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Reading notes, Sep 2025–Mar 2026

A non-comprehensive list of books/comics I picked up and put down in the last 6 months (as a starter of many books and finisher of none), and some notes about them:

Melissa Scott, "Dreamships"

Science fiction novel about uhh... spaceships and virtual worlds? Picked this up because @nnozomi wrote about the sequel once and I have a lot of curiosity about what other, more well-read people are reading (but an inability to follow through).

Dreamships is harder science fiction than I'm used to reading and I fear I am too dumb for it. There's a lot of futuristic worldbuilding going in, and a socio-political plot brewing in the background, and the characters seem pretty explicitly queer. It was written in 1992, which makes it all the more interesting. I have no idea what's going on but I'm also not exactly bored so let's see if I actually finish this.

张小猫, "逆时侦查组" | Mobius book 1

Timeloop mystery novel. We watched the cdrama adaptation last year and had Questions, so I read a few chapters before the year-end holidays.

RANDOM NOTES:

  • I vaguely remember thinking to myself, "You know what, Mobius can totally be the plot of a Who's the Murderer case” and seeing on Baidu that the author was actually involved the Who's the Murderer. Inch-resting.
  • The novel is written in a more standard supernatural procedural style which feels more natural compared to the cdrama, which focused on being a twisty action-thriller at the expense of being sensible.
  • It’s kind of funny that the cdrama erased the part where the MC takes advantage of the loop to retake the gaokao to get into the top police academy lol
  • In the novel the ML and FL are already in a relationship by the time the police are tasked to guard the CEO. The FL is a person of interest bc she’s (baselessly) rumored to be the CEO’s side chick, which makes the investigation a little Awkward.
  • Novel chapter 3.5, 3.6: Auditorium scene, first loop: There were actual assassination attempts from the anti-CEO org: 1) stabbing attempt from someone in the crowd that was trying to get autographs, and 2) poisoning attempt from a teacher who offered the CEO tea.
  • I learned that the word for minibus is 麵包車 (bread-mobile, because of the shape), how adorable:

    The Wind Spell | 風之咒

    A.k.a. the 3-chapter lesbian mermaid manhua that had been releasing in installments throughout 2025 and just ended in December! This was a challenging read for me due to the relatively (at least, compared to what else I've been reading) "literary" tone and western fantasy setting. Hoping to pick it back up for Mermay, the art is stunning and the 3-part structure (one chapter for each spell) feels perfect.

    #books #cnovels #language learning #manhua #notes #reading report #vocabulary log