Five Books and One Movie

[forestofglory]

Welcome to Five Fandom 5+1s and a Meme! This is a series of posts about stuff that’s important to my own personal fandom history. I wanted some space to talk about happy and whimsical stuff and explore the different ways I’ve experienced fandom over time. I thought it would be fun to borrow the popular fanfic structure of 5+1 things. I’m using the word fandom very broadly here, to include SFF book fandom, transformative fandom, and just liking things. The things I’ve picked to talk about might not be the best or my favorites but they are fundamental to my experience and have shaped my thinking.

1. The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner This is the first book in The Queen’s Thief series. However I first read The Thief as a child when it was a stand alone novel, with no sequels.. I loved it then and I love it now. I know some of my friends have really struggled with this one and only read it in order to read the other books in the series, but I enjoy this one a lot. I really like the use of first person narration, and perhaps I have a bit of nostalgia influencing my opinion.

2. The Vorkosigan Sagaby Lois McMaster Bujold - I tried to pick just one of these books, but I just couldn't. I need to talk about all of them, as a unit. I first read these in high school, when I was fortunate enough to have a sizeable allowance and access to a bookstore that specialised in SFF. Every month, I would walk up to the bookstore and walk home with an armful of books. I would only buy one new Vorkosigan book at a time, because I was enjoying reading the series fairly slowly.

These books are by no means perfect, but I love them and they have shaped me in so many ways. Even today,e when I’m mulling my way through a moral problem I often find myself thinking of an adage from these books, “people over principles.” Bujold has a way of getting a lot of meaning in only a few words.

3. A Door into Ocean by Joan Slonczewski This is an extremely me book that I love and wish more people had read. It has my favorite fictional ecosystem, gender politics, and non-violence. I read this in uni because I was exploring older SFF by women authors and I’m so glad that I did.

4. Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand by Samuel R. Delany I’m mad that I didn’t read this book in high school when I was reading “the classics of SFF” It just sucks that books like Stranger in Strange Land are easy to find, and constantly foisted on you by other people, but Stars in My Pocket I had to work to track down. This book is just chock full of interesting ideas! It has so much going on around gender, pronouns, sex and family.

5. Sing for the Coming of the Longest Night by Katherine Fabian and Iona Datt Sharma I can’t stop recommending this novella, I just love it so much! Its been my go to queer book rec for a while now, but I also felt extermly seen by the way the Jewish characters in this pratice Judaism in hapharad but meaningful way. This book also features magic in modern London, polyamory, and found family. I can’t recommend it enough!

+1 movie My Neighbor Totoro I saw this movie for the first time when I was 10. My fifth grade class had weekly Japanese lessons and for several weeks they showed us this movie -- in Japanese, with no subtitles. I loved it immediately and have loved it ever since. It's so calm the landscapes shown are so beautiful. I was so excited to get the chance to share this piece of my childhood media with my kid and now she loves it too!

Comments

[lunabee34]

I haven't read any of these! *bookmarks*

[forestofglory]

Well you are in for some treats!

(For the Vorkosigan books I there are several possible places to start but I recommend the omnibus Cordelia's Honor -- which you can read like its one complete book.)

[lunabee34]

Noted and thank you.

[grrlpup]

I find myself doing a reread of The Queen’s Thief every time a new volume comes out, and it would be unimaginable not to start with The Thief. It does seem different from the other books to me, but brilliant in a different way—so slow yet so much going on.

[forestofglory]

I do that too! I'm looking forward to rereading before the final book this summer. (But also sad that it will be the final book)

The Thief does read a bit younger, and its the only one with 1st person narration but it feels right to me.

[enemyofperfect]

A Door into Ocean and Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand are such classics! Delany has such a talent for casually dropping volumes of worldbuilding into a paragraph or two, and like you say, Ocean is so interesting about gender and violence and ecosystems. Have you read anything else of Slonczewski's? I remember particularly liking Daughter of Elysium, too.

Sing for the Coming of the Longest Night sounds fascinating, meanwhile. Thank you for the rec!

[forestofglory]

It's deeply frustrating to me to watch how wonderful books like these are sidelined in the conversation while books but white men of similar age get much more attention.

I have read a couple of other books by Slonczewski which where also quite good, though I didn't love them as much as I A Door into Ocean.

[jesse_the_k]

I got to be Joan Slonczewski's GoH liaison at WisCon and it was thrilling. She's as smart and kind as you'd imagine from reading her works. For example, her astute observation (not word-for-word) on the Dessert Salon: yes it's indulgent, but why shouldn't women, who've been tasked with making all the parties happen, celebrate paying someone else to deliver great treats?

slon ZOO ski

[forestofglory]

Oh, that's lovely memory! Thank you for sharing.

(Now I'm sad all over again that there won't be a dessert salon at WisCon this year)

[dolorosa_12]

I love Sing for the Coming of the Longest Night — the authors gave me a free copy last December because they were giving it as a gift to anyone who voted in the UK election, and it was such a spark of brightness in an otherwise dark and gloomy time. I love the found family aspect, and the messy but ultimately compassionate and hopeful way they all experience polyamory, and all the different characters' experiences of religion and tradition felt really realistic and resonant to me. It's really beautiful.

It feels too springlike and warm to reread it right now, but I think it will become a December tradition for me, like The Dark Is Rising.

[forestofglory]

<3

This is such a good description of what makes that book so excellent!

[jesse_the_k]

I love this format and look forward to more -- at your own pace, of course.

[forestofglory]

Thank you!

[bookgazing]

I'm definitely one of the people who loves The Thief, but understand it's a hard sell to a lot of other people. I just like Gen so much.

[forestofglory]

Yes! Gen is wonderful and I love his voice!

[starshipfox]

Interesting re. "The Thief". I actually really enjoyed that one, and then struggled with the rest of the series. I don't think I finished book three! Maybe I should try again.

[forestofglory]

Huh, I guess the second and third books involve a lot not knowing what the characters are really thinking and are a bit emotionally distant so many they wouldn't work for everyone.

[starshipfox]

I really enjoyed the first one, and I think I expected more of the same. Maybe I would enjoy the rest of the series more now that it's been a while since I read the first one. They seem to be such beloved books!