july/august 2023
☀️
pub updates
Review of Untethered Sky by Fonda Lee: I still need to finish the Jade City trilogy, but here's my review of Untethered Sky, Lee's new novella! This was definitely a fun book to review.
July 7: this is my single most rejected piece of short fiction (my records say it collected around 20 rejections before finally getting accepted) and was inspired by the story of the Cowherd and the Weaver, which my mom first told me when I was a toddler and has lived rent-free in my head ever since. There's no such thing as a story by me with no fairytale/folktale elements, will say that straight up right now lol.
I have a flash coming out in Lightspeed in September and another realist piece coming out around then, too. I wrote a heck of a lot of flash in 2022/early 2023, and I'm happy some of them are seeing the light of day while I toil on longer things in the background that may or may not ever see the light of day. Publishing is always a gift, I think—the kind of gift that shouldn't be taken for granted despite the many, many problems Publishing has.
things I've read that I am obligated to talk about
LET'S GO LET'S GO LET'S - Cleo Qian (Tin House, August 2023)
Cleo Qian's debut short story collection features stories mostly starring young Asian and Asian-American women. Lots of weird shit happens—I considered pitching a review (decided against it since I already have another review on my plate) since a good number of the stories are either 1) surreal or 2) freakin’ weird but possible. There's a Kpop star unlucky in love, a girl who gets double eyelid surgery and starts seeing ghosts, a horribly toxic sapphic relationship where alchemy also ends up involved, and all kinds of fun stuff in here. The title story of this collection, “LET'S GO LET'S GO LET'S GO” (love the all caps title), is about two former high school friends reunited several years after college back in Tokyo, where they went to high school. The estranged friend Lily Bae ends up dragging the rest of them into a weird performance art group. My favorite story was the opening one, “Chicken. Film. Youth,” which felt like a SoCal Asian-American version of Kelly Link's story “Lull” from her 2005 collection Magic for Beginners (“Lull” is also free to read online here) which also features a story nested inside a story. Both “Lull” and “Chicken” are about feeling like failures for your age, and I will refrain from saying more to keep from spoiling the whole thing here.
Starling House - Alix Harrow (Tor, October 2023)
I love Alix Harrow's The Once and Future Witches and her fairytale novellas. Starling House is best described as Kentucky Southern Gothic vibes meets Beauty and the Beast. I love Alix Harrow's heroines, and Opal is no exception. She has serious flaws but is easy to love and cheer on. It is no secret I love fairytales, and Harrow does a great job incorporating folk history here and how the same story gets told in many different ways. I read Summer Sons by Lee Mandelo earlier this year and Starling House reminded me a lot of Summer Sons (which I wholeheartedly recommend for anyone interested in queer Southern Gothic vibes), plus there was a Lee Mandelo shout-out Easter Egg in the book itself. Harrow makes great use of footnotes throughout Starling House, and if you're looking for a Gothic fairytale story, you won't be disappointed.
Other Reading Stuff
A Mitfreude of Anime and Manga’s Relationship with Anglophone Science Fiction (Or, This Essay WILL NOT Try to Get You into Anime and Manga!) - Ada Palmer: I enjoyed this very detailed essay about SFF and anime/manga fandom and where they intersected a lot. TBH I wouldn't be writing anything speculative if I didn't grow up watching anime and reading manga. This essay was a comprehensive look at Japanese genre fiction and where anime/manga fit into that.
Open Throat - Henry Hoke: One of the wildest things I have ever read, no pun intended, about a mountain lion living in Los Angeles. I don’t have coherent thoughts beyond “wowwwww” and “was Henry Hoke a mountain lion in a past life?” but this weird little book about a gay big cat made me feel many things.
The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern: I read this a long-ass time ago in high school and decided to revisit it because the magical circus trope is *chef’s kiss.* Morgenstern is an amazing worldbuilder.
other
I discovered a life hack for boosting writing speed—having the weather be so bad outside you have no choice but to stay inside and write. It’s super effective!
catch y’all again when it’s (hopefully) cooler outside!
tina