laceblade

• What are you currently reading?
Nothing at this given moment. Was reading some Wherever You Go, There You Are by John Kabat-Zinn last night.
At one point I was encouraged to practice meditation to deal with chronic pain & other issues.
I'm still trying to suss out some routines between this & traditional Catholic prayer.
I have a hard time reading more than a few pages of this book at a time without rolling my eyes, although it doesn't usually make me angry like Pema Chodron did. My personality feels very much not pre-disposed to meditation, but I keep trying to find some techniques anyway, I guess.

• What did you recently finish reading?
Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler. Just fantastic. I was expecting this to end a little more unfinished, as I know there was a 3rd book planned before she died, but it's still very satisfying.
I expect to reread this & Parable of the Sower many times.

Special A, vols. 1-2 - Ugh. Yet another series where a girl has a male rival in school, who will inevitably end up being her love interest. There's nothing special going on here, and my library doesn't have volume 3 (though it has later volumes!). Drop.

Basara, volume 1 - This came up in a discussion about a possible post-apocalyptic/dystopian anime/manga panel at WisCon 38. meganbmoore also mentioned this on Twitter and I was like, "UGH but the art is so 1990s and awful with ridiculous jaw lines and etc."
VOLUME ONE IS SO GOOD OMFGGGGGG.
In a post-apocalyptic Japan where everything's basically a desert, a pair of twins is born. Their tribe's prophet intones, "This is a child of destiny!" and Sarasa grows up believing the child of destiny is her brother Tatara - her tribe thinks so, too!
They suffer under a despotic king, waiting for the day that Tatara will lead a revolution to overthrow their corrupt society.
Then, Tatara's head gets chopped off.
So Sarasa cuts her hair, binds her chest, and becomes Tatara for her tribe.
UGH SO GOOD, SO EXCITED TO READ MORE.

• What do you think you’ll read next?
Bringing on a mini-vacation with me: Under the Banner of Heaven, The Summer Prince, a feminist Catholic book, Basara manga, & Shugo Chara! manga.

RANDOM: j00j & I were talking about how there's lots of depictions of comfort food in fantasy novels, but had trouble coming up with sci-fi examples. j00j made a post soliciting examples, which is here.
"[H]ow much science fiction is there with appealing food descriptions? It's not all Gagh and replicators and food pills/amyloid/protein gruel, right?"

Okay, so Sarah Palin is a good sport. Y/Y? Poehler's rap was bad-ass, and watching Alec Baldwin say what he actually thought was amusing.

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For Wiscon Book Club this path month, we read Octavia Butler's Lilith's Brood, which is actually a trilogy comprised of the titles Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago. I made it through the first two books, and about 20 pages of the third. I enjoy Butler's writing in terms of imagery and storytelling. The books revolve around the intersectionality of many topics: gender, sexuality, power struggles, humanity, and horror in encountering and loving an "Other" (in this case, aliens). And yet, while I sailed through the first book, book two was pretty stagnant, and from the bit I read of the third book, it seemed like it would be the same. The latter two set up really interesting premises, but then nothing happened. I think I like a bit more character development with my stories, or maybe I just wasn't in the right mood for them. I should point out that these are some of Gretchen's favorite books, and many people enjoyed them thoroughly.

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For my "regular" book club, we read The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly. I actually really love this book, but have only read about a third of it. Unlike Butler's Imago, though I do intend to finish it.

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As for books I've actually finished? It's mostly been manga lately. I finished the first volume of the Batman Chronicles today. So much LOL! Hey, is there Batman/Robin slash out there? There must be. I just got the inkling when they took their little oath to fight crime and get each other's backs. I really love the ominous narration in these comics.
Already an almost legendary figure, the cowled shadow of the Batman prowls through the night preying upon the criminal parasite, like the winged creature whose name he has adopted.

A bit more creepily....after Robin was introduced, there was a sidebar for young readers to join "Robin's Regulars." No buttons or badges are needed....one must simply exemplify "Readiness, Obedience, Brotherhood, Industriousness, and (of course) Nationalism."

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My part-time job is making me add tons of books to my Requests at the public library, too. Yesterday I bought Tim Wise's Speaking Treason Fluently: Anti-Racist Reflections From an Angry White Male, and it's pretty damn amazing so far. But Tim Wise is always amazing.


There will be a "real life" update soonish. Books always come first, right?