cnovels | Read-in-Progress Wednesday

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post type: weekly: read-in-progress

Read-in-Progress Wednesday

This is your weekly read-in-progress post for you to talk about what you're currently reading and reactions and feelings (if any)!

For spoilers:

<details><summary>insert summary</summary>Your spoilers goes here</details>

<b>Highlight for spoilers!*</b><span style="background-color: #FFFFFF; color: #FFFFFF">Your spoilers goes here.</span>*

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Started I Am Average and Unremarkable by Yue Xia Die Ying (“Butterfly Shadow Beneath the Moon”), author of such historical romances as Eight Treasures Trousseau and xianxia comedies as Ascending, Do Not Disturb. This is one of the latter -- if you like Ascending, this has the same sense of humor.

It starts out with Our Heroine, a young yao* passing for human in a world where yao are treated as demonic, entering a small cultivation sect without the resources to screen for such non-humans, but that turns out to be just as, um, let us call it trickery-oriented as she is. Am 25 chapters in, about a fifth of the way, and bounding along. Fun fun.

* Specifically, a chive spirit lol.

That summary does sound fun!

XD Chive spirit huh. I wonder what's the strangest yao that people have read about

Sounds like a possible Friday Discussion topic.

Starting a 'realist' baihe novel, The Empty Ship by Niu Er Er. The main character is a very ordinary woman, 27 years old, deeply unambitious and working as a junior teacher in a preschool, quite different from my usual.

That sounds a lot more grounded/literary than usual. Are you enjoying it so far?

Yes! It's different but I'm quite enjoying the everyday-ness of it. There's also a slight thriller/mystery element in that Highlight for spoilers!*the protagonist witnessed a murder some years ago and it's definitely still haunting her, plus I'm picking up signs of her being a pretty unreliable narrator.*

I read Cheng He Ti Tong in about three days. It was really fun and I'm now excited for the drama, except I'm quite worried about what they'll do to Bei-momo. If they turn her into a joke I'm going to fly over there and wreak havoc.

I tried If I Could Mail You A Book, but discovered that it requires more attention than I currently have. So I'm rereading Copper Coins while I wait for my brain to regenerate. I'm kinda mad, but otoh I want to enjoy my first time through If I Could.

In the donghua they seem to have turned her into a cis woman, which I suppose is the best of the options they realistically could have chosen

That's, yeah. Not terrible, I guess.

+1 yeah

hopefully the drama will be decent

Is Shelley Parker-Chan's He Who Drowned the World a c-novel? If yes, that's what I'm reading now. I'm also slowly getting through Catching CQL, although it's been on the back burner a bit because I'm swamped in library books...

I'd call it c-novel adjacent, much like Iron Widow.

Yep, would agree with larryhammer. I'd call it c-novel adjacent. Are you enjoying it so far?

It took a characterization turn I didn't see coming and it's throwing me a bit...

The licenses for Golden Terrace and Little Mushroom have been rescued by sevenseas! Golden Terrace will finally have ebook and Little Mushroom is getting a special edition!

I just saw that earlier! (I'm hoping Peach Blossom Debt and Imperial Uncle get rescued too)

Oh that is great news!!!!

That's great to hear that licenses can be picked up again.

I hope the tl will be good though.

I'm currently reading No. 1 Pretty Boy of the Immortal Path by Shisi! A novel about an MC who transmigrates into the past and takes way too long to realize he's engaged to the princess. He still hasn't realized, despite the princess's obvious insinuations, that the princess is a guy, or that the princess thinks he's a girl crossdressing as a guy.

It's a very cute and funny novel. The MC has a quiet, passive personality, but his inner monologue is lively and fun to read. It's more slice of life than my preference, but I know it's gonna turn more serious and angsty later on so I'm looking forward to that.

XD I do like an oblivious MC when it's comedic. How long is the story?

650k in Chinese. So not short, but not super long for cnovel standards.

I just caught up on chapter 81 of Dragon Subjugation Incantation (it's neat seeing Luo Qingci interacting in that persona with Ruan Li after being Chi Qing for so long) and I'm currently in the middle of volume 4 of QJJ! I might start The New Story of the Stone next, since an English translation was just released.

~~(as a side note, to my annoyance my Kindle for Android app wants me to update it I want to download books with it and I'm kinda worried about if I'll still be able to sideload books if I do)~~ It looks like sideloading still works post update!

Edited 2025-05-29 12:03 (UTC)

I didn't even realize vol. 4 of QJJ is out already!

And yay to still being able to sideload.

It just came out this week - I enjoyed this volume as much as the previous ones! Highlight for spoilers! *I'm kinda amused at how big a role grain logistics continues to play in the plot. I do hope the Hua-Qi wedding happens soon - I really want to see Hua Xiangyi and Qi Zhuyin interact!*

I'm very glad about that! I'm not fond of some of the UI changes, but it doesn't seem too glitchy so far.

Just finished The Tale of Goldiluck (manhwa) and cried many tears, started ANOTHER poetry collection (by Filipino poet Mookie Katigbak-Lacuesta), and am still working through Li-Young Lee's Invention of the the Darling--the section I'm into has moved from the fantastical (creation story) to the real (the world as a dangerous place for people who are not the "right" color for it--it's a specifically SEAsian Chinese story) so I have to sit with it for a bit.

Edited 2025-05-29 02:45 (UTC)

Invention of the Darling sounds like a pretty heavy book. Just looked it up, and if I can find it in my library, will try to get it.

Still reading: "After Transmigrating into the Cyber Game, I Defeated the Boss and Successfully Rose to the Top" but very slowly. Not because the story isn't interesting, just having difficulty focusing generally.

I tried Cyber a few times but just wasn't in the mood for the genre back then, before finally binge-reading the whole thing in one go. So I sympathize with your focusing difficulty. XD

I finished the Fish Book! I didn't hate volume 4 as much as I expected to so I'm considering that a win. I also started vol. 2 of the TGCF manhua in Chinese, as my next language practice read.

I’ve been really busy with work, and since my recent Yuri on Ice obsession requires screen time I don’t have (or the energy to sit in front of a screen), I’ve been reading instead. Right now, I’m on SVSSS Vol. 2, Chapter 8.

So… Spoilers Shen Qingqiu self-destructed to save Luo Binghe from Xin Mo’s influence, and now I’m drowning in questions:

How is Shen Qingqiu going to come back?
How will that self-sacrificing act play into the System’s rules?
Does self-destruction give a discount on Binghe’s satisfaction points?!
And how will Airplane [...] react? (I refuse to write that full name, sorry not sorry.)

I’ll be very busy the next few days, so I’m not sure how much reading I’ll get done… but I NEED ANSWERS XD (No spoilers, though... please! :P)

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Read-in-Progress Wednesday

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