wednesday reads
Apr. 16th, 2025 06:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
isisWhat I've recently finished reading:
In eyeball, Against the Tide of Years by S. M. Stirling, the second "Nantucket Trilogy" book. I liked the exploration and expansion of the map, but I really wished there was an actual map in the book, because I only had a vague idea, if any, as to where these various historical/archaic places actually were, and where they were in relation to each other. Even in the exploration across the American continent it wasn't clear where they were, because Stirling used native names (I guess?) for places. (And one of my big beefs with this book is that the exploration across the American continent had pretty much nothing to do with the rest of the book, and it didn't really have a point or a resolution. I assume it will be important next book, but in that case I wish it had been mostly left for the next book.)
I did like the new characters introduced in this one, and most especially I grinned when we met Odikweos son of Laertes of Ithaka, and also Alaksandrus of Wiulusiya, or Vilios, or Ilios. I always love seeing real historical characters show up in historical fiction! (Also I was extremely tickled when Ian quoted Monty Python, hee!)
In audio, Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, which I got from the library because it was one of the fantasy books recommended by Shannon Chakraborty in a NYT article last month. Casiopea Tun is a Cinderella in 1927 Mexico, a poor relation housemaid for her wealthy and unpleasant relatives. She snoops where she shouldn't and, oops, accidentally releases the Mayan death god Hun-Kamé, who was "killed" and imprisoned by his brother Vucub-Kamé. But before the god can take his revenge on his brother and regain his throne, he has to go on a hero's journey to find the missing parts of his body that his brother has scattered across Mexico, and of course Casiopea has to come with him.
I always enjoy stories of asshole gods and the mortals who help them out, and I really enjoyed having a story about gods and mythological traditions I wasn't familiar with. The writing's lovely, and it worked well as an audiobook, although either the reader's voice or the fidelity of the recording didn't play well with my running headphones, and of course I know only some Spanish and no ancient Mayan, so I felt like I missed a lot of names of people and places. I liked Casiopea's defensive sassiness, her desire for adventure finally unleashed, and Hun-Kamé's duality, his godly nature tainted by the vitality he drains from Casiopea to sustain his existence in the "Middle World". And the ending was great - I won't spoil it, but I was worried it would end up in typical YA land, and it did not.
In eyeball, Against the Tide of Years by S. M. Stirling, the second "Nantucket Trilogy" book. I liked the exploration and expansion of the map, but I really wished there was an actual map in the book, because I only had a vague idea, if any, as to where these various historical/archaic places actually were, and where they were in relation to each other. Even in the exploration across the American continent it wasn't clear where they were, because Stirling used native names (I guess?) for places. (And one of my big beefs with this book is that the exploration across the American continent had pretty much nothing to do with the rest of the book, and it didn't really have a point or a resolution. I assume it will be important next book, but in that case I wish it had been mostly left for the next book.)
I did like the new characters introduced in this one, and most especially I grinned when we met Odikweos son of Laertes of Ithaka, and also Alaksandrus of Wiulusiya, or Vilios, or Ilios. I always love seeing real historical characters show up in historical fiction! (Also I was extremely tickled when Ian quoted Monty Python, hee!)
In audio, Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, which I got from the library because it was one of the fantasy books recommended by Shannon Chakraborty in a NYT article last month. Casiopea Tun is a Cinderella in 1927 Mexico, a poor relation housemaid for her wealthy and unpleasant relatives. She snoops where she shouldn't and, oops, accidentally releases the Mayan death god Hun-Kamé, who was "killed" and imprisoned by his brother Vucub-Kamé. But before the god can take his revenge on his brother and regain his throne, he has to go on a hero's journey to find the missing parts of his body that his brother has scattered across Mexico, and of course Casiopea has to come with him.
I always enjoy stories of asshole gods and the mortals who help them out, and I really enjoyed having a story about gods and mythological traditions I wasn't familiar with. The writing's lovely, and it worked well as an audiobook, although either the reader's voice or the fidelity of the recording didn't play well with my running headphones, and of course I know only some Spanish and no ancient Mayan, so I felt like I missed a lot of names of people and places. I liked Casiopea's defensive sassiness, her desire for adventure finally unleashed, and Hun-Kamé's duality, his godly nature tainted by the vitality he drains from Casiopea to sustain his existence in the "Middle World". And the ending was great - I won't spoil it, but I was worried it would end up in typical YA land, and it did not.
a SECOND fun media post has landed???
Apr. 13th, 2025 11:17 amseascribbleI realized that not only had I been watching media, I have also been listening to audiobooks on the longcommute.
First, I listened to Monstrous Regiment (the old edition read by Stephen Briggs, not the new one) which was very fun and charming. PTerry holds up, and the reading handled all the footnotes and parentheticals and choppy dialogue adeptly.
Then I listened to Master and Commander, read by Robert Hardy, which was DELIGHTFUL. I haven't read a Patrick O'Brian in probably...fifteen years, at least, and the audiobook really highlighted his sense of humour. I could only find Spanish editions of the rest of the series or I would have gone on listening to them all the way through.
I took a break for some podcasts, the usual Star War (A More Civilized Age, which I adore, but which many of my friends have beef with for their bad opinions) and This Podcast Will Kill You (highlights: Viagra, Retinoids, Allergies), Science Vs (mixed feelings on this, they cite their sources but sometimes I suspect cherrypicking), Sawbones (everybody loves a McElroy), and Gastropod (highlights, the World Seed Bank, Dishwashing, and the guest episode on dentists). Also occasionally Lingthusiasm (what it says on the tin) or Queer as Fact (solidly Fine, increasingly pissing me off with bad takes or methodology).
Then I started in on Becky Chambers Wayfarers series. I had already ready A Long Way to a Small Angry Planet but I started with that, and it took me a second to adjust to how fucking PEPPY and WHOLESOME everything was. I listened on 1.15 speed because you only get 2 weeks with library loans vs Hoopla so that might have contributed?
The other books in the series are stand alone so I listened to the last one, The Galaxy and the Ground Within, next and it was about the same as the first one, maybe a little more interesting in some of the themes it explored around politics, but it didn't really stick with me (possibly due to the format more than the content).
Record of a Spaceborn Few has definitely been my favourite of them, I think. I really liked the characters and the setting of the Exodus Fleet that has just been recycling and recycling since humans had to leave earth, and the idea that you can have both tradition and change, and cozy space utopia still has political problems. Also, she straight up killed a guy midbook in a freak accident that was just because of a series of unfortunate circumstances, and I love shit like that and didn't expect it from her.
A Closed and Common Orbit I'm about 1/4 of the way through, and it's pretty good as well. I like that the cast of characters is smaller and the stories are asynchronous, and I find them both interesting, the flashbacks a little more so. Chambers is really good at looking at things in another perspective, so she writes a good "high powered robot intelligence has to get used to limited humanoid body" experience.
I only have 2 (maybe 3, if I do get to stay with my employer) more longcommutes and 4 medium ones, so after this I'll probably go back to listening to podcasts on the commute, unless somebody has an audiobook they'd highly recommend? I listen to Murderbot at sleep time.
First, I listened to Monstrous Regiment (the old edition read by Stephen Briggs, not the new one) which was very fun and charming. PTerry holds up, and the reading handled all the footnotes and parentheticals and choppy dialogue adeptly.
Then I listened to Master and Commander, read by Robert Hardy, which was DELIGHTFUL. I haven't read a Patrick O'Brian in probably...fifteen years, at least, and the audiobook really highlighted his sense of humour. I could only find Spanish editions of the rest of the series or I would have gone on listening to them all the way through.
I took a break for some podcasts, the usual Star War (A More Civilized Age, which I adore, but which many of my friends have beef with for their bad opinions) and This Podcast Will Kill You (highlights: Viagra, Retinoids, Allergies), Science Vs (mixed feelings on this, they cite their sources but sometimes I suspect cherrypicking), Sawbones (everybody loves a McElroy), and Gastropod (highlights, the World Seed Bank, Dishwashing, and the guest episode on dentists). Also occasionally Lingthusiasm (what it says on the tin) or Queer as Fact (solidly Fine, increasingly pissing me off with bad takes or methodology).
Then I started in on Becky Chambers Wayfarers series. I had already ready A Long Way to a Small Angry Planet but I started with that, and it took me a second to adjust to how fucking PEPPY and WHOLESOME everything was. I listened on 1.15 speed because you only get 2 weeks with library loans vs Hoopla so that might have contributed?
The other books in the series are stand alone so I listened to the last one, The Galaxy and the Ground Within, next and it was about the same as the first one, maybe a little more interesting in some of the themes it explored around politics, but it didn't really stick with me (possibly due to the format more than the content).
Record of a Spaceborn Few has definitely been my favourite of them, I think. I really liked the characters and the setting of the Exodus Fleet that has just been recycling and recycling since humans had to leave earth, and the idea that you can have both tradition and change, and cozy space utopia still has political problems. Also, she straight up killed a guy midbook in a freak accident that was just because of a series of unfortunate circumstances, and I love shit like that and didn't expect it from her.
A Closed and Common Orbit I'm about 1/4 of the way through, and it's pretty good as well. I like that the cast of characters is smaller and the stories are asynchronous, and I find them both interesting, the flashbacks a little more so. Chambers is really good at looking at things in another perspective, so she writes a good "high powered robot intelligence has to get used to limited humanoid body" experience.
I only have 2 (maybe 3, if I do get to stay with my employer) more longcommutes and 4 medium ones, so after this I'll probably go back to listening to podcasts on the commute, unless somebody has an audiobook they'd highly recommend? I listen to Murderbot at sleep time.
The promised fun post!!!
Apr. 12th, 2025 09:45 amseascribble(don't worry, I have a mixed life update for immediately after)
As I am sure everyone who cares has heard, the Murderbot trailer dropped! I was a little "ehhhhhhh" on the whole thing because did it REALLY have to be a white guy and how are you going to adequately portray all the digital feed stuff and ten episodes for one novella, really, but I think the trailer sold me.
I think the tone is perfect, from the way ASkars does both the internal wry dialogue and the external robotic dialogue to the little "humans...are idiots" reel and the song choice. The way its voice goes all starry eyed when it talks about Sanctuary Moon, it's just like us and our blorbos, and they found a way to capture that!
From a design perspective, the look of the armour has grown on me, and I like the design of the habitat sets and the crew's clothing. Can we talk about Gurthathin's goth nails? Adorable (I think I might find him kind of hot, oh no). Too soon to tell how the planet sets and the CGI will hold up, but so far they look good.
I can't figure out who Anna Konkle is playing (Overse, maybe?) but the snarky exchange with her is delightful. SWEET BABY BOY RATTHI IS JUST BEING RESPECTFUL? I am definitely a fan of that casting. "OOF EYE CONTACT" continues to crack me up but also resonate just a little bit too hard.
It's very funny because I follow Martha over on bsky and she likes every one of my goofy quote posts about the show. Getting a good grade in fan, which is both normal to want and possible to achieve.
***
Similarly, I am sure everybody who did not obsessively watch The Pitt is sick of hearing about it, but it really is very good! First of all, Noah Wyle practicing medicine on my TV like it's 1999 again healed something in me, at least briefly.
Everybody is talking about how wow this is such an accurate medical show, so realistic, much jargon, lots of blood! And that is true, I didn't have many things to complain about (perennially, tv CPR, but what are you gonna do, you can't break real life ribs I guess), but it is still very much a show (not a complaint, obviously, I have worked in hospitals, they're boring as hell except for when they're scary). Like, the DRAMA!!!! is cranked up, but it's all done in such a humanizing and interesting way that I (almost always) don't mind that it's a little over the top or that the exposition is sometimes just a little too clunky even for the framing devices of "transition of care" or "medical student education." I hope Noah Wyle finally gets his fucking Emmy for all his panic attacks and trauma flashbacks Acting. It's also frequently very funny, sometimes even slapstick, but it never tips over into too much. They did a good job with the emotional balance.
Given all of the everything, I really appreciate how they went full "masks are not controversial in their function" and "vaccinations good measles bad" and "abortion is healthcare" and "for profit medical system deeply broken and evil and chews up everyone involved in it except for the administrators." With some brief but consistent forays into "poor and black people get worse care." Dana's line about how "people have changed" and have less patience and more anger hit me like a fucking truck. NONE OF US ESCAPED WITHOUT TRAUMA.
( Spoilers of varying degrees of specificity )
Also, here is a post I made about if the residents/med students were cats.
As I am sure everyone who cares has heard, the Murderbot trailer dropped! I was a little "ehhhhhhh" on the whole thing because did it REALLY have to be a white guy and how are you going to adequately portray all the digital feed stuff and ten episodes for one novella, really, but I think the trailer sold me.
I think the tone is perfect, from the way ASkars does both the internal wry dialogue and the external robotic dialogue to the little "humans...are idiots" reel and the song choice. The way its voice goes all starry eyed when it talks about Sanctuary Moon, it's just like us and our blorbos, and they found a way to capture that!
From a design perspective, the look of the armour has grown on me, and I like the design of the habitat sets and the crew's clothing. Can we talk about Gurthathin's goth nails? Adorable (I think I might find him kind of hot, oh no). Too soon to tell how the planet sets and the CGI will hold up, but so far they look good.
I can't figure out who Anna Konkle is playing (Overse, maybe?) but the snarky exchange with her is delightful. SWEET BABY BOY RATTHI IS JUST BEING RESPECTFUL? I am definitely a fan of that casting. "OOF EYE CONTACT" continues to crack me up but also resonate just a little bit too hard.
It's very funny because I follow Martha over on bsky and she likes every one of my goofy quote posts about the show. Getting a good grade in fan, which is both normal to want and possible to achieve.
***
Similarly, I am sure everybody who did not obsessively watch The Pitt is sick of hearing about it, but it really is very good! First of all, Noah Wyle practicing medicine on my TV like it's 1999 again healed something in me, at least briefly.
Everybody is talking about how wow this is such an accurate medical show, so realistic, much jargon, lots of blood! And that is true, I didn't have many things to complain about (perennially, tv CPR, but what are you gonna do, you can't break real life ribs I guess), but it is still very much a show (not a complaint, obviously, I have worked in hospitals, they're boring as hell except for when they're scary). Like, the DRAMA!!!! is cranked up, but it's all done in such a humanizing and interesting way that I (almost always) don't mind that it's a little over the top or that the exposition is sometimes just a little too clunky even for the framing devices of "transition of care" or "medical student education." I hope Noah Wyle finally gets his fucking Emmy for all his panic attacks and trauma flashbacks Acting. It's also frequently very funny, sometimes even slapstick, but it never tips over into too much. They did a good job with the emotional balance.
Given all of the everything, I really appreciate how they went full "masks are not controversial in their function" and "vaccinations good measles bad" and "abortion is healthcare" and "for profit medical system deeply broken and evil and chews up everyone involved in it except for the administrators." With some brief but consistent forays into "poor and black people get worse care." Dana's line about how "people have changed" and have less patience and more anger hit me like a fucking truck. NONE OF US ESCAPED WITHOUT TRAUMA.
( Spoilers of varying degrees of specificity )
Also, here is a post I made about if the residents/med students were cats.
thursday things
Apr. 10th, 2025 07:01 pmisisWe have recently finished watching all three seasons of Warrior on Netflix!
As I said in my pre-review, it's sort of Peaky Blinders set in the late 19th C San Francisco Chinatown Tong Wars, with a generous helping of Game of Thrones-ish nudity and sex; come to think of it, there is more Game of Thrones feel to it than just that, as a large part of the plot is the rivalry and fights for dominance between two tongs. Also the fight by the Irish immigrants to be hired as laborers, when the Chinese work much more cheaply. "Fight" is a literal term here - every episode has at least one (fistfight, or knife and axe fight, or swordfight, or gunfight - or more usually, someone bringing a gun to a fistfight and having it kicked out of his hands) and two or three is not uncommon. So much fighting! Sometimes gory, though fortunately usually not pushing my limit (though a few times it was UGGGHHH yuck).
I mostly liked it a lot, though I also felt ready to be finished with it as it wrapped up. Most recurring characters were interestingly complex with very mixed motivations, though there were some stock drama bad guys, and the wealthy white men were all terrible human beings. Probably my favorite characters were Ah Toy and Chao, the most mixed-motivation characters of all - Ah Toy is the perhaps mostly lesbian madam of the bordello where the Hop Wei hang out (also an accomplished swordswoman and crafty businesswoman), and Chao is the weapons dealer who is "friend to all" tongs (for a price) and the bland and obsequious face of Chinatown to the police. But there are so many cool characters!
There is both canon m/m and f/f (and plenty of het), but my favorite relationships were the prickly platonic ones, in particular between Father Jun and his son Young Jun, and between Ah Sam (the main character of the show) and his sister Mai Ling.
One thing I particularly liked about the show was the way they handled language. In the first episode there are a few bits where Chinese morphs into English as the camera shifts, so you know that the characters are speaking Chinese, even though they are speaking English. (I think Vikings did something similar.) Some of the Chinese characters speak perfect English, but others, you can tell when they are speaking "Chinese" (fluent and casual English) vs. "English" (accented, with simple grammar). And of course when there are English-speaking whites around, the Chinese characters who "don't speak English" speak Cantonese. (Apparently the actor playing Young Jun spoke fluent Cantonese, everyone else had to learn it, and Cantonese speakers can tell :-) I also liked the slang used by the Chinese, which - I don't know how accurate it is to actual Cantonese idiom, but it added a nice flavor - the white people are "ducks", the white section of San Francisco is "the pond", sex is "sticky" (as a noun), money is "chop", a fight is a "scrap".
Probably my favorite episode was the spaghetti western one in S1, though I also really liked the arc with Rosalita Vega in S2, and the S3 banger with Chao and Lee. Warnings for basically everything, though - violence, rape (mostly implied and attempted), nudity, drugs, racism, sexism, horrible white male politicians, hopeful dreams dashed against reality.
Now we are watching S3 of The Wheel of Time, which we are up to episode 3 tonight. I'm having the problem that I don't really remember S2 because I read the books between then and now, so I'm remembering book events and trying to figure out how they match up with show events. And of course there are the very big changes that have been made in the interest of bringing it to TV.
Oh, one more thing - I was going to post this yesterday but ran out of time writing it, because last night we went to see the Cirque Mechanics show "Pedal Punk", which was amazeballs! The group was founded by two former members of Cirque du Soleil, and the show is a spectacular display of core strength, flexibility, and hand-eye coordination, all framed in an entertaining comic mime play about a bicycle shop, using props that look like bicycle parts (juggling seatposts, a penny-farthing used as an aerial hoop, etc). It's stunning and if the show is near you you should definitely see it! (Looks like from here they are going to Chandler AZ, Albuquerque NM, Alexandria LA, and then Texarkana and Houston.)
As I said in my pre-review, it's sort of Peaky Blinders set in the late 19th C San Francisco Chinatown Tong Wars, with a generous helping of Game of Thrones-ish nudity and sex; come to think of it, there is more Game of Thrones feel to it than just that, as a large part of the plot is the rivalry and fights for dominance between two tongs. Also the fight by the Irish immigrants to be hired as laborers, when the Chinese work much more cheaply. "Fight" is a literal term here - every episode has at least one (fistfight, or knife and axe fight, or swordfight, or gunfight - or more usually, someone bringing a gun to a fistfight and having it kicked out of his hands) and two or three is not uncommon. So much fighting! Sometimes gory, though fortunately usually not pushing my limit (though a few times it was UGGGHHH yuck).
I mostly liked it a lot, though I also felt ready to be finished with it as it wrapped up. Most recurring characters were interestingly complex with very mixed motivations, though there were some stock drama bad guys, and the wealthy white men were all terrible human beings. Probably my favorite characters were Ah Toy and Chao, the most mixed-motivation characters of all - Ah Toy is the perhaps mostly lesbian madam of the bordello where the Hop Wei hang out (also an accomplished swordswoman and crafty businesswoman), and Chao is the weapons dealer who is "friend to all" tongs (for a price) and the bland and obsequious face of Chinatown to the police. But there are so many cool characters!
There is both canon m/m and f/f (and plenty of het), but my favorite relationships were the prickly platonic ones, in particular between Father Jun and his son Young Jun, and between Ah Sam (the main character of the show) and his sister Mai Ling.
One thing I particularly liked about the show was the way they handled language. In the first episode there are a few bits where Chinese morphs into English as the camera shifts, so you know that the characters are speaking Chinese, even though they are speaking English. (I think Vikings did something similar.) Some of the Chinese characters speak perfect English, but others, you can tell when they are speaking "Chinese" (fluent and casual English) vs. "English" (accented, with simple grammar). And of course when there are English-speaking whites around, the Chinese characters who "don't speak English" speak Cantonese. (Apparently the actor playing Young Jun spoke fluent Cantonese, everyone else had to learn it, and Cantonese speakers can tell :-) I also liked the slang used by the Chinese, which - I don't know how accurate it is to actual Cantonese idiom, but it added a nice flavor - the white people are "ducks", the white section of San Francisco is "the pond", sex is "sticky" (as a noun), money is "chop", a fight is a "scrap".
Probably my favorite episode was the spaghetti western one in S1, though I also really liked the arc with Rosalita Vega in S2, and the S3 banger with Chao and Lee. Warnings for basically everything, though - violence, rape (mostly implied and attempted), nudity, drugs, racism, sexism, horrible white male politicians, hopeful dreams dashed against reality.
Now we are watching S3 of The Wheel of Time, which we are up to episode 3 tonight. I'm having the problem that I don't really remember S2 because I read the books between then and now, so I'm remembering book events and trying to figure out how they match up with show events. And of course there are the very big changes that have been made in the interest of bringing it to TV.
Oh, one more thing - I was going to post this yesterday but ran out of time writing it, because last night we went to see the Cirque Mechanics show "Pedal Punk", which was amazeballs! The group was founded by two former members of Cirque du Soleil, and the show is a spectacular display of core strength, flexibility, and hand-eye coordination, all framed in an entertaining comic mime play about a bicycle shop, using props that look like bicycle parts (juggling seatposts, a penny-farthing used as an aerial hoop, etc). It's stunning and if the show is near you you should definitely see it! (Looks like from here they are going to Chandler AZ, Albuquerque NM, Alexandria LA, and then Texarkana and Houston.)
Not Quite the Book Cover Meme
Apr. 10th, 2025 12:11 pmmergatrude
Back in...hmmm...1980 I believe, we were given Anne McCaffrey's Dragonflight as a text for English. Maybe they were trying to modernise the curriculum? Anyway, precocious child that I was, I had already read it. Probably twice. I read a bunch of other Pern books, but not all of them. (I also read a bunch of her other books, straddling the sci-fi/fantasy/romance genres.) Then I forgot about them until this meme.
They're...not great. The sexual politics alone are a bit skeevy, in that '70s sense of "women shouldn't want to have sex, but if they have to they can enjoy it". But they were a formative part of my adolescence (which also included Ian Fleming's soft-core porn and sadomasochism masquerading as spy novels /o\) and I feel nostalgic about them. Not enough to reread them.
Thankfully, I don't have to. There's a podcast! The duo at Dragons Made Me Do It have done the hard work of reading, thrown some great analysis at the books, and even made recommendations of other, better books that people might enjoy instead.
If like me you recall the books with misty nostalgia, you might enjoy the podcast. And if you're tempted to read the books, this tumblr post is a good guide to resisting the dragons' call.