nerakrose

this is not a drill!!!

Point of Hearts came out yesterday and somehow I MISSED the announcement so I only bought it today, but it is out!!!

Smashwords link: Point of Hearts (not an affiliate link or anything)

I love this series so much and I've been so excited about getting a new book. There is another one coming as well afaik, Point of Graves - which was supposed to come before this one, but then Stuff Happened I guess, and now we get this novella instead, ahead of Ppint of Graves. I'm not complaining. Also now that I'm like, safely landed in Denmark and all, with an INCOME, I can re-start my patreon subscriptions, including Melissa Scott. She's been sharing snippets from the Astreiant verse for a while so if there are any other fans here then there is a veritable treasure trove over at patreon waiting for you.

I literally just started reading another book that I think I'll need to commit to finishing before I can jump onto this. I might even re-read all of Astreiant...

The elevator pitch, for those who want one: this series is a police procedural set in a secondary world where astrology is real and magic. the setting is vaguely renaissance Italy, the main characters are queer, and their relationship progresses so lovely, in my opinion. they are adults, trying to make things work. These could also be described to have elements of mannerpunk as there is a strong thread of exploration of class, gender, and politics - the setting is matriarchal and somewhat queernormative, and really explores what that actually means.

these books are NOT m/m romance and if somebody tries to pitch them to you that way they are misleading you; these are fantasy novels far more than they are romance novels, and each book is a standalone mystery rooted in the fantastical and magical world it's set in. there is no on-screen smut, at most you'll get some flirting and kissing on screen. the get-together also happens off-page.

these books are major comfort reads for me and I really want them to do well so we can get more books, so if this sounds interesting do give them a try and leave a review somewhere.

dolorosa_12 does Friday Open Threads, which I always enjoy reading even if I don't always have anything to say myself, and that is where the inspiration for this post comes from. I don't usually do any open discussion posts (I am not a community builder, alas), but I want to open this one up widely, so do feel free to link to it elsewhere.

I've recently watched two different miniseries based on books, one was a re-watch and the other was new to me. One of these miniseries is in my opinion superior to the book while the other was definitely good, but I preferred the book.

My question is: What story do you feel was served better by a TV or film adaptation than by its original form? What made it better, and why?

I'll go first: Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid

This was the kind of book that on the surface looked tailor made to my tastes - I love rock music and have spent a considerable amount of my time being super into specific bands, going to concerts and collecting merch and setlists and getting tickets signed, and obsessing over band members. So when I heard of this novel, I thought: here is a book for me!

Unfortunately, I didn't really like the book. The interview format was fine but I wasn't keen on the twist, and in written form Daisy Jones especially came across like the only thing that was going on for her was the substance abuse and being mad that she didn't get what she wanted. my biggest issue by far was that I couldn't listen to any of the music. On paper the songs sounded great, and being familiar with a lot of (but not all) rock music of the time period, I could sort of imagine what the songs were meant to sound like, or vibe like, but ultimately, they were just words on paper. This book was a bit of a let down for me.

Then the TV series (on Amazon Prime in the UK) came along and I gained a whole new appreciation for the story. There was a constant running soundtrack of music from real bands alongside the fictional one, with new music written for the TV series in the appropriates style. And each song is a banger! The interview format worked so much better with the series presented as a hybrid of video interviews, like a documentary, interspersed with flashback bits. it also made it less jarring when the interview bits suddenly stopped being a documentary and started being present-time scenes outside the filmed interview. (does that make sense?) The twist also felt a lot less annoying as the actors brought a lot of body language, expressions, and tone to the interview format that wasn't there in writing, that enriched their relationship with the past and the interviewer. And of course: the music. I re-watched this series recently and loved it just as much the second time.

Of course this specific series wouldn't have existed without the book, so it's not fair to say that it should've been made as a TV series from the start and that we don't need the book, but personally I would recommend the TV series over the book in this case.

What about you?

Please note this is not the place for absolutist the-book-is-always-better-no-matter-what opinions. Be kind and respectful to one another in the comments.

Today has been a hot, sunny day, possibly the last of the season, so I took the opportunity to wash my summer duvet, hang it outside to dry, and then put it away to swap it for the winter duvet, which I washed in spring before putting away. (it's a bit soon to swap it out, but I don't mind.) I also washed the mattress protector and the pillowcase (my pillow has a protective case that can be washed) and put on fresh sheets, so my bed is now all fresh.

I've had a very fun discussion about Star Trek TOS and mid-century pulp sci-fi vs modern sci-fi over in

scanfic (in Danish/Swedish), which led me to revisit a binding I did last year for a bookbinding competition with climate change as theme. I didn't win anything in the competition, but I had a lot of fun putting the book together. As part of it, I also read a lot of different texts to curate a selection for the book (I believe most traditional binders just choose one existing text and bind it), and wrote forewords. So the binding is unique in many ways. Anyway, the point is to say, I wrote the forewords in a kind of frenzy as I was working to a deadline, but revisiting the binding and the texts I'd curated and the forewords themselves, I thought, hey actually this is pretty good? So under the cut is the foreword for the fiction half plus the links to the (publicly accessible) texts if anybody wants to read along. (the foreword for the non-fic half is very 'I have no brain left and I just need to fill this page', ha.)

( Earth is Missing! and other stories [foreword] )

I didn't do a post in June because I'd only finished one book that month.

( cut for length: research and writing queer muslim characters )

sleepyquail shared this meme - esquire has a list of 75 "essential reading" SF books.

bold the ones you've read, italicise the ones where you've read something else by the author. sleepyquail also added ** for books that are on the TBR, which I'm also going to do.

75. The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey ** I have 3 other books on my TBR
74. The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal
73. Redshirts by John Scalzi (DNF'd something else by him)
72. Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino
71. The Ten Percent Thief by Lavanya Lakshminarayan
70. Midnight Robber by Nalo Hopkinson
69. Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson (once had a copy of Quicksilver I never got around to reading)
68. Star Maker by Olaf Stapledon
67. Contact by Carl Sagan
66. Under the Skin by Michel Faber
65. Way Station by Clifford D. Simak
64. Sea of Rust by C. Robert Cargill
63. What Mad Universe by Fredric Brown
62. The Book of Phoenix by Nnedi Okorafor
61. Semiosis by Sue Burke
60. Excession by Iain M. Banks
59. The Claw of the Conciliator by Gene Wolfe
58. Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny
57. This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone (I strongly disliked it)
56. The Resisters by Gish Jen
55. Rosewater by Tade Thompson **
54. Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky
53. Solaris by Stanislaw Lem
52. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
51. The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein
50. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
49. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
48. The Body Scout by Lincoln Michel
47. An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon **
46. The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler
45. Neuromancer by William Gibson
44. The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester
43. The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
42. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
41. A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.
40. Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir **
39. Zone One by Colson Whitehead **got two other books by him on my TBR
38. The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers
37. Engine Summer by John Crowley
36. The Children of Men by P.D. James
35. Radiance by Catherynne M. Valente (I DFN'd two other books by her)
34. The City & The City by China Miéville
33. A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine ** (I've read some other stuff by her but this book is on my TBR)
32. Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie **
31. The Stand by Stephen King (I've read many of his books)
30. In Ascension by Martin MacInnes
29. Dhalgren by Samuel R. Delany
28. The Forever War by Joe Haldeman
27. 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (DNF'd a different Murakami book)
26. Future Home of the Living God by Louise Erdrich
25. Ammonite by Nicola Griffith
24. Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer
23. Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
22. Hyperion by Dan Simmons
21. Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson
20. Shikasta by Doris Lessing
19. The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut (read one, and DNF'd two others)
18. Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky
17. Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
16. The Complete Robot by Isaac Asimov
15. How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu
14. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
13. The Employees by Olga Ravn
12. 1984 by George Orwell
11. The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu ** (but lbr I'll never get around to it)
10. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick **
9. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
8. Exhalation by Ted Chiang **
7. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
6. The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin **
5. Kindred by Octavia Butler **
4. The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin (I've read something else by her)
3. The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury (I know I've read this but have no memory of it)
2. Dune by Frank Herbert (DNF'd it)
1. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

9 books on this list read, multiple DNF's and even more TBR. there are some books/authors on this list I've never heard of, and some I wouldn't have included myself, but this list gets some kudos for not being populated solely by straight white guys.

|

Entries tagged with books

new Astreiant novel!!

Monday Open Thread: good TV/film adaptations

climate change fiction

June & July reading

SF meme

Links

Page Summary