Fic Recs - Tony Stark Bingo Edition (1/?)

These are some of the Tony Stark bingo fills that have already been posted! Some stipulations:

• I mostly read sub 5k (and usually sub 4k if I'm honest) fics
  
• I mostly avoid any and all angst these days for mental health
  
• typically don't read much explicit fic these days
  
• Stony is a hard no
  
• as is Strange/Stark
  
• honestly i have a surprising number of eeehhh for tony ships
  
• if your fic isn't on this list, it's not because i hated it or whatever, these are just the fics that i had time to read and enjoyed and want to share!!!

Those out of the way, here's the ones I had time to read!!!

Cheesy Pick Up Lines by https://archiveofourown.org/users/tisfan/pseuds/tisfan - 865 words - Tony/Bucky preship, Modern fluff, Meet Cute -- Oh my goooodddd this is soooooo cute. I love the food truck puns, and Peter is cute and sassy and good. I also love Tony's running thoughts in this one, and feel like it really captures his voice!!

Performance Issues by tuesday - 1776 words - Peter Parker/Tony Stark - 5+1, Crack, Fluff, Sex Pollen (but no sex while under influence of said sex pollen), age gap, mature rating -- This is a fun bit of crack, and does a great job running with the concept of the universe wanting these two to bone but both of them finding ways to avoid it. Mind the tags, the warnings are at the bottom of the fic in an A/N instead of at the top, and otherwise have fun with this silly little romp through space.

Can't Cake my Eyes off You by mistrstank - 1759 words - Bucky Barnes/Tony Stark - Celebrity AU, baking fluff -- Tony is sooooooo hilariously clueless to how Bucky feels about him in this, and Bucky is going absolutely mad trying to get Tony to understand how much he cares about him. Bucky's also a youtube baker, and that on its own is pretty great. I love the little winks at canon--Bucky having been in a war, Tony's space fixation--while being its own self-contained little fluffverse.

(We are the ones)For Now by sleepoverwork - 1019 words - Pepper Potts/Tony Stark OR Pepper Potts & Tony Stark - nebulously canon adjacent, fluff, Pepper Potts is HBIC -- This is such such such a good Pepper Potts POV character study, and I wish we had more like this! It's so good, and we get a glimpse into just how much Pepper controls her surroundings. I also loved how it's so clear Tony thinks the moon and stars of Pepper even though it's not from his POV.

That's all for now!! I'll try and do another round up of these as more come up! There are, of course, more fics at the bingo's collection [here on ao3] and a lot of people putting forth great work, so definitely give it a read and see if you find something new you'll enjoy!!!

ETA: for like 2 seconds I had a link pointing to the wrong collection, it's been fixed!!

Book Review - The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South

[goodreads link]

This is probably one of the most important books I've read recently, and also, by nature of the subject, one of the hardest. Just reading the title should make it clear that this is ultimately a book deeply involved in the American slave trade--its history and its impact on Southern food culture.

I'm also not entirely sure how to write this particular review. I'm white, to start off, so even while reading this I've been wrestling with what to say and how to say it. Michael Twitty is also a professional, has done way more research than I've ever ever considered doing in my entire life, and this book is as much a semi-family biography as it is a history of African American food.

But he loves food. He loves Southern food, and food history, and the ways and whys and hows our shared food culture came to be, and I can understand that. So, to start, foremost:

If you have any interest in Southern food (and, thanks to that, African American food), you absolutely need to read this book.

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