Fantastic news, months have returned! I read a finite, yet manageable, number of short stories in April, and I am here to tell you about the best of them. Because I am predictable, each story is about some combination of the following themes: the nature of truth flora and fauna living and dying fraught familial relationships Aliette de Bodard’s “The Dragon that Flew Out of the Sun” (3780 words, Uncanny) is one of the first short stories I read in the month of April, and it reminded me of all the reasons I love short fiction. We begin with a…
Leave a CommentAuthor: Gin Jenny
Tired: Making fun of Franzen Wired: Making fun of Bret Easton Ellis Just kidding! Those things are both incredible! So I’m kicking off this links round-up with Isaac Chotiner’s very magical interview with Bret Easton Ellis, as well as a review of the “old man yells at cloud” book Ellis has, apparently, written. Be blessed. “It felt hidden, like I said a magic word and there was Prague.” An interview with Helen Oyeyemi. The rise of publicly thirsty women. Some thoughts on cultural appropriation, rules, and self-censorship, from Jeannette Ng. An extremely normal and fine profile of Carmen Maria Machado.…
Leave a CommentThis podcast is a sad news / glad news situation, because Whiskey Jenny couldn’t make it to recording this time, BUT we have a special guest, the marvelous Renay! We’re chatting about backlist books that we’re excited for, then reading one of the remaining books from Renay’s SF starter pack, Lauren Beukes’s Zoo City. You can listen to the podcast in the embedded player below, or download it directly to take with you on the go! Episode 117 Here are the time signatures if you want to skip around. 3:56 – What we’re reading 9:03 – What we’re listening to…
1 CommentAfter a slight drought in the month of March, I believe that the readathon kick-started my reading, and I am now ticking along very nicely once more. I actually have news to report! (Stop by Book Date to see what other folks are reading.) What I Read Last Week: A bunch of stuff! I finished up Han Kang’s The White Book, which was strange and beautiful as translated by Deborah Smith. A favorite line: A person who had met the same fate as that city. Who had at once time died or been destroyed. Who had painstakingly rebuilt themselves on…
Leave a CommentThe new development for 2019 is that time has no meaning and there is no such thing as a month of reading short fiction, and therefore I can never say what short fiction reads were the best of that month, because that set of words make no sense under the new world order. NO MORE MONTHS. Erm, but actually, work just got busy, and I fell behind in my short fiction reading. SORRY. Please accept instead this very belated post plus a link to info about the Hugo nominees for this year. I, a short-fiction-reading person, have read five of…
Leave a CommentHappy Readathon, if you are doing Readathon! I meant to post this an hour before Readathon started, but time got away from me and, well, here we are. I am just going to have to start a little late. Such, I fear, is life. In the meantime, have some links! A profile of Lindy West, on the occasion of the release of Shrill. How the internet is helping to preserve critically endangered languages. What is society really nostalgic for, when it talks about “going back” to an era of healthy, home-cooked meals? The reality TV industry isn’t providing adequate mental…
Leave a CommentHappy April! I have a belated March YA Agenda column up at Lady Business today — go check it out!
Leave a CommentSpringtime pollen is sapping both our brains, but fortunately this podcast was never very serious to start with, and we’re hoping you won’t notice. We do “hoping you won’t notice a thing” by loudly and repeatedly talking about the thing. Our transparency is part of our charm, we dearly hope. This podcast, we’re chatting about some of the oldest and newest books we possess, and then Whiskey Jenny breaks her Helen Oyeyemi tie by falling in total love with Gingerbread. (Yay!) You can listen to the podcast using the embedded player below, or download the file directly to take with you…
Leave a CommentIn the year of our Lord 2017 (of unfond memory), I read these two stories about sweet little bots doing their best, and it launched me into a new state of being in which I read short fiction so much that I have had to commission a logo about it. The main one, admittedly, was “Fandom for Robots,” but a very close second was Suzanne Palmer’s very sweet “The Secret Life of Bots.” So it was with great pleasure that I learned she has her debut novel out this year: Finder! Fergus Ferguson is a finder, and he’s been tasked…
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