main Characters Part 2: POC Main Characters Part 4: General Recommendations

[neurodivergent-fangirling]

Timely Fandom Quote #336

“Ellen Reinhardt: She’s damned to hell, cursed, as a blasphemer against the Lord for turning her back on her godly mother and embracing a group of Sodomites.

Steph Taylor: The Sodomites were literally destroyed because of inhospitality, so I’d say the household that took in an abandoned teenager is probably doing okay.”

– Chaos on CatNet by Naomi Kritzer

[neurodivergent-fangirling]

Timely Fandom Quote #329

“Dana Taylor: I can do a better job of helping you if you’re honest with me.

Steph Taylor: Yeah. I could have done a better job of helping you if you’d been more honest with me.”

– Catfishing on CatNet by Naomi Kritzer