babbling lurker

she/her - SFF reader - Destiny 2 player - random thought haver GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/alphabetseeds StoryGraph: https://app.thestorygraph.com/profile/alphabetseeds

[alphabetseeds]

august reads

novels

Revolutionary Girl Utena vol. 1 - not nearly as good as the anime, but it made me appreciate the uniqueness of the anime a lot more. 3/5

Summer Sons by Lee Mandelo - I fucking loved this book. so atmospheric, sexy, creepy and cold and haunting. perfect time of year to read it. 5/5

The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar by Indra Das - novella about a young boy whose memories of his family's truth are subsequently erased and how he deals with growing up living between worlds. beautiful, I recommend reading in as few sittings as possible. 4/5

When the Angels left the Old Country by Sacha Lamb - cozy, fable-like historical fiction meets light fantasy where an angel and a demon leave their super small village in the Pale of Settlement to travel to America and save a girl from their village. a nice read if you're looking for a solid mix of historical and magical, with a touch of queer romance and evolving identities. 4/5

Rogue Protocol (Murderbot Diaries #3) by Martha Wells - finally hopped on the Murderbot train last month and have zero regrets. Murderbot continues to care about things. 5/5

"I hate caring about stuff. But apparently once you start, you can't just stop."

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Emily Wilde #1) by Heather Fawcett - I didn't expect to like this one as much as I did, but I found it absolutely delightful and can't wait for the sequel coming out in January. Emily and Wendell really grew on me, and their adventures in Ljosland were entertaining and engaging. the romance was sweet and fit their personalities so well. 4/5

audiobooks

reread of Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir, narrated by Moira Quirk, that took me like 6 months because I mostly listen to audiobooks in the car and don't drive that often.

my main point is that if you haven't listened to Moira Quirk's narrations for The Locked Tomb series, please do so, even if you're not big into audiobooks. Quirk's delivery of hard-hitting, emotional lines and scenes brought me to tears.

a reread has also solidified for me that I am a major Mercymorn fan and apologist. I hope we can manage to get more Mercymorn, somehow, some way. I adore her.

5/5 when is Alecto coming out please.

short stories (that I remember)

I've been reading Apex Magazine 2021 anthology for over a year so I'm not entirely sure what I read in July and what I read this month because I stopped keeping track but I think this list is mostly accurate.

Throw Rug by Aurelius Raines II

Mishpokhe and Ash by Sydney Rossman-Reich

All This Darkness by Jennifer R. Donohue

Demon Fighter Sucks by Katherine Crighton

Eilam is Forever by Beth Dawkins

overall, this was a great reading month for me. I came up with a tentative reading schedule for the next few months to satisfy my own sanity because my TBR is long and I opted to join a book club. I did 2 r/fantasy book club reads this month - The Last Dragoner of Bowbazar and When the Angels left the Old Country and liked both of them. I like book clubs because it brings me to books I would be less likely to find (and read) on my own.

[foxy-alien]

Gideon was genuinely surprised to find that she was shy

I have a deep obsession with this scene, this was the moment i new i was gonna love this book. Its really the first moment of doubt? we see from this cocksure strong woman. Gideon tells herself she is confident and funny and strong in the face of the adversity in the ninth house and here is when she learns she is also... shy.

I just related to gideon in this moment so much, and i need more meta around this scene because my thoughts are mostly AHHHHH

[alphabetseeds]

I love Magnus and the terrible teens because of this scene. They are so precious. 😭

[albaharu]

Me, reading GTN for the first time, biased for the Gideon POV narration: why everyone is so mean to Gideon why arent they befriending her when she is so cool???

Gideon most of the book:

"Gonna spend my time not talking and standing in the shadows full in black"

[alphabetseeds]

our poor awkward goth himbo 👌

[alphabetseeds]

If she is the blade that holds the blood in, then he is the wound that endures.

- Flight & Anchor, Nicole Kornher-Stace

[poisonheartfrog]

They're the spiders Georg of living in other people's bodies

ID: Two edited screenshots from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. In the first one a blond woman stands outside a brick building. She has been labelled "Corona" and the caption had been edited to read "How do four people only have only body that is originally theirs between them?". The second screenshot shows three men who the woman is looking at. One looks taken aback, one is looking away from her, and the third looks upset. They are labelled "Camilla and Palamedes", "Pyrrha", and "Nona". The caption reads "They're-- The economy is in shambles." /end ID

[backstepping]

"Well, I guess there's only one question left."

[alphabetseeds]

I remember when we we're gambling to win

Everybody else said better luck next time

I don't wanna bend, let the bad girls bend

I just wanna be your friend

Why you giving me a hard time?

[alphabetseeds]

me: [sneezes]

spouse: may the Lord save your soul

me: well that's not going to happen

spouse: it will if you're really sorry

me: ...

me: I won't be

[rylandsgrace]

Across The Spiderverse + Trivia

[peach-wallpapers]

Rebecca from Cyberpunk Edgerunners

[totopopopo]

Everybody knows by now I think that harrow’s name comes from the (early) Christian concept of the harrowing of hell.

To summarize briefly, in Christian mythology, when Jesus died on the cross, he descended into the underworld for the three days that he stayed dead. I say the underworld—the word they use is Hades, not Hell, although some translations use the word hell. This pre-dates the Christian conceptions of hell that we are more familiar with—fire and brimstone and punishment etc—and reflects the idea that it was more of a neutral place where everyone went when they died, stemming from other traditions like the Greco Roman hades (obviously, which it took the word from) or the Jewish Sheol. The harrowing of hell refers to what Jesus does when he gets to this place. He descends and he kills death itself (using the cross as a weapon)—the death of death—and he leads ALL of the dead people there up out of the mouth of hades. He frees them from the shackles of death. This is all laid out in the early apocryphal text the gospel according to nicodemus. You should read it it’s fun.

When I say mouth, I mean that literally. In art and literature, even in the gospel of nicodemus, hades was characterized as an actual living creature, and in the harrowing, Jesus kills it and leads the souls out of its gaping mouth. This has lead to some frankly excellent art:

Okay, back to the locked tomb. Why am I bringing this up (other than the fact that I partially wrote my thesis in this so I will talk about it whenever possible)? Well, we know harrow’s name is… significant. We also know that in Alecto, she will find herself in hell. Okay. Where do we see ^ this imagery pop up in the universe of the locked tomb? What place does John call hell? The Soma, under the river. Soma, which means body in Greek. The body that houses the dead in its belly, the body of hades, the living body of hell. And we’ve seen it’s mouth already, a gaping mouth lined with teeth.

EDIT: it was pointed out it’s called the stoma not the soma, but. Stoma means fucking mouth in Greek so…. The point stands. The point very much stands.

Like.. mouth indeed.

I think harrow is gonna go into the stoma. I think harrow is going to kill death—or maybe, in a delicious inversion the likes of which Tamsyn Muir loves so much, she is going to kill necromancy. The death of the death of death. And she’s going to lead out the souls in there. All the people—Augustine? Cassiopea?—and all the fucking planets too.

Idk we’ll fucking see.

[alphabetseeds]

this fandom is fucking awesome.

[alphabetseeds]

2022 in books part 2

July

Foxhunt - Rem Wigmore (3/5)

Hammers on bone - Cassandra Khaw (4/5)

Upright women wanted - Sarah Gailey (4/5)

Victories greater than death - Charlie Jane Anders (3/5)

Shadows of self - Brandon Sanderson (4/5) (audiobook reread)

August

Bluebird - Ciel Pierlot (5/5)

The library at mount char - Scott Hawkins (4/5)

The wood wife - Terri Windling (4/5)

I'm glad my mom died - Jennette McCurdy (5/5)

A mirror mended - Alix E. Harrow (3.5/5)

The sandman book one - Neil Gaiman, Sam Kieth (5/5)

September

Siren queen - Nghi Vo (4.5/5)

Hollow kingdom - Kina Kane Buxton (3/5)

Our wives under the sea - Julia Armfield (5/5)

October

Harrow the ninth - Tamsyn Muir (5/5)

The bands of mourning - Brandon Sanderson (4/5) (audiobook reread)

Nona the ninth - Tamsyn Muir (5/5)

The last gifts of the universe - Rory August (4.5/5)

Over my dead body - Sweeney Boo (3/5)

November

Babel - R.F. Kuang (5/5)

Mooncakes - Suzanne Walker, Wendy Xu (4/5)

December

Everyone on the moon is essential personnel - Julian K. Jarboe (3.5/5)

Currently reading:

War girls - Tochi Onyebuchi

Gideon the Ninth - Tamsyn Muir (audiobook reread)

If you'd like to read reviews...

you can find me on GR and StoryGraph @alphabetseeds if you'd like to check out my reviews, though I am absolutely not a good book reviewer.

[alphabetseeds]

2022 in books part 1

January

Gods of jade and shadow - Silvia Moreno-Garcia (5/5)

Rhythm of war - Brandon Sanderson (4.5/5)

February

Silver in the wood - Emily Tesh (3/5)

Windswept - Kaitlin Bellamy (3/5)

March

(realizing I needed to finish r/fantasy's 2021 book challenge)

Worldbuilding for fantasy fans and adults - M.D. Presley (3/5)

How to defeat a demon king in ten easy steps - Andrew Rowe (3/5)

Iron widow - Xiran Jay Zhao (4/5)

The unspoken name - A.K. Larkwood (5/5)

Legends & lattes - Travis Baldree (5/5)

The hundred thousand kingdoms - N.K. Jemisin (4/5)

Emperor Mollusk versus the Sinister Brain - A. Lee Martinez (4/5)

The haunting of tram car 015 - P. Djèlí Clark (3/5)

April

Machinehood - S.B. Divya (3/5)

May

The poppy war - R.F. Kuang (4/5)

Daughter of the moon goddess - Sue Lynn Tan (4/5)

The dragon republic - R.F. Kuang (4/5)

June

The burning god - R.F. Kuang (4/5)

Dead collections - Isaac Fellman (4/5)

Alloy of law - Brandon Sanderson (4/5) (audiobook reread)

[alphabetseeds]

I am now addicted to making cool whip cookies, someone save me from myself

[alphabetseeds]

Harrowhark Nonagesimus cuts loose on the dance floor

[tio-trile]

Daily Nona Affirmations

(Original image)

[paradises-library]

“He and Mrs Piper quickly bonded over a deep love of scones. She made them every which way - plain, served with a bit of clotted cream and raspberry jam; savoury and studded with cheese and garlic chives; or dotted through with bits of dried fruit. Robin liked them best plain - why ruin what was, in his opinion, perfect from conception? He had just learned about Platonic forms, and was convinced scones were the Platonic ideal of bread.”

— Babel, or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution, R.F. Kuang

[alphabetseeds]

"The warm grittiness of a scone at Vaults. Mrs Piper's sweet, floury hugs. Buttery lemon biscuits melting into nectar on his tongue."

"He went back to his first morning in Oxford: climbing a sunny hill with Ramy, picnic basket in hand. Elderflower cordial. Warm brioche, sharp cheese, a chocolate tart for dessert. The air that day smelled like a promise, all of Oxford shone like an illumination, and he was falling in love."

[alphabetseeds]

everyone is a resurrection beast

my spouse has the best wild theories about The Locked Tomb

they'll roll in with something like, "X is a resurrection beast, I think this whole group is resurrection beasts!"

and I'm sitting here like fuck that's great but I can't tell you anything