It's not often that fiction makes me feel like I need a hot shower to scrub away the grime from reading it, but a friend of mine gave me a stack of 90s - 2000s small press horror and alterative fiction magazines for the next run of Eldergoth Surprise Boxes, and eeeugh. Half of them were full of bad "edgy" horror porn; the worst sort of examples of splatterpunk and writing to be shocking.
I know he bought them as research into markets that were buying short horror fiction, but they're just ... gross
People, The Strenge Case of the Alchemist's Daughter by Theodora Goss is awesome, and you should all go read it. Jilli, I think it's especially up your alley.
I blurbed The Alchemist's Daughter! It's so so good you guys. Seconding everything Pix said
Also (coming soon - very much of interest here) VIvian Shaw's Strange Practice - Dr. Greta vanHelsing, physician to monsters [link]
(also news of big old ebook sale for yours truly up in News)
I am reading Strange Practice from netgalley and it is so much fun. Coming out in July I think.
Went to the library: they had the sequel to The Rook. The Rook was shelved in the science fiction/fantasy section. Stiletto was shelved in regular fiction. What is up with that?
That is weird, sumi, but I've noticed that even when, say, buying e-books that books in a series will get categorized differently. I suppose it's someone different making the decision each time?
Up to book 17 of the Foreigner series (although I think she calls it something else, First Contact?) and I'm pleased with my decision to catch up on it. Weird to read after the Three Body Problem, I keep thinking about cosmological sociology, but
the Trisolarans initiated contact with the Solar System rather than just "cleansing" them, too.
So. I don't know what I conclude from that, but I continue to enjoy Cherryh's way with alien cultures.
Meanwhile - an important fact I have learned from Stiletto
: the Dutch put chocolate sprinkles on their toast.
(packs bags for trip to Holland)
In strange shelving stories, when I was a kid I found "Animal Farm" had originally been classified as a children's book ... someone explained to the librarians and it was reclassified as a book for grown-ups, but the original stamp was visible.
Meanwhile - an important fact I have learned from Stiletto : the Dutch put chocolate sprinkles on their toast.
For breakfast most mornings, apparently.
Nancy Pearl's summer reading list, via NPR: [link]
I love the sound of the first book, a vintage Hollywood mystery with Edith Head (!) as one of the detectives.
