u/Now-Thats-Podracing

My wife was only with one person before me. I had multiple partners before her. The thing is, I don’t ever speak about any of my exes unprompted, no matter what. My wife seems to always find a reason to bring her ex up.

For what it’s worth, she always brings him up in the negative. The thing is, whether negative or positive, I don’t want to bring up this subject. I’m not pretending that we were both virgins before we met, but I also don’t want to get into any details.

The things she randomly talks about:

- How short he was
- How rude he was
- How conceited he was
- How his penis was smaller than mine is
- How he was weird about not going down on her, or how he begged for blowjobs, or how he thought she was gross when she was on her period

I mean, everytime she brings him up, she is basically telling me that he sucks, and I’m great because I’m not like him. That’s cool, I guess. The first few times, I was ok with it. At this point, we’ve been together for 7 years and I just don’t want to hear about her ex anymore. I’ve told her this in both a nice way and then a firmer way when it kept happening. She told me that I’m being weird because she’s only saying how much better I am, or that I should have no issue since I have a larger body count. The thing is, I’ve literally never talked about any of my past partners ever unless she dragged it out of me.

Am I wrong to not want to hear about her ex anymore, even if he is only being brought up to put me in a better light?

I was thinking about Duke Waters from Path of Ascension. He’s not a MC, but he’s one of the most powerful characters and he’s just an insanely good water element user. Are there stories like that with the main character following that route?

It seems like every other story has the MC use void, or they can steal powers from their enemies (eg “hunger” in Cradle), or they can manipulate gravity, or… something. I like a strong MC. I’m even ok with an OP MC.

Are there some stories you recommend where the character is just a savant in something typical to their world?

I haven’t regularly carried cash in almost a decade. Even if I wanted to “give a dollar,” I can’t. I’m sure I’m not the only one. Is this affecting the part of the community that relies on handouts?

I’ve been in Memphis for 5 years, and I think I’ve met more Steelers fans (or seen more Steelers car stickers) than Titans or Saints or whatever. The few I’ve talked to are not from Pittsburgh or anywhere close. Why are there so many Steelers fans in Memphis?

I’m a big fan of Will of the Immortals. I mostly like how Leon is just a dude who means what he says and does what he promises. I’m really put off by books where the main character is constantly cracking (bad) jokes or where every interaction is an exercise in cringy irreverence.

Can anyone please recommend stories where the main character has more a no-nonsense/“journeyman” attitude? Preferably on Kindle Unlimited or Royal Road, but I’m open to anything.

Finally bit the bullet and got the Patreon so I could read the newest book. I’m jonesing for my fix, but I wasn’t sure when he normally posts new chapters.

I searched this sub to find the best audiobooks available to spend my surplus of credits on. I spent most of them on safe bets that I have not been let down by. However, I was surprised to find The Gray Man suggested fairly regularly. I took a chance and bought the first of the series.

I’m not going to give a long winded review, but I’ll say my piece as quickly as I can. The voice of the narrator makes me feel like he’s performing a melodrama. He gets better as the book goes on, but the first few chapters were awful to listen to. He goes from soap opera to serviceable, but never really gets “good.” The book itself is insane (in a good and bad way). The main character is supposed the be the greatest assassin in the world, because he’s oh so smart and talented. The author at least shows him to be talented, but he’s basically an idiot. Time and time again he does some crazy dumb shit that can’t just be explained by exhaustion. But man, the fight scenes are fun as all get out.

I was a fan of Bourne back in the day, but it got too cerebral without the weight it was going for. Jack Reacher was just plain awful, and I gave up on it immediately. I figured this series would be somewhere in the middle. I’m not really sure that it is.

Does the series get better, or should I cut my losses and stop after the first book?

Looking at getting a gaming laptop and don’t want to spend over $1000. Just found this one and its price dropped locally at my Walmart from $999 to $899.

i7-14650HX
RTX 5050
16GB DDR5

It looks good to me considering some of the other options I’ve seen online in my price range. Would love a second opinion, though.

Budget: $1000
Country: USA

I firmly believe in “show don’t tell,” so I was mostly on board with author, Alex Knowles, not holding the reader’s hand. However, there are parts of this book that are infuriating to piece together. It’s alluded to that the character Trayk did something awful to the character Ezra. There are hints dropped that she sold herself to him, or that he SAed her, or something. As far as I can tell, this is not resolved or explained, even though it’s played up as a major plot point that Ezra will “explain when she’s ready.” Can someone else tell me if they have a better understanding?

It’s hard to trust the context clues from the author, because he also has the MC talk about how he’s never been touched and how he’s never let anyone get close, then all of a sudden he has this tragic story about his ex girlfriend who betrayed him.