offcntr: (secret bears)
offcntr ([personal profile] offcntr) wrote2025-12-29 01:55 pm

Sharing the yums

Found in my email inbox this morning:

Hello Frank,
We met you at the holiday market at the fairgrounds. We got to talking food and baking. We went to your website and tried your potica recipe. Results: absolutely delicious!! The time and energy was totally worth it. Thank you. [redacted]

Yay!
pauraque: Picard reads a book while vacationing on Risa (st picard reads)
pauraque ([personal profile] pauraque) wrote2025-12-29 04:43 pm

Death's End by Liu Cixin (2010)

After the events of The Three-Body Problem and The Dark Forest, this conclusion to the trilogy expands the perspective on the Earth-Trisolaran conflict beyond our two petty solar systems to a galactic, interdimensional, and finally universal scale. (Yes, this is the sort of book where rather than wondering if your favorite character survives, you wonder instead if there will be a habitable universe for them to survive in by the last page.)

This book took me a long time to read, not only because it's 600 pages but also because I kept stopping due to real life distractions. I also don't have the book anymore because it had to go back to the library. So I'm afraid this post is going to be more vibes-based than going into a ton of detail, even though seventy million things happened in the book that would each be worthy of detailed discussion.

My ultimate impression of the book (and of the series as a whole) is that there are a lot of things that the author and I will just never see eye-to-eye on, but I don't mind setting that aside because I like the way he explores his ideas even if I disagree with their fundamental basis.

cut for length )
eldritchhobbit: (Default)
eldritchhobbit ([personal profile] eldritchhobbit) wrote2025-12-29 04:54 pm

Feminist Utopian Thought

On my latest “Looking Back on Genre History” segment on the StarShipSofa podcast (Episode 772), I discuss early feminist science fictional utopias and focus on A Few Hours in a Far-Off Age (1883) by Henrietta Dugdale.

Listen here!



A black-and-white portrait of reformer, freethinker, and author Henrietta Dugdale as a young woman.
swan_tower: (Default)
swan_tower ([personal profile] swan_tower) wrote2025-12-29 09:11 pm
Entry tags:

2025 publications in review

Man was this an unusual year for me and publications.

Not the part where I didn't have a novel out. That's happened before, and it will again, thanks to the vagaries of scheduling; I have years with multiple novels out which more than make up for it.

And not really the part where I only published two short stories, thanks to a drop-off in my production of new stories (after an absolute flood of short fiction writing for a few years prior). Those are:



No, the unusual part is where I published EIGHT POEMS in 2025. There are plenty of poets who outpace that, but for me it's a lot! All are either free to read online, or out of their period of exclusivity so I have made them available myself:



. . . actually, I published nine poems, but one of them is a piece I tucked into one of my own self-pubbed collections as a bonus piece. There were two such collections this year:



So that's it for 2025! I have three things slated to come out in January, though -- a short story and two poems -- so I'll be hitting the ground running next year. Let's see what else 2026 has in store!

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/9nTgOX)
maidenjedi: (Default)
maidenjedi ([personal profile] maidenjedi) wrote2025-12-29 03:01 pm

yuletide rec

A quick Yuletide rec:

Ever Dared to Dream Before - Daisy Jones and the Six, a Billy/Daisy story that reimagines their end-of-canon reunion. I really loved this story. The author let Billy deal with all his issues and Daisy be the settled, real version of herself that kept getting buried under drugs and wild youth. Every bit of this was what I wanted after seeing the series and reading the novel. This was my Yuletide gift and it is perfect!



ffutures: (Default)
ffutures ([personal profile] ffutures) wrote2025-12-29 08:22 pm
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Another Fantasy Bundle - The Burning Wheel

This is an offer of material for the RPG The Burning Wheel by Luke Crane. It's described as "the landmark indie RPG of dynamic characters and searing choice-driven stories."

https://bundleofholding.com/presents/BurningWheel

  

While I have no problems with indie rules systems, I'm not very keen on games that ask all of the players and referee to be familiar with the rules and avoid using "house rules" or simplifying things. I'm not playing pure fantasy games any more, so haven't gone into this one in any detail, but the general consensus I have on it from friends who have played it is that it's rules heavy and fairly complex, which really isn't my style of play. The price seems reasonable for the amount of material you get, more than 1000 pages, beyond that I recommend looking at reviews before making a decision about this one. There's a reasonable video review here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wj30rzCgO5o
kradeelav: Dr. Kiriko (amused)
krad ([personal profile] kradeelav) wrote2025-12-29 03:09 pm
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Krad's Art Dump 2.0

"Krad's Art Dump 2.0" is here with all of my art from the past five years minus ~100 pieces of NDA artwork.  I started this gift last decade as a way to give back to the old internet that mentored me, and it ended up a very poignant way to archive my work.

Before you download, please be aware there are many NSFW/R18 pieces as well as potentially disturbing artwork. You are welcome to save/delete whatever you want, all I ask is you do not reshare, or use it for AI training*.

Download link (1.1 GB)



Previous 2011-2020 dump: https://www.mediafire.com/file/3hqo6ltoui8mkt1/

*Read more... )

laurajv: Holmes & Watson's car is as cool as Batman's (Default)
laurajv ([personal profile] laurajv) wrote2025-12-29 03:00 pm
Entry tags:

FIC: (the time was neither wrong nor right)

(the time was neither wrong nor right) (962 words) by Laura JV
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Star Trek: The Original Series
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: James T. Kirk/Spock, James T. Kirk & Spock
Characters: James T. Kirk, Spock (Star Trek)
Additional Tags: Post-Episode: s03e12 Plato's Stepchildren (Star Trek: The Original Series), T'hy'la (Star Trek), Kolinahr (Star Trek)
Summary:

Four years and two hundred seventy-six days into the five-year mission, Spock initiates a conversation.

umadoshi: (Christmas - string of lights (roxicons))
Ysabet ([personal profile] umadoshi) wrote2025-12-29 03:47 pm

Post-Christmas mishmash | Recent media

(As is so often the case, I'm generally up to date on reading my DW circle, but not doing at all well with commenting.)

I guess at this point we're well into the liminal last bit of the year. (I said to [personal profile] scruloose earlier that I still try to hold "Christmas is twelve days, dammit" in my heart, but it's hard, especially when our observance of the the holiday at all is so low-key.) We had masked visits with both sets of parents (mine on Christmas Eve and [personal profile] scruloose's on Boxing Day), and in between, Christmas Day was just the two of us and the cats and the Netflix fireplaces. My mom sent us home with Christmas stockings and some gifts (also very low-key; we still keep nudging for just not doing presents at all), and the latter included a hard copy of the most recent edition of Garner's Modern English Usage, which was a delightful surprise.

We actually had a white Christmas, which has never been a sure thing and is getting rarer and rarer at terrible speeds, but now ice and rain are arriving, to be followed by a cold snap, so I'm really glad we don't need to leave the house anytime soon. (See also: will we lose power? Very possibly! >.< But we're pretty well-equipped to deal with it.)

I'm feeling like I should be looking ahead or setting small goals or trying to find specific things I want to focus on, but so far I'm not really scrounging the brain for it. Anyone want to tell me about how you're approaching it?

(I do think I'll sign up for a GYWO wordcount goal again, despite having written almost literally zero words this year, but at this point I have the grim suspicion that the words may stay gone until a new full-on fannish obsession hits me, and that's so infrequent for me. ;_; I have so many Guardian WIPs and fragments. [And while I'm enjoying seeing all the fannish glee over Heated Rivalry, I don't currently feel fannish about it myself {which, honestly, I'm okay with}.])

Recent media, mostly books: All Is Bright, Llinos Cathryn Thomas' "read over Advent" novella, which was lovely; The Dark is Rising (book), which I'm glad to have finally read; I don't know if/when I might read the books that follow it; Snake-Eater by T. Kingfisher; Widdershins by Jordan L. Hawk; KJ Charles' Masters in this Hall (which I should've checked the series info about first, as it's the third Lilywhite Boys book and I haven't read the second. Oops); and Brigid Kemmerer's A Curse So Dark and Lonely.

[personal profile] scruloose and I finished listening to System Collapse, so we're out of Murderbot books. Yesterday (?) we listened to the four-minute audiobook sample of The Thief, which I might be able to work with? But wow, the voice sounds so much older than Gen to me. (Also, Kobo, four minutes is a reasonable sample length, but it literally cuts off mid-word.)

I watched the season finale of Heated Rivalry pretty promptly on Friday morning, for fear of being spoiled, which meant [personal profile] scruloose, who hadn't seen any of the show previously, pretty much watched it too while feeding the cats and having their own breakfast. (I did give them some background info first.) As noted above: not feeling fannish, but I thought that was really well done overall, and the actors seem like an absolute delight.

And we've watched two movies since starting vacation (Wake Up Dead Man and Sinners), which brings me up to a whopping four [4] movies this year.
oursin: Fotherington-Tomas from the Molesworth books saying Hello clouds hello aky (Hello clouds hello sky)
oursin ([personal profile] oursin) wrote2025-12-29 07:29 pm

Not really the call of the wiiiild, I guess

Out for my walk today, went through the pocket park behind the house, and there was a lady with a small terrier (I think), that was going absolutely spare under some trees -

- and looking up I finally saw, right up at the very top where it had attained to, a squirrel, which was presumably the reason for the agitation.

Had some passing converse with the dog's owner anent this, who claims that he will never actually catch a squirrel, even though they are tame enough that if you go and sit on one of the park benches they will come and look you over.

Mostly the dogs that one sees being walked in the park are less vociferous, perhaps they have grown wise to the ways of squirrels.

So anyway, I passed on to the other somewhat larger park, and see no advance yet in what is supposed to be a development involving a pergola (???) and further eco-stuff but at least there is no longer unsightly work being done at that spot.

Have only very lately discovered that two objects which I vaguely thought, had I thought at all, were maybe bird-houses, are actually insect-houses. Much to my chagrin, I can find nothing about this on the park website which boasts of various eco and environment good stuff that goes on there (I am still trying to work out what the sparrow-meadow is, have not seen plume nor feather of a sparrow on my ambles).

However, I can at least point dr rdrz at this site where I perceive that insect houses are quite A Thing: designed to provide safe nesting, hibernation, and breeding spaces for beneficial pollinators such as solitary bees, butterflies, ladybirds, and lacewings'.

I assume solitary bees are a specific species, and have not actually been expelled from their hive for some vile transgression, to roam the earth etc etc etc like an apian ancient mariner.

james_davis_nicoll: (Default)
james_davis_nicoll ([personal profile] james_davis_nicoll) wrote2025-12-29 02:08 pm
Entry tags:

Bundle of Holding: The Burning Wheel



An all-new Burning Wheel Bundle presenting The Burning Wheel, the medieval-themed tabletop fantasy roleplaying game about vibrant, dynamic characters whose beliefs propel the story.

Bundle of Holding: The Burning Wheel
conuly: (Default)
conuly ([personal profile] conuly) wrote2025-12-29 02:07 pm

Would my dog or cat really eat me if I died alone?

Morbid question, but let's be serious here: If you were trapped in a house with nothing to eat but your recently deceased pet, wouldn't you at least think about it?

People talk about this like it's so shocking, or like it means your pet obviously doesn't really love you, but c'mon. I love my cat, but I'd eat her in a heartbeat if she was already dead and there was nothing else left. She's my cat, she's not my baby. It's not like I've gone full on Donner Party - and let's be clear, if that was all that was left on the table, and they were already dead, I'd do that too. At least, I'd think about doing it. I suppose I might not be able to bring myself to go that far, but I wouldn't find it shocking if another person did!
snickfic: "Nobody can explain a dragon" (Le Guin quotation) (mood fantasy)
snickfic ([personal profile] snickfic) wrote in [community profile] yuletide2025-12-29 10:38 am
Entry tags:

Yuletide recs (part 2)

More recs at my journal, including:

Possibly in Michigan
The Secret History
The Raven Tower
Impromptu/19th Century RPF
The Dispossessed
The Long Walk -Stephen King
Waking the Moon
Rope
mrs_redboots: (Default)
mrs_redboots ([personal profile] mrs_redboots) wrote in [community profile] yuletide2025-12-29 06:26 pm

8 recs in 7 fandoms

If you go to my journal you will find recs for stories in the following fandoms:

Puck of Pook's Hill/Callendar Series
Sussex Set
Swallows and Amazons (two stories)
Cadfael Chronicles
Chalet School
The Secret Garden 
and Dragonriders of Pern

There may yet be more to come....