Rodent Household

Locked (except for book babbling) during the last round of LJ paranoia, but generally happy to add people if we know each other from somewhere (comms/mutual friends/other interaction).

Catching up on the last two days, because ugh, work. Who thought that was a good idea? XP

Challenge #3: Write a love letter to fandom. It might be to fandom in general, to a particular fandom, favourite character, anything at all.

I love reading people’s responses to this challenge (particular highlights on my flist were muccamukk’s beautiful analogy and author_by_night’s poem “To Fandoms I’ve Only Observed”), but I’ve done this a bunch of different ways for past Snowflakes and was struggling for a new angle. I thought about an abecedarian poem (as I’d done for characters at one point), but had a harder time coming up with a “balanced” list of fandoms in ABC order, about which I’d have about the same amount to say. I finally did settle on an abecedarian idea, just not a poetic one, so: (all links go to AO3 works-in-fandom pages, with a few exceptions)

I love fandom ( because fandom is )

Obviously some letters were harder to fill with fandoms than others, but all of this is true, and these are all reasons I love fandom :)


Challenge #4: Rec Your Last Page: Any website that you like, be it fanfiction, art, social media, or something a bit more eccentric!

Maybe I should go through my billions of open tabs and see if there’s something in there worth reccing? (and take the opportunity to close some, lol)

Relevant open tabs (and the reasons I have them open):

fandomtrees spreadsheet of needy trees. Reveals are targeted at Jan 10, but there are still 39 trees short of the goal of at least 2 gifts. (Mine is not one of the needy trees, but it is here.) (Open because I was checking how likely reveals were to be delayed.)

( and 10 more links, from general to specific )

Happy New Year! I'm having a fairly pleasant 2026 so far, and hope you all are too! <3

Yuletide reveals! :D

I wrote two things this year (which, it's been a couple of years since I've managed a treat, and I'm very glad I was able to this year).

My assignment:

Voyages of the Valence: The Lanthanide Cluster Job (7862 words) by hamsterwoman
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Elements - Experiments in Character Design - Kaycie D., Object and Concept Anthropomorphism
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Vanadium (Experiments in Character Design), Chromium (Experiments in Character Design), Iodine (Experiments in Character Design), Rhenium (Experiments in Character Design), Sulfur (Experiments in Character Design), Carbon (Experiments in Character Design), Xenon (Experiments in Character Design), Helium (Experiments in Character Design), Dysprosium (Experiments in Character Design), Indium (Experiments in Character Design), Thulium (Experiments in Character Design), Rhodium (Experiments in Character Design), Yttrium (Experiments in Character Design)
Additional Tags: IN SPACE!, Space Opera
Summary:

Elements IN SPACE!

( Blathering )

The days leading up to story reveals were spent frantically beta-ing a couple of fairly long fics that required a canon primer, so I had given up on the idea of writing a treat. But I felt so blessed by my last-minute crossover treat and the fact that my main gift was in a much rarer fandom than I’d been expecting, that it gave me a sort of second wind – after reveals, obviously, but there was still Madness. And thus:

FAQ: The “Snake Fight” Portion of Your Magical Practitioner Examination (581 words) by hamsterwoman
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: FAQ: The "Snake Fight" Portion of Your Thesis Defense - Luke Burns, Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Peter Grant (Rivers of London), Thomas Nightingale
Summary:

Nightingale was aghast at my lack of ophidian knowledge.

( Blathering )

Full text of the ficlet, with the missing bit: ( under here )

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snowflake_challenge is back, with lovely new banners:



Challenge #1: The Icebreaker Challenge: Introduce yourself. Tell us why you're doing the challenge, and what you hope to gain from it.

My intro post from a year ago was mostly current but was missing Elis & John a couple of things that feel too relevant not to mention, so, I’m including an updated one below. As for the other challenge questions:

I love the little bright splash of fannishness that Snowflake brings to the start of the year – it always leads to interesting fandom reflections (my own and other people’s), getting to read/watch/look at things I wouldn’t have come across or taken the plunge on otherwise (fic/vids but also trying new canons), creating things I otherwise wouldn’t have created (one tangible highlight: a couple of years ago I wrote a pantoum, a poetic form I hadn’t tried before, for Snowflake’s “try something new” day, and it was actually published this year, which is pretty cool!), and usually also new friends. Which I guess has also answered the question of what I hope to gain from it this year :)

( fannish me in 2026 )

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YouTube now apparently also does a Wrapped: ( so here are my fairly predictable results )

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( Fannish end-of-year meme #2 )

Yuletide has revealed! (a bit more than intended, LOL, but everything appears to be back in order now, thanks to some swift manual workarounds by the mods! ♥)

I got two wonderful fics, which both really, really surprised me. I was convinced that I was getting a Rivers of London fic, because when my gift popped up, that was the only fandom I had requested with stories, and there was a RoL fic that fit what I had requested, which had recently appeared, so of course I figured it was mine. Then a treat popped up the night before reveals, and the fandoms were unchanged, so I figured it had to be another RoL fic… except Varvara wasn’t tagged in more than one fic, so I was very puzzled. Until I remembered/realized that Lady Eve’s Last Con would not have been wrangled yet, so, OK, my treat was probably that. But it never for a second occurred to me that my main gift could ALSO be Lady Eve’s Last Con, so I was completely blindsided by it:

Forgetting is Musical (1214 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Lady Eve's Last Con - Rebecca Fraimow
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Esteben Mendez-Yuki & Sol Mendez-Yuki, Esteban Mendez-Yuki/Jules Johnson
Characters: Esteban Mendez-Yuki, Sol Mendez-Yuki, Ruthi Johnson
Summary:

Intimacy is a name given to an infinite distance.
Esteban has a few more things to learn.

It is a set of Esteban-centric vignettes, pre- and post-canon, and through this format it manages to fit pretty much ALL of my letter prompts into a single elegant package (all the more impressive because I know it was a late pinch hit). I loved getting a glimpse of the roots (heh) of Esteban’s interest in soil, the light humor, complicated family stuff, the abiding but very sibling-y love of his relationship with Sol, and a hopeful ending, the whole of it very poignant and warm.

I also absolutely loved my treat, which was indeed also Lady Eve’s Last Con, but still surprised me because it was for the crossover prompt I never expected to get, because I’ve been prompting crossovers since my very first Yuletide, in every fandom, and have never gotten any, until now! And not just a crossover between fandoms, but the specific crossover prompt that had greatly amused me when I was reflecting on the book:

Natural Habitats (2161 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Lady Eve's Last Con - Rebecca Fraimow, Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Esteban Mendez-Yuki, Mark Vorkosigan
Additional Tags: Yuletide Treat
Summary:

Esteban escapes New Monte for an academic conference on Escobar, where he receives an intriguing business proposal.

This was such a fun fic! The crossover works perfectly, the universes blended seamlessly, the fun of the premise itself – but I’d posited it offhandedly, as a cracky plot idea, and my author took it deeper, into excellent character work where Mark and Esteban can relate to each other in interesting ways. And I love this Esteban’s POV, and his awkward flailing at an academic conference, and the uplifting win-win ending.

(It appears from the comments that it is entirely possible to enjoy this fic with only Vorkosigan Saga knowledge, so, y’all who are Vorkosiverse fans should go do that, and then you should read Lady Eve’s Last Con, and read the other fic too ;)

Anyway, so, both fics were a blast, in highly complementary ways. And I’m so pleased that Lady Eve fic now exists in the archive! :D

And I got a very nice comment from my recipient within an hour of the collection opening, so, Yuletide is being very good to me :D

Also, it’s nice to be able to read my gift(s) and comment immediately, instead of reading them either while falling asleep or still bleary pre-coffee, so I’m a fan of this new reveal time.

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In non-Yuletide news – Merry Christmas to friends who celebrate! Or actually, Merry Krysa-mouse!



(Backstory is that B made a joke, pronouncing "Merry Christmas" as "Merry Krysa-mas" and then L took it a step further to "Merry Krysa-mouse" [krysa = rat, for the non-Russian-speakers]. Of course, I embraced this new holiday, and was even compelled to illustrate it. You are looking at the pinnacle of my artistic ability, y'all. Drawn from "life" -- i.e. a rubber Halloween rat (which is no more, as it melted/disintegrated several years ago -- horrifying pictures available upon request) and a box of mouse finger puppets.)

We are having a quiet day after a very active Tuesday and before B’s return tomorrow, so I’m going to enjoy the peace and quiet for a bit :)

I'm giving myself a couple of Taskmaster-free weeks, even though I do have some TM NZ s6 I could catch up on, because Champion of Champions 4 is coming on Dec 22 -- so excite! The poster gives a full look at the costumes, answering the question of whether Mathew was going to wear EVEN SHORTER shorts, and the people on Reddit provided the extra context that John's Freddie's Harlequin outfit is associated with "We Are the Champions", and that Andy is wearing the cricket uniform associated with the one-day cricket as opposed to test match -- and I love the added meanings from these two nerds. (If there's a deep explanation or Maisie's nun or Sam's bellhop, that has yet to be shared. So far the hypotheses seem to be that Sam's is a reference to TM Hotel and Maisie's is going for something that will keep her knickers covered this time, or possibly another classic musical reference, Grease --> The Sound of Music.)

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In the spirit of catching up on things, I went and got myself up to date on Rivers of London (especially as I'm requesting it in Yuletide and fandomtrees. This is the first year I've had to catch up on it -- I've had a copy of the novel since early July, on preorder, and kind of forgot that Stray Cat Blues had been out for almost a year when I ordered it in October, and then proceeded to not touch for the next two months. But, well, I'm enjoying this patch of story less than previous ones, I guess, so there's less of an impetus to stay current even though I do still love the characters and the world.

5. Ben Aaronovitch, Stone and Sky -- This one was an odd experience... I've been keeping up with the novellas and GNs, but it's been 3.5 years since I read the last novel, and this one seems to be continuing the trend where it's taking me longer to read each book than the preceding one, in the post-Faceless Man arc of the series: False Value I didn't like that much (relative to the series preceding it), but read in 1-2 days; Amongst Our Weapons I liked more but took several days to finish; and this one I read over the course of weeks, setting it aside and going back to it, and I'm not sure how it compares to the other recent ones for me because it just didn't feel like a Peter book, it felt like something else, and that something else didn't work for me as well as the Peter books, but also it was trying for a different thing. ( More, with marked spoilers )

6. Stray Cat Blues (RoL GN #12) -- it does go well with Abigail's heavier and more independent presence in Stone and Sky. ( But it was mostly meh as a stand-alone story (spoilers). ) Abigail was also the only one whose art I liked in this outing. I mean, I don't read these for the art, but this was more meh/downright ugly than most of these.

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More year-end meme: ( movies, television, books this year )

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And, the year-end meme was a good impetus to dust off the fannish goals I'd put together in early January and have not checked in on since end of May, LOL.

( Fannish goals check-in )

Catching up on Taskmaster s20, the most recent two episodes:

Episode 3 -- I got to see this episode on actual UK TV (on catch-up), with not just the ad breaks but also with really annoying ads, and also with cafemassolit's cats periodically distracting me, heh. So that was an interesting experience! As for the episode itself, WTF is Maisie wearing XD ( spoilers from here )

Episode 4 -- ( spoilers )

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Also, this seems as good a place as any to talk about the stuff I watched on planes. (I also read on my return trip, but have not yet finished the new RoL book, because my phone battery was low and either the USB port on my seat or my cable weren't working, and I didn't feel like trying to fish out my powerbank from the backpack stuffed with half a dozen books from England, so I had to switch over to watching the in-flight entertainment).

Thunderbolts* -- it has been a while since I watched anything MCU related -- OK, less time than I thought, because I did watch Agatha All Along in Nov'24, but even that was almost a year ago, and I guess Deadpool and Wolverine was technically also MCU. Anyway, still a while, and much longer since I've watched a 'main storyline' kind of thing, with GotG 3 in summer 2023, and it was 2022 when I was watching anything MCU related regularly. And I still have not seen, and chose not to bother with, though it was also on offer, Captain America: BNW. ( More, with marked spoilers )

The Ballad of Wallis Island -- This is a kind of movie I would've never even been aware of before my descent down the Britcom rabbit hole, but because Tim Key co-wrote and is costarring in it, it was mentioned on Elis and John (John was grousing about not being invited to the UK premiere, except he probably was and couldn't go and forgot) and also qwentoozla went to a special screening in LA, with the creators there, and posted about it. I probably still would not have gone to the effort to track it down, because I always find Tim Key at least slightly annoying, but as I was scrolling through Virgin Atlantic's entertainment list, the movie was right there, near the start, and I was like, hey, I'm on a Taskmaster-adjacent trip to the UK, I should watch a Taskmaster-adjacent movie as part of the experience. And I did, and actually really enjoyed it, and found it both funny and moving.

( More with spoilers )

qwentoozla's write-up also mentioned that the film was an expansion of a short film that could still be found on YouTube, so, because I'm always curious to see different versions of the same story if it's a story I like, I went and tracked it down (part 2). And I don't know what I was expecting from the short version, but my main takeaway is basically that everything I liked best about the feature film was new to it -- Herb's backstory, Herb/Chris and Nell, Charles's backstory, where it leaves Charles -- and also the acting was SO MUCH BETTER. I mean, it makes sense, right, because it's the same people after 18 more years of practice, and as writers they had both the same extra years of practice and a bigger canvas to work with. But everything just works so much better in the 2025 movie. I'm glad I watched it first, because I probably would not have bothered with it if the short film had set my expectations first.

And also I tried War of the Rohirrim, and made it a couple of scenes in but it was too anime-y for me, and nothing interesting was happening, so that also didn't last very long.

The rest of the time on the plane I watched random TV shows that were available to me, and might as well capture my thoughts here, although I didn't watch anything in full, and mostly not in any kind of coherent way either.

Fleabag, season 1 -- Well, that was a bit darker than I enjoy my comedy. Like, I did find it really well done -- in particular ( SPOILERS from here )

Peep Show, season 9 -- I've been aware of the show for a while, but had no real interest in it, despite enjoying David Mitchell as himself on WILTY. But I decided to give it a shot, hoping to catch Dobby (the character played by Isy Suttie, i.e. Elis's wife, for reasons-for-the-trip-adjacent reasons). It was a season that didn't have Dobby as a regular, but I did get her for an episode later on, which suited me -- but there in the very first episode I watched was Tim Key again XD Dobby was adorable! I wish there had been more of her (but, like, I already think Isy is adorable). I was reasonably amused by David Mitchell's character, although he feels like the worst parts of his comedic persona + choices that make me dislike him. This was my first exposure to Robert Webb, and I was originally a lot less fond of Jeremy, but he did kind of grow on me by the end. Some of the scenarios did make me laugh, though. If I had easy access to this, I'd probably watch more series, but mostly for Isy...

On the way back, having run out of British shows I recognized as something I wanted to watch (I also gave The IT Crowd a shot, but did not make it past the first scene -- the laugh track was annoying me, and I really wasn't finding it that funny), I switched to an American show I'd heard good things about:

Abbot Elementary -- looking up the titles, looks like it was the first 5 episodes of season 4. At first I wasn't finding it that funny, but I think it's just that I don't find the younger characters (Janine, Gregory, and Jake) that funny, and once the show moved on to episodes more focused on the older cast, I was more on board.( Spoilers ) I also found the principal lady a lot of fun, and quite enjoyed Barbara the Jesus-referencing kindergarten teacher. It's not something I feel invested in enough to want to watch more of, but it was a nice way to pass the time on a plane.

I then moved on to a British show whose title I *didn't* recognize, and didn't quite have enough time to finish out the series:

Amandaland -- I did not realize until looking it up later that this was a spin-off of something else. I think I made it 3 episodes in, and it might not have even been the full 3 episodes, until we landed. This one was a show where I didn't actually recognize any actors (except, retrospectively, I do know Joanna Lumley, who plays Amanda's mum, I just didn't recognize her now she's older). Mal looked intensely familiar, but looking at his filmography, I've not seen him in anything, so presumably what I recognize him from is Doctor Who gifs on Tumblr... Who I did recognize in the credits was Holly Walsh, as one of the writers, as I've enjoyed her on panel shows. Mal was definitely my favorite character, and I also like Anne and Della (the chef). (Possibly the fact that I liked both Della and Anne a lot means I should finally watch Derry Girls, like people have been telling me to do for ages...) As for the show itself, I did find it suitably engaging. My favorite moments were ( spoilers ) From reading the Reddit thread on this show, it sounds like the season maybe goes downhill / the resolution is not as good as the setup, so maybe it's just as well that I didn't finish it out.

Picking up the Worldcon write-up on ( Saturday, Aug 16 with the Hugo Awards Ceremony )

The Hugo stats (final ballot voting) came out the next day, but the nomination/long list stuff took much longer and was only recently released (as I understand it, because that work had been done by the PREVIOUS Hugo committee, which all resigned in protest of the ChatGPT kerfuffle, and a different team took over) after the finalists were announced. Links to everything

( Hugo stats nattering )

I'm trying to clear the decks of fannish stuff before Worldcon (next week!!), so here's the last of the Hugo homework:

I did manage to finish half the Hugo novellas before the voting deadline.

1.T.Kingfisher, What Feasts at Night -- I did not read the first novella with this protagonist and setting, but while the events of it were mentioned a few times, and it looked like the Angus and Patience relationship had come from there, I didn't feel like I was missing anything by skipping it. Alex Easton is a fun narrator; ( and that was my favorite thing about the book (non-spoilery) )

2. Nghi Vo, The Brides of High Hill -- I usually love the Singing Hills novellas; the one I merely liked, up until now, had been When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain, which I found too simple after the beautiful intricacy of Empress of Salt and Fortune. I expect I will be ranking The Brides of High Hill above 'Tiger' and below the others, although I do think it's actually doing something interesting, and doing it well. It's just that one of the things it's doing well is again basically horror. (Why is everything on the ballot basically horror this year? The zeitgeist, I guess, but I wish there were more variety...) It's not JUST straightforward horror, although the climax of the book descends into it, and I found the last part the least interesting. ( spoilers )

3. Ray Nayler, The Tusks of Extinction -- Here is another excellent example of a novella doing very well what it had set out to do, which was not at all what I wanted to read about. There is a lot of graphic description of slaughtered elephants and also humans stomped into pulp by avenging mammoths (and also some references to human-on-human violence, for good measure), which are neither things I want to read about, like, at all. In fact, I was going to nope out after the extended description of elephants slaughtered by poachers, but then there was a POV change, and at one point, fairly early on, I read something in the dialogue of the Russian poachers that was a perfect rendition in English of something an actual Russian would say, and I got intrigued by that aspect of the novella, which is what kept me reading. ( More, with spoilers )

Hugos: Tusks, Brides, Feasts > Butcher -- but I'd be perfectly happy for either 'Tusks' or 'Brides' to win.


**

I, uh, did not finish any of the novels, but I did read all of them at least a little bit: 4 in time to rank them on the Hugo ballot, and two after the fact, figuring I should at least have an opinion on them by the time the Hugo Ceremony happens. So these are not proper write-ups -- I'll do proper ones for anything I end up finishing -- but this is my thoughts ( on the novels going into the Hugos )

I also voted for: ( miscellaneous categories )

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Flow -- I have had a weird trajectory leading up to watching this movie. ( Under here ) And it was fine?

( Mostly complaints, to be honest (non-spoilery) )

Anyway, I had no trouble at all voting Wild Robot above Flow (hadn't seen any of the other nominated long-form things). I hope Wild Robot wins the Hugo, and I would have preferred ifit had won the animated Oscar, too.

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This is not strictly speaking Hugo homework, but it is Worlcon homework, because Martha Wells is a GOH and there's a bunch of Murderbot-the-show content I'm anticipating, so I wanted to make sure I had watched the show before attending (well, and also before my free months of AppleTV that I got when I bought my new iPhone ran out). This actually also required me to start using my new computer ahead of schedule, because the old one couldn't handle AppleTV, lol.

Murderbot (TV) -- As planned, I binged it in two stints, with just a night of sleep in-between, 7.5 episodes on Friday night and 2.5 with my morning tea on Saturday. The cliffhanger endings of the episodes are effectively positioned, to be sure! On the whole, I liked it quite a bit, as its own thing and also as an adaptation. I did not LOVE it, but I also did not love All Systems Red -- Artificial Condition was when I actually started feeling fannish about the series and really enjoying it (mostly but not exclusively because of ART). ( More, with spoilers for the show, no spoilers for books beyond ASR )

I know that a second season has been confirmed, and as Artificial Condition is my favorite of the novellas, I'm really curious to see what they do with it. ( Vague spoilers for the books ) Anyway, I'm excited to see what they do with it!

A couple of links from catching up on other people's thoughts (mostly sholio's :)

- official Sanctuary Moon credits (without the glitches/distortions) that Apple uploaded to YouTube
- Fanvid: I Lived by sholio, ensemble, T
- Ficlet by sholio in which Murderbot participates in Sanctuary Moon forums (along with *spoiler*)

We are in a double Taskmaster phase for the next couple of weeks!

Taskmaster Oz s4e06 -- I had found the last couple of episodes a bit less fun than the start of the season, but this was a return to form for me. So funny! ( Spoilers )

And now, the real thing!

Thoughts on the Taskmaster S19 interviews (before watching the first episode): ( no spoilers )

Episode 1 -- that was a really fun ep! And I feel like I have a good sense of all five contestants out of it. ( Spoilers )

Ooh, ad Ed's podcast now has a video version on YouTube the day after??! The first episode is with Nick and it was delight to see him again.

Also, someone on Reddit posted a compelling theory about a S20 contestant, and I'd love for them to be right. (ETA: Although it appears to be debunked by reality, alas.)

Speaking of Reddit, I should probably collect my Reddit thoughts/milestones somewhere. This is the first (UK) series I'm watching real time(ish) while having a Reddit account, but because I can't watch it live with the UK crowd, the experience is ot actually any different -- the episode reaction posts don't really lend themselves to anything but liveblogging. But about a month ago I noticed that I'd never actually joined r/taskmaster as a member, even though I was reading it daily and commenting a lot -- and once I did, that meant that I was eligible to start earning the "Rising Star" achievement, of 1000 upvotes in your first month. Which turned out to be quite a bit easier to achieve than I had expected, as there were some fun threads going on at the time. And when the stats refreshed for April, I apparently also got the Top 1% commenter achievement, which comes with a nifty little flair.

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Hugo homework: Voter Packet has dropped, which bestirred me to actually get a membership for this year's Worldcon. Just a virtual one for now, because I'm waiting to see what happens with a) the fallout from the ChatGPT thing, and b) my job -- I'm planning on attending, but kind of metering my commitment on a just-in-time basis. Anyway, it's nice to be reading again, and possibly this is a sign I should've been reading short fiction all along. But, like, pre-vetted good short fiction...

Poems: - I'm really excited that this is the special category this year, and also curious to see how the results compare against the Rhyslings, which are already a standalone award to recognize speculative poetry. I have read the 5 short nominated poems (thoughts below), and am like 60 pages into the last poem, which is a novel in verse (oops, if I'd known that, I would not have started with this category)

( Poems )

Poems -- (5/6) "A War of Words", Ever Noir, Visiting Dragon, taxis, We Drink Lava

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Short stories: ( Mary Robinette Kowal, Rachael K Jones, Arkady Martine, Isabel J Kim, Nghi Vo, Caroline M Yoachim )

Short stories: (DONE, 6/6) Omelas Hole, Stitched to Skin, Tartarus, We Will Teach You How to Read, Marginalia, Beheading

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( Fan artist )

Fanartist: because I want some new names to win, Meg Frank, Alison Scott, Sara Felix, Espana Sheriff, Michelle Morrell, Iain Clark.

( Pro artist )

Pro artist: Micaela Alcaino, Alyssa Winans, Rovina Cai [these were my top 3 last year, too, just in a different order -- I'd be happy with any of these three winning -- or, rather, I think all three are very deserving of a win, but wish someone other than Rovina Cai would win for a change, just for variety's sake), then it gets harder, as I basically just like individual pieces of the portfolios -- Tran Nguyen, Audrey Benjaminsen, Maurizio Manzieri, I guess?

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Novelettes:

Sarah Pinsker, "Signs of Life" -- I enjoyed this a lot! While And Then There Were (N-One) remains my favorite Pinsker, and I've enjoyed her various other sci-fi, I think the thing I enjoy most consistently is when she's writing this kind of thing, a contemporary setting that seems to be just well-realized normal life, but with fantastic elements that are so thoroughly embedded and grounded, they really don't stand out. It feels too real to be urban fantasy, and also not quite magical realism, although closer maybe, but whatever it is, I like it a lot. This is a good example of it. ( Spoilers )

Naomi Kritzer, "The Four Sisters Overlooking the Sea" -- I enjoyed this one less than I usually enjoy Naomi Kritzer's short fiction (which is usually a lot), so this was a bit disappointing, even though I'm glad I had a chance to read it. ( Spoilers )

Ann Leckie, "Lake of Souls" -- OK, I'm not judging the story based on this, obviously, but this is a really obnoxious way to provide a copy for the voter packet -- PDF with a heavy watermark on every page. Which is too bad, as the story is very much my kind of thing. Leckie writes aliens and alien POV really well -- it's one of my favorite things about her writing -- so ( spoilers )

Premee Mohamed, "By Salt, By Sea, By Light of Stars" -- I've been meaning to read some Premee Mohamed for a while (I think since she won a Nebula for something?), and now I have. It was fine? A classic wizard vs dragon story, and ( spoilers ) But overall pretty slight.


Thomas Ha, "The Brotherhood of Montague St. Video" -- obviously I was intrigued by that title, but the title ended up being my favorite thing about the story... It's atmospheric to be sure, but not the kind of atmosphere I enjoy -- a sort of near-future noir. ( Not really spoilery )

Eugenia Triantafyllou, "Loneliness Universe" -- I've been seeing the author's name around awards lists and so curious to check out her work. This was fine, but not the kind of spec fic I prefer. Or, OK, that's not fair -- I'm pretty sure I've been sold on stories like this when it was someone like Ted Chiang writing them, but I think there's a particular balance of Deep Thoughts to setting and character work that makes a high concept story like this work for me, and this didn't fall inside that range. Maybe it would've worked better for me as a short story? Because I don't feel like the added length of a novelette contributed much new to the central conceit... ( Spoilers )

Novelette: (DONE, 6/6) Lake of Souls, Signs of Life (these two are close of me, but I do really enjoy Leckie's aliens), Four Sisters, Loneliness Universe, wizard one / Montague St Video ('Video' is the more interesting story but I personally enjoyed it less)

Currently working my way through the Best Related Work category, and the first of the novelettes (the T.Kingfisher one, which I'm enjoying a lot more than I expected based on the horror-y title).

Taskmaster is back!! It's not OG Taskmaster s19, which still has no air date (boo!), but Taskmaster Australia s4 started airing this week, and I appreciate having an infusion of new TM. ( First impressions and episode 1 with spoilers )

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Before TM AU started, though, as the next part of my Taskmaster withdrawal, I watched Last One Laughing (UK). ( OK concept, OK lineup, happy about the winner (SPOILERS) )

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I've been making rapid progress backwards on Elis & John. It's not even that I'm listening more, although I did listen a bunch during baking, but the lockdown shows tend to be shorter, even with the Isolation Tapes factored in. So now I've listened to over 3/4 of the 5Live episodes (by episode count, not adjusting for length -- I have 103 episodes to go out of 420+) and about 3/4 of the spanned time period (16 months to go out of ~5 years. So, definitely on track to finish before the fall.

( Feb-March 2025 )

( Oct 2020 - April 2021 )

And this goes outside the cut: Episode 107, at 15:10, John recites the opening line of Larkin's "Aubade", which I really wanted to hear in his voice, and am glad this exists out there.

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John has (re)started the How Do You Cope podcast (which he used to do with Elis) as a solo project, and I think in connection with that has also been going around on other podcasts for cross-promotion (since he can't promote the new HDYC on the BBC show, as it's not a BBC project). I'm enjoying the new HDYC a lot. The previous incarnation, I listened to a couple of selected episodes which I thought would either provide particular insight into John or which came particularly recommended by E&J fans, plus of course the excerps that they would play on the main show. The new ones I'm listening to pretty much as they come out, or as soon as I think I'll be in the right brainspace if it's something I think might be particularly affecting. I think I'll talk about HDYC below in a separate section, since that's a new ongoing thing, an additional twice-weekly infusion of John. But meanwhile I've also caught other one-off podcasts with John on them. (This is for my own records, so I'm not bothering with links, but if someone wants them, happy to provide.)

( Gambling, guest-hosting, newspaper article, etc. )

Right, How Do You Cope. So far there have been the following guests talking about their respective issues: Justin Hawkins of The Darkness (addiction), Jordan Stephens (a lot of stuff, but mostly talking about therapy), Sophie Willan (growing up in care), Tuppence Middleton (OCD), Joe Wicks (growing up with parental addiction and mental health issues), and Matt Forde (cancer diagnosis and recovery). There's an hour-long interview episode and then a bonus "gratitude list' wit the same guest. ( My impressions )

Oh, and speaking of other podcasts, only tertiarily connected to John, but I decided to listen to Isy Suttie's Off Menu episode, and had a good time with that. I always enjoy Isy on stuff, but I had not realized it was the first live recording after the pandemic, which gave it a particular flavor. Speaking of Off Menu, I also listened to the mad episode with Robert DeNiro, which I still don't fully understand what that was or why it happened XD And people on Tumblr have been posting pictures from the recent live episodes, and I cannot WAIT for the Rhod Gilbert one! And am also looking forward to Julian Clary, Katherine Parkinson, and Self-Esteem.

Speaking of Tumblr, a prolific Taskmaster fic writer has been getting into Elis & John, and I've been really enjoying their Tumblring about it, and am also looking forward to the continuation of their fic which takes off from that time (in real life) where Elis and John talked about sex clubs on the show.