"Host Vic is a character. Other Dropout stuff is like Vic plus, you know?"
I talked to Vic about their time at Dropout TV vs. my time at Buzzfeed, their queerness and gender identity, and how exactly the show is made. The interview took place on Zoom while they sat in a basement in Hungary, because they’re there for work and that’s the only place they get wifi at night. Please enjoy.
- Autostraddle, Gabe Dunn
Books! I finished 8 things already! I am ahead of schedule on the goal! (tbf I'm usually ahead in January because of the yearly challenge, but still I shall be pleased and hope I keep it up better than last year 😅🤞)
I have got to figure out a different method to rating things other than gut-impulse tho, because while it feels fine when I rate the book, I then look at how all the assorted books compare to each other and think that's not right?
regardless! I am yet again delighted by the silly graphics in thestorygraph and I really need to start talking about books more often...
So have some extended rambling to see if I can work on both of those problems at once?
First off, I adore Peter S. Beagle, he's only paused because I was not really in a short story mood and had to return the book to the library 😅, but so far the first story in the book is my favorite, so if you ever see Professor Gottesman and the Indian Rhinoceros anywhere, consider it recommended twice, both as Beagle in general and for itself in particular.
In order of actually finished:
Brigands & Breadknives (Travis Baldree)
This series continues to be just as cozy and delightful as it says on the tin, and I gotta say I adore how he treated Fern as a POV character. (She is doing overtly the wrong but completely understandable thing and the book is just so compassionate about it. idk, I am also an angry anxious confrontation-avoiding dumbass sometimes, please forgive me?)
I think it may be my favorite of the three, but it's been long enough since I read Legends & Lattes that the memory is vague so that may just be recency bias.
(Also recency is such a weird word, I looked it up to confirm the spelling and it still feels wrong even tho I know it's not. 🤣)
To Shape a Dragon's Breath (Moniquill Blackgoose)
An excellent alternate history with dragons and exquisitely done word nerdery and magic!science, (including a protag with no patience for a love triangle even if the two people she likes don't know that yet, which from the perspective of a middle-aged queer lady who only sometimes still indulges in YA&adjacent books I gotta say is hilarious), and there's something really compelling about the way the POV idealizes the native culture without making any of the people who practice it anything less than normal and messy and human.
And obviously it's not wrong about Anequs' judgement of the colonizing culture(s), so that is also incredibly satisfying.
And none of that's actually about like, the plot or anything, but that's not hard to find, so whatever.
And the sequel just came out and I'm like 1st in line in the hold queue at the library so hopefully the first line of readers will start finishing soon so I can read it in February while I still remember this one. 😅
Bury The Lede (Gabe Dunn, w/Miguel Muerto, Claire Roe (illustrator))
Not really the target audience for this one, but it's well done and has good art that complements the story well and it is truly just the right amount of vicious for what it is. (Murder! Journalism! What lines should you cross for a story? Which lines are we going to watch Madison leap over willingly and wilfully despite knowing they're *not* lines you can ever uncross?)
Not a personal favorite, but I can absolutely recommend it as a modern queer neo-noir... something? Can't think of how I want to finish that line.
The Affair of the Mysterious Letter (Alexis Hall)
I am weak for both a good riff on Holmesian canon and any setting that feels like a character in the story itself, so I'm not quite sure why this one was difficult for me to get into. I still gave it a good review because it is well done, and other people should read it, and I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys a nice light touch on eldritch!fantasy especially, and I would read more about the setting, and I did in fact think the Watson-cognate 1st person POV was exquisitely done, and yet?
There's some really neat spins on ACD details; especially enjoyable was the completely unanswered question of *who-the-fuck-is-Watson-married-to-this-time?* so it's possible it would tie together better if I'd read any ACD Holmes recently?
I think Haas was just too far off from my understanding of Holmes for me to find her enjoyable, and I never quite saw in the text the person Wyndham said he saw, and while an unreliable narrator is Entirely In Keeping with ACD Holmes, it didn't quite come together for me; the individual pieces are interesting but I didn't quite enjoy reading the finished picture once they were all put together.
Also there is no fucking way to have known enough about anything to solve the mystery which is completely plausible ina Holmes story since we're never in Holmes' POV but also wtf. 🤣
I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life (Ed Yong; narr. Charlie Anson)
idk, interesting and clearly well researched scientifically and historically, but I did not really manage to retain much?
I think the audio just didn't do it for me, so I would suggest anyone interested in the topic go for the physical or digital version rather than trying to listen to it.
The Enchanted Greenhouse (Sarah Beth Durst)
Slower to get into than her first romantasy cozy, but when it got there emotionally, it did it very, very well. Like the first one, it only lightly touches on the full-blown Revolution happening far away in the background, and instead makes the 'finding roots and kindness where you land is sometimes all you can do and that's important too' into an overarching thesis statement that is definitely a comforting one.
Also Talking Plants are Great.
(Another fascinating setting in terms of culture and magic? I didn't even look for that in particular, but I did in fact find several in a row, go me.)
I will probably read the next one, even if the blurb says it's got a fake-dating plot which I usually am Not Into, which I think means I should look into more of her backlist, too.
The Leper of St Giles (Ellis Peters)
I love the Brother Cadfael mysteries so much y'all. So. Much. (The first series that Mystery! did is exquisite. They got less so as they made more, especially as they kept re-casting Hugh Beringar, which is tragic, but Derek Jacobi never stops being amazing as Cadfael, so. Worth a look if you've got BritBox or Roku (or tubi? forgot where I saw it last) or if it rotates through PBS again.)
Anyways. Re-read a good book. (Cadfael is very cozy despite all the murder and civil war and Catholicism.) Excellent way to spend a snowstorm. 12/10.
The Summer War (Naomi Novik)
I've never managed to read the Temeraire books (I generally have trouble with any series longer than like 5 books, with a few exceptions (see Cadfael above) so yk, it looks exhausting more than fun?) but I do like her standalone fiction; it's pretty reliably gorgeous. (There's legit a description of *trees* in Spinning Silver that made me cry.)
But I don't usually *get* her main character romances, so this one was especially satisfying in that it's beautiful and lyrical and ruthless and clever and not about the side-romance as a romance but rather as a plot point and how it relates to magical oaths and curse-breaking and fae nonsense and sorcery and family expectations and regrets and fucking prophecies and Also Songs!
And word problems in math.
Might have to keep an eye out for the hardcover, I bet it's pretty, and I will probably want to read this one again.
ladies if a trans man ever tries to hit on you with the gabe dunn transmisogynist pick up artist techniques just hit him with the "sorry i only date men who are at least 6 foot"
Are some people just gifted with rational brains the way others are given gorgeous profiles or impeccable math skills? I think if I could wish for one thing it would be a balanced brain.
