Tag: m/m

Silver for Monsters

108000 words, complete @Ao3 by 
Genre/What to expect: Very Witcher. Much Monster. Wow.
No, for real though, I can’t quite decide what I prefer. Is it the monster hunts? The combat? Or maybe Lambert and Aiden being two horribly stubborn idiots? 
Rating: Explicit
Pairings: m/m  Lambert/Aiden

Lambert has been walking the Path for half a century. Wraiths, drowners, ghouls–another day, another shit contract for shit pay in some shit village for some ungrateful bastard.

That is, until he accepts a lucrative contract in Ellander and gets more than he bargained for. The Continent proves to be a dangerous place as Lambert sets out with Aiden, a witcher from the School of the Cat.

Monsters, war, love, sex, angst, revenge, silver, and steel. Lambert must fight to leave the Path before it destroys him.

Suitable for fandom blind readers? Yes, if you have a general understanding of how fantasy works.

I don’t know much about the Witcher Series, I’ve got to admit that. Played some of the first one, forgot all about finishing the second, and have attempted on multiple occasions to get further in Witcher 3. A never-ending quest, that, since there are just too many ? to explore on that map and I barely ever get anywhere.

But then there was Silver for Monsters, written by Plague (or  on Ao3), and Lambert. 

Who the fuck’s that? was my initial reaction, so I went over to Google to refresh my memory.

Image result for lambert witcher 3
Ooo- that guy!

Armed with a bit of eye candy, I threw myself right back into Lambert’s life as a Witcher. Which, arguably, isn’t exactly rosy.

Unfortunately, he’d managed to piss off just about every armorer worth his salt in the gods-forsaken cesspit of human shit and drowners that was Velen.

To be fair, neither is Lambert. He’s a bit crass. He’s crude. He has violence in him, and he fights like a man possessed. Speaking of fighting: the combat in Silver for Monsters is wonderful. Not once did I lose track or feel the need to skim. It’s remained engaging throughout. 

Speaking of engaging.

Aiden fought like he was dancing. His feet barely touched the ground as he whirled and spun in a rapid, insistent ballet that only he knew the steps to.

Aiden is, too. While Silver for Monsters is written out of Lambert’s POV, I think Aiden is my favourite of the two. Mostly because he comes with a hint of softness that contrasts Lambert- and challenges him. Don’t get me wrong. It’s not a sort of softness that’d indicate weakness, but more of a nuance to his hard edges that make me want to read more about him. Especially since we see him through Lambert’s eyes, and oh boy does he end up having eyes for him.

Which brings us a step away from monster hunting, and to the two Witchers and the bond they form. A bond shaped by a handful of delicious sparks.

“I said, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Aiden hissed angrily. His face was mere inches from Lambert’s own. Lambert could feel the heat of Aiden’s breath against his neck, the brush of his curls against his forehead. Even in the dim light of the passage, his golden eyes burned like coals. Lambert slowly began to realize that he might have fucked up. He’d never seen Aiden like this before.

Rrrr-

Seeing the tug and pull between them in the first few chapters makes for a great buildup when that smouldering spark finally ignites. Though even then the tension doesn’t break away, and we’re led on a merry chase of WHY THE FUCK, LAMBERT, until they finally catch up with each other again.

It’s great, okay?

Silver for Monsters, if you’d ask me (and you are, you are reading my blog), brings the best of three worlds together. Monster hunting. World building plus character development. And the occasional Rrrrr between Lambert and Aiden that ties it all together perfectly.

Plus, it comes with one of my favourite tropes, so how can I not recommend it? As evident by me losing it while reviewing:

That’s an instant Taff-slay right there, though even without it I would have adored this fic. I do adore Lambert, too, even if I get a little grouchy at his stubborn ass at times. And yeah, so I’m an absolute sucker for Plague’s writing style, and how I get adventure, action, smut, romance, and a fat serving of humour to go with it, all in one delicious dish.

So. Yeah. Read it!

 

tafferlingLeave a comment

/r/Fanfiction HP Winter Fic Exchange Part 2 of 2

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The /r/Fanfiction Harry Potter Winter Fic Exchange was a delayed Christmas present for 7 Harry Potter fans. Each put their list of preferences in and received a random recipient to receive a drabble based on their preferences. We have split them up into two parts (since the reviewers did take part :P) and will be reviewing them in blocks!

Fandom blind friendly: All require some basic knowledge of Harry Potter.

Reviewed by: Ashes0909

 

A Muggle Life

433 words, complete, @ AO3 by SatuD2

Genre/What to expect: A lovely drabble exploring Ron and Hermione moving into the Muggle world.

Rating: Gen

Pairings: Ron/Hermione

The first drabble takes on the question of what Ron Weasley would be like in the muggle world. Trying to adjust, Hermione is there to lend a helping hand in this sweet and authentic story.  It perfectly captures how uncomfortable Ron would be in a muggle flat and Satu does a wonderful job showing a kind intimacy between the couple, that helps them through this magic-to-muggle transition. A lovely fic all around!

 

The Ball Game

552 words, complete, @AO3 by Robbin_Hoods

Genre/What to expect:  Post-War Hogwarts era. During a Quidditch match, Harry Potter and Oliver Wood go after the snitch in the Forbidden Forest. 

Rating: Gen

Pairings: Harry/Oliver

The second drabble is a tale of two boys struggling to find something to say to one another. Harry and Oliver walk through the forest and are confident with everything but one another. I really liked how Robin_Hoods chose to start this fic, and from the very beginning I was rooting for these two to find a way to bridge the gap from friends to flirting. Great job!

Snowflake Kisses

595 words, complete, @AO3 by 

Genre/What to expect:  Post-War Hogwarts era. Draco is trying to adjust to Hogwarts after Voldemort is defeated.

Rating: T

Pairings: Harry/Draco

The last fic of this set was a gift written for me by amaranthium. They’ve all changed after the war, none moreso than Draco. Harry starts to see it and with this observation, he becomes intrigued. A little dash of mischief from a friend, and Harry and Draco’s relationship transforms in a fitting and festive end. Lovely work!

In summation

These three drabbles are lovely little fics. Each show their couples coming together in different ways. Some, for the first time, while others are adjusting to a new world and having only one another to lean on. All in all, the fics were very well done and a great, quick read. Enjoy!

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When I Come Around (Wheake) [Degrassi]

degraswheels01

2.5k words. Complete. @AO3 by PugMaster
Summary in 10: Canadian Teen boys figuring out sexuality.
Pairing: M/M Snake x Wheels
Rating: T

Wheels and Snake are friends, but it’d be better if they weren’t. If they weren’t, maybe things would be different, and he would have made out with Heather without feeling like something was just off. Set during 4×07 “Just Friends.”

Your Host For The Evening: Raeror

Fandomblind Friendly: No. Look for your Local Seeing Eye-Pug for assistance.

So, the Degrassi franchise is the first soap opera to put canon teenagers in the starting roles. Kicking off in ’79, it ran through the entire 80s, disappeared in the later 90s, came back in 01 and has been running ever since. Located in Canada, we are in the 80s version. Now, the canon gives us all sort of angsty things like AIDS, Suicide, Teen Pregnancy, and molestation.

So.

Much.

Molestation.

While this fanfic tones everything down, it still gives off hints at times that relationship issues aren’t the only problems that our protagonists are facing.

So in this story, this guy Wheels (shown in picture) is finished making out with a hot chick (ladies love the mullet) but…. he wasn’t into it. He’s really not that into girls altogether. He knows that he would get labeled as a faggot for the rest of his life if anyone found out, and we start with him on the girl’s porch, panicking as he realizes that his world in on the verge of collapse. Pug does a really good job of bringing this character’s fears to life. I’m reading the words but I can clearly see Wheel’s face as he’s practically shitting himself.

Enter Snake. Probably the best person Wheel’s can talk to for this. Reason 1 being that Snake has a gay brother, Reason 2 that Snake is technically sexually ambiguous in this fic (but there’s a ship name for a reason…).

So Snake has to be the mature one while Wheel’s is scrambling and defending himself in every part of their little back and forth. Pug creates a genuine hurt/comfort/fuck off/shit/ I don’t know what’s next/we’ll deal with this later  dynamic. So in the end Wheel’s scoots on off, not as panicky as he was when he started. But there is work to be done, and you don’t know what’s going to happen next. Maybe everything goes well with Heather? Maybe Wheel’s secret spreads and his social life get killed like a dog ran down in the street. We don’t know what happens. We can only hope for the best.

And that’s the realism of teen drama. You don’t know what going to happen next. One minute everything seems fine. And the next minute, everything is gone to all hell because  a tiny detail is overlooked. Teenagers are trying to figure out a world they have no clue off. Misteps inevitably happen, and chaos follows. The only thing that really matters is damage control. And that’s what this fanfic is about. Damage Control.

So yeah, give this fic a read if you want some genuine teenage hurt/comfort.

Fan Review (Mine’s better):

-Somecallmemichelle

Well this has been a long time coming, hasn’t it? I mean all the jokes about writing Snake and Wheels together, and you end up being the first one to do it.

Alas, the ship may seem implausible, impossible even, but you manage to arrive to a point where it seems kind of possible (at a glance). Sure, they don’t kiss, but there’s always that possibility in the air.

I think you represented Snake wonderfully, hopeless naive about the matters of the heart, specially those about those who share the same gender, and reminding his brother…well, like it was 1990 and not 2002, when he’s way more perceptive to it.

Wheels, well he sort of stumbles his way into kind of confessing, of course he doesn’t want to do it, he knows well Snake isn’t into that “stuff”, but he just says something stupid, and then it all comes crashing down. like a wave, it splashes around. Though I think he’s sort of relieved. And panicking.

A wonderful oneshot, and a gift that meant so much to me, in a really crappy week. You did such a good job! Thank you (did you convert to the best ship? /s)

00raerorLeave a comment

OUT! [Haikyuu!!]

Out!

104k words, complete @Ao3 by 
Genre/What to expect: A coming of age and coming out story.
Rating: T
Pairings: M/M  | Yamaguchi Tadashi/Other & Yamaguchi Tadashi/Original Character

JAPAN’S FIRST GAY ATHLETE COMES OUT!

Yamaguchi never expected to read THAT headline in Gay Japan News, but he about fainted when he scrolled down to the photograph. There–volleyball on his hip, naked from his Seijoh shorts upward and eyes pleading for readers to devour him–was the familiar face of Oikawa Tooru.

Oikawa? Gay? OUT?

Suitable for fandom blind readers? Yes

Reviewed by: Tafferling

iconOUT! was the first story I found on /r/FanFiction, and it was also my debut as a fandom blind reader.

It wasn’t finished back then, and I had no idea what to expect, because what could you possibly do with highschool volley ball that would hold my attention?

Oh boy.

A lot, apparently.

Somehow (and I am still thinking there’s black magic involved), Haru wrote one of the most heart warming, gut wrenching, giggles inducing, edge-of-the-seat-oh-god pieces I’ve ever read.

The characters live and breathe on the pages, and I didn’t need to know anything about them, because every single one stood out as an individual once they opened their mouths. It features an original character, and he blends in with the cast as if he’d been there from the start (far as I am concerned, he was– and I think that makes me one of the lucky ones). Two chapters after he’d been mentioned for the first time, and I fell absolutely in love with him.

All through the fic, starting with Yamaguchi’s flighty and anxious introduction, to his world being knocked out from under him, and then painstakingly slowly put back together, the pacing remains sublime. There are clear, wide reaching arcs, but each chapter stands easily on its own, making it easily enjoyed in bite sized portions. If you can keep yourself from reading on, anyway. Which you might not be able to, because if there’s one thing OUT! does exceptionally well, then that’s sinking it’s teeth into your emotions and dragging you along whether you want it to or not.

I’ve experienced Yamaguchi’s coming of age story with a constant, involuntary squeeze to my chest and gut. Whether it’s the down to earth tone of it, the every-day-bullshittery that he has to go through, or the larger than life moments it all amounts to. By the end, it all felt like it mattered. Like Yamaguchi mattered. Taiga mattered. And I couldn’t have been happier that I got to follow them through a monumental part of their lives.

But emotion isn’t all that OUT! has to offer. It’s also got this eery habit of bringing music alive, and I swear that the only explanation for this has got to be afromentioned black magic. How else is it getting me hear the notes in my head?

It’s also got tension. And I don’t just mean the tension between two young men at the cusps of growing up. That’s there too of course. It’s lovely. I loved it. I don’t mind having more of it. No. I mean the volleyball matches. Those bloody things come with the same high stakes pressure as a season finale of the Walking Dead. You want to skip to the end just to spare yourself the agony, but you can’t, because it hurts so damn good.

So, should you read it?

Hell, yeah. Do.

It’ll patch you up if you’re feeling down. And when you’re done, maybe you’ll have found yourself happier than when you’d started. It certainly had that effect on me.

Review examples from Ao3:

It took me two days to finish this, but wow, where do I even start. As much as I love stories that are all sunshine and rainbows, sometimes I need red something that hurts. Taiga was an absolute delight. Yamaguchi, I loved everything about him here- he was so realistic, so human. Thank you for such a wonderful story.

Let’s make it simple: best chapter so far. That went deep. It was intense, but not over-dramatic. Oikawa’s tale was simple but that’s exactly what makes it so sorrowful. It’s something so simple and yet it causes so much pain. And Iwa-chan surely is a poor boy. If society doesn’t always accept you, that’s ok. But if your own family doesn’t accept the way you are, the way you’re Born, that causes endless pain and … I don’t know what else.
So your son/your daughter is gay… so? What’s the matter? Where’s the problem?

“If Iwa can’t be happy because of how the world works, then I’ll change how the world works.” Oikawa Tooru
That left me almost speechless. It’s wonderful to have someone on your side who’s willing to be “public’s target” just to make someone else feel better. I do think that Oikawa is very brave – they way you portray him at least^^ (But he surely is brave in the manga/anime as well).

tafferlingLeave a comment