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What do you need? Where do you go? What is this constant whispering?
I must use this week to remind myself that it is not at all true that I write something and then it falls into the unrecoverable gulfs of history, because "Tea with the Earl of Twilight" has been beautifully reviewed by Anne M. Pillsworth and Ruthanna Emrys at Tor.com's Reading the Weird:
Because the necessity—the obligation—of painful knowledge is a theme woven through this story's core. Knowing hurts, and knowing is dangerous. But not-knowing doesn't make you safe either, and certainly doesn't make you a better person. Sid's haunted by Hilary's life and death, and by his fear of attackers who would have been equally dangerous to her and her lover. But even before Hilary, she's haunted by the shadow of climate change, of a future in which the sea will take back a city that she knows deeply and intimately. If you know that someday Cthulhu is going to rise and overturn all, what should you do? Why speak the names of the dead, the murdered, when larger horrors await? You can't make the problem never-was, can't return to a pre-anthropocene, pre-knowledge innocence—you have to work with the present you've got and the futures it leaves open. So this is a story about little fixes—or even just changes, getting things moving that were held in stasis—amid huge, terrifying realities that aren't going away . . . This story is gorgeous and painful, and achingly appreciated during a time when eldritch horrors sometimes come perilously close to being worse than fiction.
I had been having a rather discombobulated afternoon caused by sleeping much later than planned despite the sunlight flooding our street, but this review makes up for all of it. For the record, the three pieces of Elise Matthesen's jewelry that contributed to the fictional item in the story are the necklace-crown "Remember What You Say in Dreams #4" (silver wire, silverleaf jasper, driftglass and freshwater pearl) and the pendants "Was Ice, Am Ocean" (silver wire and labradorite) and "The Sea That Marks the Heart" (silver wire, abalone, nazar-blue seed beads). Have some links!
1. I had no idea the U.S. Navy maintains a grove of white oaks strictly for repairs of the USS Constitution, but I am delighted to find out. I like that it is a conservation project, too.
2. Both environmentally and aesthetically, I love the underwater museum of Paolo Fanciulli.
3. I didn't know Climate Mayors existed, either, but I am glad to hear that Boston's own Marty Walsh has just been named chair of the coalition. Because we have tides like this. And so I write the stories I do.
Because the necessity—the obligation—of painful knowledge is a theme woven through this story's core. Knowing hurts, and knowing is dangerous. But not-knowing doesn't make you safe either, and certainly doesn't make you a better person. Sid's haunted by Hilary's life and death, and by his fear of attackers who would have been equally dangerous to her and her lover. But even before Hilary, she's haunted by the shadow of climate change, of a future in which the sea will take back a city that she knows deeply and intimately. If you know that someday Cthulhu is going to rise and overturn all, what should you do? Why speak the names of the dead, the murdered, when larger horrors await? You can't make the problem never-was, can't return to a pre-anthropocene, pre-knowledge innocence—you have to work with the present you've got and the futures it leaves open. So this is a story about little fixes—or even just changes, getting things moving that were held in stasis—amid huge, terrifying realities that aren't going away . . . This story is gorgeous and painful, and achingly appreciated during a time when eldritch horrors sometimes come perilously close to being worse than fiction.
I had been having a rather discombobulated afternoon caused by sleeping much later than planned despite the sunlight flooding our street, but this review makes up for all of it. For the record, the three pieces of Elise Matthesen's jewelry that contributed to the fictional item in the story are the necklace-crown "Remember What You Say in Dreams #4" (silver wire, silverleaf jasper, driftglass and freshwater pearl) and the pendants "Was Ice, Am Ocean" (silver wire and labradorite) and "The Sea That Marks the Heart" (silver wire, abalone, nazar-blue seed beads). Have some links!
1. I had no idea the U.S. Navy maintains a grove of white oaks strictly for repairs of the USS Constitution, but I am delighted to find out. I like that it is a conservation project, too.
2. Both environmentally and aesthetically, I love the underwater museum of Paolo Fanciulli.
3. I didn't know Climate Mayors existed, either, but I am glad to hear that Boston's own Marty Walsh has just been named chair of the coalition. Because we have tides like this. And so I write the stories I do.
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Choco_frosh, but he's probably working or something. When the bells at Old North were hung on a new frame in 1983, the historical preservation people insisted that the new frame be oak, instead of replacing it with the now-commonplace metal frame. The plans that the foundry sent called for oak that was thicker than one could commonly get, but somehow (I don't know the negotiating details), we got to use the Charlestown Navy yard's designated stash for the frame members. Ed Levin, of blessed memory, a founder of the Timber Framers guild of America (later of public TV Nova trebuchet fame), put the frame together.
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That's really cool.
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As for the Navy, WOW. I would like to see "the largest contiguous forest under single ownership in Indiana."
P.
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I'm really pleased by it!
I would like to see "the largest contiguous forest under single ownership in Indiana."
So would I! I have been deprived of both trees and oceans this year and it feels profoundly unfair.
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Thank you! I love that people think about my work. It makes me feel like I am doing something right with it.
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If you can afford the forests, it makes a lot of sense to me.
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That is very cool.
Is it rebuilt every twenty years for ritual reasons, or just because that's how long it takes for the relevant bits to wear out?
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Please let me know if you find out!
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I love that review so much. This line particularly got to me: "Why speak the names of the dead, the murdered, when larger horrors await?" And the mention of "little fixes"; I couldn't help thinking of "Little Fix of Friction" too. And being compared with Aickman is a Damn Good Thing.
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Yes! And ribboned with anemones.
No wonder you love the place so.
He was inspired by shipwrecks! I thought of drowned classical statues, too. Sunken amphorae.
I love that review so much. This line particularly got to me: "Why speak the names of the dead, the murdered, when larger horrors await?" And the mention of "little fixes"; I couldn't help thinking of "Little Fix of Friction" too. And being compared with Aickman is a Damn Good Thing.
*hugs*
Thank you. People seeing what I wrote makes me so happy. I do not disdain them simply liking it, though.
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Oh, *yes*! The Sovay Museum. I'd visit. (In a little submarine, as I can't swim.)
*Thank you. People seeing what I wrote makes me so happy.*
You're welcome! One of the many things I love about your work is that it *asks* me to think things over. I prize that more and more. *hugs*
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You're welcome!
I also wasn't expecting Indiana, but this country did used to be a lot more old-growth than it is.
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Thank you so much! I am honored to have accidentally haunted part of your local landscape as well.
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I remain pleased also!
*hugs*
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That really is a beautiful review: "So this is a story about little fixes ... amid huge, terrifying realities that aren't going away." My heart aches. (It aches perpetually these days.)
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No problem! I never mind comments whenever they come in.
Your photos of the tides were impressive in the ominous way of all climate-change-influenced photos--I think I pointed my oldest at them, since he is often walking in those areas on weekends.
And that was without a storm.
My heart aches. (It aches perpetually these days.)
*hugs*