One plays the violin and sleeps inside a fridge

[sovay]

And today, Ajit Pai and the FCC burnt net neutrality. I guess this is one of the nights we sit up in the hills and plan how to hit the Seleucids so hard, Alexander's teeth will hurt. (Also he'll be confused, since his relations with the Jews were cordial enough to rate a touching if fabulous scene in Josephus and an equally positive appearance in Lights (1984), but you can't go around leaving empires where people live and expect not to get socked sooner or later.)

Here are some whiplashily different things.

1. Courtesy of brigdh: I had of course encountered "absquatulate" in the works of Barbara Hambly, but I had never heard of "dumbfungled" or "goshbustified" and I laughed like a loon.

2. I was asked on Facebook if I knew any weird or spooky traditions associated specifically with Hanukkah. I did not, and said that I associate the tradition of ghost stories around this time of year almost strictly with British Christmas, but I could offer a literary option: Eric Kimmel's Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins (1989), an original tale of Hershel of Ostropol which has so successfully passed into folklore that I have heard it retold in the wild. (I put it into a poem myself.) I wondered if it had antecedents in two stories in Isaac Bashevis Singer's Zlateh the Goat and Other Stories (1966) in which demons visit households on Hanukkah—frighteningly but harmlessly in "Grandmother's Tale," with the real possibility of death and destruction in "The Devil's Trick"—but I just found this recent interview with Kimmel and the influence he cites is Dickens. I guess ghost stories for Christmas were relevant after all. I am honestly delighted.

3. Courtesy of David Schraub: Courtney Milan's #metoo story. It has since made the Washington Post. Since it becomes very clear in the course of her post that romance novels are the career she adopted after she was traumatized out of her previous profession, I figured the strongest gesture of support I could make was to buy one. I remember either phi or skygiants saying something that made Unraveled (2011) sound attractive to me, so that's where I'm starting.

ETA: I am sneezing my face off and going to bed.

Comments

[selkie]

Yeah, the notion that she is diverging from solid m/m gave me a sad little But But But But Why face, but I will still preorder the book because I want to know where the universe goes. Spectred Isle is my favorite of hers in a while and that's saying something, because she's currently the only author who gets my preorder money.

Free samples are here http://kjcharleswriter.com/free-reads/ but I think you should start with the Magpie Lord/Charm of Magpies series, PARTICULARLY 'A Queer Trade' even though it's out of order, and then if you enjoy confectionery with light bondage in some of the books but no supernatural elements, move on to Society of Gentlemen which is 4 books of m/m sex and class warfare. Never hurt anybody. I enjoy that she consciously rings some of the Heyer tropes BUT ALSO does not fall into cod-Regency. Just cods of other kinds.

[sovay]

Spectred Isle is my favorite of hers in a while and that's saying something, because she's currently the only author who gets my preorder money.

I had never heard of her, because I live under a rock, before Spectred Isle turned up in one of hawkwing_lb's Tor.com reviews and I impulse-ordered it through the local independent bookstore and was very pleasantly surprised. kindkit has also said favorable things, especially about Think of England, A Seditious Affair, and An Unseen Attration.

but I think you should start with the Magpie Lord/Charm of Magpies series, PARTICULARLY 'A Queer Trade' even though it's out of order, and then if you enjoy confectionery with light bondage in some of the books but no supernatural elements, move on to Society of Gentlemen which is 4 books of m/m sex and class warfare.

I think I can live with that.

Any of the free stuff you particularly recommend, or just all of it?

[selkie]

Eh, I'd skip Remnant actually because the Whyborne and Griffin universe is so involved at this point and, subjectively, I only enjoy Hawke's Hexmaker series and find W&G super draggy and dry. (Although I do enjoy Charles' Simon Feximal and he crops up in... I think it was Spectred Isle actually but I'm doing a credit card reconciliation right now and I shed a REAL TEAR to learn they had gone to the Front because that probably means No More Of Those People)

And I have not read the Christmas coda to Society of Gentlemen because I hate subscribing to things. Also, KJ Charles is best with a little magic mixed in.

[sovay]

(Although I do enjoy Charles' Simon Feximal and he crops up in... I think it was Spectred Isle actually but I'm doing a credit card reconciliation right now and I shed a REAL TEAR to learn they had gone to the Front because that probably means No More Of Those People)

It is Spectred Isle, and I am seriously considering tracking down The Secret Casebook of Simon Feximal just so I can read what they were like when alive.

[selkie]

In my recollection, though I read it two summers ago, they banish ghosts and have fraught interactions and eventually there is the passion of the cut sleeve, but with a lot of grudges to go around. It takes a long time for Robert and Simon to trust each other and also to LIKE each other, and they just don't have a lot of time for boning because ghosts. Demons too I think? It was a very, very plausible go at ghost-hunting and banishing.

It looks like there's been a paperback reissue in the last month -- it was a Samhain Press casualty initially -- but also you can use the digital files even if you don't have a Kindle, at read.amazon.com . I say this mostly because the digital is on sale right now for a third the price.