Aurora's Sundry Notes

Oh, hello, hello. I am still around, and healthy and well and all, I'm just kind of bad at getting around to doing things, so this journal has suffered as a result. I've thought about posting on many days, but turns out just thinking about it doesn't make it happen!

But here, let's have that my recent culture round-up (maybe I need to call it that instead of "culture consumed". The latter sounds so... consumer-like).

Books

I'm still slower at reading than usual, brain just doesn't have the usual energy to focus on reading so I to read in much smaller chunks, and so books are getting read slower. But at least I can read and enjoy it, so that's good. I finished the reread of my beloved This Is How You Lose the Time War. It's one of those books that I only love more, the more I read it, and keep discovering new layers as I read it again.

I'm currently reading The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow, and I've liked it quite a bit. Beautifully written, and I really like the concept of doors between different universes, and the role stories, storytelling and writing play in this. Though I will say this is not maybe the best time ever to be reading a book about a woman of colour written by a white woman (January is mixed-race). But at least I really like the fact that her problems are not primarily because of the colour of her skin, though oppression and racism play into her experience of the world and why some things go the way they do - it's all very much present in the story. As a white person from an overwhelming-majority-white country, I'm not qualified to say how well the book does by race. So far it hasn't raised major red flags for me, but obviously my perspective is limited.

I've also been reading some nonfiction - still continue to mainly get my dose of my own language in writing by reading nonfiction books written in or translated into Finnish. I've recently started a book on astrobiology, and I've been inspired to pick up again the book I was reading earlier in the year about how weather and climate have affected human history, which is really interesting.

I keep trying to write something about Black Lives Matter, but it's hard, because it's so easy to get into topics that my mental health doesn't like. But suffice it to say: while I've been intentionally diversifying my reading for some years, and have only had excellent results - so many great books and authors I've discovered, such a richer world of cultures, thoughts, histories etc. - I've realized now I still don't read enough by Black authors. It's probably partly because they're not promoted as much, and partly because they're often about really painful and traumatic topics, because that's what publishers will publish from Black writers. Plus goodness knows what internalized racism I've picked up from living in a white society with plenty of racism even if it often isn't acknowledged. So I've been going through the book rec lists that have been coming out / linked to lately, looking for books that look like they'd be my mind of thing to read, and placing them on hold in the library or, so far in one case, making a successful request for the library to buy the book so I can then borrow it. Hopefully I'll find some gems as I get to reading these.

Justina Ireland's Dread Nation, which has been on my TBR for ages anyway, has just arrived to me at the library, so I hope to pick it up soon! It also fits my plan of reading as much queer stuff as I manage during June, since no offline Pride stuff is happening. (My city postponed the Pride Week until September, hoping that big events can happen then. Otherwise next week would have been Pride Week. It's really hot here now, though - at least for my poor heat tolerance - so honestly I don't even mind that it's only in September.. Hopefully it works out then.)

I haven't got much money to buy books myself, but at some point I'm going to pull together enough scraps of money to buy P. Djèlí Clark's novellas, because they're amazing. If you want a book rec from me for amazing books written by Black authors, I highly recommend his alternate history fantasy/steampunk stories, they're some of the best stuff I've read. And somewhere I saw the Tor.com folks say he's going to have a full-length novel coming out next year set in the alternate history Cairo that's depicted in A Dead Djinn in Cairo and The Haunting of Tram Car 015. I can't wait!



Podcasts

Uh, where was I the last time I did this? Let's see the main things:

The Penumbra Podcast: I've listened to The Sportive Nymphs and started on Juno Steel and the Long Way Home... Which means that, incredibly, I'm getting closer to the end of S2. Still quite a few episodes to go, what with the last Second Citadel story of the season being something like 5 or 6 episodes, but not many stories left! Of course there's already plenty of S3 to go before I'm anywhere near caught up - at the moment I'm something like 1 3/4 years behind.

I finished re-listening to The Far Meridian, and have now progressed to the minisodes that have been published lately. The show makes me feel happy and seen with all its complicated human emotions and very-slow-burn queer female longing and connection. Also on a re-listen you notice so many things that you didn't notice the first time around because then you didn't know what would be significant later.

I'm starting to dive back into Wolf359, and finished listening to the very long special episode, Change of Mind, which is past!Lovelace and I loved it very much. (I continue to have a massive crush on her.) It connected interestingly to the end of S3/what will probably be the beginning of S4. So I'll get to S4 at some point soon, if I dare...

I've been trying out some new fiction podcasts; so far I've made the most progress with Under the Electric Stars, which is a cyberpunk drama by and with queer people and people of colour (and queer people of colour - I have the impression most are both, at least character-wise) and I really like it so far. Another story I've started listening to is Valence - it's an urban fantasy thingie and it has Ishani Kanetkar (Arkady on The Strange Case of the Starship Iris) on it which was honestly all I needed to want to check it out (plus, Jordan Cobb who's Kathy on Among the Stars and Bones!), but also all the others are really good and the story seems really interesting. Contains honest treatment of mental health stuff, I'm kind of having to take it slowly because the main character's negative inner voice is rather effective at times. But it's good!

In terms of nonfiction podcasts, I found Exolore on st_aurafina's recommendation, it's about worldbuilding science fiction planets based on all the sciences the host and the guests can possibly bring into a single podcast, and it's just what I needed. And connected to the topic I mentioned earlier, Heather Rose Jones's Lesbian Historic Motif Podcast just did an episode on f/f historical fiction by Black authors with at least one Black protagonist. There's a transcript on the page I just linked to, so check it out if you don't feel like listening, and get some book recs that way.

Other culture

I'm super slow at watching any TV series, but I'm halfway through Gentleman Jack now, so yay? I really need to just turn off my subscription, though, either try to speed through the rest of the series before my current month runs out, or just buy it, it'll be cheaper. I'm still liking it lots, I don't know why it so hard to focus.

And last night was Midsummer's Eve, which is kind of a big deal in Finland, and I had exactly zero plans beyond food, so I watched some of the Finnish National Ballet's A Midsummer Night's Dream ballet online. I find it a lot easier to focus on ballet than on TV shows, so maybe I should just switch to ballet. Should check out how opera works for me at the moment.

Museums have opened here, so I hope to get around to visiting one soon.