KJ

Ghostlight by Suzanne Palmer : The fourth and final book in The Finder Chronicles is a satisfying stopping point, but I dearly hope there is more some day. ( Spoilery thoughts. )

Silver & Lead by Seanan McGuire: Somehow I let the new October Daye book get by me last fall, so right after finishing Ghostlight, I picked it up and read it in a day. It picks up four months after the last big story; I hesitate to call it a calmer story, because there is no such thing as a calm Toby Daye story, but in comparison to what came right before it does seem like a bit of a break (although with a warning for child endangerment). ( Spoilers for the book and series. )

Saving Throw: I'm pretty sure I've mentioned the Save Data Team streaming channel here before. I discovered them some years ago through their Ace Attorney with an Actual Lawyer series (they're currently working on Investigations 2, which is the only game in the series I've never played, so it's been fun to discover it along with them), and I've been watching much of their content ever since. But one series I hadn't been following was Saving Throw, which is their D&D actual play podcast. I kept telling myself that I would catch up someday, and I decided "someday" had finally arrived. I've actually been listening to the audio-only podcast version, which makes it much easier to listening while doing other things; I'm now up to Arc 4 (Episode 30) and enjoying it immensely. Chris, the DM, is an excellent storyteller who's created an interesting post-apocalyptic world, and he expertly wrangles a team of five screw-ups who've just graduated at the bottom of their class from an adventurers academy. The stakes start out apparently small, but before long the group is thrown into the deep end of politics and legends, and it's fun to watch them navigate that as well as their interpersonal relationships. The DM and players all know each other really well, and that trust and respect shows in the way they play, even when they're giving each other a hard time. The series is still going -- looks like they just wrapped up Arc 7 -- and I'm looking forward to catching up.

Joyride : A buddy road movie focused on Chinese-American women taking a personal journey across China, testing the boundaries of their relationships and coming back stronger. We were looking for a lightweight way to pass an evening, and I'd say this fit the bill, although a little raunchy for my taste (explicit drug use, over-the-top sex). Top-notch cast, particularly Sabrina Wu as the awkward and too-relatable Deadeye.

The Knives Out films: This was a rewatch -- I've seen Knives Out and Glass Onion several times, and I insisted we watch Wake Up Dead Man the day it was released on Netflix -- and I'm happy to say that the series holds up, both as individual movies and overall. I think Knives Out is still my favorite, although a Chris Evans fangirl would say that, but I appreciate them all for their different strengths. Before the rewatch, I would have put Wake Up Dead Man a clear notch below the other two, but now I'm not so sure -- Father Jud is easily the best protagonist in the series, and I appreciate the depiction of a priest who represents the best aspects of Christianity drawn in contrast to some of its very worst. I also found the mystery quite satisfying, maybe even the best of the lot. The major downside was the supporting cast, which was fine (I will never argue with yet another showstopper from Glenn Close), but they didn't quite have the chemistry or interest of the ensembles in the other two films.

I started the day with a crumpet and shopping at Pike Place Market, then headed over to the con, where I attended a panel and three readings.

• A panel on writing for corporate IP with Rebecca Roanhorse, G. Willow Wilson, and Diana Ma (with whom I wasn't familiar; she's written various works for hire, most notably Power Rangers). It was an interesting conversation about the upsides and downsides of working in other people's sandboxes.
• First reading: Fonda Lee, who read from a forthcoming sci-fi novel about warriors who are essentially samurai who work for multi-planetary corporations.
• Second reading: Rebecca Roanhorse, who read a bit of her breakthrough short story ("Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience", which won a Hugo some years back), a bit of the third book in her epic fantasy series Between Earth and Sky, and a bit of a forthcoming story set in The Sixth World. I would note that in both her panel and her reading, she mentioned being a Hugo finalist for Best Series but disclaimed any expection that she might win, which made what happened at the ceremony tonight even more exciting.
• Third reading: Marie Brennan, who read a short story that came out a year or two ago. It was a good story, but particularly interesting because it was originally going to be a fantasy trilogy. But for various reasons, she never wrote those books, and eventually she decided the big concept -- a revolutionary who decides the figurehead of the revolution needs to be assassinated -- could be told in short form.
• And then of course the Hugos. As I mentioned earlier, I didn't vote this year because I wasn't engaged reading, watching, or critical analysis at all this cycle, but I still wanted to watch the ceremony. Lots of surprise winners -- at least, surprises to my circle, and also apparently to Rebecca Roanhorse herself in the case of Best Series. Some high points: Abigail Nussbaum on the importance of critics to fandom, Diana Pho's call to stand up to fascism, and Roanhorse and Lodestar winner Darcie Little Badger on the need for diverse voices in fiction. (Have multiple indigenous people ever won Hugos in the same year before?) The ceremony was okay, some hiccups in production -- particularly the lack of pronunciation guides. Worldcon also needs to decide once and for all how to handle nominees with large production teams, because long lists of participants are still getting laughs in the room, which I don't feel great about.

The con continues into tomorrow, but I'm taking off in the morning to move into the second phase of this vacation: an Oregon coast road trip with some friends who are flying into Portland tomorrow and Monday. So I say goodbye to con space for now, and consider whether I'll go to Los Angeles next year.

Hard to believe that Worldcon 2025 is almost upon us. Despite the various dramas and screw-ups of the con-runners, I'm still planning to go, mainly because Seattle is one of my favorite places to visit, especially via road trip, and I have plenty of time to make a leisurely drive out of it. Except for a brief work trip to Oregon, I haven't been to the Pacific Northwest since my last road trip up there in 2012, so a return trip is long overdue.

The other reason to go to Worldcon is to see and meet friends! So I'm posting to ask who else is going, and/or if you live in the area/on the way between Seattle and SF and would like to meet up.

My rough plan:

• Leave SF early on Wednesday 8/13, with a goal of arriving in Seattle in time for Writers with Drinks on Thursday, 8/14. WWD is always a fun time, and that line-up is stacked!
• Attend various Worldcon and/or Fringe events on Friday and Saturday; I still need to sit down with the schedules to see what, if anything, is interesting. I also plan to hit Pike Place Market (can't leave Seattle without a stop there) and maybe the Chihuly museum (which I've never visited). This would also be a great time to see people!
• Attend the Hugo Awards Ceremony at 8:30pm on Saturday -- I'm extremely uninvested this year (I have to confess that I didn't even vote), but I'd still like to go.
• Leave for Portland on Sunday 8/17 -- my one firm commitment, since I'm taking a friend to the airport
• Spend at least 2-3 days in Portland, then drive back to SF via the coastal route.

Let me know if you'd like to connect!

We finished it yesterday. I am relatively satisfied overall -- some things I enjoyed, some complaints for sure. From what little I've seen of a consensus (since we played so slowly I haven't been following along with commentary at all), I agree that the story and characters had a lot of potential but were underwritten. Given where the story starts, I feel like we missed almost an entire game of backstory (the story DA: Dread Wolf was going to be?). I understand why, from a practical position, this game stands so separate from all the others -- there are so many potential world states by now that managing all the different versions would be a Herculean task (I suppose that's what fic is for) -- but divorcing the action and characters almost completely from what happened in southern Thedas over the past ten years made it harder for me to connect to the larger world. Also T got pretty bored with the sidequests about halfway through -- he felt like they weren't interesting enough on their own to justify spending the time. So we focused on main story and character quests, and toward the end on getting every faction up to a rank of at least two stars.

To the surprise of no one who knows me, we played a Grey Warden dwarf and romanced Harding (although we flirted with everybody until we were forced to make a choice, and it was hard to resist Neve (T's favorite companion by far) and Davrin (thereby breaking my streak of romancing the Grey Warden companion the first time through every game; I justified it because we were the Grey Warden this time)). Everything else is spoilers, so I'll put it behind a cut).

Here be spoilers, you are officially warned.

( Spoilers for all of DA:V )

For a game in a series that's been so important to my fannish life, I feel like I ought to have more to say, but maybe its inevitable, given that I've been disconnected from the fandom for so long. Maybe it's time to fix that.

Who else has played? What do you think? Feel free to leave spoilers in the comments (but mark them as such in case there are others here who don't want them).

New Year, new week, new update. I didn't mean to take this long a break from, well, everything, but I did, and I think it was the right choice. A long enough break to miss it? Yes, but I suppose the true test will be whether I start it all up again -- writing, journaling, fandom.

I think a quick year in review is a nice place to start. The best, most exciting thing, of course, is that we adopted some kittens in October -- calico sisters whom we named Katsu and Mochi. They're seven months old now, and they are huge -- at her vet appointment last month, Mochi weighed 8.5 lbs, and Katsu is just under a pound less. They're also the softest kitties in the world, especially Katsu, and adorable trouble-makers, and I love them.

( Pictures! )

Other things that happened include vacations to Hawaii, Maine, and Lake Shasta, reading almost no books but falling down lots of YouTube rabbit holes, sinking lots of hours into Baldur's Gate (and we're only just starting Act 2), and getting the flu for Christmas (I'm pretty sure -- I tested negative for COVID four times, and the symptoms were distinctly flu-like). Fortunately being sick didn't mess with my holiday plans too much, although I took more time off from work than I would have preferred. But overall I would say things are good.

Will I be here more going forward? It's hard to promise anything. But I would like to be. I at least promise to try.

• Transformative Works Policy: Anyone is welcome to make transformative works based on my fic, or link to/comment on any of my writing including my posts here, without permission, although a pingback is always appreciated!


• Current Passion Once upon a time I broke my Civilization addiction, but I got back into it this fall. Hopefully it won't last much longer. My primary fandoms are Final Fantasy, Dragon Age, the MCU, and Critical Role, but I haven't been super active in any of them for the past few years. Attempting to rediscover my passion for fandom is a long-running desire of mine.


• Where to Find Me: In as much as I'm active anywhere these days... the site I check every day without fail is Twitter (iamkj), for all its recent failings, and inertia is likely to keep me there until the lights go out. DW is the social media site I feel the strongest personal attachment to. I've started dipping my toes back into Tumblr (owlmoose95), but I'm not really in the habit of checking it regularly yet. But it's the most likely site to serve as a Twitter replacement for me. And I'm still playing Flight Rising (my profile page) if you want to come find me there. I also use Instagram and Facebook, but I'm only likely to add you there if I know you IRL. If you meet that criteria and are interested, let me know.


• Master List: Most of my fic is posted on AO3 (owlmoose). My non-fiction writing is here and on ladybusiness


• Anything Else: This is the first time I've posted to DW in over two months. There's a lot I could say about that, but every time I think about laying it all out, I get paralyzed, and I don't do it. So instead I'm just going to jump back in like nothing ever happened and see if I can manage do complete some Fandom Snowflake challenges, no pressure, just whatever seems fun or worthwhile.

Top Gun: Maverick: I've seen the original of course, a few times I think, but it's not a deep and unshakeable part of my youth the way it is for many of my generation (including T). It's also been many years since I've seen it, but fortunately I was recently reminded of most of the major plot beats by Legal Eagle's video on all the laws Maverick broke (tl;dw: he's lucky if he's just in jail). Anyway, this movie is entirely a love letter to Top Gun, so if you like that movie, you should enjoy this one. I thought it was a bit silly, very predictable (I called a major twist at the end because "I have seen a movie before"), and riddled with plot holes and characters making ludicrous choices, but it tugged the heartstrings in the right time and places, so I found it worth watching, if impossible to take at all seriously.

She Hulk: Attorney at Law, Episodes 3-4: I'm continuing to enjoy this show. It's not particularly earth-shaking, but it's a fairly light comedy -- it doesn't need to be earth-shaking. I enjoy Jen a lot, her relationships with her work friends and with Wong are great, and the fourth-wall breaking asides work really well.

Thor: Love and Thunder: I admit, I'm not sure how to feel about this one. There was some fun stuff in here, but overall I found it a convoluted mess, mostly because its tone was all over the place. ( Spoilers )

So I have now officially attended an entire WSFS Business Meeting, all four days of it (not quite beginning to end because I was a few minutes late on Friday). I learned a great deal about parliamentary procedure, Roberts Rules of Order, and fandom politics. I don't know that I'll ever sit through a whole meeting again, but I feel like I better understand a few things now. The big news, of course, is that the Hugo for Best Game or Interactive Work won!! It will be passed on to the 2023 Worldcon, and assuming all goes well at that Business Meeting, the category will officially run for the first time in 2024. (The motion passed easily yesterday, with no drama and very little discussion, so there's no reason to think it won't also pass in Chengdu.) Big big love and props to justira for all the hard work they did to make this dream a reality. (If you want to congratulate and/or thank them, their Twitter is probably the best way.)

Other highlights of the Business Meeting include the passing on of the two proposed changes to how Fan and Pro are defined being passed on to a committee (which I, uh, volunteered to be on; we'll see what happens there) and the two proposed changes to Best Series failed (one handily, one in a close vote). There was also a ton of procedural drama which I won't get into here, but will probably write about more later.

The other big thing that happened yesterday was of course the Hugo Awards. I enjoyed the ceremony very much -- as I expected, Annalee and Charlie Jane were funny, kept the proceedings moving (it started on time and we were done in exactly two hours), and were clearly having the time of their life up there. I'm already seeing debates around some of the winners -- these conversations about fans versus pros are certainly going to be interesting, and the longlist raises a lot of questions -- and the laughter at the way the Strange Horizons staff was announced is being rightly discussed as a problem. But overall I enjoyed the ceremony very much, and I'm glad I could be there.

Although I'm staying on in Chicago for a couple more days, the con activities have concluded and I believe my friends have all left the site, so I'm declaring my con officially over. I deeply enjoyed getting to see and hang out with so many people and be in fandom space, and I'm really glad I came. Thanks to everyone who made Chicon 8 a great experience for me, whether you knew it or not.

As planned, I started my day at the WSFS Preliminary Business Meeting, which was actually action-packed and filled with drama. While my primary purpose for attending is to support the Best Game or Interactive Experience Hugo, there are a number of other proposals to change the awards from members of the Hugo Study Award Committee -- tweaking best series and changing the definition of fan vs. pro -- that are very controversial and were released without gathering feedback from wider fandom, and in at least one case without the permission of the committee as a whole. Perhaps as a result of this, probably the biggest news out of the entire preliminary meeting is that the Hugo Study Committee has been formally dissolved, although we will be debating all the resolutions they proposed. This may be the first WorldCon where I attend the entire business meeting, so I expect I'll have more to say about the whole experience once it's over.

After lunch with justira and bookish_di, I met krait at the art show. We walked around and admired the shinies, I put a bid in on a necklace, and then we hit the dealers room and admired shinies some more. I then relaxed in my room for a bit (and watched up to the break on last night's episode of Critical Role) until it was time for the live recording of Our Opinions Are Correct. Annalee and Charlie Jane talked about therapy in speculative fiction, with special guest Theo Germaine, a trans non-binary actor who recently starred in a horror movie about conversion therapy. As I expected, it was a fun time -- I enjoy this podcast, and both Annalee and Charlie Jane are excellent live, so it makes for a very good combination.

My last event for the day was a panel on good LGBTQIA+ rep in fiction, which justira was on. The moderator was a little green, but once settled in he did a good job, and it was a nice conversation.

Then it was time for a light dinner in my room, where I am now about to sack out with the rest of Critical Role. I want to get up in time to have a real breakfast before tomorrow's business meeting -- not grabbing a bagel sandwich in the hotel Starbucks with the long line -- so it seemed like a good night to wind down early. See you tomorrow, WorldCon.