[AMBIENCE] Dreamy Paris Cafe

 

[SHORT REVIEWS] #9

回溯 by 二月竹

(mtl: Backtracking)

[BL] On-going. Summary: Xu Huizhou's mother committed suicide when he was 4 and his father left the same way when he was 5, he was tossed around, family was emptied out and he was thrown into orphanage. Soon rumors spread that he had a suicide gene. Only four close friends from the orphanage reached out to him. He really considered them the closest people, but they were the ones who killed him.

The permise of this story is refreshing. XHZ did not die in a true sense and also had no idea who pushed him from the cliff during the outing (not really possible for all four, too crowded?), but all four testified that he committed suicide and all four brought his "suicide note". But XHZ actually did not die, he spent a lot of time under the cliff and was found, thus he survived. XHZ knew it was impossible to return back home like this, no one will believe that he was plotted against, thus he decided to wait for the best opportunity. Ten years later the former four friends became "prominent", one was a famous singer, another married a wealthy family, third one owned a company and the last was famous in the field of psychiatry. Seemingly well-off people built their hapinness on the bones of one person. If there is a murder there must be a motive. Initial hint is that XHZ must have uncovered their "secrets", but what those secrets are is not known at the beginning, only small episodes are thrown out. But there is also an undertone of morbid obsession of at least 3 of the above-mentioned (one keeps a lover with the same eyes, one keeps a pen and another also has a souvenir).

Ten years later at 28 Xu Huizhou comes back to China to implement his plan of revenge. He does not confront anyone openly, but lays out his actions cleverly. You know he had collected a huge amount of information about these four people and now will deal with them according to long-term observation and calculation. I think the way it is slowly revealed is quite fascinating, so I have quite some expecations towards it. This type of novel brings a lot of satisfaction factor when it comes to bringing foes to justice.

女配开始发疯以后 by 挠时光

(*mtl: After female supporting role starts to go crazy)

[BG] Completed. Summary: Lu Fanning felt that her life was a disaster. Her parents after the birth of the oldest daughter felt they would be happy to have a boy and waited for a boy, but when Fanning was born as a girl they were filled with disappointment. For this reason they preferred the eldest daughter and constantly PUA'd the youngest, even the oldest daughter herself put herself into a higher position. But then Fanning had a dream where she was told that she is a peacock blood and should release her inner self from shackles that others put on her. So her family noticed that Fanning changed, no longer caring about the family of three who wanted to use her. Fanning used to work in the editorial, the work her famly insisted on instead of fashion design she so longed for before, while her sister joined entertainment industry and was praised from top to bottom by their parents. She married Ying Shaoyuan for some time, but their marriage was empty and at some point the divorce seemed to be imminent, but she had no idea that her husband had a problem of severe social fear. So peacock and social fear joined hands. The family is quite unreasonable in this novel, they want benefits, but are not ready to share some warmth, even insist of leaving everything to the eldest. Her sister also wanted to become popular, while parents were praising her to heaven she was not as popular as they said, but later overturned as a Neptune raising fish (thanks to Shaoyuan). In general it's a short story that Fanning changed her ways, stopped being a pushover, she also figured out things about her husband and basically helped him to adapt, eventually they fell in love. So it's a HE. Anyway, I stopped midway and then read the ending to get the gist of it, because at some point I felt a little bored. Some of the books I will mention in this post will be the same. I found them all on the last search, since it's been a while since I made a new finds search. After all books are updated frequently. RATE: 3/5. Good relationship, but I can't judge the entertainment value, after all I got bored myself and used the skip.

维持女配的尊严 by 淅和

(*mtl: Maintaining the image of the female supporting role)

[BG] Completed. Summary: Wen Shuangmu was reborn, finding out that she is in the campus novel with constant Shura field among heroine admirers. Because it's a campus novel I'm wary of it a bit. The moment Shuangmu opens her eyes she is at the point of teh car accident and rushes towards the school to take the exam. A bit extreme beginning. But also what makes me wary is the presence of the system. I'm not a huge fan when the system has tasks to do. The summary also mentions that it's a villain growth system and also female supporting system used by the ML. What I don't like with the systems that require doing tasks is when it comes to emotions. FL might do tasks, but it doesn't mean she loves the target, while the target might really fall in love with her, so I find such relationships appearing out of nowhere tbh.

和三个叛逆弟弟一起上综艺 by 竹外疏狂

(*mtl: Being on a variety show with three rebellious brothers)

[BG] On-going. From the author of the "all villain show" that I loved a lot. Here we have Gu Qi who comes to the show in view of rumors about her involvement with three men. Who are actually her relatives, thus the book title. Because it's still on-going and had a small stumble along the way, I'm simply waiting for it to be finished to start reading. I've been burnt by several on-going novels that were on hiatus for too long, so I try to wait for completion. At least I have some expectations.

路人甲心声泄露后被反派全家团宠了 by 夕朝南歌

(mtl: After the passerby's innermost feelings were leaked, he was favored by the villain's entire family)

[BL] On-going. Summary: Ye Leyao died suddenly after staying up late. And he traveled to a world full of books. Good news is that each family member is a boss, bad news is that all of the have bad ending. One day the entire Huo family suddenly started hearing the inner voice of their youngest adopted son, but what they heard shocked them to the core. What does it mean their second brother is not the biological father of his white moonlight's child, what does it mean that the third son will get into trouble and where does this childhood sweetheart that comes to break up their parents even comes from?! Day after day Leyao was eating melons that were connected to different plots and.. the entire Huo family was inadvertantly eating those melons along with him. Strange thing, not only the Huo family was hearing Leyao, but also the acclaimed actor Qin Yao. Might not sound new and I also recently found a BG novel with similar premise, but there is a difference. Leyao actually eats melons that concern himself and his family, occasionally when he joined a variety show he could eat melons of others, but at least there is some connection between him and it progresses even the connection between him and Qin Yao, unlike the BG novel I've mentioned, there the girl just eats melons of other people.

炮灰美人他不干了[重生] by 甘洄

(mtl: He quits being a cannon fodder beauty)

[BL] On-going. Summary: The novel itself is more serious than its' cover. I don't know why author decided to choose such an anime-style cover when the content can be called depressing. Ye Zhiqiu is reborn 10 years back in time, right before the fateful night when he saw his future husband Qi Xin. This was originally a day of glamour and celebration for the flamboyant, but it was also his beginning to disappearing out of fashion circle, spending 10 hard years supporting husband's brand and in the end getting divorce papers, since his husband who grew up sucking his blood and PUA'd him did not need him anymore. Only much later Ye Zhiqiu found out who was a friend and who was an enemy. He grew up under the care of his stepmother and she was the biggest villain in his life who slowly ruined him. So this is what the novel is about. Ye Zhiqiu comes back and wants to drive everyone who acted against him mad, he wants revenge. This novel has potential in being satisfying, because unlike one-dimensional villains of such stories, this stepmother is truly disgusting, she came along when Zhiqiu was really young and from the early days she controlled him psychologically, even under the guise of care no one would be able to say a word against her. Though many wealthy people would not bye her narrative. Zhiqiu truly cared for his family, but who knew they would treat him like that in the end. Thus Zhiqiu decided to use some tricks of carrot and stick against them too. He first took off with his career, stepping in and helping a declining company in need, next found allies who would help him to develop in new energy field and become rivals with his father's company, then he used the sent Qi Xin who acted for the sake of investment and trained him as a dog, not to mention how he walked around other members. Patience and calculation. The initial chapters are satisfying. I'm waiting for it to be completed for further reading. Oh yeah, ML appears quite early, his name is Qin Jianhe, a big boss of a big brand.

虚情真爱 by 板栗子

(mtl: False love)

[BG] Completed. Another story by Chestnut. Summary: Yu Shi had a job in her university, being Fu Yishi's fake girlfriend to escape marriage. Then one day Yu Shi disappeared and Mr. Fu believed that she took money from his mother and disappeared. A year after disappearance Mr. Fu travels to an island and finds a restaurant opened by none other than the missing girlfriend. Mr. Fu may have faked relationship, but he fell in love with his fake girlfriend. Anyway, I've been waiting for it to be completed and as a result it is quite short (only 55ch long), so I may read it in the nearest future, if I won't stick to something else.

[Chinese BL novel] 钓系美人和偏执大佬联姻了 by 应祁/ Fishing beauty marries the paranoid boss*

(*title is mtl'd)

Summary: Gu Qichi passed through, but he had no freedom of his body. His memory starts from his return to biological parents and ends at the moment of his death. He was reborn many times, but every time he was locked in this body like cage and could only watch with anguish how his life was ruined under the guise of invisible hand. But on this fateful night he suddenly felt like he could move and took over the control. This night he was framed by the so-called good brother, in the end he was despised by his parents for being promiscuos. Instead he bumped into Bo Yu and spent the night and the gears of fate began to turn.

Gorgeous cover and touching story, if you read enough, but the content is definitely not new. This is why I skipped most part and read the finale.

And because I'm this bad, there will be spoilers in the review right off the bat.

At first you might be even repulsed by their possessive and morbid passion towards each other. Bo Yu finds Qichi early on and proposes marriage, at first Qichi of course thought of refusing, but seeing it was Bo Yu he agreed. Bo Yu's possessiveness felt almost perverse when you start reading and it also felt strange as if he fell in love just from spending one night together. But if you read the story behind, you will understand that there is quite a reason for their obsession. Soon enough Qichi also shows his strange side, so they both have these unexplained strong feelings towards each other. And to understand it of course I need to share biggest spoilers, although I say the idea behind it is not new, but at least it is touching and their feelings stop looking too dark.

/~SPOILERS~/

Gu Qichi never transmigrated, he is the original Gu Qichi and he is a protagonist of this "world". But the tragic events of his first life made him close off himself and he lived through 17 of such "scripts" before finally awekening. The one who "transmigrated" was actually the fake young master, he used his time from young to adult to become close to the parents and also later frame the true young master and cause his demise. But in that life Qichi and Bo Yu loved each other and Bo Yu spent years to find any ways to "make a wish" for Qichi to be reborn. He grasped at any straw and one of these straws was his pious worship at each step of the temple. In this awekened timeline he did not have the memory of the past at first, but subconsciously he loved Qichi deeply, so they came together soon.

This is why I say the idea is not new, that one person pays what they can to help their loved person return, but it's still very touching reading about such sacrifice and thus their obsession with each other becomes less And I mean it, I read striking like at the beginning.

Funnily, I really remember these moments and the story behind their relationship, but the story itself left my head completely. I really need to write reviews and write down some ideas when they're fresh instead of waiting when I read something different in intermission and completely forget what it was all about.

And I've read half of it, but later kind of let it go. Judging from the chapter names they actually came into view of public and even half of the novel is dedicated to a variety show. Mainly I wasn't as interested at this point and skipped to the ending.

But anyone who is interested can give it a try, if the style will be to your taste.

RATE: 3/5. But the cover is indeed gorgeous, I think I saw similar style, I need to look into it/artist.

[Chinese BL novel] 大佬，咱不离婚了（穿书） by 遥的海王琴 / Boss, let's not get divorced!*

(*title is mtl'd)

Summary: Zheng Shu transmigrated into a novel where he was nothing else, but a cannon fodder. Young master who is actually the richest second generation was fooled by his "lover", divorced for him and with the help of "caring" relatives the entire Zheng family business quickly declined. Because this cannon fodder also oppressed main protag shou, protag gong sent his company to bankruptcy and there was nothing left for the former richest young master in the end. Zheng Shu had a car accident and traveled into this world on the fateful day of signing the divorce papers, looking at capable and handsome nominal husband he said "Stop! I can still redeem myself!".

What I liked the most right off the bat, there is not obvious underline that original Zheng Shu basically fell victim to other people's schemes and what is devastating, people who could have helped him didn't do due deligence. This includes our ML and it also includes the original housekeeper.

The family connection of the novel are also intricate.

So the novel starts from the divorce scene. Some ask - why he didn't divorce then? First of all it's not that easy, he himself has no business acumen, so it is easy for the ML, Yu Sinian, to come forward, he was the one who brought the company to its' heights. Divorce that involves power division isn't that easy, it can easily break such a big company into fractions. And even if Zheng Shu wanted to liquidate his assets it's also not that easy. Original Zheng Shu grew up without mother, who died when he was young or father, who was constantly busy. It is easy for a young mind that did not build defense mechanism against scheming to be swayed, this happened with the "lover" who found original Zheng Shu, Lin Xi. He used Zheng Shu for profit and there wasn't much left for feelings, while original Zheng Shu treated his lover really well tbh. Yu Sinian did a big mistake that he forgot that he married Zheng Shu at 19 when he was still so young and not understanding the battles at the shopping mall. There is also housekeeper Uncle Qin whose fault isn't less, as a family figure he should have guided the young master towards enlightment, but instead it felt like he indulged original Zheng Shu, so he would be happy (this includes actually supporting his affair with a lover = extramarital affair). Uncle Qin isn't a bad guy, he had no bad motive, but he is too bad at educating. Thus the result lies in everyone. And this is what I applaude that original might have existed as a fool in others' eyes, but he wasn't described as such.

Zheng Shu is also a rich second-generation. But he wasn't as absurd, but he could act domineering when needed. Because he knew what he was worth he decided to leave things and save this marriage. In this case he completely cut off previous indulgement, was always on call, was attentive and mostly he was openly chasing Yu Sinian. Although at times he felt shy, but in the end he knew how to be proactive and was like a little beaming sunshine against the coldness of Yu Sinian as an ice block.

Zheng Shu took great care of Yu Sinian, if things happened he always informed what was happening and why, he also returned home early even if Yu Sinian was on a business trip. All in all he was keeping his word. he showed his sincerety in transferring what he had to Yu Sinian, which helped in start-up capital for his new company.

He returned assets he spent on Lin Xi, which uncovered the truth behind Lin Xi's relationship and Zheng Shu's cousin. In the end he actually picked up the entertainment company that was originally opened for Lin Xi and started it as his career. Because he had nothing else but money, so he spent it on scripts he checked and people who went through trials and training.

Slowly feelings between Zheng Shu and Yu Sinian started to change and Yu Sinian did not stay completely untouched by Zheng Shu's care. Although at first of course he went through thinking a lot about their relationship. After all he knew only original Zheng Shu and did not want to be one in the fish pond and eventually be forgotten, he treated feelings seriously and only Zheng Shu with his openness subverted his opinion (and mine too), because he did not give up on this relationship and thought they can be happy together. Initially he didn't think about great love, but it became great later.

Their combination is quite cute, when together Zheng Shu tries to act like a cutie, although can be demanding pepper to let the relationship progress, but outside some people forget that he is still a domineering young master and can kick asses. So he also jumps around cutely when he wants to protect Yu Sinian and leave him as this untouched flower on a high mountain who does not need to deal with things unworthy of him. Yu Sinian on the contrary isn't only a block of ice, he uses business as punishment for those who dare to bully Zheng Shu, so he is also a scary person. Anyway I found their combo quite cute.

/~SPOILERS~/

The main storyline also involves Yu Sinian's origins and main protag gong. They are acually cousins, and come from the same family, Xie. Yu Sinian's mother was sent to marry a man she did not love, but also who was prone to domestic violence. Although Xie Zhang came from a prominent family, he was incompetents and used violence as means to vent, because Yu family had a younger brother who came to mediate. In the end when Yu Sinian was five they escaped from  the hospital and met Zheng Shu's mother, who took them in and later sent them abroad with her husband. They considered this meeting fateful, since at that time Zheng Shu, the long-awaited child was conceived. They supported mother and son and eventually Mr. Zheng asked Yu Sinian to marry his son, because he knew what harm would bring his son leaving him alone against the gangster relatives. Thus Sinian married Zheng Shu out of gratitude for care, but nothing else. You can imagine that Zheng Shu who just lost his father did not want that.

The stories are also such a small world. Xie Chengfeng lost his parents in an accident, but he felt that this was man-made, but because the old man Xie was too face-saving the case was closed. He joined hands with Sinian in the small fight against other two sons of the old man, who actually were perpetrators in his parents' accident.

The story is even narrower world because original protag shou, his uncle was in a relationship with Yu Sinian's mother, but they were separated and had a deep misunderstanding about the day they wanted to elope.

RATE: 3,75/5. Light-hearted and lovely. Great combo and chemistry between MC and ML. It was quite funny, I left out many things that happened that deserve the read by yourself :)

[AMBIENCE] Snowy Mountains at Sunset

 

[Chinese BL novel] 白月光手撕替身剧本后[重生] by 惗肆 / After Bai Yueguang tore up the stand-in script*

(*title is mtl'd )

Summary: Jian Jinzhao till the last moment of his life could not comprehend that he was betrayed by his closest people. One is a friend with whom they shared the career troubles and another is a friend with whom he was acquainted since childhood. But these people pushed him as a scapegoat and pulled him down from the altar with accusations of money laundering. Their life was fine, the company was fine, they even found someone similar to Jian Jinzhao to take over, but Jian Jinzhao was devastated. The next moment he was reborn two years prior the accident.

It's a double-rebirth novel. MC and ML are both reborn.

Also it is well-crafted, easy to digest content. There is nothing super outstanding or new tbh, but it doesn't mean it's a bad novel. After all it's a seasoned author and now they can pull up a good story. I've read it almost in one seating, so it's very easy-going instead of thrilling drama. There are ups and downs, but they are easily solved not to make readers wait for too long and feel devastated.

JJZ was reborn for a week at the beginning of the novel, he was still in a bad state of mind and was tortured by nightmares every night. When he had a meeting with one of the perpetrators of his previous life, TV drama actor Qin Ye, he announced his withdrawal from their common company and setting up a new one. The reason wasn't given too clearly at first and the other party thought JJZ had a temper fit, but JJZ did what he promised, terminated contract with the company, sold his shares and fired his agent. His agent under the name of JJZ found and pimed newcomers, but since JJZ had no evidence he did not tear up completely and just left. As you can guess the company tried to bring troubles to JJZ's new company but it was in vain.

After that meeting with Qin Ye JJZ met with Yu Yan in the hotel, a young and promising actor in his previous life who seemed to be plotted during the wine bureau, he decided to help and this became the beginning of their relationship. Yu Yan is the ML and he is 9 years younger. Because JJZ knew that Yu Yan will become prosperous he did not object to him joining his new company.

JJZ and his first and former agent Ji Jia established the new comany and hired several newcomers from professional background with the idea of training and development. Yu Yan was more experienced and won his first role in the audition of the recently returned director Wen. In his previous life Yu Yan also played in the movie 'Mud' and became a household name as the youngest best actor.

For the company to be on track and gain a strong foothold and be a "clean" it came through several purgings, you can also consider them the ups and downs of the story. Like for example newcomer Qi Zhou who wanted to take shortcuts, but was shot down in the revelations. The previous company who took many attempt in muddying water also came defeated in the online confrontation several times. And since the previous company of JJZ was involved in money laundering some story behind it was also revealed. By "clean" company we can compare the two. For this we also need to have the insight into who is JJZ and his "friends". JJZ's parents are scholary family, his dad is a professor and his mother is into caligraphy, he always had bottom line and principles in the entertainment industry, so he may not be liked by capital due to his principles (thus the conflict with those who wanted to launder money). On the contrary Qin Ye came from the average background and had a bit of inferiority comlex, he was ready for sacrifice unlike JJZ thus he was involved in transactions. His childhood friend Lang always wanted to compete with JJZ, thus he joined the company and was in the upper management, but he always protected his own interests (thus he betrayed JJZ in the previous life rather quickly). Since JJZ is a principled person he wanted his staff and those he wanted to bring to have integrity of an artist and they went through several tribulations to finallize who went and who stayed. So the clash of the JJZ and the big capital is the main final conflict you could say. But JJZ in this life is not alone.

Yu Yan came with a purpose, since he was reborn he was happy that JJZ was still there and he changed his course of actions from previous life and joined JJZ's company, he also openly came to chase people and proclaimed love, which slowly made JJZ warm up to these feelings. For Yu Yan JJZ is an emotional support and not only a lover, so the story is more like double-healing. The reason for it is simple, Yu Yan is a product of love between two famous people in the entertainment circle, but the happy life didn't last long, the feelings on the screen could not be applied in real life and cohabitation, plus both were having their careers as their priority, in the end Yu Yan was nothing more but a left-behind child who was cared by a nanny. Although his material things never lacked, but he lacked love. Although his nanny cared for him and he grew up with nanny's son, but when he became sensible he did not have much affection for a reason. In his own opinion the nanny got paid and her son, whom she indulged, actually was vain and used everything Yu Yan used and created the image of a rich person and never clarified. This nanny's son is none other than Song Yu, the person who was found to replace JJZ. This is a bit of a spoiler, but it is revealed when he appears on the scene anyway. Song Yu is the basic green tea character, but it's a good thing he did not matter in the story much and his parading in front of MC and ML did not bring any success and everyone treated him as a fake and a joke. After all no matter how he emphasized on their "close" relationship, there was not much sincerity in his actions. On the contrary it was JJZ on the screen who brought Yu Yan to his senses and he fell in love with this person and he decided to join entertainment world to join hands with the person he cares about and this time he promised everything to keep the person he loved safe. Thus we have the double-healing process, JJZ slowly comes out of the shadow of his previous life, finally gains confidense, slowly warms up with Yu Yan and walks bravely towards the future.

PS: The cover was drawn beautifully, completely represents the image of JJZ in the novel, he always wears glasses (chain glasses included).

RATE: 4/5. Simply good-looking and well-crafted. Very fast-paced. Does not dwell on things and at times there might be an impression that there is not enough depth, but it can only be applied to some events or conflicts, the characters themselves got enough space to showcase what they are.

[KDrama]

As a person who likes to keep track on things they watch and read, hence I keep a blog for decompression and also for sharing purposes, in '23 I rekindled with Korean dramas. At first I haven't thought I'd be so lucky to watch something I will like so much and something that will click with me to this extent, as a result I thought about how different the dramas I watched in the past were (I had a pause that lasted for a decade, no kidding) and the new dramas showed how the industry grew and evolved in a good way. Although many nostalgic group people might say - why they don't shoot dramas like before - it's as if there are no interesting dramas, which is completely untrue. The development of technology allowed to move cinematography, camera work, cgi many levels up! Let's not talk about scripts. From dramas I saw many use innovative transitions, shots, use of cranes and drones, the colors are vivid and many more details. Although many dramas are still filmed in a studio, but it lost the "studio feel" that dramas had a decade ago and they feel more natural. Plus the direction of dramas changed as well. How should I put it.. from several dramas I've seen, it was really all "drama", it was more melodramatic, soap opera (or maybe I was that unlucky). Like for example some drama in a wealthy family etc. Actually reminded me of what is popular in Turkish TV shows, but those went further, while Korean TV dramas have 16 episodes per show (average number), then Turkish shows are like few hundred episodes long.. damn, just like Santa Barbara. For people who watched it, as the first really long series that I watched on TV, this title became a common noun used to describe a TV series that runs THIS long. I mean even Mexican TV series paled in comparison. Yeah, we watched a lot of stuff in early 00's

Uh, I went off-topic. Anyway, back then I had a feeling as if everything is too melodramatic and there is nothing more to it. Not to mention the technology wasn't as developed, so things like cgi looked a bit low-budgety. And bad choice (bad luck) in dramas, plus the soap opera feel made me lose all interest in Korean dramas for a whole decade. Only with involvement of short videos (YT Shorts) recently it allowed to take a glimpse at some popular kdramas and I was caught in the whirpool again. Kidding, I was happy to be caught, I found that many dramas can be so different and entertaining. And they made me happy and allowed me to relieve stress, which is a big plus. I don't know if I will add KDrama reviews here, since I started writing them on MDL, so who knows. After all there are no option to include pictures on MDL unlike throwing them here hehehe.

Just a day ago I finished 'Destined with you', which was my New Year watch, not chosen for the purpose and has nothing to do with NY :'D it just happened that I watched it and NY came along ahaha. Part of me still wants to throw a word or two here and share several snippets. But let's leave it for later.

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