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kitewithfishWhat I’ve Read:
(edited to add) Ninefox Gambit – Xing Book Club – It's fine? Yoon Ha Lee's other book that I've read, Phoenix Extravagant, does some interesting things with a similar theme, and I think the writing improved. I haven't read the rest of the trilogy so it seems like this is a set-up novel and the rest of the series is required to understand the impact of what's set up here. For a debut novel, solid! I mostly felt like this didn't quite land for me due to the lack of stakes - I didn't really care about the main characters until the very end?
Tadek and the Princess by Alexandra Rowland – This novella is a tragic and beautiful love story for a side character from A Taste of Gold and Iron. I loved it; it’s kind and tender and I cried.
Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation – Mo Xiang Tong Xiu – Vol 1 +2 This is the book series that The Untamed is based on, and I am just getting into the books properly. I bought vol 1 and read it years ago, but I hadn’t understood at the time that the original online light novel was so long that it had to be divided up to be officially translated and published, so I ended up finishing the tv show faster than the book – tho I can’t say I did either of them quickly.
I distinctly remember that my initial reaction to this book was puzzlement; I really didn’t get the hype, the writing seemed choppy, and the plot was very inconsistent. The issue I didn’t recognizedthat I was having was that I was learning a whole new toolbox for approaching Chinese fantasy in translation. (Worth comparing to Jo Walton’s SF Reading Protocols - https://www.tor.com/2010/01/18/sf-reading-protocols/ - if you start reading scifi and fantasy, you sometimes have to learn a new skillset to enjoy it)
The task of translating a fantasy novel with a romance from Chinese to English involves an immense number of decisions about how to localize the text or keep it in the original, on top of the sheer task of making sense of the plot and jokes. If I use my reaction to this books as a yardstick, I would say that I have learned a lot about Chinese, light novels, gay tropes in Chinese literature, and about Chinese as a language, since I first picked up volume 1 back in December 2021. There’s lots more to learn, but this story feels so much less alien than it did the first time I picked it up.
What I’m Reading:
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York– Robert Caro – like 7%
It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections in Horror - Joe Vallese (Editor) – SPN Seminar – 38%
-Short essays where queer authors talk about horror cinema’s impact on them, with a focus on particular movies.
The Lottery and Other Stories by Shirley Jackson – read a few more short stories – I’m now into section 2 of the book. 41%
What I’ll Read Next:
When Women Were Dragons - Xing Book Club
Lord of The Rings – in keeping with my vague sense that I should actually read the big books that everyone talks about!
Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett out from the library.
Gild, and We Have Always Lived in the Castle.
Owned and need to read: Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology, California Bones, Raven Song by IA Ashcroft, At The Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard, Tamryn Eradani's Enchanting Encounters Books 2 and 3, Tom Stoppard, Invention of love, "You Just Need to Lose Weight" and Other Myths about Fatness by Aubrey Gordon
(edited to add) Ninefox Gambit – Xing Book Club – It's fine? Yoon Ha Lee's other book that I've read, Phoenix Extravagant, does some interesting things with a similar theme, and I think the writing improved. I haven't read the rest of the trilogy so it seems like this is a set-up novel and the rest of the series is required to understand the impact of what's set up here. For a debut novel, solid! I mostly felt like this didn't quite land for me due to the lack of stakes - I didn't really care about the main characters until the very end?
Tadek and the Princess by Alexandra Rowland – This novella is a tragic and beautiful love story for a side character from A Taste of Gold and Iron. I loved it; it’s kind and tender and I cried.
Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation – Mo Xiang Tong Xiu – Vol 1 +2 This is the book series that The Untamed is based on, and I am just getting into the books properly. I bought vol 1 and read it years ago, but I hadn’t understood at the time that the original online light novel was so long that it had to be divided up to be officially translated and published, so I ended up finishing the tv show faster than the book – tho I can’t say I did either of them quickly.
I distinctly remember that my initial reaction to this book was puzzlement; I really didn’t get the hype, the writing seemed choppy, and the plot was very inconsistent. The issue I didn’t recognizedthat I was having was that I was learning a whole new toolbox for approaching Chinese fantasy in translation. (Worth comparing to Jo Walton’s SF Reading Protocols - https://www.tor.com/2010/01/18/sf-reading-protocols/ - if you start reading scifi and fantasy, you sometimes have to learn a new skillset to enjoy it)
The task of translating a fantasy novel with a romance from Chinese to English involves an immense number of decisions about how to localize the text or keep it in the original, on top of the sheer task of making sense of the plot and jokes. If I use my reaction to this books as a yardstick, I would say that I have learned a lot about Chinese, light novels, gay tropes in Chinese literature, and about Chinese as a language, since I first picked up volume 1 back in December 2021. There’s lots more to learn, but this story feels so much less alien than it did the first time I picked it up.
What I’m Reading:
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York– Robert Caro – like 7%
It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections in Horror - Joe Vallese (Editor) – SPN Seminar – 38%
-Short essays where queer authors talk about horror cinema’s impact on them, with a focus on particular movies.
The Lottery and Other Stories by Shirley Jackson – read a few more short stories – I’m now into section 2 of the book. 41%
What I’ll Read Next:
When Women Were Dragons - Xing Book Club
Lord of The Rings – in keeping with my vague sense that I should actually read the big books that everyone talks about!
Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett out from the library.
Gild, and We Have Always Lived in the Castle.
Owned and need to read: Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology, California Bones, Raven Song by IA Ashcroft, At The Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard, Tamryn Eradani's Enchanting Encounters Books 2 and 3, Tom Stoppard, Invention of love, "You Just Need to Lose Weight" and Other Myths about Fatness by Aubrey Gordon
