Name: Zoe-- with a zillion nicknames in tow

INFP, melancholic, empath. My heart is stuck in the 40's and my mind in the 70's. I love writing and philosophy and am majoring in both at school. I do extensive historical and philosophical research, which may or my not include planning and writing arbitrary theses. (Proud nerd.) I'm not interesting; I'm interested. Perpetually. Which is why I'm always leaving reviews.

What I Write: currently stuff for the Starsky and Hutch, Nancy Drew, and Les Miserables fandoms.

When I Write: (especially important) I am a college student. About to graduate. Ergo, I am busy. Things take a while sometimes. Sorry!

POSSIBLY COMING SOON IN ORDER OF LIKELIHOOD...

Gull and Gullibility- when Starsky's incessant singing starts to annoy others in the squad room, they plot their revenge. Humor.

No Cigar- Matt and Kyler's wedding. Matt/Kyler, Nancy and Kit friendship. Romance.

That It Should Come To This-instead of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Welton puts on Hamlet. And instead of Puck, Neil gets the role of Laertes. Angst.

Les Miserables: The High School version- adapted musical lyrics. What are Mizzies like if put in modern-day high school rather than 19th century France? Read to find out! Musical verse, of course. Humor/parody.

The Gamine and the Bourgeois Gentleman- a Jondrette girl once took a begging letter to Monsieur Leblanc. What had she told him that convinced him to help her family? Drama/friendship.

Relevant literary information:

Favorite books of all time (both fiction and non, and plays, and short stories):

1. Argonautica

2. Nicomachean Ethics

3. Iliad

4. Les Miserables

5. Prometheus Bound

6. Odes of Pindar

7. Symposium

8. Brave New World

9. East of Eden

10. Candide

11. Arcadia

12. And The Mountains Echoed

13. Kite Runner

14. The Red Badge of Courage

15. A Raisin In The Sun

16. Ajax

17. The Black Cat

18. The Bell Jar

19. King Lear

20. Of Mice and Men

Very Greek heavy, but the Greeks did just about everything best--at least in the Western hemisphere. Never mind that I'm of Greek descent and toooooootally not biased...

Unrankable favorites: War and Peace, The Scarlet Letter, The Pearl, Stargirl, On Revolution, The Crucible, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Metroland, Little Women, Winter, A Separate Peace, The Great Gatsby, The Prince, One Day In The Life of Ivan Denisovich, The Alchemist, Night, To Kill A Mockingbird, Animal Farm, Kidnapped!, Dandelion Wine, The Things They Carried, Don Quixote, Death of a Salesman, Tevye the Dairyman stories, The Last Valley, Lost Horizon, Ivanhoe, The Misanthrope, Respect For Nature (Paul W. Taylor), Timaeus, Maurice, the Tom Quest series, Oliver Twist, Reflections in a Golden Eye, Macbeth, The Matchmaker, Our Town, War Horse, Ichneutae (Sophocles satyr play fragment)

Favorite writers (poets, playwrights, novelists, probably some nonfic tossed somewhere in here): John Keats, Robert Burns, Lord Alfred Tennyson, John Donne, Victor Hugo, Thomas Hardy, Walt Whitman, W. H. Auden, Sylvia Plath, Wilfred Owen, Sappho, Sharon Olds, Chaucer, Homer, Apollonius, Pindar, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Tom Stoppard, Thornton Wilder, Shakespeare, John Steinbeck, Jerry Spinelli, Edgar Allen Poe, Leo Tolstoy, Victor Hugo, Edna Ferber, Khaled Houssini, Robert Louis Stevenson, Richard Llewelyn, James Hilton, Sir Walter Scott, Fran Striker, Carson McCullers

...and Samuel Clemens and François-Marie Arouet, of course. Brownie points if you know these guys. :P

Relevant fanfiction information:

Favorite ships:

Les Miserables: Eponine/Enjolras, some of Eponine/Montparnasse, a little of Eponine/Marius, Cosette/Montparnasse, Jehan/Feuilly, Combeferre/Courfeyrac.

Phantom of the Opera (also serves for Love Never Dies): Erik/Christine, Erik/Antoinette, Raoul playing with himself HAHAHAHAHA I'm so mean.

Narnia series: Ramandu's daughter/Peter, Peter/Caspian, Edmund/Caspian, Corin/Lucy, Jill/Eustace.

Harry Potter: Harry/Draco, Lily/Severus, Ron/Hermione

Dead Poets Society: Charlie/Knox, Knox/Chris, Neil/Todd, Charlie/Cameron, tie between Charlie/Todd and Charlie/Neil (threesome?)

Nancy Drew: Nancy/Sonny, Jamila/Dylan, Rose/Abby, Henrik/Alejandro, Henrik/Sonny, Zoe/Dagny

And now: capricious facts, I salute you. Read at your own risk.

OK. So since I've been writing a lot of Nancy Drew stuff, I guess I had better talk about my experience with the series. My first game was Message in a Haunted Mansion, so that one will always be dear to my heart. When I started playing, Blackmoor was the new game, so I've been playing for about ten years (since late 2004). Nancy Drew made up a large part of my childhood. I'm fond of it not only in its own right but because I played most of the games with my sister, and I've got really fond memories of that. Eventually she went to college, then I went to college, so we stopped playing all of the games for the first time together. However, we have played all of the games right up to 2/3 of the way through Shattered Medallion (soon I'll be going to visit her to finish). Until very recently my favorite was Secret of the Scarlet Hand. Its information about the Ancient Maya was fascinating, which provided for intelligent dialogue and an intriguing plot. The games that touch upon history are definitely my favorites since they take real-life events and issues--such as stolen artifacts and faked provenance documents in SSH--and add to them just a dash of the fantastical for flavor, just enough for a reasonable suspension of disbelief. Not to mention that the ending was one of the highest-stake endings (I think the highest) that Nancy has faced in any game. Plus, SONNY JOON. C'mon. Like I said, suitable grounds for favorite status, but this has changed within the last year. Silent Spy is now my second favorite game (after Shattered Medallion), although it was my favorite for a few months. For once we get to see Nancy develop significantly as a character. Granted, her character changes after being provided with new insights after each case, but the development in this game has more gravity because the situation is so personal. Other characters were compelling. The plot had high stakes. The ending dialogue was beautiful and significant. (I've just used that word twice haven't I? Ah well.) MED's now my favorite due to its philosophical nature and altruistic themes.

As a matter of fact, all of the games of late have been of high caliber. Nancy Drew has really been hitting its stride for the past two years now. Before that, the games had a lighter flavor, not really dealing with many of the deeper issues in life. No one died, and the culprits always got the retribution they deserved. In fact, the ending of Deadly Device says that the givers will always be remembered over the takers, good over evil, which simply isn't true (however I wish it were). Bad guys win a lot of the time. There was a certain amount of risk in the early Nancy Drew games, when Nancy nearly dies during a case, for example, but these risks always seemed to stop short of the grittiest symptoms of reality. I noticed this change in Deadly Device, which was the first game wherein Nancy is called in on a murder investigation since Secrets Can Kill. That game held a distinctly darker tone than the ones that preceded it. (Just ignore the givers/takers ending statement that is indicative of a sentiment that prevailed in the earlier games.) Next game: Ghost of Thornton Hall. I appreciate the fact that this game deals with mental illness and trauma as part of those “darker issues” of which the earlier games were lacking (as I mentioned before). Hard to top this game… but HER did it with Silent Spy which is by far Nancy’s most personal case. When we see Nancy's cases through Nancy's eyes, what is important to her is important to us. And this is more important to her than any of the cases covered in previous games. Hard for HER to top this one too. I suspect that’s why they pulled the Sonny card for the subsequent game… and man, did it pay off. Silent Spy one of my favorites, but Shattered Medallion managed to take a literally out-of-this-world theory and make it worth our time. And also the villain didn't really get the justice (s)he deserved--yay realism! It balanced fantasy and reality in a way that didn’t take out the mystery and didn’t seem too far-fetched. Is this the Golden Age for Nancy Drew games? If so, I look forward to the next case!

Having said all that, here's my list of favorites (and yet another testament to the fact that I've got wayyyyyy too much time on my hands):

By plot:

1. The Silent Spy

2. Secret of the Scarlet Hand

3. Last Train to Blue Moon Canyon

4. The Final Scene

5. Ransom of the Seven Ships and Tomb of the Lost Queen, tied

By background information/subplot:

1. Secret of the Scarlet Hand

2. The Shattered Medallion

3. Ghost of Thornton Hall

4. Alibi in Ashes

5. Danger By Design

--Curse of Blackmoor Manor honorable mention for scope of backstory (all quite fascinating)

By characters:

1. Haunting of Castle Malloy

2. Alibi in Ashes

3. Shadow at the Water's Edge

4. Tomb of the Lost Queen

5. The Haunted Carousel

By amount of replays (approximate):

1. Secret of the Scarlet Hand

2. Warnings at Waverly Academy

3. Secret of the Old Clock

4. Ransom of the Seven Ships

5. Alibi in Ashes

By villain (game names given, not perp names. no spoilers; don't worry!):

1. Shadow at the Water's Edge

2. Trail of the Twister

3. Tomb of the Lost Queen

4. The Final Scene

5. The Haunted Carousel

--The Captive Curse gets honorable mention because I love that villain, as well

By soundtrack:

1. The Shattered Medallion

2. Curse of Blackmoor Manor

3. Last Train to Blue Moon Canyon

4. Labyrinth of Lies

5. Danger By Design

By puzzles (how did I not have this category before?!?):

1. Sea of Darkness (really innovative!)

2. Last Train to Blue Moon Canyon

3. The Shattered Medallion

4. Ransom of the Seven Ships

5. Secret of Shadow Ranch/Shadow At The Water's Edge (can't decide!)

--Danger on Deception Island and Secret of the Old Clock get honorable mention--love the jauntiness of those. Also Sea of Darkness for its many variations on a beautiful theme... including a vocal one, which is pretty new for Her!

--I would have counted Warnings at Waverly Academy for Mel's cello music if I could--I love the Bach Suites--but that's not actually part of the soundtrack

Favorite characters:

1. Sonny Joon (obviously), MED

2. Alexei Markovik, ASH

3. Jamila El-Dine, TMB

4.Nick Falcone, TFS

5. Henrik Van Der Hune, SSH

6. Deirdre Shannon, ASH

7. Colton Birchfield, GTH

8. Harper Thornton, GTH

9. Dexter Egan, TRT

10. Patrick Dowsett, MED

--Lillian Weiss (STFD), Mel Corbalis (WAV), Ryan Kilpatrick (TDD), and Zoe Wolfe (SPY) are honorably mentioned because I love them! More because I love them and less because they're well-rounded characters--that's why they didn't make the list.

Difficult to explain why HAU is my favorite game for characters and none of them turn up here while two from ASH do. In regards to HAU, the characters form well as a collective that effectively drive the story forward. This is a list for favorite individual characters, though, hence the inclusion of Deirdre and Alexei at the expense of Kit, Kyler, and Donal.

...and this is what happens when I've got way too much time on my hands.

NOW on to Les Mis:

RABID-RANT ALERT (spoiler free-ish. major spoiler free):

Marius is dead to me, and here is why:

I hate him. I hate him. He's ignorant. The fact that he knows three languages doesn't seem to help him in constructive political arguments if he compares Napoleon to every Greek god there is (I exaggerate, but surely you get my point) and gives a multiple-page rant that is deflected by three words by Combeferre. (Besides, comparing any of those marvelous deities/characters to Napoleon is such an insult.) Marius has a poet's mind; that's fine. But he shouldn't be shooting his mouth off when he doesn't know what the hell he is talking about. At least Jehan is lovable because he only talks within his areas of expertise (which are plentiful) instead of being pretentious about things outside of them. Also, I hate how he pines over Cosette for six months. Cosette eventually did put him to the back of her mind while going on with her life, showing who's really the bigger person here.

Above there is an Eponine/Marius pairing; I only really like this for the musical fandom, where Marius' idiocy is a little more lovable. I will give Marius this: he is brave, even if he is of the reckless sort (more like Eponine than perhaps he would like to consider), and it's admirable indeed that he didn't except his grandfather's money when making a new life for himself. Anybody think I was too hard on this blockhead? Let's debate!

Favorite movies of all time:

1. Stand By Me (1986) and Interstellar (2014)

2. All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

3. The Last Valley (1970)

4. To Sir, With Love (1968)

5. Rebel Without A Cause (1955)

6. A Single Man (2009)

7. Ordinary People (1980)

8. The Great Dictator (1940)

9. The King's Speech (2010)

10. Empire of the Sun (1987)

11. Mosquito Coast (1986)

12. Laura (1944)

13. The Big Lebowski (1998)

14. The Dark Knight (2008)

15. City Slickers (1991) (an odd choice but it has a really really good story arc AND portrays a positive relationship between a human and farmed animal! Double WIN!!)

Favorite television:

I'm a South Park/Simpsons/American Dad! kinda gal. For other faves/shows that are no longer on the air, here:

Soap, Starsky & Hutch, Mork & Mindy, The Honeymooners, Dick Van Dyke Show, Brady Bunch, Hill Street Blues, Doogie Howser, M.D., Family Guy, American Dad!, How I Met Your Mother, Kings, Taxi, Third Rock From The Sun, The Big Bang Theory, Royals, Poldark

Favorite musicals:

1. Show Boat

2. Fiddler on the Roof

3. Finian's Rainbow

4. Les Miserables

5. Chess

Other great ones: Little Shop of Horrors, Porgy and Bess