Death to Realism! 031
Death to Realism! 031
Hope July is treating you well! If you need a refresher on the origin & nature of these bi-weekly updates, check out the first issue before reading on.
What's New?
There was a last minute change of plans with Glasgow Zine Fair, as my partner tested positive for COVID a few days before I was meant to go. I was still able to get all of our new stuff in to be featured at the communal zine table, but ultimately passed on being in the exhibition hall all day because I was pretty sure I'd be contagious.
Since then, we have mostly been recovering, so this issue will be a little light, but what this does mean is that I have the majority of the zines I printed for the festival are still sitting in my apartment, so I've re-activated the online store! That's right, you can order Plaintext Distro zines online for the month of July, and please do! I think the stuff we have on offer is really cool and I'd love for most of it to be out in the world!
Coming Soon
I haven't had much time to work on stuff due to trying to rest as much as possible, but I have been tinkering with improving the classification scheme of my personal zine library and possibly making it publicly available for the curious? I've also made the notable move of starting a new working playlist for my next fiction project, a multi-perspective near future sci-fi novella about having a really boring job, so hopefully I'll get into a productive groove with that as well.
The Rec Room
Best youtube channel Classics of Game is back after a hiatus, and this is my current favorite of their most recently posted videos
I'm also trying to pull together a short story on the theme of "relationships" for Red Futures Magazine's current submissions call. If the topic interests you, I reccomend giving it a try! We're a pretty friendly and laid back sci-fi discussion group.
I've also been rereading Trigun Maximum following the impressive reboot trailer. It was one of my favorite manga in high school and still just as fun revisited.
Finally, recent Zone picks Zeiram and Zeiram II, alongside Mechanical Violator Hakaider scratch a similar itch for weird dystopias and future tech alongside charming characters and wild sets. I reccomend them all!
I've Been Reading
When I've been feeling less cloud-headed and not suffering from nasal congestion, I've been gradually working my way through Elfriede Jelinek's rein GOLD. As a creative extrapolation of Brunhilde and Wotan's dialogue from Die Walkure, it's an interesting follow up to finally being able to listen to the complete Soft Valkyrie, but it's dense and sparing in its paragraph breaks. Hopefully I'll feel more up to it this week!
This personal essay about an early teen experience of punk music really got to me, especially wrt the aforementioned playlist I was in the process of putting together at the time. I also really enjoyed this article by Geeks for Social Change, about common pitfalls in matchmaking and collaboration between local initiatives and people with tech know-how.
I think that's all I have this bi-week! For new subscribers who have signed on since the last newsletter, you can check out the archive of past issues at any time!
Thank you again for your support,
Emilie