Author: aegoncoffee

Human female. Multi-racial, mostly vegan foodie. Science-lover. Photographer, both alt-process wet darkroom AND digital. Fluent in legalese. Use a French press with enthusiasm. Bibliophile. Cephalopodaphile. Taught swimming, trained as an architect, teach users on legal software and legal/compliance topics.
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Book (Manhwa): A Martial Master Wakes Up as a Concubine by LICO, koyanghee

Cover for A Martial Master Wakes Up as a Concubine by LICO , koyanghee

A Martial Master Wakes Up as a Concubine
by LICO, koyanghee
published by Webtoon (44 chapters, ongoing)
2023 – present

If you hear me cackling after dinner for no apparent reason, it is likely because I’m reading this comedy comic.

Nyeonbi Cheon is a famous villainess who somehow winds up romantically entangled with a famous hero. After her boo kills her (!?!), she wakes up in the body of an imperial concubine who appears to have died simultaneously. She has no memory of this concubine’s past, but instead has her own villainy-filled memories, plus a desire to avenge her death against her unexpectedly cruel former love.

If there is anything a famous, powerful, crude villainess struggles to pull off, it is the manners required of an imperial concubine. Poetry? Tea making? Polite chit chat? Oh, goodness no – these are critical failures! The backstabbing and rivalries are familiar enough concepts, but Cheon isn’t allowed to murder her way out of them. (Or is she…?)

Whether it is chatting with the guy who brings her rice cakes, telling the emperor how much she wants to see his package (which makes him want to… not let that happen), or faking the aftermath of a fight to preserve her secret past identity, no one messes ordinary activities up more obliviously to social graces than she does! I really do laugh out loud – this is so silly in a fun way.

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Book (Manhwa): My In-Laws are Obsessed with Me by seungu, Han Yoon seol

Cover page for My In-Laws are Obsessed with Me by Seungu, Han Yoon seol

My In-Laws are Obsessed with Me
by seungu, Han Yoon seol
published by Webtoon (100+ chapters, ongoing)
2022 – present

This comic has a cheerful prologue to reassure you that things WILL GET BETTER . Because you need that reassurance so you don’t panic and flee after the first full episode!

Pereshati is getting murdered as the story opens. She tries to convince herself that her clear murder memory is all a dream when she wakes up in what appears to be the past. That can’t be right – time travel is impossible! However, she soon realizes the events leading to her murder are playing out EXACTLY as they were before, and she wants to make it stop.

Her rash new plan seems to be going well… right up until she is being buried alive. But somehow, waking up as the dirt hits seals the deal she was trying to make with a scary Grand Duke. After this, she can seek revenge against her murderers from a position of power and try to not get murdered again!

This story suggests that a “curse” might just be a technology we don’t understand; that intimacy is difficult with people who are literally poisonous; that you shouldn’t rule out your daughter-in-law’s accusations that someone might be committing terrible crimes using [the family secret]; that it’s good to make your husband blush now and then; and that being kind can make your in-laws very CLINGY.

I reread the series up until the present chapter, and realized its long serialization made me forget key details. I enjoy the story even more for having refreshed my memory.

Pereshati looking shocked is hilarious; I like her outfits; I like her facial expressions (and the jokes about the Duke’s facial expressions)… She seems like a rather nice, normal person going through some extremely terrible things, and trying to remain kind while doing so. The Duke also seems rather… like a normal person? (Dukes in other stories are merciless killers who draw their sword several times a day to dish out punishments; this one is somewhere between chill and chilly.)

Cute, fun, with good collars, with accurate-feeling scenes of awkwardness… I’m looking forward to more.

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Writing: Fountain Pens (Primary Red Theme)

A Pilot Metropolitan in Red, with a writing sample from its smooth medium nib.
My very red Pilot Metropolitan. The ink is likely Diamine Syrah.

This Pilot Metropolitan (yes, another) is another satisfying, well-designed, reasonably priced pen. It writes smoothly and looks great. It has spent many hours in my hand, and that time has been pleasant.

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Book: Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

Cover of the book Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow
by Gabrielle Zevin
published by Penguin Random House
2022

The pen friend who recommended this to me was so right – and so good – to encourage me to read this!

Sadie is visiting her sister in a hospital when she meets Sam after his life-changing accident. The fact that he speaks with her (and almost no one else) leads to her return, and then to a friendship that spans decades – and the creation of multiple immersive video games reflecting their joint and separate (and often disparate) visions. Estrangement, reconnection, deep friendship, creative collaboration, fundamentally knowing each other at the geekiest levels, affection, exploitation, and the fraught business of being opposite sex business partners in the world of video gaming make for an engaging, emotionally developed story.

Zevin creates a window in time when real innovation in video games was possible, when leaving MIT to create a game as one’s life’s work felt right, when friends made in youth become lifelong, when life happens to members of a group at different rates, and when creative credit and blame were never evenly distributed.

The collaborative elements, design, and friend-strife all feel compelling. It is hard to dream and create with other people! Even people you know well. ESPECIALLY people you know well.

This is an adventure story, a tech story, several relationship stories, a tribute to geek culture at its university-spawned-finest, and the story of several entwined lives running on slightly-misaligned-yet-deeply-caring tracks. I was deeply engaged throughout.

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Life: Sunshine and Wind

Photo of a yellow, black, and blue butterfly (with some red eye like patterns) resting on flowers.
Whoever designed this butterfly should be very proud.

I’m posting with the hesitation of someone who realizes that dumb and indifferent AI programs will steal and then vomit up my (incompletely digested) content in no coherent order. (What a world.)

I’m relaxing, playing with ink, buying paper, and eating delicious (vegan Vietnamese) food with a friend I haven’t seen since the Before Times. These are good days.

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Book (Manhwa): A Not So Fairy Tale by Hyobin

Banner for A Not So Fairy Tale by Hyobin
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A Not So Fairy Tale
by hyobin
published by Webtoon (44 chapters, ongoing)
2023 – present

This contemporary Korean comic tells the traditional story of the Fairy and the Woodcutter in a modern zombie-fighting context!

A thousand years ago, a goddess came to earth, and (under instruction from a suspicious deer) a human man stole her clothes (her keys to heaven) and demanded that she have his children, only to die without returning them, leaving her trapped on earth with humans. (See Wikipedia’s summary of the variations of this folktale.) In the contemporary Korea of this comic, she is still here – and she is PISSED. Zombies (called Fiends) are killing people, and Moran Cheon, as she is now known, is a famous actress who SECRETLY can kill zombies with her bare hands. She can also leap from tall buildings, is inhumanly strong, and is unnaturally beautiful.

She wants to go back to to the celestial realm, is angry at that evil deer, and has been waiting impatiently for that damned woodcutter to be reincarnated so she can get her situation sorted out.

Three highly attractive characters from A Not So Fairy Tale.
The characters are good-looking, and drawn in an atypical style that I enjoy.

There is more to the fiend situation than anyone knows, and the detective who is investigating isn’t dazzled by the goddess at all – a sure sign that HE IS THE PROBLEM – I mean, the reincarnation she has been waiting for. The goddess has struggled with with loneliness, resentment, a fox-spirit child she raised as her only other potentially immortal companion, and the risk that she will miss the chance to return to the heavens forever.

This story has: a celebrity, zombie-fighting, immortal actress; a handsome cop who may have hidden memories of his past lives; luxury condominiums; corporate cover-ups; secret crime-fighting identities; unnatural healing abilities; characters who lack human ethics; monsters posing as normal people (until they are ready to eat you); eternal villains and their adversaries; and the fox drawn in…vulnerable moments.

This comic is refreshing – contemporary urban settings, a new type of monster, a non-traditional interpretation of a folktale, lovely art – and is the least predictable of the stories I’m reading. I’m looking forward to future chapters.

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Writing: Fountain Pens (Bright plus Dusty Green Theme)

Collage of three images showing a full length Monteverde fountain pen, a close up of its nib, and a page of writing in a dusky green
My Monteverde Prima fountain pen; its nib; a writing sample about the our golden summers, and how strange it is that other places have green summers. Who knew? The muted green ink is Herbin’s ‘Vert Empire.’

The view out my east facing dining room window is of the deep green of a holly tree, and the brighter green of a juniper, which inspired me to fill my greenest pen and write about the color.

This Monteverde Prima is one of my earliest fountain pen purchases. I initially thought it was stingy with ink, but just happened to be using a drier flowing ink. I tried others and improved my paper choices, which help me appreciate this pen’s smooth writing and pleasant proportions. It is comfortable to hold, is reliable (doesn’t clog or dry out), and the way it catches the light is attractive. The nib is firm, and I am amused that Monteverde is so proud of it that they engraved their long name on it TWICE.

The ink is Herbin’s ‘Vert Empire,’ the color of a dusty green velvet, or leafy desert plants that must protect themselves from the sun by being a bit gray. The pen isn’t an exact match for any of my five or so shades of green ink, though it comes quite close to Herbin’s ‘Lierre Sauvage‘ (which the Herbin website associates with anarchy. Ah, leafy green anarchy…). A medium bright green with silver sparkle could also come close, though that might be difficult to read if too shiny. (If you are a fan of Herbin’s “Vert Atlantide,” you probably beat me to this.)

Yes, my personal true color of California in summer is the yellow-gold of sun-dried grass on our rolling hills, but our extensive agricultural regions offer many shades of green, from the yellow-greens of grape leaves through the pale, silver-greens of artichoke leaves.

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Book (Manhwa): Made of Stardust by Kalisami

Banner for made of Stardust by Kalisami

Made of Stardust
by Kalisami
published by Webtoon (42 chapters, ongoing)
2023 – present

Kalisa falls to earth naked, in pain (from an energy weapon still protruding from her body), and with amnesia. Her human assailant is thrilled, and takes her back to his kingdom to make her his wife.

What Kalisa doesn’t immediately understand is that she is a powerful being from the sky. Beings like her, called stars, can be shot with human weapons and brought down to earth to either spread fertility while alive, or to extend the life of the powerful if consumed while dead. Unclear on what awaits her in the hostile human kingdom after witnessing human violence against innocent creatures, she makes a break for it with her tiny, winged dragon, Lumi.

The story is largely presented as Kalisa experiences it – with no memories of what is happening, innocence as to how the world works, mysterious voices, danger, and the dread of seeing what has become of others of her kind.

The art is pretty: cheeks and lips are rosy, bodies are slender and strong; Kalisa’s clothes are painted on, while those of a handsome ally resemble draped costumes of ancient Greece; her dead peers turn into dark, sparkling glitter; her fertility creates clouds of blossom colors across the landscape…

Chapter 42 is the mid-season finale, and it isn’t clear if Kalisa and her new friends and allies will survive, why the planet is dying (though this seems to be about human greed and a lack of compassion for other living things leading to environmental ruin, making it very relatable), and whether humanity dying out is inevitable. The loveliness of the illustrations will lure me back.

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Book (Manhwa): I Abdicate My Title of Empress by Kim hee sung, galbi

Banner for I Abdicate My Title of Empress by Kim hee sung, galbi
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I Abdicate My Title of Empress
by Kim hee sung , galbi
published by Webtoon (54 chapters, ongoing)
2023 – present

When we meet Adelheid, she has given up her crown princess title and left her country for an arranged marriage to a hostile-but-hot blond emperor in a far off empire.

Not only does Emperor Karl exude hostility to Adelheid for not being as passive as a flower in a vase (the way he likes his women), but his jealous young mistress controls the money, and chooses not to fund Adelheid to show her who is really in charge. Karl tells Adelheid that if she minds her own business, she can do what she wants (though we grasp that this would involve having money to live on).

Oh, and the empire is being picked apart by sky monster attacks that the church has responsibility to stop, yet doesn’t seem inclined to do much about, especially if their delays kill off their rivals, those noble knights who actually try to save people from being killed.

Between Adelheid’s ability to read the law to determine her rights, a handsome noble who wants to beat the sky monsters and so becomes her official-aide and official-if-not-actual-lover, and that fact that ADELHEID CAN FLOAT WHILE DEFEATING SKY MONSTERS (!!!) because she is an unusually POWERFUL MAGE (!!), the empire’s power structure starts to crack beneath her booted feet.

Characters from I Abdicate My Title As Empress: our heroine, the emperor, and the empress' aide
I’m having difficulty keeping track of all the empresses being sabotaged by blonde mistresses across the many manhwa I am reading, but since this heroine flies in the updraft caused by invasions (?) and her aide, Lionel, is so blatantly pretty (look at the eyeliner!), I think I can track this story using either of those details.

Brazen attacks on Adelheid and whiny demands from Karl’s mistress might make Karl rethink his life choices. We will learn why Adelheid REALLY left her kingdom, and how many attractive warriors from back home want to turn up to fight alongside her, and about council meetings (because governance requires those, sadly).

This story has: a golden-eyed, monster-fighting, floating heroine; a handsome, ineffective emperor; a whiny, blond, unethical mistress (the primary mistress type in manhwa, from what I can see) with power-hungry allies propping her up undeservedly; a beautiful nobleman who isn’t sure why he stares adoringly at the heroine (duh); a corrupt church; neglectful authorities; and AN EVIL POWER THAT DROPS BUILDINGS AND MONSTERS FROM THE SKY! (This may be crossing into sci-fi. It’s unusual, and I’m here for it.)

The next season promises (even more) pretty men from Adelheid’s home empire, and more Adelheid-floating-sky-battles so I’m looking forward to it.

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