Mastodawn

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Bogi Takács Dec 2, 2022

Today on #BogiReads (if you're new, on Friday I like to recommend a #novella for the weekend):

Succulents and Spells (Windflower Book 1) by Andi C. Buchanan
@andi

Gentle #sapphic adventure with both contemporary fantasy and science fiction elements, set in #AotearoaNewZealand.

Loved how it was both cozy & clueful (!), and also appreciated how the magic worked. More pls.

On sale rn for 99c:

#witchy #fantasy #NonbinaryAuthors #NeurodivergentAuthors @transbookstodon

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Bogi Takács Dec 2, 2022

I usually do these recs on weekdays, so see you on Monday with the next one! G-d willing. (Might be a wintry story, I need to make a final decision :) )

I already picked the novella for next Friday and it could not be more different than this week's novella...! Graphic body horror! #BogiReads

https://apex-magazine.com/short-fiction/have-mercy-my-love-while-we-wait-for-the-thaw/

Today on #BogiReads (Dec 5): Have Mercy, My Love, While We Wait for the Thaw by Iori Kusano in @apexmagazine July 2022.

The wintry story I promised! Also heavy moments about empire, independence and accountability (!); in front of a vast backdrop, but also up close and personal...

@shortsff @shortstory #AsianAmericanAuthors #JapaneseAmericanAuthors #QueerAuthors #SpaceOpera #SFF #ScienceFiction #Colonialism #PostWar

Have Mercy, My Love, While We Wait for the Thaw - Apex Magazine

The residents here are used to our visits now. Seeing us arrive doesn’t draw the stares it once did. I’d been surprised we were recognized at all, but a space colony is never so big as it first seems. Even the people who never saw the vids of Rhodan’s squadron shackled and loaded into trucks, the awful stills of me standing wooden-faced behind my mother at her inauguration, know who we are.

Apex Magazine

https://thedeadlands.com/issue-17/dervish/

Bogi Takács Dec 8, 2022

Today on #BogiReads (Dec 7): A Dervish Among the Graves of Ghazni by Tanvir Ahmed, in The Deadlands.

Beautiful historical fantasy story about the ties that bind even beyond death and the voice that whispers from behind the veil between worlds. Need to read more by the author, he also has a recent story in SH!

@shortsff @shortstory

#Fantasy #HistoricalFantasy #SFF #Death #Magic #CentralAsia

A Dervish among the Graves of Ghazni, by Tanvir Ahmed - The Deadlands

Among the strange happenstances and peculiar mischances of ancient times is the story of a dervish in Ghazni who dwelt only among the dead.

The Deadlands

Bogi Takács Dec 8, 2022

For some reason I do not see an update on Dec 6, I might have missed it?? Sorry about that!

http://strangehorizons.com/poetry/tzedek-the-wild-hunt/

Bogi Takács Dec 9, 2022

Today on #BogiReads (Dec 8):

tzedek: the wild hunt by Elisheva Fox in Strange Horizons, Nov 2022.

A poem involving Jewish folk monsters, the American landscape + embodiment. Also " covenant-colored wings" (!) One of my favorite recent speculative poems:

#Poetry #SpeculativePoetry #SFF #Fantasy #ContemporaryFantasy #Fabulism #Jewish #Mazeldon #Poem

@shortsff (poetry groups anyone?)

tzedek: the wild hunt.

and oil rigs make men believe they are nephilim, invincible as david until they meet him and his electric teeth.

Strange Horizons

@shortsff @bookstodon #Novella #CanadianAuthors #MauritianAuthors #CanLit #Horror

Bogi Takács Dec 11, 2022

Today on #BogiReads (Dec 10): Helpmeet by Naben Ruthnum, published by Undertow @Undertow May 2022.

A novella for the weekend! #Historical + #BodyHorror (I mean it! a lot of it!). Also both about healthcare and caregiving & their overlaps. The point of view really made me believe everything, had that tone exactly right.

(Purchase links in next post)

Bogi Takács Dec 11, 2022

Directly from publisher:
https://undertowpublications.com/shop/helpmeet

Amazon:
https://amzn.to/3iIkkYI

Bookshop (I strongly recommend this over Amazon):
https://bookshop.org/a/14302/9781988964386

(the latter two are associate links)

Helpmeet — Undertow Publications

PAPERBACK Cover art by Caspar David Friedrich It's 1900, and Louise Wilk is taking her dying husband home to Buffalo where he grew up. Dr. Edward Wilk is wasting away from an aggressive and debilitating malady. But it's becoming clearer that his condition isn't exactly a disease, but a phase of ex

Undertow Publications

Undertow Publications ✅Dec 11, 2022

@bogiperson @shortsff @bookstodon

Thank you, Bogi!

Bogi Takács Dec 11, 2022

@Undertow Thank *you* for publishing it!

Ana Dec 11, 2022

@bogiperson thanks for reminding me this exists! I had heard about it before but now remembered to add it to my TBR :D

@bogiperson @apexmagazine @shortsff @shortstory
Incredibly powerful and moving. Hard to think about what feelings conquerors might have, guilt, anger, love - but above all guilt. Does this happen in the real world. Would Putin's soldiers feel this way if they destroyed Ukraine?

I don't think that parallel quite works for me? The point of view is someone who fought for independence from the empire, and whose mother is one of the main leaders doing so - and there is also a periphery of the periphery situation going on (at the station). The question is, whether the victorious autonomy needs accountability; the protagonist is on the side of for and their mother is against (AFAICT).

@Island_Martha @apexmagazine @shortsff @shortstory It is Rhodan who is from the colonizing people, but he ended up siding with the independence, and also was a victim of a war crime that permanently injured him, from the side of independence. At least that is my reading of it?

@bogiperson @apexmagazine @shortsff @shortstory

I think because I live in Estonian I reacted very viscerally to some elements described. Particularly the disparate availability food between the liberators and the people liberated resembled the conditions in the Soviet Union and Communist countries where the nomenklatura had access to a wider range consumer goods than the people under them. A very interesting recent novel, ‘The Museum of Broken Promises’ by Elizabeth Buchan deals with conditions in Prague during this period.

IMO it doesn’t matter what label the victorious side adopts if living conditions for the populace do not improve but actually degrade or if they are lies. For example, in 1940, the Soviet Union annexed Estonia to ‘protect’ it. 1941, the German army liberated Estonia from the Soviets and remained here until the Soviets re-liberated Estonia in 1944, occupying this country until 1992.

I think these are all interesting points! (fwiw I lived through the 90s in the region too.)

There is a difficult balance when people are liberated from an empire, conditions might worsen and often remain that way specifically because the empire has external leverage (I feel many colonized countries have had this), but on top of this the new leadership might not be ideal either as you mentioned. (cont'd)

That does not mean independence was wrong (I don't think you claim that either, but I do want to state it :) ).

Also I think there is a difference between an external force / another empire liberating an area versus people from that area reclaiming their self-determination; I wouldn't conflate them (though the leadership can be corrupt in either case!)

I also agree that the story can prompt a lot of great critical discussion and already has :)

As for exposés, I think there might be a difference based on prior expectations. His base did not expect Trump to be a wonderful person, but I have seen (esp. in leftist contexts) people being exposed of misconduct still experiencing consequences. (even if I often feel they should experience even more consequences!)

@bogiperson @apexmagazine @shortsff @shortstory
I want to go on record as being strongly opposed to violent revolutions on the grounds that the inflamed passions required to overthrow entrenched rulers seldom allows for calm, reflective leaders to find places in the 'new' government. If you analyze the experiences of the Baltics and post Communist countries there seems to be a correlation between the violence used to 'kick the basturds out', and the corruption and incompetence of the new governments, with Estonia's Singing Revolution on one end of the scale and violence that overthrew the Ceaușescus in Romania at the other.

I would also certainly pefer a peaceful transfer of power! But Hungary had a peaceful transition that resulted in the massively corrupt Antall government, and increased violence toward my ethnic group in particular, legitimized by govt rhetoric.... So sadly a peaceful transition is not a guarantee of anything. I don't think anyone wanted the Soviets to stay though, besides their closest clientele.

@bogiperson @apexmagazine @shortsff @shortstory

That has long confused me. Have been in Budapest several times and found it to be a wonderful city. How they could have ended up with such racist unpleasant governments is outside my comprehension.

@Island_Martha

To be honest, it's not very comprehensible to Hungarians either! There is even a folk legend slash conspiracy theory about it, the Curse of Turán: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_Turan

Curse of Turan - Wikipedia