I've not been posting many saves lately because I've been reading this series in all the spare time I can muster. Just finished Double Down, and GUH. The romance in this series is sort of like if you took Harry/Draco fanon's physicality and stubbornly unspoken fondness, combined it with Peter/Neal's professional dynamic of friendly one-upmanship, and then rounded everything off with a little of Erik/Charles's star-crossed idealogies destined to forever get between what should be the love of the century. And then, like all of the fandom's I'm comparing it too, there's also a fascinating cast of side characters adding their own explosive pinch of cheerful mayhem to the mix. Et voila, Shadow of the Templar, as I see it so far. Also, this fic has droves and droves of amazing dialogue, including some of the most brilliant zingers I've ever encountered and more gems of sarcasm than you can shake a stick at.

"Go to China!" his father said. "See the world!" his mother added. ("Use all those seemingly useless 'dialects' you learned in college!" his own brain chimed in, treacherously.)

These sound pretty awesome.

In which the modern world and the world of fairy tales collide in this lovely, lovely queer retelling of Beauty and the Beast. So much to love about this story--such an original take, and such an original voice.

Jesus. So good.

WOW. Just. OMG! LOVE.

FUCK, I GIVE UP. I love this man's writing. For the past 5 days I've been curling up with it every night before I go to bed. I don't think I can keep saving every other story I read, because honestly they are all good and I want them all in my life forever. So, Delicious, this is an author rec. He's awesome. His characters are realistic, lovely people you wish were your friends. His romances are unbelievably warm, dear things you wish existed in real life, that give you hope that they do exist, because the characters seem real enough for the romances to be real, too. The hot gay sex is basically an afterthought in my recommendation, but there is a lot of that, too.

In which believing in mystery and romance actually does pay off, sometimes. This is the most lovely little short story romance I've maybe ever read, I feel like it could easily be a whole novel, every character is so easy to find behind their few lines of characterization, they just breath out of the story like they're real people, and though the narrative encompasses maybe 30 minutes real time, the rest of the story, the months leading up to what we see, are so deliciously well alluded to, you get it. By the end, you know exactly how it must have gone. It's like getting the transcendent happy ending without needing to read the whole novel. Small caveat: there were some points where I was like, "lol stalker!" and was kind of weirded out, but I'm wondering why I had to be all cynical about it like that. That is totally my own tragic issue, possibly our whole generation/society's tragic issue. This story is lovely, and that's that.

In which two roommates who couldn't be more different find something to bond over, and then they find something more. *eyebrow waggle* This was actually really nice and so realistic, just normal, and kind of funny and kind of hot and just -good-.

Awwww, omg, omg, omg. Cute blind date story with a cute guy who is obviously on spectrum and they make it work and it is the cutest thing ever, omg.

In which the front man/vocalist of a PATD-inspired band is sort of perplexed to find out his genius-guitarist-slash-long-term-boyfriend is Apollo. Yes, the Greek god. Which contains the line: "Jeremy was painfully aware that post-show, flushed and sweaty, he did not look particularly impressive and tried for a casual 'I'm totally the sort of dude who hangs out with superior beings and it ain't no thang' smile." Hahaha, craaaaack, but also really, really good. Jeremy's meandering mental asides are seriously some of the most awesomely, crazily hilarious stuff I've read in ages.

Lovely meet-cute workplace romance!

A mischievous fantasy I haven't quite gotten behind yet, but its worth following to see where it will go.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.