maharetr

Dear creator

Wed, 07 Jan 2026 04:32:44 GMT

Hi!

I freaking love this exchange, and I hope you're excited and/or not too whelmed, too! As always, if you have an idea for any of the fandoms/pairings here, and it doesn't clash with my DNWs, then go for it! I'm delighted with any rating and relationship (& or /) status, and as sexually explicit or as general-audiences as you want to go. I've got some preferences for some of the Original Works fandoms, but they're just that, preferences.

If you're after any pointers, see below. I got my sign up in with just enough time that I don't have much more to add, but I put it all here for completeness's sake. Good luck, and have fun!

General loves and DNWs are the same across all my fandoms, my NSFW feels are slightly more fandom-specific, so I'll put those under the respective cuts

LOVES, in no particular order
⦁ Slice of life
⦁ Treasured objects, imbued with Meaning for a character
⦁ Learning how to feel safe/regulated/noticing 'happy'
⦁ Cosy environments, especially making an environment cosy however that means for these specific characters
⦁ Rituals, esp finding comfort in them, (as opposed to an OCD-type tenseness)
⦁ Competency kink! Doubleplus so lovingly teaching someone else the skill
⦁ Those little in-jokes/shared experiences/history/emotionally intimate moments that observers don't know the significance of, but the characters *feel* it

DNWs
⦁ Characters feeling crestfallen, or getting their hopes up and having those hopes dashed without someone there to share in the feeling
⦁ Fatphobia

( Knives Out: wake up, dead man )

( Heated Rivalry )

Original Works
( Sex Worker in a Frontier Town/Daughter of the Local Preacher )

( Adventurer Newly Lost in a Sprawling Dungeon/Rival Adventurer Who's Been Lost Here A While )

( Lonely lighthouse keeper/Merperson trapped in a tidepool )

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Reading, inspired by actually finishing something and still having several things on the go

Fri, 11 Jul 2025 13:42:22 GMT

The incandescent by Emily Tesh. DAMN, girl can write. This was an impeccable love letter to teaching (in UK private schools, anyway), to teenagers, and to teachers. It's a very well done magic system, I appreciated the shit out of Saffy's character, and several moments were downright electrifyingly gripping. The ending, tho? Smidge too pat, and I'm bewildered about what happened to [redacted character] and their actual motivation. Anyone who's also read it feel like weighing-in in the comments? That aside, I loved being able to curl up in this world, and I'm sad it's over. I wavered back and forth on Tesh's novellas, but between Some desperate glory (real good, not perfect) and this (REAL good, 95% perfect), I'd definitely pick up the next thing she puts out.
Note: there's now epic spoilers in the comments, heads up.

Currently reading:
The hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy by Douglas Adams. Rereading, for Elle Cordova's patreon bookclub. First 10 or so pages in and I'd forgotten how sharp it is. It's a real pleasure.

All systems red by Martha Wells. I remember why I bounced off this the first time during Hugo reading. I totally believe that the writing gets much tighter as the series goes on, and I'm tempted to jump to either book four, as fred_mouse started there and said they had no problems doing so, or dive headfirst into the TV series. Probably the latter.

ETA: Have now watched ep1 of the series, and hells yeah, there's that worldbuilding and vibrancy that I was missing.

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Holiday plans

Wed, 11 Dec 2024 13:21:02 GMT

Okay, so I read here almost daily, and I keep having the itch to post and generally (it feels like) contribute to my cosy little nook that feels like my corner of Dreamwidth, and also freezing up when it comes to the idea of Making A Post(tm).

But! My annual leave has kicked in as of today, and I just remembered that Arcane is a thing that I've been meaning to catch up on, thank you gorgeous Tumblr gifsets. So!

My holiday plans, as I think of them:
- start watching Arcane (so less intimidating than 'watch' Arcane. Yeah, I don't get it either)
- catch up on the guy who was doing the Disco Elysium streaming, the substance abuse counselor who had some fucking fascinating takes on things. (-1 this step: figure out who that was again)
- hang out in the park with the dogs, once we stop having Fucking Heatwave Warning temps
- tune guitar and figure out where I was up to with the online video lessons
- read books! (Currently reading: The Teller of Small Fortunes, and it's not perfect, but it's solidly holding my attention, and I'm Charmed af by at least one character. I have Papergirls complete from the library, as well as Gina Chick's memoir 'We are all stars')
- pick up my drop spindle for the first time in ages
- catch up with friends in various ways

...And that's a post! Go me. How's everyone doing? <3

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Season of drabbles letter

Mon, 28 Oct 2024 13:47:09 GMT

I'm hoping I'm writing this before you see your assignment email, or that you've come back! See my dear creator tag for more details, especially about Bastard Son (etc), but here we go!

General DNWs I have a weirdly intense embarrassment-adjacent squick that basically goes: if you could describe a character as crestfallen, I'm going to struggle to read it. That goes double if it's not 200% fixed for the character in question before the end of the piece. I am here for angsty, definitely, and I love me some hurt/comfort. But I'd rather no graphic violence, rape, or major character death etc.

Disco Elysium. Oh god, I love so much of this game (the fatphobia a jarring, saddening exception). But I love Kim so much, and realising-he's-maybe-not-100%-straight, trying-to-sober-up Harry.

Idea sparks:
- sheltering somewhere together out of the weather in Martinase
- reserved, compartmentalising Kim letting Harry see all of him (his home, or sharing what lights him up, and/or his body).
- Harry figuring out how to have a life post-addiction and who he might want to be. Or figuring what/who he wants to be sober for, if he's not anywhere near post-addiction yet.
- Both or one of them figuring out how to be really, actually happy. I'm happy for a solo character study here, if you want.

Bastard son... uh, see here for possibly too many of my thoughts?

4'33" - John Cage (Song) I saw this on the fandom list and cackled with joy. So the point of this piece is that whatever you can hear over the next 4 and a half minutes *is* the music. Loosely. Wiki entry here.
Idea sparks:
- So someone's (your fandom fave? an OC?) sitting quietly. Where are they/what're they doing/why. What are they hearing and what are they making it mean?
- A person in an orchestra and/or the conductor making those four ish minutes really mean something to themselves (or the partner they're silently communicating with) I love me some non-verbal communication, in-jokes, and...I'm struggling to find the word for it at speed, but that language that develops between two people that makes sense to them alone.

Good luck! Feel free to use or discard any idea here, basically, and have fun!

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Reading notes

Sat, 05 Oct 2024 12:40:17 GMT

Finished reading
A question of age : women, ageing[,] and the forever self by Jacinta Parson. Mum read this one as an audiobook as her before sleep read, and recced this to me, and I'm really interested to hear what she got out of it. Reading it as a print book was probably much less enjoyable.

As someone who just turned 40, I'm starting to get very interested in engaging with ageing and what it means in our culture, and figuring out what it means to me personally. I am extremely here for whatever the 'forever self' might be. I have no fucking idea what it is, actually, having now read this book.

I'm used to non-fiction books that are either collections of essays with discrete points, or books that are chapters building on previous arguments. This was a book that purported to be the latter, but read like the former, and I found it immensely frustrating as a result. It made some really good starting points in each chapter that then...went nowhere. Seriously, this table of contents (Amazon link to the sample) looks so structured and Going Somewhere and argh. Each handful of pages makes a really entrancing point, that goes fucking hard reset into the next point that will have nothing to do with the one that came before it, or the one that comes after it, and reaches zero conclusions. I expected each element to relate to a time of life, but each introduction resets to her childhood memory of that element and then bounces all over the place.

It feels like this is the first draft of something that needs to have its core points written on sticky notes and reordered into an actual whole, and god, I really really want to read that. I am so sad its not that, and I can't tell if it's my own expectations, or if I'm trying to impose a structure on something that doesn't need it, or what. Ugh.

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Reading notes!

Sun, 22 Sep 2024 09:22:34 GMT

Finished reading
The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi by S.A. Chakraborty. This was FUN. I loved the take on demons, and really liked Amina and her crew. The latter parts of the supernatural elements felt as interesting and as consequential as a dream sequence (which is to say, not very), but the author made the 'recounting story to a scribe" WORK, in beautiful, effective hindsight, and she gets many kudos for that. I'll gladly pick up book 2, doubly so if there's a 'the story so far' refresher at the front.

Big magic by Elizabeth Gilbert. Filled with woo and vibes about being creative, but they're *impeccably* my woo and vibes. Read a library copy, and then turned around and went out and bought my own copy.

Nimona by ND Stevenson. I saw the movie first (which I LOVED), and it's hard to tell if I'm unfairly judging the original text by the one that came second, or if it's actually wobbly as a book. It *really* feels to me like a 'started, gonna see where this goes, hey!' web comic. Which it was! And isn't automatically a bad thing (see: Digger by Ursula Vernon, which I think was also this but didn't feel like it), but it kinda... I feel like the movie was better, because as a text it *had* to make coherent sense from the get go, whereas a pantsed web comic doesn't.

The moon of crusted snow by Waubgeshig Rice. Been on my TBR pile forever, finally got it from the library. This was...sadly inconsistent for me. Someone in reviews suggested it should be read more as a fable than as a post-apoca story, and that shift in thinking did help, post-read. A First Nations (North American) community is cut off from the rest of the world by a power outage that also affects the rest of probably the country. I'm still very torn on it in multiple directions. ( general thoughts, positive and negative. No real spoilers ) I'd be really interested in others' thoughts, if you've read it.

The reluctant hallelujah by Gabrielle Williams. This was an impulse secondhand bookshop buy. Australian YA. I was taken in by the title and the cover, and by the strong, assured teenage Aussie voice that was effortlessly rolling along the page. Teen girl goes on road trip to convey Secret of her parents, who have gone missing.

I finished it in three hours of holiday afternoon, and I would absolutely actively seek out more by this author and...did not like this particular book, thinking back on it. It started with a solid premise: parents haven't come home, they have a Secret that their teen has to deal with, and transport. Excellent premise. Except ( spoilers ) The MacGuffin could have been anything and the author went with...that, and also didn't touch it, but also it was such a good Australian teen voice and I am so *clutches hair and growls in frustration*.

Currently reading:
Diving back into Witch king by Martha Wells, which I'd gotten 70-odd pages into during Hugo reading and realised I wanted to savour rather than rush through for a deadline. Picking it back up has been remarkably difficult on the executive function, but I'm back in at page 40 or so, and finding the swing again.

A question of age: women, ageing and the forever self by Jacinta Parsons. Recced by my mum who did it as an audiobook. I have a library paperback, and it's...hmm. Is there a word for purple prose that's a totally different colour but also same vibe? idek. I want to support the idea very, very much and I'll definitely give it 50 pages (possibly 100 pages given the ease of the page layout) but I'm cautious.

Up next:
It's taken me this long to get back into the reading swing, I don't really want to jinx things, but maybe The artist's way by Julia Cameron.

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Hugos 2024 -- Novellette thoughts

Thu, 27 Jun 2024 12:49:40 GMT

Listed in the order I read them:

“The Year Without Sunshine” by Naomi Kritzer (Uncanny Magazine, November-December 2023) ( Read more... )

“One Man’s Treasure” by Sarah Pinsker (Uncanny Magazine, JanuaryFebruary 2023) ( Read more... )

“On the Fox Roads” by Nghi Vo (Tor.com 31 October 2023) ( Read more... )

“Ivy, Angelica, Bay” by C.L. Polk (Tor.com 8 December 2023) ( Read more... )

“Introduction to 2181 Overture, Second Edition”, Gu Shi /〈2181序曲〉再版导言, 顾适 translated by Emily Jin (Clarkesworld, February 2023)( Read more... )

I AM AI by Ai Jiang (Shortwave) ( Read more... )

( My current rankings for the category )

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Hugos 2024 -- Short story thoughts

Mon, 17 Jun 2024 13:03:00 GMT

Listed in the order I read them:

"The Sound of Children Screaming" by Rachael K. Jones (Nightmare Magazine, October 2023) ( Read more... )

"Better Living Through Algorithms" by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld May 2023) ( Read more... )

"How to Raise a Kraken in Your Bathtub" by P. Djèlí Clark (Uncanny Magazine, January-February 2023) ( Read more... )

"The Mausoleum’s Children" by Aliette de Bodard (Uncanny Magazine, May-June 2023) ( Read more... )

美食三品 (“Tasting the Future Delicacy Three Times”), 宝树 / Baoshu (银河边缘013：黑域密室 / Galaxy’s Edge Vol. 13: Secret Room in the Black Domain) ( Read more... )

"Answerless Journey", Han Song / 没有答案的航程, 韩松, translated by Alex Woodend (Adventures in Space: New Short stories by Chinese & English Science Fiction Writers).( Read more... )

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Hugo reading!

Tue, 11 Jun 2024 13:06:48 GMT

Finished reading
Translation state by Ann Leckie. ( Thoughts, any spoilers under cuts within )

Starter villain by John Scalzi. ( Thoughts, any spoilers under cuts within )

Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher. ( Thoughts, any spoilers under cuts within )

Put aside
Witch king by Martha Wells. I got about a fifth of the way into this and realised that I was really enjoying it, enough that I was already willing to rank it, and wanted to savour it rather than try and rush through it in the week I'd allocated each book. So I've put it aside and will get it out of the library again, probably post-Hugos at this point.

Currently reading
The adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty. It's been a kinda intense week and a bit for me, which probably explains why starting to read this made me feel so *tired*. I'm going to give it at least 50 pages and see if I can find a groove with it.

Up next
The saints of bright doors by Vajra Chandrasekera, which given that it seems about as dense, style wise, and I'm going to have to shell out for a WorldCon membership/Hugo voting packet regardless to get it, I might jump straight to the novellas as a palette/achievement cleanser first.

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Reading amnesty, of a sort

Mon, 20 May 2024 12:39:43 GMT

Reading amnesty!

Put aside
In ascension by Martin MacInnes
Described as Contact for the climate change era. I started it, and was very engaged and enjoying the quiet narration of the protagonist and the intensity of what was going down and what it was building towards. And then I put it down at a crucial point, and didn’t get back to it fast enough for those crucial details to stay in my brain, so it stayed put down, which is in no way the fault of the book. It would be nice to get back to it once I’m not furiously Hugo-finalist reading.

Finished reading
The tainted cup by Robert Jackson Bennett. This was an impulse library reserve that past-me had made, and by the time it came in present-me had no memory of why, which felt like a gift on several levels. It turned out to be fantastic. It felt like a sumptuous read: rich details, grounded world, and deep inside characters’ motivations and quirks. A fantasy-frame for a murder mystery detective novel, essentially. With a dyslexic-and-hiding-it male Watson and a female, also-neurodivergent Holmes, this was a good read, and will be going on my nomination ballot for next year’s Hugos, if I do shell out for voting rights this year.

Some desperate glory by Emily Tesh. I’d really wanted to love Tesh’s novellas but hadn’t, so I was delighted with how good this was, for all that the subject matter was grim. Kyr is part of the last outpost of humanity fighting against the aliens who destroyed Earth. Where this book took that, how fast it got there, and how it handled its characters’ fascism was both deep inside Kyr’s head and horrifying to the reader, with some very fun-to-me tropes to get Kyr to see it too. Happy to spoil in comments. The ending was slightly, slightly pat, but also made me smile on the last page, so 4.5 stars, and definitely going on my probable Hugo ballot.

Currently reading
Witch king by Martha Wells. Everyone loves Murderbot in a way that makes me want to give it another try, but this’ll do in the meantime. The quotes on the back give me no actual hints about what it’s about, and the lists of characters and their very, very similar names and titles are appreciated and exhausting, but the first few pages I got read on the bus are…yeah, yeah, okay, I’m here for it.

Up next
Translation state by Ann Leckie. I read Ancillary Justice, but it never quite sunk in for me like I’d hoped. Interested in reading this one as a nudged-by-the-Hugos.

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CandyHeartsExchange letter

Tue, 02 Jan 2024 13:08:06 GMT

Dear Candy Hearts Exchange creator!

Hi, welcome! It feels like it's been a bit since I did an exchange, and getting excited about writing again has been such a joy and relief. I hope you're feeling excited too :)

A lot of this letter is a consolidated copy of my sign up, as a heads up, with fandom-specific rambling (if you're not here for TLOU, I have equal amounts of love [and angst] for all my fandoms, it's just that TLOU was a big game, with much in the way to process...). Short version, though: if you have an idea, do a quick check against my DNWs, and run with it! Seriously, whatever you're excited to write will shine through, and I'd love to read it. If you're after any pointers, though, read on for details.

( General loves (as relevant)! )

( General fun sex times )

General DNW: Fatphobia. As a weirdly specific thing, I find it excruciating to see characters be crestfallen.

Fandoms!
( The Bastard Son and the Devil Himself )

( The Last of Us (Video Games) )

( Original Works )

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Reading update

Wed, 13 Sep 2023 13:19:10 GMT

Finished reading:
Sisters of the vast black by Lina Rather. Finished at last! I’d been spoiled for [thing], but that didn’t lessen my grim enjoyment of the plot when it finally arrived. I also didn’t see [other reveal] coming. I feel like I should have but I didn’t, and frankly kudos for that, author. I’d be tempted to keep reading the series, but all the reviews are talking about how the grim gets grimmer, which is very in line of where it was going, but also not somewhere I want to go myself right now.

How to keep house while you’re drowning by K.C. Davis. After having two people use the word lazy in genuine judgement (not at me!) in my presence within a few days of each other, I finally went looking for a sample of ‘Laziness does not exist’ which has been on my TBR for ages. It wasn’t quite what I was after, but the ‘readers also liked’ gave me the above, which was much more what I was after. This is about separating care tasks like housework, eating, and body cleaning from the framework of morality that so many, many people have them embedded in. The book’s designed for people who have ADHD/depression/grief, and who are generally struggling. I’m struggling way less than that general audience, and it’s a very short, very quick read. I still feel like this book lightly rocked my world’s foundations, and improved it in subtle but profound ways.

( Choice quotes )

There’s also several incredibly important chapters on rest: the right to rest, the necessity of rest, and the fact that housework task balance in a relationship/household isn’t about who does the tasks, but the importance of everyone getting the amount of rest they need.

Highly recced. As someone on goodreads reviewed: ‘Short, sweet, and validating as fuck.”

Raven, graphic novel by Kami Garcia, illustrated by Gabriel Picolo. I read this because Beast boy kept bumping onto my radar as a Cool Thing, but it was second in a series, Raven is first, and I’m a completionist to my bones. There’s a really fantastic story here that either would have been better served as a traditional prose novel, or as a substantially expanded graphic novel. We get introduced to Raven as she’s involved in a car accident that kills her foster mother. She gets family-fostered into her aunt’s care, and that and her amnesia left me utterly floundering. The references to her mom left me floundering: her foster mom or her birth mom? I had no grounding in who she was before the accident, and only a vague sense of her personality by the end of the novel. There was so much going on with family history, powers, and baddies that as someone who was coming to it utterly cold, I only had the barest of grips on by the end of the book. Left me wanting a much deeper story.

Beast boy by Kami Garcia, illustrated by Gabriel Picolo. I’d been attracted by the opening pages (funny, charming, really good sense of interiority), and by someone’s tumblr screencap of a found family drawn from a neat camera angle. This was much, much better grounded, helped by Gar’s family, friends, and a full set of memories. Also it’s a much more traditional superhero comes into their own narrative, which helps, but it took nearly a month of not-really reading Raven vs three days of reading Beast boy, which feels like a shame.

Currently reading:
How to do the work by Nicole LePera. Got interested in her work via her Twitter account. This is a mix of working through trauma, soothing the body, developing better relationships with yourself and others type stuff. So far it’s a mix of ‘I knew 80% of that, but the rest of the 20% is new and hella useful’, and ‘oooof’ E.g. I know a fair amount about staying present and grounded so that wasn’t too challenging, but goddamn am I bracing myself for some ego work.

At 52% this a cautious rec so far: plenty of good stuff in here, but there’s also a really hefty thread of ‘yoga solved all my client’s problems!’ and also sincere plugging of intermittent fasting to ‘give your digestive system a break’, which… *makes very sour face*. So, rec, with caveats.

Didn’t finish:
Wolfsong by T. J. Klune. I nudged myself into reading the last chapter to see if I wanted to read the intervening 100-odd pages, and the answer was actually, no. Sadly, but no.

Up next:
- The ladies of Grace Adieu. having another go at it as bedtime/book-book reading.
- One of the many, many epubs I got from the Hugo voter’s packet. Probably the short stories and working up to the longer.

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Wednesday (ish) reading

Thu, 03 Aug 2023 13:43:26 GMT

Currently reading:

Wolfsong by TJ Klune. This is a ‘beloved friend thrust this into my hands’ type acquisition. I’ve had a rough time with Klune’s works. On one hand, his worldbuilding is spectacular, his first third, frequently his two-thirds of his novels are amazing and gripping and filled with feels… and then he’s yet to close it out for me. The romances he establishes don’t seem to have the same carry through as the rest of his work. Or they don’t for me, which as someone who doesn’t read romances on the whole, but who wants to be swept off my feet, feels doubly saddening.

This is a werewolf pack story (a/b/o minus the kinky sex so far), with a very emotionally stilted style that actually really works for its emotionally stilted main character. It’s also tightly written down to its bare bones of scene setting; it gets in and out of its scenes at speed, conveying exactly whatever it needs to and then bailing to the next scene. That…sort of works for it. It makes it difficult to connect properly with the characters, but it makes it an easy read. I gave it my ‘first 50 pages to do something that engages me’ which it did. And then ’50 pages after we finish the main events of the blurb to keep me reading’ which it kinda did. It gave me snippets of emotional intensity, and/or genuinely funny beats. The main character is kept entirely on the sidelines of what feels like the main action for the entire novel so far (360 pages of 560) to the point where the reader is also only introduced to it in that ‘we have two baddies with the same initial that we’ve barely met’ and…ugh. Writing this up, I’m not sure why I’m still reading, other than sunk costs. Acknowledging that is apparently still not quite enough to make me stop. *facepalm*

Sisters of the vast black by Linda Rather. Nuns in space. Attempt number…three? This consistently felt like way too many characters for a novella. Once I stopped trying to keep them straight in my head, and just pressed on with it instead, I got to some interesting things and some very neat world building. Probably going to finish it this time, although I was foolish enough to skim goodreads about it at 60%ish and promptly got brutally spoiled by the summary. More *faceplaming*

…It’s a weird feeling to be in a reading rut while reading. Better than the previous non-reading rut, I guess.

Up next:
Even though I knew the end by C.L. Polk, as a phone read. I lightly bounced off Witchmark despite the gorgeous cover and moderately intriguing worldbuilding (from memory the relationship that was getting established didn’t click for me). But 150ish pages and done, I’m willing to give a shot. Or at least a sample shot.

The ladies of Grace Audeiu by Susanna Clarke as a physical read. Short stories, with a very measured, comfortingly confident opening. I have tentative hope I’m going to enjoy it.

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Reading Wednesday (aka the last...year? ish?)

Wed, 07 Jun 2023 12:11:57 GMT

Finished reading
Accidentally Kelly Street by Briony Stewart. An illustrated picture book of the lyrics to said song by Frente. Illustrated (and therefore essentially, composed as a new story) by someone I went to uni with. I have weirdly strong memories of the video clip and the song, and the illustrator has turned the lyrics into this gorgeously lit, utterly coherent, completely different narrative of a story. Do rec.

The spear cuts through water by Simon Jimenez. A library ebook, the first in a long while. Picked up based on Abigail Nussembaum's review here This is doing fascinating things with point of view (first, second, and third), and is also at points, grippingly terrifying. Several characters are introduced as bracing themselves to challenge the evil throne, essentially, and I was nauseated for all of them (it's pretty damn violent in places). It's 550ish dense pages, which took a good six weeks to finish, and I was very grateful to whoever it was who reserved the ebook after me and then immediately decided 'nah' and returned it, so I an essentially unbroken string of renew, and renew, and--. I feel like the final third could have perhaps been foregrounded a little better, but it's still a really, really strong novel. De rec.

Small game by Blair Braverman VERY interested based on this review. Turns out I fucking inhaled this one -- 300ish phone ebook pages in three days, done and dusted. Harrowing and realistic, this is a very sparse, clipped writing style which teetered on that knife-edge of 'not good', and *yet*... I could not stop reading, and also started thinking in that voice, and kinda want it read it again in a 'I'm not ready to leave yet' sort of way. I think on balance that makes it very, very good.

Currently reading:
The gifts of imperfection by Brene Brown. I bought this paperback years ago after watching her vulnerability TedTalk, and bounced off it at the time. In retrospect, I can see why: this is both challenging as fuck, and also a speed run of a bunch of in-depth concepts. It reads like a workbook of a much larger course. Which isn't a bad thing, honestly -- it's a quick read (having said that, I'm yet to finish it, having put it aside after I went back to work), but I'm very glad I went into it with both her TedTalk several times over, and several years of therapy under my belt so I already had the shape of what she was talking about.

It was also challenging enough that in the few weeks since putting it down and writing this up, I had entirely forgotten the chapter titles. It feels like one of those therapy sessions where we were going somewhere deep and frankly threatening or core enough that I lightly...forgot. Hard. I do know I've left some page markers in a 'come back and engage again later' and I think I remember what those were?

The sisters of the vast black by Lina Rather. An ebook novella I bought ages back for the promise of queer nuns in space. I don't actually know *what* I was expecting from those tags, exactly. This is well written and slightly less gripping than I'd hoped (but that's also hampered by my sporadic reading style). Many feelings-points for the description of the woman reading her love's letter, and savouring the warmth of the tablet she's reading it on like an embrace. I'm restarting because I didn't get that far into it the first time, and it's been long enough since I picked it up that I can't remember the first 20 pages, actually.

The dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin. About 25 pages in, physical paperback. This has been on my 'should read' list for years. I remember bouncing off 'The left hand of darkness' in my mid 20s becuase I in no way understood what I was reading or what was going on. This one, I've either grown up a bit, or it's less dense-of-concept. Either way, I'm relieved, and it's making me chuckle, even.

Up next:
The ladies of Grace Adieu and other stories by Susanna Clarke. Absolutely captivated by File770's spruiking of the opening pages.
Even Though I Knew the End, C.L. Polk - Nebula novella that I saw a very good review of that I now can't find.
“If You Find Yourself Speaking to God, Address God with the Informal You”, John Chu -- Ditto novelette, including on the review front.

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A little contribution of a post

Mon, 10 Apr 2023 13:34:29 GMT

This is me walking in quietly and sitting in the corner. Much has happened, and is happening, but y'know. Books.

I've finished-read a few things, or read samples a bunch more. We did a bunch of reading a work and I've brought home almost the entire Discworld collection and have it under my bed. I'd read most of the Death books in high school, and many of the Witches books in young adulthood, so now it's time for the City Watch.

Guards, Guards! I think this was a re-read, but t's long enough ago that it barely counts. I was very charmed by this. Epic kudos for the first proper appearance of the dragon over the city -- I felt the weight of that take-off, and the physicality of that dragon, holy hell.

Men at arms which I've just started. I don't think I've read this one at all, which is exciting, but it also seems heavy on the 'white cis guy grappling with the first wave of affirmative action' and oh, boy. I'm not sure I want to read something where I'm likely to be bracing for what are now Very Tired Jokes, and missteps, and, and. Ugh. Is it better than I fear?

I've also sorted a pile of books that have been lurking invisibly in my room for a very long time. Sorted into 'definite keeps', 'op-shop run', and 'read the first fifty pages while on holidays'. I'm so fucking grateful for the holidays, oh my god.

Hi, everyone. It's good to be back. How you all doing?

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Dear creator!

Fri, 06 Jan 2023 13:48:16 GMT

( Here be some very specific The Last of Us fic ideas and thoughts if we matched here in the Candy Hearts Exchange )

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I live!

Thu, 11 Aug 2022 14:30:56 GMT

(AKA I've gradually started reading again, and even more slowly am getting my shit together to make notes about it again. Actually, the push has been that I want to get some of my thoughts out about Stay and fight before I finish it. Also I wanted to be pissed about Orson Scott Card in multiple venues. Motivation is motivation, whatever its form, I guess?)

DNF
Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card. I know we all hate the bigot, but I was weak; it was a library copy, and I was craving a phat fantasy/sci-fi to fall into and this had so many things that I love: generation ships! Post-apoca! TIME TRAVEL!

But in the first 15 pages the MC's dad is killed (fine), and the death scene is one of the most strangely non-described, distantly written things I've read. Father (who is an established pompous ass) is trapped under a fallen tree, apparently impaled by branches, and asks his son not to look…but we have no idea what his son looks at instead, and father keeps talking in exactly the same lengthy uninterrupted sentences with no sign of pain. Also the son is a trapper of animals, and would know exactly what punctured intestines would smell like. There were So Many missed opportunities to ground the scene that I'm like "do you even care what you're writing?". I put the book down in cranky and googled "is the dad actually dead?" because there's no freaking body. (Spoiler: he's intended to be dead). I'm so sad that I won't get to the neat time travel and generation ships, but wow is it not worth the grinding frustration of "this could have been good, dammit."

Finished reading!
The witness for the dead by Katherine Addison. Reading the goblin emperor world such a weird experience for me. I can mostly catch up with how the world and its structures work, but people's names and titles are so unfamiliar to me that they don't stick. I'm not reading for the plot, I'm just such a profound sucker for 'emotional intimacy within formal structures' (“We thank you for that which the Serenity does not do” lives rent-free in my brain, forever), that I'm willing to read an entire novel with the literary equivalent of intense faceblindness, just for those moments. I'm buying the sequel, grim topic and everything.

Currently reading:
Stay and fight by Madeline Ffitch. This was…entirely as pitched by this Tiktok: https://www.carsales.com.au/cars/holden/cruze/suv-bodystyle/, but that doesn’t make it a comfortable read. It's a realistically grim look at what off-the-grid subsistence living is like, but also none of the main characters seem to like each other, which, again, grimly realistic, but it makes for an uncomfortable read. I actually paused reading for a long time when the external conflict looked like it was about to turn up, because I didn't want to see things get even *worse*.

I picked it back up, eventually, and when the external forces arrived, it was both a surprise to me that the author went there and also entirely real-world realistic and an important point to make, that I was genuinely impressed.

I've got less than 100 pages to go, and I'm legit transfixed. The last hundred pages also includes a C-plot relationship section that has me "THAT, I wanna learn how to write that love" (two similar-aged, non-related men, father and middle-aged-son dynamic, ‘son’ desperately loving the grouchy older man and wanting to make things good for him, and neither of them able to articulate a fucking word, and that’s fine). She’s also doing amazingly, in retrospect, in constructing brutally human, warts-and-all relationships. I very want to know how she's going to finish this novel, given she's pulled zero punches so far, and I can't see how this is going to end well, but but I want it to. Goodreads reviews suggests she doesn't pull off whatever she's aiming for, but the writing is so good on a sentence level, still.

Up next:
Take two of the giant fantasy, due in a few weeks:
Babel https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57945316-babel-or-the-necessity-of-violence -- gonna try the excerpt of this, at least.

The grief of stones by Katherine Addison. Sequel to Witness. Bundled up in my order with the two below books, waiting for all three to arrive.

Psalm to the wild-built by Becky Chambers. I have a bounce-around relationship with Chambers’ works, but this one hit alllll of my comfort buttons in a row. (a re-read, I’m purchasing my own expensive copy after doing a library loan read) Entirely character-driven utopia. Nothing happens for an entire novella and I love it so, so much. $50 for a hardback novella much.

A prayer for the crown-shy, the sequel to the above.

Ten steps to Nanette by Hannah Gadsby. Nanette the show destroyed me in the best way. I’m equal keen/scared to read this probably as an ebook, and as I’m waiting for the other three above to arrive as a job lot, this will probably be first off the rank.

Oh, oh, and poetry books, incoming from Dymocks sometime maybe even this week. Ada Limon’s Dead bright things and The carrying: poems.

…I’ve been on a bit of a book-buying bender, I guess. Just a very slow, none-of-them-are-published yet bender.

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Dear Chocolate Box creator!

Tue, 04 Jan 2022 12:39:54 GMT

Hi! I love this time of year! I'm so excited to see what you'll come up with! :D

Concept ideas, from last year's letter: I've got a lightly rotating list from my dear creator/writer tags that you're welcome to check out. For a challenge like this, where the emphasis is a little more on 'short and sweet', I'm very here for, say, a sex/afterglow scene that showcases the characters, or something else utterly mundane to hang a moment on (cooking a meal, sharpening a weapon, making something). No need for anything convoluted or intricate (unless you're into that ;)) Feel free to grab a concept from another fandom/prompt here and apply it to whatever we matched on, too.

Mood Likes
Looking at my fandom list, and with maybe one exception, I'm all about people being safe and happy this year, or at least safe and happy for the space of the work.

General loves:
- People being immensely competent at something, (and also kind in teaching others).

- Hurt/comfort, both emotional and physical, especially after some sort of trauma. Finding a new/better/different way to be in the world after wrenching change.

- That Oh romance moment – either startling realisation of "I'm in love with them", or esp in already established relationships – where Character A looks at B and thinks: I adore you.

- Characters shaving/brushing hair/tending to each other as quiet acts of devotion or service. Esp if one can't do it themselves because of injury etc, but also just because maybe they're exhausted or had a bad day, and having someone take care of you is deeply soothing.

- Having or making cosy/habitable spaces esp in post-apoca settings or settings of scarcity: no stable home, or in the middle of a ruin etc)

( Sex Likes )

DNWs
- Fatphobia, specifically. Show any/all larger characters the love and respect and joy in their own skin that they deserve as people, pls. I'm okay with a little homophobia, transphobia, racism, ableism, sexism etc, should the muse take you that way, as long as it's refuted/scoffed at by the characters it's directed at.

- Prefer no pet/familiar death (killing animals for food is fine).

- About the only hard limit I've got aside from fatphobia is characters getting their hopes up and then getting those hopes dashed (basically, if you could describe a character as 'crestfallen' I'm going to be unable to keep reading, unless I know it turns out all okay in the end, or that the character gets to process it properly. Yeah, I don't know why, either. I think it's a weird mutation of an embarrassment squick).

( Fandoms! )

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Reading! Back again at last

Thu, 16 Sep 2021 13:24:12 GMT

God, I burned out on Hugo reading real hard/early this year, it seems. Or maybe it was right on time, and it's the later con start date that's fritzing things.

Finished reading:
Girls of paper and fire by Natasha Ngan. I inhaled this in a week. The tension really does ratchet up excellently. The romance honestly made about as much sense as the average 'girl falls for mysterious boy', which I can't complain about. I did like Wren as a character. I can't tell if the book is actually disserved by being YA, or if I was just interested in something it was never going to cover, regardless (exploring what intimacy was like after assault).

The galaxy and the ground within by Becky Chambers. My reading of this is so all over the place. It took 100 pages for the story to move out of territory covered the in the blurb, and after it did, I felt like I was sorely lacking for reasons to keep reading. There was a deeply touching moment or two (Tupo and their museum was a particular highlight), but then there were long stretches of not much. Then the denouement hits for each character, and they are (for the most part) breathtakingly perfect, so clearly something worked in the preceding pages, but I'm at a loss to what it was. I want Roveg's story in its entirety, though. And actually, Speaker and Tracker's story, and their people. Thinking back, this felt like a novel-length short story, which is…awkward. Okay! But I wanted to read about these characters in different places than Chambers's wanted to put them.

Avoiding the aging parent trap by Brian Herd. An impulse reserve from the library, by an Australian family lawyer. I'm 60 quick pages in an don't feel like I've learned much, but it's also still in the ground-setting territory, and I'm an only child of an only child, so a lot of the 'bury your sibling hatchet for the sake of your parents' doesn't apply here. It sounds like solid-enough advice for them, though.
Now Finished: Heh. This was somewhat useful. The information about who owns what, and who will get what in which circumstances, was valuable. Also the "get legal advice before you do anything big or even medium-sized in relation to elder care or changing wills or selling anything" advice was very effectively driven home, esp in Australian-specific context. Centrelink doesn't care if you gift away your million dollar lotto win to charity; it still counts as your asset for five years. Ouch.

That said, Big Sky Publishing better be a cover for some guy working out of his study/garage, or I'm gonna be judging them super harshly. The copyediting (children's', ouch) and editing left a lot to be desired, and any half-decent editor should have pulled him up on exposing his biases, and get him to tone down his snideness.

Currently reading:
One last stop by Casey McQuiston. A library reserve, gleefully made while the book was still on order. I've read the first few pages, and it's tight and funny. I'm not sure if I'll be able to keep up with its style for hundreds and hundreds of pages, but I'm keen to have a go.

At p175 or so: This was a really good example of (…upping the ante? I'm not sure what term I'm looking for here). But when characters hit the point that I the reader knew about from the blurb, I had QUESTIONS, (with literally that much wide-eyedness interest), and kept reading. The wheels are starting to spin just a little bit, and the 'oh! I can never tell her how I feel about her!' is starting to grate, but I'm also reasonably sure the ante is about to up again, so I'm interestedly sticking it out.

Up next:
I now have a copy of Witness for the dead (Goblin Emperor companion book) by Katherine Addison. It's slimmer than I realized, and so, so pretty and nice to hold in hardback. I'm technically currently reading it, but it's much, much slower going, and requires much more brain power per page, so I'm just dipping in and out atm.

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Reading meme

Sun, 04 Jul 2021 09:06:26 GMT

Wow, does it feel like I burned out on Hugo reading early this year. I stalled out on The city we became, and am now craving something to curl up with and savour slowly over a long period of time, with zero deadlines.

Finished reading
Frog and Toad's storybook treasury by Arnold Loebel. I sought this one out based on the charming Frog and Toad Twitter bot. I started by reading it silently to myself, but that felt much too fast. I switched to reading it aloud to black_samvara over several nights, and that was absolutely the way to do it.

The Frog and Toad series is an early reader for 6-7 year old kids, and I'm surprised—probably shouldn't be—but am so impressed by now good it is at that. The word choice, the ways to create repetition and the gentle themes that also legit made me laugh out loud…goddamn.

Knowing that Loebel was queer makes the underlying theme ache all that much sweeter. They were together. They were happy. They were happy together. It low-key destroys me when I think about it too much.

Homesick by Nini Capri. Finishing off the final story, in this case a novella. It's character-strong, rather than plot or concept, which is making for some heartstring tugging moments but is also making it slow going. I finally, finally finished it, and it took me a while to realise why the last one dragged so long while I finished all the other stories At Speed: this particular novella (novelette?) didn't pose me any questions that I wanted answers to. The rest offered immediate, urgent: 'what the fuck is going on?' 'what the fuck is going to happen?' The rest of them, in fact, keep the last one from dragging the collection down; still a 5/5 read.

Currently reading
Girls of paper and fire by Natasha Ngan. Impulse library pickup, for the pretty cover and the Goodreads memory that it was queer, written by an author of colour, and dealt sensitively with its grim, fantasy-shaded themes of sexual assault. I'm about 80 pages in, and it's a compelling, smooth read so far.

Up next:
I desperately want to get my hands on The witness for the dead by Katherine Addison (companion to The goblin emperor), but it's in the expensive hardback import category.

Much closer to home is The galaxy and the ground within, Becky Chambers's last in the Wayfarer series. I've reserved the library copy, which is overdue, which makes it so close and so far…

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Hugo reading

Fri, 28 May 2021 11:38:05 GMT

Finished reading:
Black sun by Rebecca Roanhorse. Having finished it, and having had a day or two to digest it, I like it more and more. It was well structured, and everything wove together well. I was slightly peeved that ( spoiler ), which somehow made it feel like not enough things were resolved to justify ending the novel when it did. An even more minor peeve was the use of xie/xer pronouns instead of they/them, which, after someone pointed out it makes gender neutral characters sound like literal aliens, I cannot unsee.

Her writing style—distanced and somewhat heavy on the telling—isn't my favourite, but it got the job done. The worldbuilding is evocative and interesting and new, and I ended up liking or at least being interested in a bunch of the characters. I'm interested enough in them and their new world order to consider picking up the sequel, which is an achievement in and of itself. It might even be new and fresh enough to bump Piranesi off the top of my ballot. Maybe.

Currently reading:
Cemetery boys by Aiden Thomas. mmm. This is published through Swoon Reads, a 'submit your manuscript for public voting! Most popular gets published!' outfit, which, oh boy. It feels like it, too, and that's not a compliment of its opening pages. I am extremely here for a Mexican ghost (a la Coco) romance story with a trans MC. Like, so very yes please. But I'm hoping very much that it smooths out.

Up next:
The city we became N. K. Jeminsin. I (re)read the first few pages (again) and FUCK, they're good. Hits the ground running with character and place and voice. So, so good.

General Hugo musings, for what they're worth
I liked Calculating Stars well enough, but reading Fated Stars somehow just feels like homework. Goodreads says I can jump straight to giving The Relentless Moon a go, which honestly is attractive.

Harrow the Ninth. I bounced so fucking hard off Gideon the Eighth, I can't even. I'm very here for orphan outcast, including orphan outcast raised entirely in a society that grinds her into the ground for being different. But one that somehow maintains a sense of defiant self, and a self of self so apparently outside the culture, really, really threw me. That said, skimming goodreads and opening the sample…I like this. I really fucking like this. FINE. I'll give Gideon another go.

Murderbot. I expected the first novella to grab me, and it just…didn't. I want to give the series another go, though. Goodreads says to read the second one, and then it's safe to jump to the novel, so I'm going to try that.

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Hugo-ish reading update

Sun, 23 May 2021 11:57:47 GMT

Put aside
Elatsoe by Darcie Little Badger. Read the first 30 pages on the bus on the way home, and haven't gone back to it yet, although I do plan to give it the first 50. Most reviews on goodreads adore this, but a handful were like: "this reads much younger than it's actually pitched" and man, it…really does so far. The art style, the voice, the character urgently riding her bike somewhere, and later meeting her friend at the mall… Would make an excellent 14 yr old protagonist, but she's written as 17, and it's throwing me. I'm not yet sold on the 'find the truth of a family member's death' yet either.
Update: never got back to it, and as someone had reserved it, I returned it to the library without much of a pang. Politely leaving off my ballot, I guess.

Finished reading:
Finished-not-really: with one story to go, it's on the backburner while I read library books, so…

Homesick: stories by Nino Cipri. With one story to go, holy SHIT this was SO GOOD. Seven short stories. Several genuinely scary ("Dead air", I'm looking at you), all funny and tightly written. I would read the hell out of "Shape of my name" (time travel! trans character!) as an entire novel. I'd also love to read "Presque Vu" is another one I'd read as an entire novel (spirits/ghosts have started appearing everywhere, and have started haunting people in bizarre ways).

"Presque Vu" also had the amazing moment of a joke that had me (and the main character) laughing out loud as the side character who inadvertently delivered it, blinks and says "wait, why are you laughing?" Like, impressively good shit.

Legendborn by Tracy Deonn. Also finalist for the YA-not-Hugo. Read the first 50 pages, was willing to give it another 50, and now I'm nearly 200 in. I'm genuinely interested in Brianna's story, and finding out what happened to her mother (this 'find the truth of a family member's death' is working for me), being Black in an all-white, old-money, old-magic secret society, and in who her mother was.

I'm interested enough that I'm willing to slog through the "…would they really be telling her allll this Secret Society information?" exposition dumps. There's the occasional motivation silence (it was not at all clear how much she knew and what her initial intentions were when she rocked up to said Secret Society and knocked on the door, for example), but the main character's overarching goal is very clear, and there's enough moments of shining captivation (her meeting her new psych was excellent). I'm not entirely sure I'm going to make it through all 500 pages, but I look forward to picking it up each time which is a feeling I haven't had a while. So far, going on the ballot at the very least.

Updated with about 100 pages to go: It's an impressive debut, and I can see how it'd be a fantastic read if you'd become invested in the secret society, but I really, really wasn't. I was extremely here for Brianna, her grief, her mother, the friend with they/them pronouns, and the whole mother-related storyline, but that felt like less than 200 pages worth of a 500-page book. I'm at a bit of a sad loss as to why it needed to be that long, and that was 500 pages of the smallest published font I've seen in some time. Going on the ballot, though.

Currently reading:
Black sun by Rebecca Roanhorse. WELP, heads up for maiming of a child by a parent. It's the first chapter, and describes how said mentioned-on-the-blurb character became the way he is. It's skip-able if need be, and probably easier to read if you know the shape of it going in, but it was harrowing to come to cold.

21 May Update: I hadn't been hooked by page 50, but the opening had been so harrowingly effective that I decided to give it to page 100, and it finally clicked for me on page 77ish. I'm extremely here for Xiala (bisexual mermaid sea captain!) and Seraipo and the story of the sea crossing. I care not at all about the Sky Temple whatevers, which might be a problem later as those stories are about to collide. But this is a fast, easy read, and I'm happy enough to roll along with it.

Up next:
Cemetery boys by Aiden Thomas has been on my radar for what feels like aaaages (read: a year, but it was 2020, so like, a decade), and now grabbed it from the library because not-a-hugo finalist.

The city we became by N K Jemisin. I feel like I've started the ebook sample several times, and was both entranced but also somehow never finished said sample. I'm hoping the physical book from the library will help.

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March (...and April) reading

Sat, 17 Apr 2021 02:56:51 GMT

Finished reading:

The good thief by Hannah Tinti. I really enjoyed her writing style, but then ending sort of wobbled for me. I'd interestedly pick up something else by this author, though.

Piranesi by Susanne Clarke. Oh man. This really is a book I want to reread so I can watch it unfold with my newfound knowledge. Not that Clark did anything startlingly unexpected or novel, but there feels like an immense satisfaction knowing ….ugh. All of it. Trying to put it into works feels like diminishing it into simplistic concepts, but that doesn't help when you're trying to describe it to someone else. As someone who likes books where not much happens? It's good, it's very good. It's not perfect (heads up for not-great queer rep, and also a single paragraph of entirely unnecessary fatphobia), but despite those flaws, it still managed to make me feel immensely peaceful and more secure in the world, so there is that.

Silver in the wood by Emily Tesh Argh. I want to like this so much! This is exactly the sort of story I want to have written! Forest spirits, and forest protector! Multiple types of masculinity, and a queer relationship! But damn. It desperately needs another edit (it's readable! But *makes face*), and the first part of it feels so rushed. I know it's a novella so probably had word count limits, but I really wanted another thousand words to be able to settle into the setting, and then a few more thousand to establish the antagonist properly. I've just started the second half. I love Mrs. Silver already, but idk if she's going to be enough to negate the fact that the first half was a lot of manly-man walking around the forest using a crossbow to kill explicitly-female dryads, and an off-screen human woman described as an ogress for being allegedly overbearing. I'm still reading, but I'm grieving what could have been, and not yet planning to pick up the sequel.

Having now finished it: I rescind the ogress complaint: Mrs. Silver was the GREATEST! But I was left so frustrated and grieving what could have been if the narrative as a whole had been given enough words to breathe. All of it just felt too rushed. :( Not getting the sequel.

“A Guide for Working Breeds” by Vina Jie-Min Prasad. Short story finalist for this year's Nebulas, which was how I stumbled over it, and now Hugo finalist too! This was laugh out loud funny, and still makes me smile. Robots and their robot mentors.

Finna by Nino Cipri (novella) Recced by fredmouse <3. I was utterly charmed by this. I wanted (and still want) more relationship grounding—I know they just broke up, but I wanted to feel what they'd lost—but the ending felt more and more right the longer I sat with it, which is a kudos in its own right. I'm glad it made the Hugo shortlist. I'm expecting something else to be better than it, honestly, but it's a worthy contender.

Klara and the sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. I read Never let me go after seeing the trailer for the movie, which means that I went into that particular book not even realising there was a twist to be slowly, horrifyingly revealed. Of all the books I wish I could (re)read cold for the first time, that book is on the top of the list. So I went into Klara very interested and as cold as possible. I read this over a weekend, ( general, mostly feelings-based spoilers )

The murders of Molly Southborne by Tade Thompson. Holy shit. Passed on to me from fredmouse via chaosmanor. chaosmanor also passed on that it was full of gore and body horror, and confusing, but if I could make it through the first chapter I'd be fine. I knew starting this at night was not a great idea, but I did it anyway, absently picking it up this (Tuesday) evening and started reading the first few pages curiously, on my feet. I figured I could stop should it start to get too creepy. I read it straight through in one sitting, and okay, it helped that it was only 117 short pages, but STILL.

( One tiny detail that I wish had been addressed ) Regardless, I was entirely willing to roll with both the opening and the premise, and still wasn't quite sharp enough to twig to how it pulled together, and goddamn, that was an EXCELLENT use of a novella, and the ending was fucking great. Thinking about it, the writing style/voice feels like The queen's gambit, and it works really, really well for it: that tight third person of someone who's outside the mainstream world but also knows shit.

Epic heads up for body horror and gore and violence, tho. I don't know that I'd want to consume a steady diet of said, and I'll…probably be okay sleeping tonight, but I can see how other people wouldn't be.

The dictionary of lost words by Pip Williams. In 1901, the word 'Bondmaid' was discovered missing from the Oxford English Dictionary. This is the story of the girl who stole it. This was both excellently written and frustrating in tiny, sharp, specific ways. This was so cosy in a white, middle-class British way that I kind of squirm at how much I enjoyed it, but I did. I did keep muttering 'where are the queers? Where are they?' Once I realised the live-together-forever sisters were fictionalized takes on actual historical real people, I relaxed a little, but still, a narrative that included positive feelings towards (former) sex workers, and the stories of working-class people of colour, the silence around queers felt…loud.

The author wanted to tell the stories of women and the women's words that had been excluded from the literal record of the dictionary, and she did a good job there, using a fictional woman to channel that, including several common grief-experiences that hit really well and hard, like, the author is good at this, but the author also for some reason intentionally dodged several moments of emotional impact. Like, it feels very distinctly like the author didn't feel like her fictional character was allowed to make active choices. The story of her life still works, but as a writer, I was left blinking that a few scenes were missing crucial sentences that would have allowed the character to be a fully rounded person, and been immensely emotionally satisfying for (this) reader, and argh. I critique because I liked? I guess? And am also taking notes for my own writing.

DNF:

When rain turns to snow by Jane Godwin. Australian YA. A boy turns up on a girl's doorstep with an infant child. I was tempted into this one by the lyrical writing (for lovers of Fiona Wood indeed <3) and the authentic teenage-Australian voice. I rage-quit at page 50-70 or so when I realised that most of the book was going to be these very young teenagers ineptly not-properly caring for an ill infant and actively not telling an adult (MC's mum is Right There, to be told and for administering life-sustaining care, jfc) for a hundred plus pages and fuck no. Tween/teen me probably would have liked it, but apparently adult-me Cannot. Will Not. Nope.

Currently reading:

Homesick by Nino Cipri. (also from fredmouse) I'm two and half short stories into this collection, and holy shit, it's GOOD. The third story—a ghost? Who-knows-what's-going-on!? Story was so good/unsettling that I stopped reading before bed and was epically unsettled for sleep. Highly recced daytime reading!

Up next:

Genuinely want to re-read Piranesi, doubly so now that it made the Hugos.

Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse. Public service announcement: I have been informed that one of the heroines is a bisexual mermaid sea captain, at which point this book goes from "This author's first book was solid, but I didn't grab its sequel, and I'm not really running to pick this new series up, even if it has been Hugo-shortlisted" to 'holy shit, keen library reserve, yes pls!'

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Reading meme of...whatever. February, at this point

Thu, 04 Mar 2021 13:44:26 GMT

Finished reading
The Guernsey literary and potato peel pie society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. This was one that mum and granny had both read, and so I read it in turn out of a faint sense of obligation. I…hmm. Imagining this was written by Mary Anne Spier (from the Baby Sitters' club) helped me get through it, honestly. Lampshading the fact that a series of letters or anecdotes does not make a book…still does not make a series of letters and anecdotes a book. The German occupation of Guernsey Island is a genuinely interesting idea, but man, it really felt like the author/s didn't want to write it, so wrote about someone (trying and not yet) writing about it instead. There's a couple of nice moments, and ( spoiler ) but I'm wondering if it would have been quite so popular without the 'died before she could see it in print!' narrative attached to it.

Currently reading:
The good thief by Hannah Tinti. Holy hell. This is billed as the American answer to Oliver Twist. Which, to be fair, I've not read the original of. Ren has been raised in an orphanage, missing both his parents and one hand. He gets adopted by a smooth-talking conman, Benjamin, who sees Ren's amputation as a benefit to swindling people. The writing style was tight and wry and enjoyable enough to keep reading through the first part, and then holy hell did it get properly bleak and intense and amazing. I literally said 'what the fuck' out loud at one point, in great horrified admiration. I've got about 100 pages to go, and I'm just about holding my breath thinking about what's going to go down. This book has done zero shying away from … anything. It's been in no way gratuitous with its violence, which has made it all the more harrowing to read. The writing's done an excellent job of making me feel that no one's plot-proof, and I'm worried for all of them.

Up next
Piranesi by Susanne Clarke. Collected from the library yesterday. I'm so quietly pumped for this one.

My TBR pile is back to feeling like it's teetering, but I'm very looking forward to the reserve I have on Klara and the sun by Kazuo Ishiguro, which is out sometime this month. Idk when it'll get to the library, per se, but I'm hoping to go in as cold as possible. You might notice this isn't actually decreasing my TBR...

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Reading meme -- January, ish

Fri, 05 Feb 2021 06:35:55 GMT

Finished reading:
Anxious People, by Fredrik Backman
I liked one of his previous books, am keen to read translated novels, and one of the blurbs of this made me cackle. This was the sort of book felt like it was Being Clever, rather than actually being clever. That said, it made me laugh out loud on public transport, and then made me tear up on public transport, so it's also doing things right. The ending is rather pat, but I'm also giving it a pass for how much it made me smile. On balance, I rec it.

The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives In Your Home, by Jeffrey Cranor, Joseph Fink
I adored the modern-day sections, but the bulk of the novel (the historical sections) didn't hold my interest anywhere near as much as I'd hoped. I feel like it was aiming for Lies of Locke Lamora territory and fell short, which is a damn shame because I love the podcast even if I no longer listen. It might well be better as the audiobook, with Meg Bashwiner's voice to carry it through, but it's still sort of ( general spoiler )

Currently reading:
The queen's gambit by Walter Tevis. Library grab, based on the captivating TV show and chaosmanor's rec. I am just--fucking--what. How did he do that. Genuinely, this is tight-third-person, but also so tell-y, and HOW did he make chess games, where I have barely any idea what's going on, SO TENSE? HOW is his writing so compelling? I am staring at it in writerly baffled awe, and relishing the ...there's a name for it. Voice echo? where you write or talk in the mannerisms of whatever you've just been around. Thank you, Walter Tevis, my god.

Up next:
The good thief by Hannah Tinti. Paused a little way into it so I can go library book reading, but looking forward to getting back to its quietly lyrical language.

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke. rachelmanija's post about 'go into this as cold as possible', and a brief snatch of 'kindest protagonist' and I'm THERE. I've placed a reserve on it at the local library.

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