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Hi again, I'm back for a review for the galazy event :)
The way that you take this prompt is so awesome. The way you begin is so soft and slow, like a crawling wrath, I just love that. And I also love how you use the apple imagery that feels like the Garden of Eden. The way it decays and how it all happens in one sentence really makes me feel the rush and like the darkness of the image.
I love how you use the repetition between the first and second paragraph, and how you describe the shape of the fire <3 And you bring back the Eden story when the description of the fire turns to snake, I love the way you thread your themes throughout.
Thank you again for your amazing writing!
Catherine
Hi there, here for a review for the galazy!
Your descriptions are always so amazing, but you know this already <33
I love how the descriptions you use for absinthe are both for the liquid and the way it makes you feel. At least that's how I read the first paragraph. Especially the line "flickering fuzzy, furred at the edges", I just love that
I love the alliteration and rhyming you use as well, that phrase "giggle-rich and wicker-witch" is just so pretty. And then following it up with "slashing, splashing, and dashing" :) And the awy that you use silver and gold in this is beautiful as well, really giving a regal, elegant feel to the story. I feel like I'm in anoter world when I read your work <3
Thank you so much for this one! and the end also really makes me want to read this diary entry
Catherine :)
I loooved your description of the snake in the first paragraph. That line about taking the feet first and leaving the sky last was perfect. I wasn't quite sure where you were taking me after that, but it all fit together so perfectly like a jigsaw.
And the last paragraph perfectly encapsulates sloth, I loved the image of his head lolling and his body "baby-dolling" clever parallel imagery plus the rhyme plus just such lush language like always.
I really, really loved this whole fic, thanks so much for writing and posting!
**review left for the winter in fairyland event**
Ooh this one starts out quite differently to the others, it doesn't seem to be all about the drink right away, which is intriguing and fitting for the lust prompt.
Soooo I could practically taste rose on my tongue when I was reading your second paragraph, your description was that perfect!
The other thing that I love about this series is how they're so cyclical in structure, you often repeat phrases and then the chapter always ends in almost exactly the same place it started. It gives it this really unique, hypnotic feeling, like it's taken you on a journey but then dropped you off just where you started, except you see the beginning in a different light now you're at the end.
I'm bummed there's only one more chapter!
**review left for the winter in fairyland event**
I'm back to googling liquors I've never heard of before but this one might be my favorite so far! It starts off so strong with comparing the rings of the cups to wedding rings and Saturn wings - what a creative comparison! And then I love how you describe the heat and light - it's so fun to read and also a nice contrast to the sleeker, cold drinks in previous chapters.
All the orange and brown and toffee and peach imagery fits gluttony perfectly. And "heart sick and heart sweet" fits gluttony so perfectly!
**review left for the winter in fairyland event**
Okay I've at least had limoncello so I think I can appreciate this one even more! The description is just perfect, particularly all the bits of description about the metallic and pine notes. That is exactly what it tastes like, beneath all the lemon!
I noticed this one has a lot of nature metaphors and also personifies the drink quite a bit, comparing it to the human body: bones, flesh, blood, the metallic heartbeat. Not sure if it's intentional but it makes me think of an interesting interpretation of greed, almost like cannibalism - greed for flesh.
Anyway, well done! And onto the next one :)
**review left for the winter in fairyland event**
Ooh I've never had creme de cassis, I had to google! This one strikes me as particularly poetry-like, with all the rhyming and cascading clauses. This one was also a bit creepy, or maybe unnerving is a better word. The description of the eyes of mold and liver spots is gross but super evocative and descriptive.
The last paragraph was also particularly good, I keep finding these little references to Tom/Voldemort that I assume are deliberate, like the bone white dust. I also adore the image of vertebrae straightening as an image for pride! Fits the prompt perfectly.
**review left for the winter in fairyland event**
Another gorgeous drabble! I love the rhymes in this one, I almost whispered it aloud to myself as I read because I wanted to hear the way the words played with one another.
The image of the rotten apple is also perfect for Tom, and again the snake imagery. I think this one also fits wrath really well, with the worms consuming the apple and the spark of fire.
One thing I really like about your style is how you hyphenate to create new adjectives, it’s something I do a lot too when I’m trying to be more poetic and it’s so gorgeous here. Blister-pink, heady-thick, crimson-cast. It gives it the feel of a classical poem, and makes the language more precise.
Onto the next one!
**Review left for the winter in fairyland event**
This is such a delight for the senses. I love how sensory your writing is, there’s a lot of visual imagery but also a focus on touch as well. And seeing how you play with words, particularly alliteration and those long sentences that twist around and repeat themselves, it’s just lovely.
And definitely fits the prompt of envy, I love the idea of 7 drabbles for the 7 deadly sins.
Even if this weren’t tagged with Tom/Voldemort I think it’d be pretty clear who this is meant to be about, not just the line about “dear diary” but all the hints at green and silver and snakes and just the psychology of it feels like him, which is impressive in such a short piece.
Thanks so much for writing and posting!
**Review left for the winter in fairyland event**
#snowfoxes
Hello dear!
Your language it this is just beautiful. I like the use of emerald as a color that denotes envy.
The way you use allteration and repetition in this drabble is so clever, too. Bust like the words are repeating or echoing, the bubbles in the drink are rising up. And it also reflects the unbalanced, giddy feeling of having had too much to drink.
If I'm honest, I don't feel like I really understand the story, but I did enjoy reading your richly poetic words. And I am engrossed enough to be curious, especially about when this is happening and wether this is the beginning of the infamous diary, or some other notebook entirely.
As ever, your skill with language continues to blow me away.
xoxo Renee
Hi Laura! I’m here for the review event and also as an excuse to read some more of your lovely writing.
Your prose in this chapter was absolutely beautiful (as usual). Your description is amazing and I can clearly see every detail of what you’re describing in my head as you describe it. Everything flows so well and I am continually in awe of how you write.
I also think this works really, really well with the prompt you listed in the endnote. The bits about the drink souring on his tongue and scalding his throat particularly fit really well. I think the part about writing in a diary also fits in well – all the parts about being envious.
I also really liked how each chapter title is a kind of alcohol. Absinthe fits in really well with envy so you did an excellent job pairing them up (and I’m not surprised about that with you because you always do an excellent job with your fics).
I loved this and I’ll be back for some more of your writing soon!
~Liv
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how do you do this. every. tom-dammed. time?! i want to sink my teeth into this imagery it’s just *chefs kiss* incredibly creepy. the slow, patient, lazy way you describe the snake moving, the way that this somehow makes it all the more sinister. patiently, with hardly any effort crushing it’s prey, the way you describe it kissing it’s victim with its tongue. even in the following section, all of the imagery you describe could still relate to this creature sinking it’s fangs in and sucking the life from whatever or whoever it is devouring. even the pace of your writing slows down, even that is almost lazy. it doesn’t rush, it strolls, slythers. the image of blue curacao, such an unnatural colour, which matches both in the cold possibly blue scales of the snake but also the unnatural creepiness that clings to nagini. i want to know what unfortunate soul ended up in her clutches, who was it, why are they now in the hands of the snake, where is tom in this? it’s utter perfection. i can honestly just bow down to you after reading this. it’s beauty and horror rolled into one fantastic series of drabbles, i’m only sad it doesn’t go on.
(veni, vidi, foxi)
this just feels so sureen. tom is on a high, it’s almost like he’s in the afterglow, or high on an opiate. it looks like lust, sounds like sexual lust, only this is tom so it’s never going to be that simple. the images are almost heavenly, pink and soft, flying on hummingbird wings and chubby cheeks combined almost brings an image of those classic paintings of cherubs. but it’s all tainted. for some reason i’ve always seen rose as a bit tacky, y’know. tbh i think that comes from being a teenager in the uk but like it’s not real. It’s reflected in the peeling plaster, the fake leather and fake gold. it has delusions of grandeur. the snitches, i mean stitches are literally a way to victory, float before him. all the gold is there too. and that’s what tom really lusts after, victory. power. this one just reads so dreamily, it’s perfumed and the air is thick, it smells thick and feels soft, silky, but maybe too much, too perfumed, the sort you’d choke on. just so beautifully written.
(veni, vidi, foxi)
laura, i love you. because for gluttony you give me a sickly sweet liqueur that’s used in desserts and associated with after dinner decadence and it just makes my wee mixology heart sing because it’s so perfect. it just epitomises your attention to detail and the way that nothing is half thought through. the idea of this after dinner coffee, the aperitif that goes with it, it speaks of plotting and men with cigarettes in dark robes, of decadence that’s the height of luxury. but also the image of this fragile little cup, the china that’s so frail and delicate, in the hand of tom is terrifying. he’s the sort of person who could hold it and crush it in a moment, same with delicate flowers or lives. it’s fragile and it lives at his convenience. but anyway, back to the descriptions of the coffee because honestly it’s making my mouth water, and that's just such excellent writing. you create what you’re describing and that’s SO powerful. we taste it with him, we feel the heat and the sweet and then the stong bitter and it’s almost like toms thoughts roll over his tongue. just incredibly done.
(foxy glory!)
another utterly perfect alcohol choice because limoncello just embraces that bitter sweetness that is so moreish, you could finish a bottle and (if you were still standing) still want more. the way you list off thing, keep going, more and more it’s like there’s always more, he want’s more. more power, more blood, it’s never enough. the repeated mention of silver obviously brings to mind marital and financial greed, as well as of course silver being one of the colours of slytherin and of tom, colder than gold, but just as hard, almost more inhuman. you describe claws and teeth, bring to mind tom grabbing and devouring and still not being satisfied. i’m amazed at how you weave these metaphors so well, though not surprised. each of these is like distilled brilliance.
(veni, vidi, foxi)
purple sort of is like pride, isn’t it? In the way that green is envy. it’s that idea of emperors, royalty or (i don’t know why my brain did this, forgive me) professor plum in the library in cluedo, wrapped in a smoking jacket and all that. why are you SO good at this! i love the way you've again captured the sense of the sin, in this case pride, and made it seem almost luxurious at first before showing it rotting again, molding, turning to something horrible. it again just captures what this does to the body, to the mind. tom may seem like an emperor looking out over his rome but inside he’s molding away and festering, though for tom that only makes him more concentrated, as the humanity and the flesh is stripped away you’re just left with the black husk. everything you write is just so luxuriously descriptive but you’ve really sent it into overdrive with these. you can touch it, taste it, smell it. you can see it like it’s real. incredible.
(vive la foxes)
i really hate campari. the drink not the drabble. just… y’know, putting it out there, it’s got that bitter burn at the back of the throat and sort of coats your mouth and eugggh *shivvers*… so in summary it’s perfect for wrath. excellent naming, ten points for the alcohol choice. okay your imagery here just makes me want to melt and curl up in a ball of amazing description. the way you assign wrath to something rotting, turning something pure and new and fresh into a withered, black pulp that's eaten by worms is just incredibly metaphoric excellence. it’s like we can see this happening inside tom, rotting him to the core, his anger black and smokey. he is like smoke though, there’s a spark and a tiny flicker of the wrath inside him but it just flows out like silent deadly smoke, all leading back to him. your language in this and the vividness of the feeling you create is honestly a gift. you’re just incredible.
(vive la foxes)
i love that the chapter titles are alcohol, and they act as a clue to the sin. absinthe could never be anything but envy. it’s just deliciously you, and the writing its just rich and dark and twisting. It’s all so tom. I can imagine him with a glass of the pale green fairy. i love this, i love the idea of what tom is envious of, and the repeated way its all old and gold and the image of bottles of champagne just brings to mind the rich pure-blood society. that's what he's envious of, the glamor and estate and the world they have. it’s all in touching distance, and to him is a birthright but something that was taken from him, and we know how tom feels about tom taking things he thinks of as his. it’s all so eery, even though nothing really happens, until the switch at the end to the diary that’s so haunting. wonderfully done, darling.
(vive la foxes)
i love the combination of blue curacao and sloth, with the slow death the snake deals out, almost like it's lazy, when in fact the snake knows there is no need to rush. she's caught the prey, it's secured tightly, concentric circles and a gordian knot and there's no way the prey will be able to run away so what's the point in rushing when you can really savour and enjoy the slow death. it's just fantastic imagery and blue curacao with its colouring could be similar to nagini, and i just love that. especially the snake being like a fortress when it's all coiled around the prey. and even though he's not described i've got the feeling that somewhere in the back i know there's tom, lazily looking on and enjoying himself while he watches the prey die, like a true predator. it's such a perfect way to end this collection - with death, even when the sin is sloth. and to me, it seemed like in each drabble there was always some dangerous current, always looming on the horizon, making them uncomfortable to read (in a good way) - i loved them all!
(for foxy glory!)
okay so it legit felt like tom and the mystery person with him are swimming/bathing in rose with lil snitches flying above them while the paint above is peeling and i imagine tom is both kinda high on pleasure and also still thinking in that brain of his, plotting stuff, seeing how he could use whoever the person is. it's lust, yeah, but tom's lust is never just lust, there is always an undercurrent of ambition and lust for power and glory. never love for the person. they're there to be used and discarded after their usefulness expires, just like everyone else in tom's life. i like rose, but somehow it always makes me think of fake/gilded things, which you similarly described here/made the association, and that resonates with me. maybe because i've always thought of it as an inbetween red and white wine, it's neither but wants to be? so much like tom.
(for foxy glory!)
i really really adored the descriptions of cointreau in this one because it was more like describing a caramel toffee, sweet and tasty and swimming in a cup lined with golden saturn rings, it's just this perfect image of what someone haughty like tom would sometimes allow himself. like a lapse in judgement almost, if that makes sense? and the way you combine bitter with hot, and then it spills over it's just kinda speaks to me about fascination with this allowance, this dip into gluttony for tom, who is really not someone you'd associate with that particular sin but in this context it works. we know he's so damn obsessive, and i can imagine him for one small moment allowing his obsession also to spill over, almost like gluttony. and playing with hot cointreau is dangerous, you could get burned, like tom could burn you, i feel like because it's definitely not the other way around, he'd never allow himself to be burned.
(for foxy glory!)
i don't consider tom greedy except for power but with limoncello i feel like you've captured the essence of it well, in a weird way. with describing the pin pricks reminded me of needles and then branches and it all felt like that latin saying per aspera ad astra, which feels tom-like - of course, he'd always want to find shortcuts but to make limoncello it's a whole process and to get to the top, to have ultimate power is also a process and tom is greedy enough for power to go through it all, even so far as to make horcruxes and we know how difficult that is, but he wouldn't let it stop him. in part that's due to other characteristics, but one part of it is definitely greed even though possibly not in the traditional sense we might view it/think of it. part of my association with the saying is because in croatian it literally translates into 'over thorns to the stars' so all the branches and pin pricks made me think of it. (and limoncello is produced in italy so ancient rome? right?). but really, again the alliteration killed me, it works so well, and also limoncello does not taste good, and greed doesn't taste good and i bet even tom doesn't like it when he recognises that feeling inside himself because it's beneath him. but he still feels it.
(for foxy glory!)
ah of course imperial tom riddle and a purple drink, which is code for royalty. and of course he sees himself when he rises back up as this impervious thing because he literally can't be destroyed/affected by anything (or so he thinks). but the description of the blackcurrants and them going moldy, toxic even again just reminds me of tom, but in his not-yet-risen form, not sure for what reason but he was like a parasite during that time, and the transformation seems symbolically cyclical with this drabble, blackcurrants turning into the creme de cassis, tom turning from a hideous barely alive creature into something invincible, it's just great symbolism. i also love the fact that tom is most definitely not royalty, whatever he thinks of himself, but he's still acting like it, super proud and haughty and very good at self-delusion. fantastic.
(for foxy glory!)
i feel like with tom riddle i'll often think of quiet, calculated anger, but really voldemort was pretty much unconstrained in his wrath which check out tbh. but i think that when he was still tom, his bursts of anger, of wrath were rarely seen by others (i think he would have wanted to keep up the facade that he's in control literally all the time) so seeing it written here, interspersed with the imagery of dark red campari, and fire and ashes, it all works so well and i feel like it's a glimpse into one of his unhinged moments that people would've rarely seen back then. i love how the spark is supposed to be this spark of revolution (i think?) but his plan isn't to actually have a revolution, it's just a ruse to tear the wizarding world apart, with barbs so it rips and then he'll come out on top. it's really beautifully horrible imagery. i especially also liked the rotten apple as an image of the society tom wants to bring down, really well written, loved it.
(for foxy glory!)
pairing absinthe with envy is perfect and also with tom and green and slytherin it's just very fitting, your brain is amazing for combining all three. (also as a random sidenote/fun fact: absinthe literally made me fall flat on my face the first time i drank it as a wee 16 yr old). i love the repeating of the words to describe the drink and the taste and the colours, especially alliteration works brilliantly in describing the slickness of absinthe.i absolutely adore your description but i feel like i'll just be repeating myself with that, though this drabble literally reads like poetry and it is poetry - you've made the act of drinking into a work of art and that's hella impressive. the dear diary at the end made me laugh out loud because looking back it really does seem silly for tom riddle to write in a *diary*. but the repetition of silver and gold really works with tom and envy because he's surrounded by riches that he doesn't have but wants, maybe in a shallow way, because we know he wants power more but still. this was perfect.
(for foxy glory!)
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