posted by bzedan at 11:40am on 12/04/2025 under meta
I think one can do pinned here? Or "sticky"?? Anyway, I just went and cleaned up some weird code that the linkback from my WP plugin was doing and figured that I should note: more often than not, what you see here is just mirroring my blog-blog! But I do reply to comments here, obvi, the posts just *originate* mostly from another place.
In the spirit of putting some useful things right up top, here's a the intro from my Tumblr, where I am the most active:
If you follow me on Comradery (or Patreon), or elsewhere, you may have heard me mention a tedious-to-work-on current project that I’d be sharing soon. Well! I’m serialising another book!! The tedious parts were doing an edit and breaking the book up into nice chunks (and queueing it). Starting June 21, 2026, I’m serialising The Consoling Divide! You may remember (or have been signed up to get the emails for) The Audacity Gambit, this is both a sequel to TAG and also a story that can stand on its own.
If you’d like to know more about this upcoming story, check out the info page here! Also please, enjoy the cover and a blurb:
Here’s the blurb:
Five years ago, Emily Anderson of Royal Oak Court Trailer Park was declared the Chosen One and sent on a quest to the Sidhe realm to end the exile of the adults who raised her. She succeeded, because that’s what Chosen Ones do, but the aftermath left her alone and in charge of the rest of the children in the trailer court.
Since her return, they’ve all found a kind of peace and stability, but nothing can stay the same forever. When Emily learns she has to plunge back into the fairy world she gladly left and reopen emotions she’d even more gladly bottled up, her reluctance is met by the one thing she knows is true: she can only rely on herself. One of the children Emily raised needs her, but first she needs to find them. The world she’s returning to is a different one than what she experienced as a hopeful teen, and even when it is familiar her place in it is no longer as clearly defined, the path not so easily followed.
I had fun going back and getting this ready to serialise, I hope all y’all have a nice time reading it. In case this is a blog post and not just an email (I am writing this ~ in the past ~ oooOOOhh ~ here’s a signup for getting The Consoling Divide delivered to your inbox. Of course, as always, you can as easily add it to your RSS, which is very sexy too.
If you were signed up for updates for TAG, I’ve (I believe) set up things so that you either start getting emails for the new story as before and can also easily unsubscribe from TCD updates if you prefer. Please let me know if you have trouble with it! Goodness knows its been a bear from my side.
The intent is to be annoying (ie: somewhat regular, rather than easily distracted) about promo’ing this one, I have promo images and everything. So expect to keep hearing about this for a bit! It may not start until mid-June, but hey, I’ve got plenty of other stuff for you to read until then.
This week started off with a water leak and dealing with the mess of that, so of course the whole schedule was thrown off. Then, I had dentist on Friday, which also begun my annual chunk of time off that I take each spring, so I quite nearly missed blogging this week. HOWEVER I want to keep the weekly thing going so here we are. A post.
I would do a link roundup but currently my second monitor is at the doctor’s (Chase is fixing how it is mounted), and I’m incapable of doing that sort of thing quickly with just one little laptop screen. Wait, maybe I am strong enough.
FEMICOM Museum, a very cool archive of girly games, toys and consoles. I love small archives and websites are such a nice way to handle that. I’ve not heard of most of these toys, but that’s less about me not being into girly games and more about me being of an age and temperament where most of the games I knew about as a kid were either Sega MasterSystem (then Genesis) or handheld poker games. status: moved to *absolutely random shit (because I haven’t got a folder for these kinds of sites yet, the asterisk indicates a folder to be sorted)
DriftBook by Lur Noise over on Itch. A game about walking and drawing and exploring. I had heard of it then forgotten and was reminded again, thank goodness. status: keeping the dang tab open because I mean to do it this week
Tiled Words. Hey do you like crosswords but want them to be more annoying (positive), but haven’t the mind for the kind with no clues or no numbers or whatever? Tiled Words is a great variant where you build the words that answer the clues. It’s fun and there’s a depth of puzzles at this point (they’re daily!) to support a big zoned out crossword dive if you are so inclined. status: keeping tab open on tablet because that’s where my streak is
Coffee with a Codex, over at UPenn. As they describe, it’s a weekly “informal lunch or coffee time to meet virtually with Kislak curators and talk about one of the manuscripts from Penn’s collections.” It’s nice to sign up for the email reminders to see what is upcoming, but I never end up watching them live, which is fine as they’re archived over on YouTube. status: already signed up for emails, shared here to round the list out
Okay there. A Post ™. My pomodero just blipped and some laundry is coming out of the dryer so onto the next thing.
Storytelling Collective does a yearly challenge for flash fic, with prompts and a nice community format. Every year I complete a run I pick my ten favourites and collect them into what is basically a zine. This is my fifth year doing it!! Check out the zine for 2026’s flash fiction here, and then enjoy a favourite from 2025’s collection.
There were probably better ways to spend a time loop than a job interview. Luz had done them. Made a lot of memories. Great stuff.
She’d been making one of her morning idea lists however many “days” back, realising she’d learned most of the skills, done most of the things, visited most of the places she’d ever wanted. There didn’t seem to be much left to conquer. Which was a couple of levels of depressing in a way she didn’t want to look at directly.
Then she’d remembered.
The actual first day. The true day zero. She’d had a job interview. It had gone pretty terribly, for several reasons. And she’d been that mix of despondent and angry that you get when that sort of thing happens, and the rest of the afternoon and evening had happened and then she’d woken up and had gone through it again. And again.
It had taken Luz about two weeks to really figure out she was in a time loop for real—partly because there was a little Catholic bit still inside her who felt like this was probably a deserved level of hell, partly because there was a little bit of a chemical imbalance in her brain that made her not always sure of how real things were.
Each day of those two weeks she’d done the interview and it had gone badly, in various different ways. Once she’d caught the drift of real-reality it was the first thing to go. Then years or aeons or whatever had passed and now she was back at go.
Well, she’d been back at go for a while now. Her goal was to get them to offer her the job right there, at the interview. And, even all these skills and life lessons and whatever since the time loop began and she was still “not a great fit for the role.” Luz had tried a department store’s worth of various business attire. She’d memorised the interview questions, the HR lady’s answers, she’d learned how to make the horrible blonde HR lady laugh. She’d displayed knowledge of skills not listed on her resume (Luz realised she would have a hell of a resume update when the time loop ended, actually), she’d shown a preternaturally intuitive understanding of the business thanks to doing a month’s worth of research on it.
And yet!
Luz was pretty sure at this point that the answer to getting the job was skin lighteners and hair dye. Being more “naturally femme,” even though she was girly as hell, actually. It wasn’t Luz that was the problem, it was something she couldn’t fix in an infinite number of days. She was feeding the pigeons, who Luz suspected also were aware of the time loop, when she thought of a new angle.
It took several days of preparation, which was fine, she had nothing but days. But one morning that was as gorgeous as every morning because it was every morning, she was waiting for her drink at the same coffee shop as the blonde HR lady.
Deploying a combination of skills built up over a seemingly infinite number of loops, that was assisted by her naturally clumsy demeanour, Luz deftly fumbled her drink when she went to pick it up and simultaneously added a little something extra to the blonde HR lady’s cup. Luz knew that her face was now seared into the woman’s mind, which was fine. Luz’s drink was also hopefully as permanently embedded in her sweater set.
With her interview still a couple hours away, Luz got herself cleaned up, wearing the clothes she thought were nice but normal. No more business costumes, just regular office clothes.
Her heart felt light as she was sent up the elevator and guided by some baby of an office assistant to the small conference room. It soared when the door opened and a stranger entered, apologising while fumbling a folder of papers. Their colleague had gone home with a stomach bug, so sorry, so they’d be doing the interview. Luz smiled graciously. That was absolutely fine with her, she was looking forward to it.
Storytelling Collective does a yearly challenge for flash fic, with prompts and a nice community format. Every year I complete a run I pick my ten favourites and collect them into what is basically a zine. This is my fifth year doing it!! Check out the zine for 2026’s flash fiction here, and then enjoy a favourite from 2025’s collection.
Healthy Habits: One day at a time!
Sol 178
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: x 10k Steps: x Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: Pretty good! I think today was a fruitful day. I did the quarterly check of the water recycler a couple days early because the twice-cycle EVA is coming up and of course they’re scheduled for the same day. It would make sense if there were more people here but, lol, just me. 🙂
Sol 179
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: x 10k Steps: x Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: Counting suit check as a chore today (although I also made some progress on the library re-cataloguing, but that’s a FUN chore). Trying to be gentle with myself because I hate EVAs and can feel tomorrow’s mood already souring from here.
Sol 180
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: x 10k Steps: ? do non-gravity steps count as steps? it’s movement, whatever. Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: AUGH I hate EVAs. I like being outside fine, it’s kind of fun, even. The thing is, the whole time I feel like I’m about to lock myself out of my car, you know? Even though I literally know this is impossible, it always sits there in the back of my brain. All was good on the ship, yay, etc. Patched some spots that were probably micro-meteor fly-bys, or whatever. I know the shielding layers capture them if they get past the skin, but I’m not going to have this thing looking a shit if when I get picked up. Tomorrow is a self-care day!!
Sol 181
Hydration: xx Skin/Bodycare: xx 10k Steps: [ ] Cleaning/Chores: [ ] 8 Hr Sleep: xx
Mood: I knew there was spa music in the library! It was under “atmospheric,” keyword “flute.” I crushed up some asprin from the med store, used half a ration of honey and made myself a mask (the other half went in some mint tea). I made sure the shower room was super sealed and opened the wash spigot. It didn’t mist like I expected it to because: microgravity (full of surprises!), and it was lukewarm but it was nice. I drank my tea and played with bubbles of water and did a body scrub with salt and did no chores today. I also fell asleep under the sun lamp but it’s on a timer anyway.
Sol 181
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: x 10k Steps: x Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: I was doing seal checks and when I was at the port I thought I saw something. Dunno! And also when I was on the cat-wheel I stg there was movement, corner of my eye. Did I pass some psychosis checkpoint at Sol 180, wtf.
Sol 182
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: x 10k Steps: x Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: [ ]
Mood: Couldn’t sleep, heard? A thump? Maybe? Maybe it’s the air cyclers, but I checked those ten sols ago to change the filters. Made myself go through all the stuff and chores today because a routine keeps you grounded. I got this!!
Sol 183
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: [ ] 10k Steps: xx Cleaning/Chores: [ ] 8 Hr Sleep: [ ]
Mood: So! I turned on the exterior lights today!! Or last night! I guess!! I heard the noise again so I was like “let’s prove your mind is making things up” and I turned on the lights, even though I know they add like a thousand steps on the cat-wheel every second they’re on. Guess what was outsideeeeee. I think? Flesh??? I’m not a biologist. The real big point here is that I’m not outside in space any longer, I’m in a Thing. The light reflected off stuff. Kind of spent most of the day on the wheel.
Sol 184
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: [ ] 10k Steps: xx Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: [ ]
Mood: Lights on briefly again today. Still in the thing. When not on the wheel tried to make more progress on library re-categorisation, looking for bio books.
Sol 185
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: [ ] 10k Steps: xx Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: It’s got to shit me out eventually. Do space monsters use the toilet. Does a space bear shit in the space woods. More time on cat-wheel good to tire me out so I sleep.
Sol 186
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: [ ] 10k Steps: xx Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: Will the stomach acid??? hurt the ship? I’m not doing an EVA in this. Found the bio books, they’re not much help because nobody has studied giant space whales or whatever, because they shouldn’t exist. I am having a stress breakout, not skimping on taking care of my body tomorrow. PROMISE.
Sol 187
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: x 10k Steps: xx Cleaning/Chores: x 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: Did a mask while on the cat-wheel. Multi-tasking. The “transit time” of a sperm whale is 15-18 hours. That’s “stomach to anus”. Elephants are 18-24 hours, mouth to butthole. Wild actually as the former is ten times the size of the latter. Like you count whale weight by units of elephant. If I’ve been in this thing since Sol 182 then that’s five? days. I haven’t put the lights on since 184, because I freaked myself out about a stomach scavenger ecological cycle. Maybe I’ve been out of the thing since then.
Sol 188
Hydration: x Skin/Bodycare: xx (took two “showers” today) 10k Steps: x Cleaning/Chores: [ ] 8 Hr Sleep: x
Mood: Today I took part unwillingly in a scat film. There was a bunch of actual shaking? Like the ship was being shook around?! Turned on lights and it took me a bit but I realised I was a piece of corn in nature’s trash compactor. Fucking!! Gross!!! I could barely look at those pages in the bio-books, wtf now I’m living it. Now that I’m back in space will this all freeze dry and flake off the ship? Will it freeze dry and stick to the ship? How long will I be able to handle this mentally before I have to EVA about it? Because I’m not letting this ship look like shit if when I get picked up.
Storytelling Collective does a yearly challenge for flash fic, with prompts and a nice community format. Every year I complete a run I pick my ten favourites and collect them into what is basically a zine. This is my fifth year doing it!! Check out the zine for 2026’s flash fiction here, and then enjoy a favourite from 2025’s collection.
You’ve done this before. You’ve defeated magicians, killed kings, rescued the helpless. It doesn’t get easier, it doesn’t. That’s fine, that’s what you signed up for. But you’re stood here anyway, listening to this knight—this paladin—looking sweatless in his gambeson even though the sun is at its zenith, sneering at you and the others about numbers. As if any of this could be quantified.
He’d already yelled at young Drake for filling a cup with cider, saying that cider was for heroes only. Which everyone bristled at, you are all of you heroes of some sort, so who is this man coming in from the city with his definitions?
Most of you have outlasted several royals. Partly because royals have the lifespan of mayflies, and partly because some of you have hair that matches the metal of your armour. And here is this man, his full moustache the same liver-sick colour as his skin, saying you weren’t heroes, you wouldn’t be until you’d met some set of goals. This many beasts slayed, that many outlaws captured, and an amount of tithes gathered that you know couldn’t be achieved without stealing from the villages. Which it would be, stealing. Even if they gave it. The lot of them need seed and the coin to get the things they can’t grow far more than any of this lot do.
Of course, those who do the best at meeting these goals will be rewarded somehow, badges or swords or a plot of land. You have a plot of land. You get to see it once or twice a year, when its so cold out that not even the worst villains dare to leave their lairs. And what would they do, actually, what could they do, actually, to those of you who didn’t deliver what somebody in their silks demanded? Take your land? You’d like to see them try. Tell you to leave the corps? What, so that the gap you left would be filled with witless young things who don’t realise what they’re signing up for?
The knight is saying something about how long he’d been titled. You wonder if he realises how few of you are titled. You’re a rarity in in the group, with your land and your comfort, as uncommon as it is for you to have time to enjoy it. On and on the man is prattling, about what he has that he assumes none of you do. You wonder if he’s trying to inspire jealousy to fuel action, which is poor kindling for any kind of lasting fire.
You’re glad you’re in the back of the group, even with your years of practise you know you can’t keep your feelings off your face. You lean against the table, resting your knee. Your one lasting injury and it’s not even from battle, but a calf getting too rambunctious. That’s what life is, you know that. Your corps know this. You’ve all of you worked together enough that so much of what you is instinctual—the way your hands move, setting the arrow to the string, the way the others take steps aside to clear a path at a single word from you.
This close the shot is good and you marvel for a moment while the knight’s mouth keeps moving in disdain, before it catches up to what his body already knows. Setting the bow back on the table, you walk the cleared aisle up to the body, resisting the urge to kick it, though you do hold it down with your foot as you remove your arrow from the eye.
“Shame he got lost on his way here.” You don’t look up at the others, but you can feel their shoulders relax. Someone in the back suggests that maybe it was those bandits you’d heard about recently. Murmurs of agreement then, and somebody adding that they’d heard the bandits had gotten as far as the castle.
You straightened up then, considering the possibilities. “If there are bandits in the castle, then I suppose it is our responsibility to root them out.”
Really did not read much this month (only four books!), partly because I was catching up on short stories, partly because it takes me what feels like one million years to read a non-fiction book. Hm, I need to do a short story roundup at some point. Well, let’s look at March reading stats.
What a lyrical, loving book. Driving between three journeys to rivers that answer the titles question with a resounding “YES!”, and time spent with a spring by home, this book courses along with stories of people and places enlivened by rivers and the fights to keep them flowing free.
I quite liked this book, Macfarlane does a lovely job describing how places and people change him on his journey to three different rivers while not overly centring himself. There’s some VERY good descriptions in here, like “Rasputined with injuries,” which I think I sent a screenshot of to most people I know, I was so tickled by the turn of phrase.
A solid history of Prohibition that focuses on the crack it opened for the claws of the modern prison system and federal law enforcement power, as well as the opening salvos of the war on drugs.
My focus, in my particular interest in Prohibition, is how it integrates with the early Pure Food movement/food safety and the world described in Sinclair’s The Jungle, and the still-lasting effects around state laws and the choice of poison in denaturing alcohol. This book’s focus was more on the prison systems and supporting federal structure built to reinforce the eighteenth amendment, which is ALSO very important–but it always feels strange when a thing that is one’s focus is summarised in a few lines and not returned to. A very solid history, however.
Underland by Robert Macfarlane with Roy McMillan as narrator
I didn’t like this one as much as Is A River Alive?, and I think its a mix of author growth and subject (even though I do love a cave).
I’ve mentioned before that I listen to audiobooks with Chase and often they’re the audio version of something non-fiction I’ve recently read, as I try to get better at “hearing” audiobooks. This time though, the book that came through Chase’s holds was Underland, and I was like “well I like that stuff” so I listened along and eventually realised Macfarlane was also the author of a book I’d read earlier that month. There’s a good span of several years between Underland (2019)and Is A River Alive? (2025), and I don’t know if its just the nature of time or the particular experiences Macfarlane had gone through in the later book that led him to de-centring himself a bit more and approaching things with a little less judgement (which! noting not a wild amount, Underland just has moments where his comfortable middle class British life is clearly leading his inclinations of what is good and what is not).
That covers 3/4 of my reads for the month, but here’s the covers of ’em all anyway.
Hmm, do I have anything to say about the fourth book I read in March? No, not anything nice, really. A real “it’s fine” of a haunted house story.
I recently got (thank you, Chase) a cool USB stick, so I used it to finally move some of last year’s files off the ol’ tablet. Please first, look at this.
What, that’s just a crayon.
Or IS it?!!!
Amazing. Anyway, I need to do a blog post and I have doodles that maybe didn’t make it anywhere else (though I think most did?) but they for sure didn’t make it here, so here’s a dump of images.
Mouseworld but make it The Locked Tomb? Don’t mind if I do. Ummm, I think was from this tumblr post. The Flinstones birds are from an illustration for one of the collected zine versions of my newsletter. I think I did the style justice.
Don’t remember why for this one! Shrimp!!
Have you heard the good news about Worm In A Rock God? A great comic that you can read here (and on Bluesky), don’t be put off, the opening pages are empty on purpose.
I won’t stop thinking this is one of the funnier memes/edits I’ve done. See. it’s about how Lancelot was basically a fandom self-insert character. Like how Gopher from the Disney Winnie The Pooh wasn’t in the books. I use “like Gopher” a lot in reference to characters who are added into stories when they change mediums. It’s been funny to me for 30 years.
Anyway! That is it. Everything else is around or was an illustration for something or was a niche meme made for a single person. Oh! Actually, have an emoji I made for the family discord to close it out.
I have spent most of this week doing fiddly things that are very boring and haven’t gathered a moment to blogpost this week so! Tab cleanout it is also because god I need to just do that as well.
xkcd 2501 generator, what it says on the tin. Make your own of the oft-memed panel about experts over estimating how much the general public knows about a specific topic. status: shared, shared on family discord
Discord Chat Exporter on GitHub by Tyrrrz, because I do like the concept of archiving. However, this is one of those things that looks jussssst complex enough I feel defeated before even trying. I think GitHub in general makes me feel that way. Nonetheless! status: moved to REF: Web & Computer
Tegerio on Patreon. I had encountered a comic panel I liked by JW Kennedy over on Bluesky and looked them up to find more. I found the Patreon and on my phone the whole thing (which is 18+) was blurred so the tab had been living open until I remembered to look at it on the computer where I’m signed in. From there I found a Tumblr archive of a webcomic, which I’m now following and fingers crossed I remember to start reading the backlog of it. status: followed links, followed Tumblr
A Little Nightcap, at Cooper Hewitt. A friend had sent me a post about this embroidered cap and I poked around in the notes to learn more about it and would like to maybe replicate it some day? Love this comment on it regarding the “caterpillars” that accompany the rainbows and clouds the cap is covered with:
Those are not caterpillars. Why must we always assume the most pleasant option and have a narrative; especially when it is abundantly clear they are house centipedes. We live with them now, and folks certainly lived with them then, and oftentimes things are ornamental without a reason, other than familiarity. Caterpillars, do not hve antennae, nor junctured legs. It is a lovely and interesting piece. Thank you for sharing it.
status: moved to REF: Fibre & Sewing
50 Ways to Meet Your Neighbor, a zine I encountered on Bluesky and immediately lost the source of. Wait! Because the tab had just been open forever I was able to browse back and it’s from Million Experiments. It’s one of those lists of things that vary in seriousness and usefulness but does get the brain moving. MOSTLY though what I keep thinking of is that Mister Rogers Neighborhood is available on Hoopla on Binge Pass, which means you can log on with your library card and check watch for a week. I am enjoying it, it’s nice and calming and familiar and also hopeful, which is vital I think nowadays. status: saved zine to archive
How To Stop Jumping Ship, one of multiple posts about fixing the Internet Problem I’ve seen lately. This one feels less um, “I know how to fix it let’s start by building things anew” than others I’ve seen (and could be just being a bitch about, I haven’t brought myself to read more than the pull quotes yet but I’m a bit :grimace: about it, maybe because that particular post is on Substack which is ah, hm. Anyway, I am here with my blog, which is mirrored on Dreamwidth (hello, if you are reading this there), I have a newsletter, I dunno. I know this isn’t a cute/cool retro style blog, but it’s mine. Did you know my oldest real post is from 2008 I guess. I think I imported my LJ over here, once upon a time, but damned if I know what posts are what. status: added the blogring to my Links page, moved a link from post about IRC to REF: Web & Computer
Please wish strength at me as if I keep my shit on track I can finish this boring task this weekend.
My best friend is wonderful in many ways, and one of those was is that she tells me what to make him for presents. Birthdays are the important ones. Last year I wrote a story for her Fallout ghoul OC and this year I looked at my list of suggestions and decided to make him a little hand puppet. As a kid he’d had a little pig puppet with an aloha shirt that was fun to remove, and she liked to make the voice for it. The suggestion given me was to make a puppet for his fursona and! it was also a nice way to fill another square on Fibre Arts Bingo: “Make something with the waste/leftovers of other projects.”
First, please appreciate the cuteness of puppet Molly. She has a floral shirt that can be removed (like her inspiration), and a very simple denim vest. I’ve made a lot of puppets before (though not all were as involved as the owlbear puppet), but the simplicity of a hand puppet is a real delight.
Squishy little face!
Like I do, I looked at what patterns were around for what I wanted to make then quickly drafted out my own. At this point I’ve made enough plushies and whatnot to be able to eyeball shapes, so it came together pretty quickly.
Someday this kind of process will not work out for me, but not yet.
Now, this square was using scraps from old projects and the faux fur used for most of the body was most of the last scraps of faux fur purchased to make my best friend’s cat a sky bison costume for the Korra finale, which was ah. Well over 10 years ago. More of the scrap was used a couple of years ago to make her a stuffed animal (a minotaur that is not quite this fursona, but spiritually similar).
With Joann Fabrics gone, frankly I don’t know where I will get faux fur in the future (I’ll figure it out, but no rush), so I had to use what I had on hand. Which was luckily enough! Not quite enough to do the body, which was done in cotton flannel, but the inside of faux fur feels gross to the hand, so that worked out fine.
Go-go my 20 year old workhorse of a basic Brother.
It went together easily enough! Her clothing is more scraps: the shirt was made from some hippie dress or top from who knows when that has had patches and pieces cut out enough there’s not much left, the vest from one of the scraps I keep whenever jeans become jean shorts. To be fair, this square and the “stash only” feel a little like cheats because I generally only work from stash any more, because we live in a small space (the bulk of the stash acquired in different living situations). The overall goal this year is to reduce the stash as much as I can, turning things into objects and clothing.
Nose ring! (binder ring from Daiso)Her hair is yarn from some ancient crochet project.
This though, this was a real joyous use of scraps. I love knowing that this was made with pieces from something I made for a cat my best friend and I both loved, in celebration of a show that felt (and was) so important to us and to seeing queer relationships on TV. So much time between then and now! And our friendship the bridge across it.
I ended up reading a bit less this month (well, in book numbers, not page numbers) thanks to Flash Fiction February. That said I also am trying to be better about having more than one book checked out on Libby at a time. I get nervous is all, what if I don’t finish the first book while I have the second book checked out, ugh, it’s there hovering, waiting. But Libby has changed it’s delay options, so rather than pushing things back to a date a week, two weeks, some months from now you can only suspend a hold and then unsuspend it when you’re ready. I have, ah, several books suspended right now (most of which are non-fiction because I’m slow at reading them and like to pace them between fiction).
Anyway, here’s the roundup and stats for February.
Here are my Storygraph reviews for my top rated books:
What a grody, gorgeous, viciously verdant book. The story drips thick and rich through a rotting, sprouting world of opera and overthrown regimes, as the characters twine relentlessly to their fates.
Boy-o, what a delight this was. It’s thick and visceral and lived-in. It just makes me want to use squishy descriptive words about it. It also does some things with structure that I didn’t catch right off, so I don’t want to say too much, but I’d loved Leechand now I guess Ennes is just on my list of To Watch For. This felt like a good companion to Isaac Fellman’s Notes from a Regicide, so if you like one or the other, there’s a rec for you.
Whew what a book! So many shadowed layers, thickly and deliciously spread with an inhabited world and the mess of people in it. The plot doesn’t twist so much as turn like a winding snake, a winding ribbon to an ending.
This had been on my to-read and I’d then forgotten but then a pal’s review (and a better review than this) reminded me about it and I dropped it in the hold queue. Weirdly?? Reminds me a little of If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler but maybe just parts of it, maybe just the journey of it, the papers and the periods of being lost, the structural play. It’s certainly a better book than IOAWNAT, to me at least.
The layers of this book fold together like beautiful cloth wrapping, from novel-in-a-novel to interviews to the main tale. It kept me turning and unwrapping the story drawn in by lush descriptions of family and food and life. You want to call the ending the bow on it but it was instead the thing hidden by all those layers and I don’t! feel it was quite what I wanted or expected to find.
Notable about this book, I paired it with Looking Glass Sound by Catriona Ward in the latest newsletter reading recommendations and I’ll just copy what I said there:
I recently read two books in a row that had the same thing going on. Not the story or the style or anything, but both were awesome rides the full way through, doing some neat things with how a story is shaped, but then the ending didn’t hit for me as solidly as I needed it to. Which does not! Mean they’re not worth reading. It was actually really interesting to interrogate myself on why the endings didn’t work for me the way I wanted. Maybe (probably) they’ll do better for you.
I can’t hate a book for not sticking the landing, not if they do it the best they can. I don’t know how either of these books should have ended but the endings here work! And I enjoyed the ride, so I can’t complain (well, I can, but you know).
Here’s the pretty gradient of the month’s covers:
There’s Legendary Children again, this time it was as audio, a joy. The other book in this lot was Kate Elliot’s The Nameless Land, the concluding book of the Witch Roads duology. As sometimes happens, the second book didn’t do it for me as the first did. Still glad for it, well-written, good conclusion etc., etc., but I can’t pick out which ingredient (longing? world building? quests?) I found so tasty in the first book that was missing here.
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