I asked on Twitter if The King’s Daughter was based on The Moon and the Sun by Vonda McIntyre, but no one answered. Reason.com came to my rescue, via File 770. Yes, it is. The film was made eight years ago, this article says, and the review is… not kind. Maybe I’ll just reread the Nebula-winning book.
I’d hate to think I didn’t fill you guys in the “squeecore” thing! Is it a controversy? A dust-up? A revelation of a movement? A kerfuffle, a tempest in a teapot? You be the judge.
Basically, “squeecore” is a word a couple of podcasters invented for speculative fiction they don’t like very much. Here is the original podcast. Is squeecore a movement? Simon McNeil weighs in, and so does Camestros Felapton. And then again.
This seems like a William Gibson thing, or an elaborate joke. Atlas Obscura shares Iceland’s historic Final Big Mac, now 12 years old, which mummified instead of decomposing, according to MacDonald’s, because of a lack a moisture. (Are they saying their burgers are dry?) Or maybe it’s a horror story—the mice in the owner’s garage didn’t touch the bag in twelve years.
Self-promotion, but you’ll benefit from it. From today through Friday, January 28, Barnes and Noble is offering 25% off all pre-orders. Enter the promo code Preorder25. My editor sent this to me and you’ll notice it just happens to come up to my book.
I stopped at this LitHub article for the photos, but the author comments tickled me, and I got a couple of good book recommendations out of it. I hope you enjoy it.
This Publishers Weekly article on a longitudinal study of bookstores can be depressing. It doesn’t address used bookstores, and because it’s looking back, not much discussion of the ways brick and mortar stores are thriving. And we know what we need to do if we love our brick and mortar shops.
In Cornwall, the first Sunday in May, people gather with “the May horns” and other noisemakers to drive out winter. Their chief cheerleader is Old Ned, a giant crow figure who dies three times, reviving each time, along the trek. You may see this again, closer to May. The video is about 3 minutes. (Note: the Mayers make noise, not music. If you expect music, you will be disappointed.)
It’s pretty funny the number of electrons wasted on expressing consternation over a podcast (re: “squeecore”) that doesn’t say all that much. I think the thesis is not that there is any movement per se, but that a lot of fantasy and SF now has an aesthetic shared with Netflix and videogames, where everything builds toward rather predictable “stand up and cheer” moments that the rather predictable heroes arrive at by being hip and badass. There does seem to be a lot of the same types of plots and characters given in publisher book descriptions, but that may be the marketing department and not always reflective of the content. Am not familiar with either Netflix or videogames, so that aspect of the argument is opaque to me.
That was my sense of it too. I wish they hadn’t rushed to give it a “brand name” because the discussion itself would have been interesting.
The book that came to mind for me when this kerfuffle started up was Max Gladstone’s Empress of Forever, a book that (unlike his first 4-5 Craft novels) I did not enjoy. Not sure if the podcasters would see it as an exemplar though.