esmé holden

I've been playing Dragon Quest 3 (HD-Remake) and I came to a point where I needed to make a merchant to send off for the main story and I just kind of made a guy called "Fat Chud" thinking this would be of no consequence.

Immediately I'm faced with the consequence of my actions

Huh

#5 - All the Lovers in the Night by Mieko Kawakami
At first I found this a touch slight, but as its details accumulate, and especially after that flashback, it starts to build into something quite substantial. Even if its attempts to capture that poetically don't always work, the foundation is there

#4 - Carol by Patricia Highsmith
Easily the best thing I've read in ages! Even though it was born out of a yearning daydream, Highsmith is so clear-eyed about all the frictions of romance. Especially when you're young and prickly and basically still selfish.

You just don't understand the supreme court and the very foundation America was built on. Appealing to some undergirding good that has not, and will not, ever exist is beyond naive.

for an hour 'aspen' is among wiseman's bleakest films: the most hitler sides of america having a nice holiday on the slopes. but throughout its looser, communally focused second half, it becomes something more complex: an image of broken, abusive people looking for hope and most of all a centre.

it always feels too early, that's the terrible thing. life is, even at its longest and most well-lived, still brutally short. rip frederick wiseman.

Recently I've been enjoying: 'Carol' by Patricia Highsmith, 'The Aviator's Wife' by Éric Rohmer, 'Metropolis' by Osamu Tezuka, 'Keep Your Cool' by Riley, 'The Winter's Tale' by William Shakespeare and 'Psychonauts' by Double Fine.

esmé book shelf, sans the books im currently reading

You have to be shoplifting on principle at this point

got some good sleep for the first time in a week plus :D

goat would never

Sisters!!!

i guess so lol, apparently @esmesays.bsky.social and i hold practically the same space

#3 - The Winter's Tale by Shakespeare
My first problem play! The jagged shifts in not just tone but character—Leontes' paranoia comes from an unrelated word that suddenly turns into total obsession—all come together for a perfect, beautiful, still strange ending. Also, Autolycus rules!

just in time for oscar season

I regret to inform you that “1979” by Smashing Pumpkins was released in 1996, which is now 30 years ago. Meaning a similar song released in 2026 would be called “2009”

#2 - Vile Bodies by Evelyn Vaugh
Really good. Comes alive after shifting from a comic novels of eccentric character & quirky names, to a depressive trudge through changing time, but it needs that contrast. Though it allows some troubling ideas in with its anti-modernity.

#1 - Scene by Abel Ferrara
I read this in the best part of two days; it's pretty brisk and breezy, despite the constant depiction of the indignities of drug addiction. The prose are good enough for this kind of thing and Abel is way more balanced and respectful than you'd think.

a woman in a red shirt is reading a book to a man ALT: a woman in a red shirt is reading a book to a man

To hold myself to reading more this year, I'm making a thread of every book I finish. And if by the end of the year there are only, like, eight, I will be very embarrassed.

my ballot for yanco's "greatest" shorts films of all time list (the quotation mark are theirs, not mine, and very much welcomed)

link to the full list: yanco.be/en/greatest-...

tatsuki fujimoto, I understand you, I could fix you

👀

in the library, catching up on my life

movies

I’m writing a screenplay, please help me make it when it’s finished

Sabrina Carpenter… nice

beautiful woman. not a great filmography as of right now.

my dream is to be bluesky famous

I watched the first episode of The Pitt yesterday, and it was so profoundly normal. I sort of get why people are into it, especially if you're adjusting to the standards of modern TV, but to me it was the kind of show that might be on at an aunt's house that would I would kind of pay attention to.