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reading (etc) Wednesday
Reading: For now at least, I've DNF-ed Katie Daysh's Leeward. It wasn't doing anything for me, and I mean that literally. I felt nothing for any of the characters and none of the story development, such as there has been, caught my eye. (I know I've said I want slow, less plotty stories. Did a monkey's paw twitch somewhere? For a slow story to work, other things about it--characters, worldbuilding, language--have to be awesome. In Leeward, they're . . . not. And the pacing manages to be both slow and too fast--nothing happens for pages and pages, then emotionally important moments flash past with neither preparation nor adequate follow-up.) I may give it another chance at some point, because I admit I've been tired and not concentrating well. But I don't have high hopes.
Melissa Scott's new novel Master of Samar came out, and I've started that. This isn't an Astreiant novel, but it's of the Astreiant type, with urban life and magical systems out of European history (except they actually work), and a mystery to solve. Since I didn't love Water Horse, Scott's foray into epic fantasy, I'm glad we're back to the kind of thing Scott does well. Her strengths are here, and so are her flaws (functional prose, characters who aren't very distinctly drawn); she's a long-time favorite writer of mine, who was writing queer sff before almost anybody else, and I will forgive things from her that might have me DNF-ing somebody else's book.
Other media: Apparently Rusty Quill's podcast Cry Havoc, which they announced as TMA was ending, finally dropped? I've seen good reactions but haven't listened yet. I don't know if I will. I'm troubled by things I know RQ has done, and I don't 100% believe the other accusations but I don't 100% disbelieve them either. And regardless of their ethics, they've pretty thoroughly demonstrated an inability to make a worthy follow-up to either The Magnus Archives or Rusty Quill Gaming. *shrugs* If it's still around in a year and people still like it, maybe then.
I have gotten back into podcasts somewhat, because I'm back to taking walks 5 days a week and needing something to listen to. Mostly I'm still working my way through the large backlog of the British science podcast The Curious Cases of Rutherford and Fry, but I've also started listening to S2 of Old Gods of Appalachia.
I had mixed feelings about S1 of Old Gods. It was impressive storytelling and technically well-made, with a strikingly unique voice created by the use of the accents and speech patterns of southern Appalachia (where podcast creators Steve Shell and Cam Collins grew up), and a mythos that builds wild, interesting new things on a Lovecraftian foundation. But it was so violent and so gory that I often had a hard time listening.
S2, so far, has been less violent and gory while keeping all the things I loved. I'm liking it a lot. (Sadly, I don't think I can recommend starting with S2, because the stories are connected and S1 does a lot to set up the mythos.) If you're less of a wimp than me, you may not find S1 hard going anyway.
I've tried a couple of other podcasts with less happy results. I keep wanting to listen to Pseudopod (which is a genuine anthology horror series, hosted mostly by the lovely Alasdair Stuart), but I bounce off the amateurish writing of the contemporary stories every single time. (There was a trans rights episode a couple of months ago, which of course I listened to, but it was awful.)
I also listened to the first episode of Malevolent, which has been praised here and there, but again I found the writing really clumsy, full of infodumps and the most awkward rationale for narrating everything that I've ever heard. (Audio drama podcast folks: please just take the audio format for granted. The audience isn't going to ask "why is this well-told, cool story being narrated?" any more than they'll ask "why can I see these people planning their big heist or having an intimate conversation?" about a movie. They will suspend disbelief if you give them the space to do so!) Anyway, if Malevolent gets better, please tell me.
I haven't watched any TV or movies. I keep wanting to go back to seeing movies in the cinema (I'll mask, as I mask everywhere public and indoors) but every time I check there's nothing good playing.
ETA: Make that no TV apart from Taskmaster. Which I'm still enjoying, but my watching has slowed a bit because it does start feeling same-y if you watch too many episodes in a row.
Melissa Scott's new novel Master of Samar came out, and I've started that. This isn't an Astreiant novel, but it's of the Astreiant type, with urban life and magical systems out of European history (except they actually work), and a mystery to solve. Since I didn't love Water Horse, Scott's foray into epic fantasy, I'm glad we're back to the kind of thing Scott does well. Her strengths are here, and so are her flaws (functional prose, characters who aren't very distinctly drawn); she's a long-time favorite writer of mine, who was writing queer sff before almost anybody else, and I will forgive things from her that might have me DNF-ing somebody else's book.
Other media: Apparently Rusty Quill's podcast Cry Havoc, which they announced as TMA was ending, finally dropped? I've seen good reactions but haven't listened yet. I don't know if I will. I'm troubled by things I know RQ has done, and I don't 100% believe the other accusations but I don't 100% disbelieve them either. And regardless of their ethics, they've pretty thoroughly demonstrated an inability to make a worthy follow-up to either The Magnus Archives or Rusty Quill Gaming. *shrugs* If it's still around in a year and people still like it, maybe then.
I have gotten back into podcasts somewhat, because I'm back to taking walks 5 days a week and needing something to listen to. Mostly I'm still working my way through the large backlog of the British science podcast The Curious Cases of Rutherford and Fry, but I've also started listening to S2 of Old Gods of Appalachia.
I had mixed feelings about S1 of Old Gods. It was impressive storytelling and technically well-made, with a strikingly unique voice created by the use of the accents and speech patterns of southern Appalachia (where podcast creators Steve Shell and Cam Collins grew up), and a mythos that builds wild, interesting new things on a Lovecraftian foundation. But it was so violent and so gory that I often had a hard time listening.
S2, so far, has been less violent and gory while keeping all the things I loved. I'm liking it a lot. (Sadly, I don't think I can recommend starting with S2, because the stories are connected and S1 does a lot to set up the mythos.) If you're less of a wimp than me, you may not find S1 hard going anyway.
I've tried a couple of other podcasts with less happy results. I keep wanting to listen to Pseudopod (which is a genuine anthology horror series, hosted mostly by the lovely Alasdair Stuart), but I bounce off the amateurish writing of the contemporary stories every single time. (There was a trans rights episode a couple of months ago, which of course I listened to, but it was awful.)
I also listened to the first episode of Malevolent, which has been praised here and there, but again I found the writing really clumsy, full of infodumps and the most awkward rationale for narrating everything that I've ever heard. (Audio drama podcast folks: please just take the audio format for granted. The audience isn't going to ask "why is this well-told, cool story being narrated?" any more than they'll ask "why can I see these people planning their big heist or having an intimate conversation?" about a movie. They will suspend disbelief if you give them the space to do so!) Anyway, if Malevolent gets better, please tell me.
I haven't watched any TV or movies. I keep wanting to go back to seeing movies in the cinema (I'll mask, as I mask everywhere public and indoors) but every time I check there's nothing good playing.
ETA: Make that no TV apart from Taskmaster. Which I'm still enjoying, but my watching has slowed a bit because it does start feeling same-y if you watch too many episodes in a row.