headstone | Network

Review copy provided by the publisher.

This is such a fresh and vivid fantasy, it is achingly sad and exciting and wry by turns. I am so glad I got to read this. It tangles two timelines, the "past" of the 1940s and the "present" of the 1970s, both in Hong Kong's Kowloon Walled City slum and then reaching out to the areas around it. Mercy Chan doesn't have any memories when she washes up on the shores of Hong Kong during the Japanese occupation--a terrible time to be friendless and unprotected. But she isn't quite either thing, because she has Bao, her maogui (cat ghost)--not a type of spirit known to be friendly, but Bao has apparently made an exception for Mercy.

Bao won't be the last of the local ghosts, spirits, and gods we meet in the course of this book (although he is my favorite). Mercy's talent at communicating with ghosts has given her steady work with the triads for decades. Now her past is catching up to her, and if she can't remember what it was, her future looks imperiled--and so does the future of Hong Kong itself. This is a book that seeks kindness in a world that doesn't always think it has room to be kind, and I found it to be a very satisfying read indeed.

lunabee34

I have missed you all, so I've eased myself back into DW by starting to comment on everyone's journals again, and now I thought I'd try my hand at posting again.

1. I've been reading Hobbit fanfic ever since we watched the movies with Fi for the first time over Thanksgiving break, and I'm thoroughly enjoying myself. I can't tell what's fanon and what's canon, though (or from whence it comes if canon). Like, Thorin's sister must be named Dis because everybody calls her that, even though I don't remember that information being in The Hobbit or the trilogy. But I see a variety of names for her husband, which tells me that information isn't included anywhere. Also, there's such a broad swathe of what is probably fanon that seems to appear in every story: that the Ri brothers all have different dads, that Dori is extraordinarily fussy and into tea and etiquette, and etc. I wonder who was the originator of a lot of these ideas.

2. Have some Hobbit recs:

Mr. and Mrs. Baggins by LullabyKnell
Turns out Bilbo and Lobelia have more in common than they thought. They get married about it.

Of Risks and Rewards by Bgtea
Kili/Fili
After BOTFA, Fíli can sense the growing separation between him and Kíli, but he is at a loss as to how he could even begin to rebuild the close relationship they once had. It is just his bad luck that fate is about to throw several more wrenches into his life in the form of suitors.

A Mixture of Madness series by Salvia_G
In which sexual mores are quite different for dwarves. Here be lots of super hot dwarf sex.

3. I have pretty much quit reading Stranger Things fic, but have the last few recs I have in open tabs:

and it all comes down to you by skoosiepants
SGA/ST fusion
The one where Eddie and Steve are soulmates in space!!

A Kiss with a Fist by Sablesea
Steve/Dustin
In the immediate aftermath of the final battle.

Tempus Fugit by Fuuma
Eddie/Dustin
Post-season 4 where Eddie lives.

A Catalog of Non-Definitive Acts series by KidA_666
Steve/Jonathan
Tommy Hagan gets taken instead of Barbara.

glitteringstars posting in

writethisfanfic

Hi everyone! How has writing been going?

Does anyone have writing plans for the weekend? Do you use other art forms for brainstorming or motivating your writing (art, fan mixes, editing)?

kaberett

I currently have a bit of a special interest happening, right. So I spent a bit of today's therapy session talking about it, as one does, and then meandered around to one of my current Big Topics[1], and made it all the way through to the wrapping-up stage of proceedings!

... when My Favourite Metaphor About Therapy abruptly suggested itself to me and I had. A Moment.

Which is how I found myself explaining that, in a thematically appropriate coincidence, said favourite metaphor is "emotional heavy lifting, with trained spotter".

To which came the response: "... can I. borrow that."

And thus: A Good Grade In Therapy.

[1] social anxiety. it's the social anxiety.

jesse_the_k

On his second day, Shadow wandered into our bedroom and leapt up on the bed. I made my creaky crane eh-eh sound which is the closest I get to saying "no" to a dog and he hopped right off. (Clearly, he's had some training.)

This morning we were resting in bed and he stood in our bedroom doorway. I said "Shadow come!" and he stepped inside! And wagged his tail! and then immediately turned around and went back to his crate.

But his tail can wag.

shipperslist

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linky

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Current Mood: contemplative

sovay

It is the dozenth birthday of Hestia Hermia Linsky-Noyes, lhude sing meaw! We sang to her after midnight. She ate eagerly of her festive ham. She has spent the afternoon in the pursuit of Bird Theater. I remember her brother under that same light. Bast smiled when our cats were born.

Current Music: Dropkick Murphys, "Tessie"

princessofgeeks

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common_nature

Loved the look of this sunset through a cloud gap the other night.

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rachelmanija

A French children's book in translation from 1961, in which five children are trapped in a cottage by a landslide.

14-year-old Laurent's family is concerned that he spends all his time reading and doing chemistry experiments, and isn't engaging with other people. So they dispatch him to stay with his younger brother and sister in a cottage only occupied by a 14-year-old girl and her younger brother, who are alone because her mother is having surgery. The idea is that Laurent will have to take care of the other kids, and this will make him come out of his shell more. His parents do leave him the out of being able to pack up his siblings and return to Paris if he really hates it.

I am honestly not sure if it was even vaguely normal in 60s France for five kids ages 14-5 to stay alone in a remote mountain cottage for ten days, or if this was just a literary convention. Anyway, Laurent unsurprisingly hates it and packs up his siblings to leave. But while they're on the train platform with the other kids, he has a change of heart and they all head back to the cottage. But they stop in the cottage of a family friend, who is out at the time.

It gets buried in a landslide! They're all trapped in pitch darkness! In an only vaguely familiar house! They can't use the stove because it already nearly suffocated them with carbon monoxide! Their only air is from a narrow shaft leading to a giant canyon! There's very little food! No one knows they're in trouble because one of the kids wrote ten postcards dated for every day of the vacation, then arranged with the post office to send one per day!

The kids having to do everything in total darkness for most of the book is a really cool twist on this sort of "trapped in a space" book. (One of my favorite moments is when enough dirt slides away that some light gets in, and they see that they've been half-starved in pitch darkness with two huge hams and a lantern hanging from the ceiling.) It has some cozy elements - they're trapped with goats, which they can milk but which also get into everything and poop everywhere, and one goat gives birth to twin kids - but gets desperate quickly when Laurent gets an infected cut and the main milking goat drowns in a flooded cellar. But it all ends up okay when they first signal with Morse code in a mirror (in a nice touch of realism, it takes a long time for anyone to figure out the message as the kids get some of the letters wrong, including signaling OSO instead of SOS) and then make and set off gunpowder!

Not an enduring classic, but an entertaining read.

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muccamukk

The Battle Against Enshittification

dw_dev: AI and Dreamwidth.
Great post from

mark about exactly how DW could use AI (potentially spam filtering), and how it will never use it (feeding your posts into the maw).

404 Media: 'AI Is African Intelligence': The Workers Who Train AI Are Fighting Back.
Kenyan workers are still the underpaid labor behind AI training, moderation, and sex chatbots. The Data Labelers Association is fighting back.

The Verge: Grammarly is using our identities without permission.
When users select the 'expert review' button in the Grammarly sidebar, it analyzes their writing and surfaces AI-generated suggestions 'inspired by' related experts. Those 'industry-relevant perspectives' include the likes of Stephen King, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Carl Sagan, among many others.

Wired: Grammarly Is Facing a Class Action Lawsuit Over Its AI 'Expert Review' Feature.
I'm sure everyone enjoys getting sued by Stephen King.

The Flytrap: Sex Workers Versus the Algorithm.
Mostly about payment processors, but also about filtering: the endless dance around content bans requires constantly coming up with new ways to craft video titles and content that are frustrating not only for adult performers, but also their customers.

The Guardian: The world wants to ban children from social media, but there will be grave consequences for us all.
Age-verification systems require collecting sensitive data to support the biometric information. In no time, the internet will become a fully surveilled digital panopticon.

Canadian Politics
(I'm actually saving fewer links about this, because it's mostly pretty disheartening. And I can't deal.)

TheBreach: Pierre Poilievre is misleading the public about refugee healthcare (Video: 3 minutes).
Desmond Cole fact checks his misinformation and explains how blaming the most vulnerable distracts us from fighting for good health care for all.

The Tyee: Advocates Hope a Ruling Will Change RCMP Treatment of Indigenous Witnesses.
But critics say the Canadian rights tribunal didn’t go far enough after finding police discrimination.
Nominally good news, but so much about this case pisses me off. $7k each? Seriously? Reminder that the one person who got state protection in all of this, the guy who (allegedly) abused all those people, is John Furlong. Fuck that guy.

The Breach: A notorious RCMP unit shaped B.C. universities’ reaction to Palestine encampments.
From Fairy Creek to university campuses, CRU-BC is positioning itself as the go-to police force for repressing dissent.
Category: jackbooted thugs.

Kind of Cool, Actually:

HeatherCoxRichardson: Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter | Reckoning with Jason Herbert Podcast (Video: 1:43 hours).
Words cannot express how validating this was. Lo! How many long years have I said that AL:VH is the most historically accurate Lincoln movie? HCR agrees.

The Tyee: What Can You Do with Used Plastic and 3D Printers? Meet Two Pros.
Not sure how scalable this is, but it's a cool project.

The Narwhal : In northeast B.C., fresh food is scarce. This First Nation hopes geothermal energy could change that.
Cool project to restore food security after Site C fucked it up, hopefully they can get funding.

NorthernBallet: Northern Ballet's Gentleman Jack | Costumes (Video: 2 minutes).
I've really been enjoying the promo clips for this new ballet. I hope there's some way to watch it online.

tozka

A knitted cover which goes over the top of a round red mailbox common in the UK. The cover has a dark green base with a riot of 3D flowers of different types and colors on top.

I love finding post box toppers!

📍 Chichester, United Kingdom - March 2026

pauraque

subtitle that didn't fit in the subject line: On Being Both, Beyond, and In-Between

I'm going to say this prominently because I think it has caused some confusion among reviewers: This is a book by two nonbinary authors and the title is Life Isn't Binary, and it is NOT (primarily) about nonbinary gender identity! If you want a book that is primarily about nonbinary gender identity, this book may not give you what you're looking for!

Instead, it is about problems with binary thinking in all areas of life. There is a tendency for people to view many things in terms of two categories in opposition. Male/female and cis/trans, yes, but also Black/white, straight/gay, privileged/marginalized, body/mind, emotion/logic, friend/lover, us/them. The book examines and deconstructs these binaries and more, and encourages thinking about who currently benefits from their resultant flattening of nuance, and what we could gain from framing concepts in a less polarized way.

The book is short but extremely densely packed with ideas. I read it as a two-person book club with

dragonque, and every chapter elicited fruitful discussion about its points and how they related to our own lives and experiences. I have known

dragonque for a long time and I feel like I got to know them much better through talking about this book!

I do think at times it can feel too dense and too short for the vast scope of its thesis. The authors can state in one sentence an absolutely massive idea that could itself be an entire book, and that's the only thing they say about it because they're already on to the next point. (The authors have in fact collaborated on several other books which sound like they may elaborate on some of the things where I was like, "so, that's all you're going to say about that one? okay!")

But I found the book very worthwhile and thought-provoking, and after returning it to the library I bought my own copy because I expect I will be re-reading it, referring to it, or wanting to lend it to people.

duckprintspress

A banner with a rainbow stripe and text that reads "A Very Queer March"

Happy March!! If you’re looking to grab a bunch of queer titles to help you march into April, check out this fab bundle of 63 queer stories for $60 – A Very Queer March itch.io bundle! We’ve got two titles in this one – The Salt in the Sea by J. D. Rivers and Lightbringer by boneturtle.

Get so many queer stories, bundle available now through March 31!

prettygoodword

diglossia (dai-GLOS-ee-uh) or diaglossia (dee-uh-GLOS-ee-uh) - (ling.) n., the use of two varieties of the same language in different social contexts of a speech community.

Typically, one is a high/prestigious mode and the other a low/everyday mode. A common example is High German and Swiss German, common throughout German-speaking Switzerland, but many countries where there's an official version used in schools and broadcasts (often based on the dialect of the capital) and local variants have this (outside the capital, that is). As a linguistics term, introduced in 1959 by American sociolinguist Charles A. Ferguson from Latin diglōssia, bilingual (with influence of French diglossie, bilingual), from Ancient Greek díglōssos, again same meaning.

---L.

selenak

( Paradise 2.05 )

( Star Trek: Starfleet Academy 1.10 )

Current Mood: calm
Current Location: Munich

reading

Network

The Girl With a Thousand Faces, by Sunyi Dean

3 Things

Check In: Day 12

A good grade in therapy, something that--

We Have a Tail Wag!

...

Artist Things

She's got a common full of love

mundanity

Hole in the Sky Sunset

Landslide, by Veronique Day

characters20in20 Round 21

Returning + New Pitch Hits

Supernatural: Gabriel's Big Bang

links list (the Internet may be getting worse)

photo: ready for spring

Life Isn't Binary by Meg-John Barker & Alex Iantaffi (2019)

A Very Queer March! An itch.io Bundle

Get so many queer stories, bundle available now through March 31!

di(a)glossia

Beware of mailmen and self build bombs

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