All posts by SF Bluestocking

Blog News, Weekend Links

State of the Blog and Weekend Links: April 9, 2017

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So, the big news of this week, for me, is that SF Bluestocking is a Hugo Finalist for Best Fanzine, and I cannot even begin to express the depth of my gratitude for everyone who thought well enough of this blog to nominate it for the honor. I’m honestly still just blown away that this is a thing that has happened in the world, and I’m beyond thrilled to be in such fine company in the Best Fanzine category. Thank you, truly and with many superlatives, to those who nominated me, and welcome to new readers, which I know there are a few of this week. I’m glad you’re here.

Even better news: last year’s rules tweaks seem to have led most of the various Rabid and Sad Puppies to change their tactics and/or just lose interest in griefing the awards altogether. There’s still a smidgen of puppy influence, but it’s little enough that I feel pretty confident saying that this year’s finalist list is, overall, the strongest and most diverse one in the years that I’ve been following the awards.

If you want to get a head start on reading for the awards, File 770 has already collected links to where you can read this year’s finalists online for free.

io9 talked with Stix Hiscock, the pseudonymous author of this year’s Rabid Puppy troll pick, the Best Novelette finalist “Alien Stripper Boned From Behind By the T-Rex,” and she seems nice.

For the first time since 1971, a music album has been nominated for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form. It’s an experimental hip hop album by clipping., Splendor & Misery, and it’s brilliant. Pitchfork has the scoop on why this nomination is important.

This year’s finalist list for the Nommo Awards, given by the African Speculative Fiction Society to celebrate work by African authors, was also released this week.

Tor.com shared their lists of all (or at least a lot) of the releases to look for in April:

Fantasy Cafe’s annual Women in SF&F Month began:

You can read the schedule for week two here.

Predictably, the Ghost in the Shell movie starring Scarlett Johansson is flopping, big time and largely because of the white-washing of the lead role. The best thing I’ve read about it yet is this round table discussion about it with Keiko Agena, Tracy Kato-Kiriyama, Atsuko Okatsuka and Ai Yoshihara at The Hollywood Reporter.

Troy L. Wiggins wrote about why black characters in fantasy need backstories.

A. Merc Rustad’s So You Want to Be a Robot and Other Stories is at the top of my must-read list for this spring, so I was pleased to see them interviewed at Quick Sip Reviews.

It’s been a cool five years since Kristin Cashore’s last novel, but there’s finally a title, cover and excerpt for her next one, Jane, Unlimited.

George Takei is writing a graphic novel to be published sometime next year.

Sarah Gailey and Max Gladstone chatted about Gladstone’s now Hugo-nominated Craft Sequence. Also, you can now get the first five books in a digital omnibus edition for just $12.

Ruthanna Emrys (Winter Tide) wrote about the optimism of H.P. Lovecraft.

P. Djeli Clark’s review of Andre M. Carrington’s Speculative Blackness: The Future of Race in Science Fiction is a reminder that I literally have a copy of the book three feet away from me and I haven’t started it yet but definitely ought to, ASAP.

Mari Ness continued her fairy tale blog series at Tor.com with a post about one of my favorite fairy tales, The Goose Girl.

The first title in the Book Smugglers’ new Novella Initiative has a title, cover and release date: Keeper of the Dawn by Dianna Gunn will be out on April 18th.

Black Girl Nerds posted on why Doctor Who‘s black gay character matters.

Nerds of a Feather, Flock Together’s Dystopian Visions series is still going strong:

Aliette de Bodard’s newest novel, House of Binding Thorns, was out on Tuesday, and she’s been making the rounds promoting it:

The second half of Uncanny #15 is now available online, and you should definitely drop everything you’re doing and go read Sarah Pinsker’s wonderful short novella “And Then There Were (N-One).” It’s the first novella ever published in Uncanny, it starts with a convention for Sarahs from thousands of alternate universes, and it’s my early favorite for best novella of 2017. Truly superb and a very fun read.

Finally, Fireside Fiction has added a new $20 tier to their Patreon. $5/month will go to support the Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberties Union, and you also get a rad Antifascist Fiction Club pin.

Television, The Expanse

The Expanse: In “Here There Be Dragons” lines are drawn and sides are chosen

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“Here There Be Dragons” is, in general, another solid episode of The Expanse, though it’s central metaphor—relating the search for the protomolecule to historical exploration, where exploration is supposed to represent human advancement—falls a little flat and nearly obfuscates the much more impactful way in which the episode is about breaking points and choosing sides. The overall effect is sadly somewhat muddled, but there are enough smartly written, powerfully realized scenes that get their point enough that most of the episode’s flaws are forgivable in context.

It’s also starting to be very apparent that the show is diverging from the books in some significant ways. I’d planned on reading one book ahead of each season, but I’m increasingly feeling as if—if I want to continue reviewing the series as an adaptation of the source material—I’m going to have to go ahead and read the rest of what’s already been published, sooner rather than later. In the meantime, and for the foreseeable future since I don’t expect to read another four books and several novellas before the end of this season, expect less book-related commentary here. Instead, I’ll for the most part just be analyzing and commenting on what they put on screen unless there’s some very important book versus show connection to be made.

**Spoilers ahead.**

The episode starts with a flashback to Ganymede Station, before the mirrors fell, in which we see Dr. Strickland with Mei and a woman doctor or scientist walking through the station, apparently to the secret tunnels and rooms under the station. There are several of these flashbacks throughout the episode, and they don’t do much besides confirm that Mei was alive before the mirrors came down and that Dr. Strickland is an absolute monster. There’s not enough new information in these scenes about either Strickland or what he’s doing on Ganymede to really justify their existence, and as adorable as Mei and her backpack are every one of these scenes was a speedbump that distracted from actual current events in the show without being particularly entertaining. These kinds of running flashbacks have been used to great effect in the past to reinforce a thematic thread of an episode—the Epstein story was almost perfectly utilized in this way—but even Strickland’s late-in-the-hour speech to Mei about imagining themselves as explorers, a sinister echo of something Iturbi says earlier in the episode, isn’t impactful or memorable enough to feel necessary to the broader plot or message of the show or even just to this episode. This material could all have been left on the cutting room floor and the episode would have been better for it.

On Ganymede in the present, Holden, Naomi, Amos and Pax are working their way down into the depths of the station to search for Strickland and Mei. While still on their way down, Amos points out to Holden that Holden didn’t even try and stop him from killing Roma. Holden replies that he “[doesn’t] mind bashing some asshole’s head in” if it’s for a greater good, in this case finding and eliminating the protomolecule, which has clearly become Holden’s white whale at this point. Holden’s increasing tendency towards violence and amorality when it comes to achieving his, frankly, ill-defined objective continues to drive a wedge between him and Naomi. By the end of the episode, after Holden cruelly (and stupidly, from a strategic standpoint, to be honest) allows the final (barely) surviving Project Caliban scientist they’ve found to bleed to death before she can give them any useful information, Naomi has reached her breaking point.

While Holden, Pax and Alex are going to continue hunting for the Caliban creature and the protomolecule, Naomi is staying on Ganymede, where she intends to help Melissa on the Weeping Somnambulist evacuate people from the station. They can’t stop the protomolecule, she says, but she can do some good here and now for the people who need help on Ganymede. It’s probably the best thing Naomi has done for herself or anyone else all season. Holden is unhealthily obsessed with the protomolecule, and he’s dragged the rest of them along with him for more than long enough. That Holden feels the need to send Amos with Naomi as a protector is exactly the kind of sexist garbage I would expect from him, and Holden’s final kiss to Naomi is ugly and possessive enough—though I suspect it was intended to be bittersweet—that I’d be fine if she was rid of him for good. Losing Naomi may be the wake-up call Holden needs to get his act together, but he’s got a long way to go to deserve her.

On Earth, Bobbie gets a lecture from Captain Martens about duty before being informed that she’s out of the marines when they get back to Mars. When they go to leave, however, their dropship isn’t allowed to land and pick them up—something about an attempted OPA attack, straight from the desk of Undersecretary Avasarala. While they’re waiting for their next chance to leave, Bobbie goes to Martens’ quarters, where she gives him one last chance to come clean with her about what happened on Ganymede before she beats the information out of him. When she gets the story—“We were a goddamn sales demo!”—Bobbie flees (or, rather, walks quickly) through the Martian embassy before having to run the rest of the way to the Earth border, where she requests political asylum.

Everything about this sequence of scenes is done well, from Bobbie’s subtle expressions as she’s told that she’s no longer a soldier—which has been the core of her identity before now—to the restrained brutality of her attack on Martens—she wants information, not to kill him—to the tense drama of her flight from the embassy. Everything is crisply filmed and artistically composed, and I love the contrast between the artificial lighting inside the Martian embassy and the bright natural sunlight outdoors. Bobbie’s decision to go after Martens for information and her even more important choice to take what she’s learned to the U.N. represent hard-earned character development, and the beating she gives Martens is a great catharsis for both Bobbie and the viewer, especially in light of the confirmation that Mars is looking to buy Project Caliban. That we also get a nicely done scene with Bobbie, Cotyar and Chrisjen is just icing on the cake of this storyline this week.

Chrisjen herself is still dealing this week with fallout from Eros and doing her own work to find out as much as she can about the protomolecule and what’s going on in the solar system. Iturbi is still sending her regular updates from the Arboghast at Venus, where he and Janus have almost buried the hatchet and managed to get some science done. In another standout scene, Errinwright comes to Avasarala with an idea to get at Jules-Pierre Mao through his daughter, Clarissa, though Chrisjen cuts him off to break the news that he’s about to face some consequences for his role in what happened with Eros. Errinwright seems to think that he’s taking the fall just because Mao isn’t available, and he even has the balls to ask Avasarala to speak in his favor—which she, of course, won’t do—before kind of sighing and resigning himself to the fact that he’s on his own. Still, Errinwright seems at least slightly certain that he’ll get through this mess, at least to judge by his slightly ominous parting “somehow” to Chrisjen. Shohreh Aghdashloo and Shawn Doyle have a great onscreen chemistry together, and they do a wonderful job of selling the scene and making the audience really believe that these characters have a long, somewhat tumultuous, history as colleagues and political adversaries while still having a friendship (for lack of a better word) that goes quite deep.

As if a great Avasarala/Errinwright scene wasn’t enough, we’re also treated to a brilliant Avasarala and Cotyar scene late in the episode when Chrisjen receives a message from Jules-Pierre Mao himself, inviting her to parlay with him at a place of his choosing, off Earth, with a limited escort of her own. Cotyar insists that it’s a trap but then makes Avasarala’s own arguments to her, and it’s nice to see how much he’s come to care for her. His protective concern and her need for him to validate her opinions establishes an almost familial closeness between the two of them, and it’s sweet.

Miscellaneous Thoughts:

  • While I didn’t like the flashbacks in general, I appreciated the contrast in the job done by the set dressers to transform the hallway between pre- and post-incident looks.
  • I want a Misko and Marisko backpack.
  • So, Naomi had a kid. Nice to have that confirmed, but it’s been so strongly hinted at this season that the revelation wasn’t surprising.
  • Alex scenes on the Rocinante are delightful. There’s one moment during their slingshotting path to Ganymede where they come around the turn of a moon and Alex sees Jupiter and several other moons ahead of them, and it’s beautiful. I suspect that sort of thing would never get old, no matter how common space travel gets.
  • While Alex’s slingshot maneuver has already been criticized for its science fail—which showrunner Naren Shankar has already addressed—that wasn’t the most absurd thing to happen in the episode. That honor belongs to the coffin pod thing that they find in what Holden calls an incinerator but that seems to work much more like a near-magical vaporizer. It looks ridiculous when they zap it, the sound it makes is silly, and calling it an incinerator is just plain inaccurate. There’s not even any ash or melted plastic or metal left over. Just *fwoop!* out of existence.
  • Bobbie to Cotyar: “What the fuck are you looking at?” She’s a people person.
  • The protomolecule sure has set up house on Venus.
iZombie, Television

iZombie: “Heaven Just Got a Little Bit Smoother” establishes a new and problematic normal

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**This is a pretty spoilery review from start to finish.**

iZombie’s season two finale cleared the board, killing off or otherwise getting rid of the show’s major villains while ending the season with a zombie- and energy-drink-fueled conflagration that threatened to alert the whole world to Seattle’s undead problem. The first episode of season three, “Heaven Just Got a Little Bit Smoother,” is all about establishing a new baseline for the show and for all its characters, starting with everyone getting their stories straight about what happened at the Max Rager party, as the episode picks up 2.8 minutes after the last one ended. It’s a tense beginning, with Clive, Liv and Major coordinating their stories with new character Vivian Stoll (Andrea Savage) while on the other side of town Peyton, Ravi and Blaine are dealing with the aftermath of the shootout with Mr. Boss’s men after they’d kidnapped Peyton.

After this initial excitement, however, things slow down for a minute so we can get a slightly info-dumpy Liv voiceover that catches us up on the current state of the team—Liv, Ravi, Major, Peyton, and Clive—who are gathered together at Liv’s place to figure out what to do next. Liv suggests that they adopt a new “no secrets” policy between the five of them, and in the interest of that agreement tells them about her first meeting with Vivian and Vivian’s idea of making Seattle the capital of a zombie homeland. Interestingly, instead of jumping to conclusions and immediately labelling Vivian as a villain, Liv, Major and Clive take the time to set up a meeting with Vivian the next day to find out more about what she and her company (Fillmore Graves!) have planned.

Meanwhile, Blaine has headed back to his funeral home, where he’s confronted by Don E., who is convinced that Blaine is faking his amnesia. It’s an interesting and entertaining way for Blaine’s past to come back and haunt him, but even more interesting is to see a glimmer of the old Blaine when he realizes that the business is his and that Don E. and Chief were taking advantage of him when he first lost his memories. He lets Don E. quit, but before Don E. leaves, he finds Blaine’s frozen dad. It’s no surprise later in the episode to find Don E. unfreezing the old man so they can plot revenge against their mutual enemy, but it is a positive development, at least for watchers of the show. I’m encouraged that the show seems to have found a balance between Blaine having amnesia and Blaine still being Blaine, deep down.

The meeting with Vivian is delightfully unexpected. I rather thought she was going to replace Vaughn Du Clark as the show’s manically wicked corporate bad guy, and Andrea Savage would be great in that type of role, but that doesn’t seem to be the direction the show is going at all. Instead, Vivian’s preparations for “D-day” (“D” for discovery, when humans learn about the zombies in their midst) are actually mostly sensible. I mean, if she’s really concerned about humans taking military action against zombies, I’m not sure that moving every zombie man, woman and child to a tiny island is the best strategy, even if she does have her own zombie militia, but it’s not the worst idea, either. Sure, it sounds like a made-to-order target for drone strikes, but it could also work to prove that zombies are peaceable, normal people capable of existing in regular society if given the chance. If nothing else, Vivian thoroughly shows here that she’s not planning a pre-emptive strike or anything of the sort, and this gives Liv, Major and Clive quite a bit to think about regarding whether humanity is ready to know about zombies at all.

Unfortunately, after this promising start to the episode, the rest of it turns into a little bit of an overstuffed mess that all the smart, snappy dialogue in the world can’t completely make work. Here’s a list of things that happen in the final two thirds of “Heaven Just Got a Little Bit Smoother”:

  • Ravi isn’t dealing well with the news that Peyton and Blaine slept together, and he’s being a dick about it. Peyton hasn’t been entirely fair to Ravi, what with totally bailing on him without a word and all, but Ravi needs to grow the fuck up. I almost audibly cheered when Liv told him to stop it.
  • Peyton goes to see Blaine to thank him for saving her life, and he asks her straight up if they’re a couple. Whatever conversation that leads to happens off-screen, however, which makes it not really clear to anyone, viewer included, exactly where these two stand.
  • Major is looking for a job, but everyone still thinks he’s probably the Chaos Killer, which sucks. He eventually takes a job at Fillmore Graves. Because of course he does.
  • Ravi and Clive have a genuinely excellently done expository scene where they talk a lot about Ravi’s seventeen remaining doses of zombie cure and Liv and Major’s options re: getting cured and losing their memories versus just sticking this zombie thing out for a while longer. We’re also reminded that Major must make a choice sooner rather than later before the first non-working cure he took horribly kills him.
  • The security guard from the Max Rager party goes on a right-wing conspiracy theory radio show and spills about the zombies he saw tearing through the event. Liv and Clive try to stop him, but this only makes matters worse by adding fuel to the government cover-up fire.
  • Liv keeps staying on soldier brains to try and keep from feeling her feelings about having to shoot Drake, but it obviously stops working. Clive gets her extremely drunk, off-screen, which is sweet, but now it feels like the show is trying to avoid letting anyone have any feelings about this.
  • Peyton is being harassed and/or threatened on Twitter, and it frightens her. She tries to call Ravi, who petulantly refuses to answer the call, so instead she turns to Blaine for comfort. Nice going, Ravi.

What I want to talk about is the end of the episode. Early on, when Vivian is showing Liv, Major and Clive around Fillmore Graves and explaining what they do there, they meet a little boy, Wally, who knows Clive. It turns out that Wally and his parents are zombies, but they also used to be Clive’s neighbors, and Clive is happy to see Wally again so they agree to make plans to get together later. At one point in the hour, we hear a caller on the radio talking about how he thinks his neighbors are zombies, and the episode ends with Wally and his parents being murdered, each one shot in the head, presumably for being zombies. I suppose this can be interpreted, generously, as a way for the show to make the zombies’ potential plight real and to give Clive a very personal reason to care about what happens to the zombies in case his friendship with Liv isn’t enough.

Okay, sure. But there is a lot of weird coding going on here. While Malcolm Goodwin and Rahul Kohli have been regular cast members since day one, the show has otherwise struggled at times with diversity and hasn’t spent much time dwelling on race at all. However. There are some definite parallels emerging between the zombie experience and the experiences of immigrants and people of color in the US, and it’s uncomfortable, to say the least. All but one of the show’s notable zombies (good and bad) before now have been white, and it’s bad optics—at the very least—for the first black zombie family on the show, including a young child, the be murdered before we’ve even been properly introduced to them. At worst, it’s lazily racist shorthand to reiterate—in case the violent anti-zombie rhetoric that sounds very like ordinary right-wing vitriol wasn’t enough—that the show’s white zombies are, in the universe of the show, an oppressed minority. That the instigator of the anti-zombie frenzy that led to Wally and his family’s murders is also black doesn’t seem coincidental. It’s weird messaging all around, and I’m not sure that I’m willing to give it the generous interpretation when the show has failed on race in several other ways.

Finally, and still speaking of race, let’s talk about why this show, now in its third season and having received criticism for it for years, still can’t seem to cast a woman of color in any significant role. In addition to Vivian Stoll, the show also introduced us to Ravi’s ex-boss, Katty Kupps (*groan*), who is (surprise, surprise) also white. Listen. I love this show, and I love Liv and Peyton, and I liked Gilda or Rita or whatever her name was last season, but the most memorable woman of color that’s ever been on the show is memorable primarily for being a horrendously offensive racist stereotype of black women. No woman of color has ever had a multi-episode arc, and Liv has never been shown to be friendly with any woman of color. We couldn’t even get a woman of color as a love interest for Clive, who when he was dating dated a white woman, or Ravi, who is very hung up on Peyton.

This is bullshit. Women of color deserve better, and white women don’t deserve to always have even fictional worlds revolving around them a hundred percent of the time. Maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised later this season, but I’m not going to hold my breath.

Miscellaneous Thoughts:

  • Considering this show’s predilection for slightly on the nose joke-y names, I googled “Stoll” and was not disappointed: Vivian Stoll could be roughly translated to “life support.”
  • So… do zombie kids grow up? Or are they trapped as children forever? This is important.
  • “We’re trying to keep a secret here.”
  • “I don’t like thinking about that!”
  • David Anders should sing in every episode.
  • Aly Michalka has finally gotten promoted to series regular, which means we should be seeing a lot more of Peyton from here on out.
Into the Badlands, Television

Into the Badlands: “Red Sun, Silver Moon” is fascinating and frustrating

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After a great season opener and a solid episode last week, “Red Sun, Silver Moon” is something of a letdown. It’s not a bad episode, and there are a couple of excellent scenes, but the whole thing feels decidedly slow-paced. This is mostly due to a major event teased in episode two not happening this week at all. “Red Sun, Silver Moon” is a lot of exposition and set-up with a deeply frustrating ending. The exposition is interesting, but it’s not particularly exciting for a full hour when you’re waiting on something else to happen.

**Spoilers ahead.**

Sunny and Bajie are still crossing the Outlying Territories, where apparently “everything is barren and windswept,” when they arrive at a bridge where their way is being blocked by a new character. Before we get a proper introduction, a group of bounty hunters show up—down ask where they came from—to try and capture or kill Sunny for the price that’s been put on his head. It’s nice to get a good fight scene in before the opening credits, but this is the most interesting thing that happens to Sunny this week. The new character, Nathaniel Moon (Westworld’s Sherman Augustus), is cool—an ex-Clipper with even more kill tattoos than Sunny (999 to Sunny’s 404)—but his purpose in the story is fairly predictable, and he never feels like a credible threat. That’s he’s left alive and missing a hand as Sunny and Bajie move on (with Bajie taking Nathaniel’s sword), likely means that this isn’t the last we’ve seen of Nathaniel. I only hope that means better use will be made of him in the future.

Nathaniel Moon serves a couple of purposes in the episode and in Sunny’s overarching hero’s journey, a questing storyline that’s sometimes (like this week) a little too conventional for its own good. First, Nathaniel a barrier in Sunny’s path back to Veil, both literally and metaphorically. Like Odysseus, Sunny is finding himself side-tracked this season by other characters and events that demand his attention, and this week that’s Nathaniel Moon, who Sunny must physically best in order to move on to the next step of his journey. Secondarily, Nathaniel represents a version of Sunny himself, but a failed version with a fridged wife and son to function as a cautionary tale for Sunny, and in this sense Nathaniel exists to instill doubt in the hero. Nathaniel, grieving and broken and cynical as he is, is Sunny’s worst fear of what he could become if he doesn’t get back to Veil. The problem with this is that it is such an archetypal externalization of internal conflict that it’s not surprising or even particularly compelling. We even saw a similar, but more visually interesting, storyline play out with M.K. just last week, so it’s repetitive as well.

Speaking of M.K., this episode finds him still dissatisfied with his lack of progress at the Temple. The Master won’t let him back in the mirror room, advising him to stop fighting himself, which suggests that, whereas last week M.K. needed to conquer his darker side (and this week, Sunny needed to physically overcome a symbol of his own darkness and doubt), the Master’s ultimate goal for M.K. isn’t for the young man to beat his darker self into submission. Rather, M.K.’s goal should be a more holistic solution to his problems; he must reintegrate the fractured part of his personality in order to find wholeness and discover the answers to his questions about his past. M.K. doesn’t have the patience for this yet, though. Instead, kept awake by his anxious desire to be finished with the Temple, M.K. snoops around until he observes something frightening: the nomad boy, Tate, being tortured, which we find out from Ava is how the monks cleanse failed initiates of the gift. Instead of taking that information, heading back to bed and rededicating himself to his studies, M.K. asks Ava to leave the Temple with him.

At Quinn’s secret villain lair, which is still one of the coolest secret villain lairs I’ve seen in ages, Quinn is reading “Rumplestiltskin” to baby Henry when Veil tells him that it’s time for his x-ray. Perhaps unsurprisingly to the viewer, given his bizarre behavior, Quinn’s brain tumor is frighteningly large. We learn, however, that Veil has told him that the tumor is cured, although she’s still treating him with some kind of unusually blue potion that apparently just keeps his headaches under control. It’s an intriguing new shade of nuance added to the power dynamic between these two characters, and adds some nice depth to Veil, who can sometimes feel a little one-note. While last week it seemed as if she was primarily Quinn’s prisoner, here we see that if he’s guarding her very closely it’s because he’s actually extremely dependent upon her, both physically and—it seems—emotionally, though the show seems to have abandoned the idea from season one of Quinn having a sort of sexual obsession with Veil. Instead, we’re now getting something much weirder and more compelling. It’s going to be interesting to see which happens first—Quinn finding the real x-rays that Veil is just keeping in an unlocked drawer or Veil making her escape as its heavily implied she’s planning.

We first heard of Ryder calling for a conclave of barons last week, and I rather expected it to happen in this episode, but it doesn’t and it’s hugely anticlimactic. Instead of the conclave, we get a pre-conclave planning session with the Widow, Tilda and Waldo, which is at least a well-conceived and nicely acted scene, even if it is a huge disappointment to not see more forward movement in this storyline. The short story here is that the Widow isn’t taking her official Regent, Tilda, with her to the conclave; she’s taking Waldo, who has advantages of experience and knowledge that Tilda doesn’t. Tilda isn’t thrilled about this, but she’s mollified when her mother leaves her in charge, though the Widow’s “if I die, destroy the oil fields” feels worrisomely like foreshadowing, and I will burn some shit down if anything happens to her. The episode ends with the Widow and Waldo arriving at Ryder’s new mansion for the conclave, and things look bad. The place is absolutely crawling with clippers, the Widow and Waldo are unarmed, and Ryder and Jade look like murder is on their minds. Unfortunately, that’s it for this week, and now I have murder on my mind because that’s no way to end an episode.

Miscellaneous Thoughts:

  • I’m still slightly unclear on some things about the setting for this show. Like, I’m sure there are some rules for the worldbuilding, but I’m not at all certain what they are. That said, the monks’ secret science rooms are fascinating.
  • Sunny finally got a shave and a change of clothes, and holy shit Daniel Wu is a beautiful man.
  • I love Jade’s red eyeliner and dark red lip, but that dress is a little too matronly for a femme fatale look. Still, I’m digging the clash between her true red look and Ryder’s almost magenta suit. I have no idea how people in this kind of bonkers post-apocalypse are getting such great clothes, but the show’s costume designers do a great job of using costume to tell a story.
Blog News, Weekend Links

State of the Blog and Weekend Links: April 2, 2017

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I almost skipped this post this week because I’m worn out. My partner spent all week home sick, my kid was on spring break (and nothing is more tiresome than a “bored” teenager), the foot I broke almost two years ago has been swelling up and painful again (Thanks, changing seasons!), there’s a new WoW patch with new stuff to do, and I wrote quite a lot trying to wrap up some things from the last few months. I’m also trying to do some spring cleaning type things around the apartment, and I’m still trying to figure out how to make myself stick to some kind of reasonable food and exercise regimen for healthier living since I’m not getting any younger. And, honestly, I think I might be getting sick with whatever my partner had, which isn’t great since I’ve got tons of stuff I want to do this coming week.

I did accomplish some things this week, however. I hung up the hummingbird feeder I finally bought (though I haven’t seen any birds yet) and shopped around for some flowers for the balcony (though I haven’t found any I liked well enough to look at all spring and summer yet). I didn’t read much, but I wrote a decent amount, publishing a book review, two television episode reviews, a wrap-up post of my last three months’ reading and my Spring Reading List.

This coming week, in addition to Into the Badlands and The Expanse, I’ll also be reviewing the third season of iZombie, which comes back on Tuesday. You can catch up on my last two seasons of reviews here if you’re so inclined. There’s also a spiffy new trailer for the new season:

It’s the beginning of a new month, and that means Patreon rewards. If you aren’t supporting Kameron Hurley, you should be. $1 a month gets you a new short story. Catherynne M. Valente just joined Patreon as well, and she’s wonderful. $5 gets you recipes and essays and as much access as you could want to Valente’s general delightfulness since she’s a frequent updater. Finally, think about supporting Fireside Fiction on Patreon. For just $2, you can get an ebook version of all the fiction they publish each month, plus the satisfaction of keeping them around and publishing great stories.

There’s a new issue of Fiyah Literary Magazine available. This quarter’s theme is “Sipping Tea” and just look at that gorgeous cover art. It’s also got seven new stories for your reading pleasure as well as an excerpt from the YA fantasy novel, Coal by Constance Burris.

There’s a new Aimee Mann album, Mental Illness, and I can’t stop listening to it.

Aliette de Bodard’s sequel to her 2015 novel, The House of Shattered Wings, is out this Tuesday. This week, she promoted The House of Binding Thorns and talked about her myriad influences at the B&N Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog.

The Book Smuggler’s shared a Becky Chambers essay, “The Case for Optimism” from their third Quarterly Almanac.

Jezebel took the time to remind us that Beauty and the Beast is just one in a long line of stories about women hooking up with animals. The more you know.

New Doctor Who Companion Bill (Pearl Mackie) is gay. She’ll be the first full-time openly gay Companion in the show’s history. The new series starts on April 15, and I have to admit it looks good after a couple of lackluster years:

Nnedi Okorafor is interviewed in Issue 82 of Lightspeed.

The new Ann Leckie novel has a title, Provenance, realease date, October 3, and now a cover, as revealed at Book Riot on Monday. Though it’s obviously designed to be visually compatible with the Imperial Radch covers, I think this one is an altogether sharper look with the high contrast between the dark moon, the bright red of the ship, and the blue of the vaguely Star Trek-ish font of the title. I am excite.

The Guns Above by Robyn Bennis is one of the more interesting-looking debut novels coming out this spring, and her Q&A about the book at the Tor/Forge Blog is encouraging.

Fantasy Cafe posted the schedule for week one of their 6th (!) Annual Women in SF&F Month.

At nerds of a feather, flock together, their Dystopian Visions series continued with Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler, 12 Monkeys, and “Get Out/Speak Out: Dystopia, Violence, and Writing as Action.”

Also at nerds of a feather, 6 Books with Matt Wallace, whose Sin du Jour series of novellas should be on everyone’s reading list.

I’m currently reading Lilith Saintcrow’s short story-turned-novella, She-Wolf and Cub, published by Fireside Books on March 28. Saintcrow talked about the genesis and writing process of the book over at terribleminds. So far, I’m loving the book, but also look at this gorgeous cover art by Galen Dara:

Books

The SF Bluestocking Spring Reading List

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I try to keep my reading lists realistic, but the next couple of months have a frustratingly uneven distribution of books I’d like to read. For one thing, I’m usually only getting through two books or magazines a week, and there are several weeks coming up that have four to six new releases that I’m looking forward to. While having access to advance copies lets me get a head start on things, the truth is that there’s just (always, natch) far more great fiction being produced and published than I’m physically capable of reading and writing about. So this is really more of a wishlist of all the fiction coming out in April, May and June that I would read if I could.

Tor.com Publishing

I generally make an effort to read all of Tor.com’s novellas because they’re inexpensive and the variety encourages me to read things I might not normally give a chance to. I’ve also really fallen in love with the novella length; it’s long enough to feel like a book, but short enough to make for quick reading. Here’s what they’ve got coming out over the next three months.

  • Winter Tide by Ruthanna Emrys (4/4)
    This is actually a short novel, and I’m sadly thinking of skipping it in spite of having been sitting on an eARC of it for months. While it’s been well-reviewed, it’s yet another Lovecraftian book, and, frankly, I’m just Lovecraft-ed out right now.
  • Proof of Concept by Gwyneth Jones (4/11)
  • Buffalo Soldier by Maurice Broaddus (4/25)
    I’m still slowly making my way through Broaddus’s recent short story collection, Voices of Martyrs, but I’m really looking forward to this title.
  • All Systems Red by Martha Wells (5/2)
  • Killing Gravity by Corey J. White (5/9)
  • Greedy Pigs by Matt Wallace (5/16)
    On the one hand, I’m thrilled about a new Sin du Jour book. On the other hand, I’m already sad that there’s only two more coming after this one.
  • River of Teeth by Sarah Gailey (5/23)
    This book had me at “bloodthirsty feral hippos” and “mercenary cowboys.”
  • Lightning in the Blood by Marie Brennan (5/30)
    A sequel to last year’s Cold-Forged Flame.
  • Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire (6/13)
    A prequel companion to last year’s Every Heart a Doorway.
  • Mapping the Interior by Stephen Graham Jones (6/20)

Magazines

  • FIYAH Literary Magazine, Issue Two, Sipping Tea (4/1)
    I loved the first issue of FIYAH, and I have every expectation that their second issue will be excellent as well.
  • Uncanny Magazine #16 (May/June 2017)
  • Lightspeed Magazine #82, #83, #84
    My free three month subscription runs out in May, and I still haven’t gotten around to reading the March issue, just for time-constraint reasons. It’s a great magazine, and I’m hoping to get around to it, but there’s just so much else out there that I want to read.
  • Fireside Fiction
    I highly recommend supporting Fireside on Patreon so you, too, can get a convenient digital format of what they publish each month.

Comics and Graphic Novels

I had a couple of things on my winter reading list that would have been nice to read but that I never got around to. However, these are must-reads.

  • Ladycastle #2 (3/29)
  • Saga, Volume 7 (4/4)
  • Bitch Planet, Volume 2: President Bitch (5/31)
    The publication date on this has moved several times, so I may just end up grabbing the single issues.
  • Monstress, Volume 2: The Blood (6/6)

Books

  • She-Wolf and Cub by Lilith Saintcrow (3/28)
    My current read.
  • The House of Binding Thorns by Aliette de Bodard (4/4)
  • Red Sister by Mark Lawrence (4/4)
    I feel like Mark Lawrence’s work before now has been exactly the sort of thing I like to avoid, but this new series has a girl protagonist who has been compared to Arya Stark. That still puts it in the category of things I like to avoid, but Lawrence is a popular author and YOLO, so I’m thinking of trying this one out just in case I’m not going to hate it.
  • Spindle Fire by Lexa Hillyer (4/11)
  • So You Want to Be a Robot and Other Stories by A. Merc Rustad (May)
    I just discovered Rustad’s work last year, and they’ve quickly become one of my favorite short fiction writers, so I’m super excited for this release. You can pre-order it from Lethe Press now.
  • Final Girls by Seanan McGuire
  • A Tyranny of Queens by Foz Meadows (5/2)
  • A Court of Wings and Ruin by Sarah J. Maas (5/2)
  • Wicked Wonders by Ellen Klages (5/2)
    Klages’ Tor.com novella, Passing Strange, was wonderful, so I’m looking forward to checking out more of her short fiction.
  • The Radium Girls by Kate Moore (5/2)
    I don’t read nearly as much non-fiction as I ought or as I’d like, but I’m pretty excited about this book.
  • The Guns Above by Robyn Bennis (5/9)
  • Behind the Mask: A Superhero Anthology edited by Tricia Reeks and Kyle Richardson (5/16)
  • The Refrigerator Monologues by Catherynne M. Valente (6/6)
    I would read a phone book if Catherynne M. Valente wrote it.
  • Raven Strategem by Yoon Ha Lee (6/13)
    Sequel to last year’s excellent Ninefox Gambit.
  • The Changeling by Victor LaValle (6/13)
  • The Space Between the Stars by Anne Corlett (6/13)
  • The Prey of Gods by Nicky Drayden (6/13)
    One of my most anticipated debuts of the year.
  • The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter by Theodora Goss (6/20)
  • The Waking Land by Callie Bates (6/27)
  • Amatka by Karin Tidbeck (6/27)

Television, The Expanse

The Expanse: “Cascade” is an incisively thoughtful exploration of systems failures

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I suspect that “Cascade” may not end up being a fan favorite episode due to its lack of action and excitement, but it’s one of the best written episodes to date when it comes to thematic coherence and the emotional weight of its character arcs. It’s also an episode that gives us a much better look at the show’s imagined future of Earth, a deftly accomplished bit of revelatory exposition that gives us a fuller picture of the context in which the events of the show have happened. There’s not a ton of forward movement on the main plots this week, but the character work, exposition and set-up in “Cascade” seem sure to be invaluable as we move into the final three episodes of the season.

**Spoilers below.**

On Ganymede, the Rocinante crew split up to look for news of Mei and Dr. Strickland, Holden and Naomi going one direction while Amos and Prax go another. While their search makes up their plot and accounts for most of their actions in this episode, it’s secondary to the deeper story being told here, which is about the breakdown of communications and relationships between members of the crew, a system failure that is paralleled and emphasized by the cascading system failure—helpfully explained by Prax—that is currently taking place on Ganymede Station. Prax’s line, “The station’s dead already; they just don’t know it yet,” is positively foreboding, implying a time limit on the group’s activities on Ganymede (a feeling backed up by the social and governmental breakdowns we see on the station—the place is a powder keg) as well as suggesting that the damaged relationships between the Roci crew members may also be past a point of no return.

Against the backdrop of the dying station, Naomi and Holden, unquestionably the leaders (in an almost parent-like role) of the Rocinante crew, are still and increasingly at odds over the way things have been going, primarily because of Naomi’s growing discontent over the amount of violence and damage that they bring with them wherever they go. The tragedy on the Weeping Somnambulist has exacerbated the situation, and Naomi is not dealing well with Holden’s seeming indifference to the event. For his part, Holden feels guilty, but he’s rather desperately holding to the debatable belief that they did the right thing. Meanwhile, Amos seems to be becoming both increasingly unhinged and increasingly introspective, on a necessarily self-centered, inward-looking journey as he examines and tries to understand his own violent tendencies. Perhaps paradoxically, Amos’s disconnection from his friends only seems to leave him further unmoored and more prone to acts of extreme violence, though he’s so far still been able to be reined in before actually senselessly murdering anybody.

The good news for the Roci crew this week is that they manage to find a solid lead on the whereabouts of Mei and Dr. Strickland, though they still have no idea why Strickland took the girl in the first place and there’s plenty of reason to be apprehensive about what’s going on. Though Holden and Naomi haven’t found any evidence of protomolecule infection on Ganymede, it seems likely that the off-the-beaten path unsurveilled sections of the station where Strickland took Mei would be a perfect hiding place for some secret mad scientist stuff. The bad news is that Mars has ordered a no-fly zone around Ganymede, which will make it difficult, if not impossible, for Alex to retrieve them even if they are successful in rescuing Mei and discovering what Strickland is up to.

On Earth, the “peace conference” is wrapping up. Though Admiral Nguyen thinks that Bobbie has simply cracked from the trauma and stress of her experience on Ganymede, Avasarala still has some questions she hopes Bobbie can answer. Unfortunately, Bobbie is locked in her room until the Martian delegation is prepared to leave. While Bobbie is using every sharp metal implement she can find to break out of her room so she can see the ocean, an increasingly distraught-seeming Errinwright is going through the data from Bobbie’s armor, which evidently confirms to him that the events on Ganymede were connected to whatever Jules-Pierre Mao is up to. Apparently wracked with guilt and worry about the consequences, Errinwright finally goes to Avasarala and tells her everything he knows, giving her all the information he has on the protomolecule project. This Errinwright and Avasarala scene is great, if only because of the complexity and nuance of feeling both actors are able to convey with relatively few words. It’s not a long scene, but it’s something of a watershed moment, with Errinwright essentially throwing himself on Avasarala’s mercy. While Chrisjen’s not ready to tear up the existing government of Earth just yet by outing Errinwright for his illicit activities, it’ll be interesting to see just how it plays out in the coming weeks.

The showpiece and most deeply impactful part of “Cascade,” however, is Bobbie Draper’s journey through the streets of New York to see the ocean. Once she escapes from her room, Bobbie quickly realizes that she has no idea how to get to the ocean, and she’s disoriented and kept perpetually off balance by the bright sunlight and open spaces. She also finds that Earth isn’t very much like what she thought (or was taught) it was at all. As she roams the streets of New York near the UN, she finds not a decadent world of lazy, entitled people, but a dystopian hellscape where many people are barely subsisting on basic income, at least some healthcare needs aren’t being met, the environment has been significantly poisoned and opportunities for legitimate work are scarce. I imagine that this view of The Expanse’s Earth is no more completely representative of the state of the planet than a view inside the UN or of Holden’s parents’ farm, but it’s an important counterpoint to those more sanitized images that has been completely missing up until now. So far, Earth, largely due to Chrisjen’s self-assured and hyper-competent presence on screen, has been allowed to see like one area of the solar system that more-or-less had its shit together, but it’s revealed here—to Bobbie and the viewer—to be just another broken and possibly failing system. Bobbie’s emotional journey in this episode is one of the most compelling single-episode arcs of the show to date, and it marks Bobbie’s arrival, finally, as a primary protagonist that the viewer can truly empathize and identify with.

Miscellaneous Thoughts:

  • I loved the Alex scene on the Rocinante. It was a nice bit of levity in an otherwise serious (and at times quite dark) episode. However, it was slightly overlong, especially with that obnoxious music playing.
  • “Truth and fact aren’t the same thing” might be the best evidence yet that Martens is fucking evil.
  • I loved the small but significant detail of Bobbie using her Purple Heart to finish popping out that window. Nice symbolism, if a little on the nose.
  • I want more Cotyar scenes.
  • “Every shitty thing we do makes the next one that much easier.”
  • Chrisjen tells Bobbie that Mars was testing the protomolecule as a weapon, which seems somewhat supported by the no-fly zone around Ganymede, but I didn’t think Mars had any more official connection to Mao and the protomolecule than Earth did. Interesting.
  • “Fuck you, ma’am.”
Me too, Naomi. Me, too.
Book Reviews, Books

The SF Bluestocking Winter 2017 Reading List Wrap-Up

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Spring has already sprung here in Ohio, both technically and actually, judging from the amount of allergy trouble I’ve been having the last couple of weeks, and I’m working on getting together my reading list for the next three months (look for it this week!), but I thought first I’d take a look at what I’ve read in the first three months of 2017. Last year was such a terrible year for me that I ended up struggling a lot to write much about what I read, though I read quite a bit. The good news is that this year I’ve been off to a pretty strong start, getting through most of my Winter Reading List and even reading a couple of things that weren’t on there. I’ve even written about almost everything I’ve read, even if it was just a short blurb and a star rating on Goodreads, although I am still finishing up my last few reviews of titles from my winter list.

This post, however, is about celebrating the best and most exciting of what I’ve read in the last three months.

29939303Best Fantasy Novel – Crossroads of Canopy by Thoraiya Dyer

Crossroads of Canopy is a gorgeously imagined book about a young woman’s political awakening when she’s forced to question everything she knows about her society and herself. It’s set in a marvelously unique fantasy world in which people live in cities built in the tops of trees in an enormous rain forest, and it’s worth reading for the inventive worldbuilding alone, but it’s also got a wonderfully difficult and complex protagonist in Unar. Crossroads is a story about the roots of a revolution, and I cannot wait to see what happens next in Thoraiya Dyer’s Titan’s Forest series. While it’s not as thrillingly groundbreaking as, say, N.K. Jemisin’s The Fifth Season, Crossroads of Canopy is, for me, similar in the the sense that it’s exactly the sort of thing I think of when looking towards the future of the genre, especially as it broadens to include epic fantasy that isn’t set in some analogue or other of medieval Europe.

29939160Best Science Fiction Novel – The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi

This book was a complete surprise to me in every way. I’ve always rather intended to pick up something by John Scalzi, but I’ve never quite gotten around to it as I seldom read work by white men and have been mostly interested in new books, standalone titles, and debut authors in the last couple of years. Tons of people I know love Scalzi’s work, though, and since The Collapsing Empire is his newest book and the first in a series, it seemed like as good a time as any to check him out, especially when I got a surprise early copy in the mail from the publisher. It’s really good and hands down the most enjoyable thing I’ve read so far this year, smartly plotted and fast-paced, with lots of snappy dialogue and a great sense of humor. I couldn’t put it down.

33775885Best Magazine – FIYAH Literary Magazine, Issue 1, Rebirth

The first issue of FIYAH is excellent from its beautiful cover art to its collection of perfectly curated short fiction. With evidence mounting up that black readers and writers aren’t being served and included the way they should be in genre publishing, FIYAH is a uniquely valuable space for stories by, for and about black people. My favorite story in this issue was “Chesirah” by L.D. Lewis, but “The Shade Caller” by DaVaun Sanders and “Long Time Lurker, First Time Bomber” by Malon Edwards were also standouts. If I have any complaint about the magazine, it’s that I’d love to see more nonfiction content in it, but that’s purely a personal preference. Issue 2 will be out on April 1.

marapr17_issue15covermed-340x510Best Novella – “And Then There Were (N-One)” by Sarah Pinsker

I at least try to read all of Tor.com’s novellas as a matter of course, and they’re pretty prolific, so I would have expected one of those to be my favorite so far. However, the fine folks at Uncanny just published their first ever (short) novella in #15, and it’s wonderful. Sarah Pinsker’s story of a convention–SarahCon–for Sarah’s from thousands of alternate reality might be my favorite novella of the last several years, to be honest. It’s smart and funny and thoughtful in perfect proportions. It was enchanting from page one, and it’s a story and concept that has been often on my mind ever since I read it. “And Then There Were (N-One)” will be available to read for free online on April 4.

33964649Best Comic Book – Ladycastle #1 by Delilah S. Dawson and Ashley A. Woods

I only read one comic in the last three months, but it was a good one. Since the sad/infuriating circumstances that led to the indefinite hiatus of Rat Queens, I’ve had a definitively medieval-fantasy-comic-shaped hole in my life, and Ladycastle is the perfect thing to fill it with. The art is slightly more cartoonish than I usually prefer, but it grew on me as I fell in love with the story and characters. The only problem with it is that there isn’t more of it, and they seem to be working on a slow production schedule with a couple months between issues. I want it all now.

31216072Best Sin du Jour Novella – Idle Ingredients by Matt Wallace

Okay, so it’s the only Sin du Jour book published so far this year, but it’s awesome. And look at that cover! I always buy these as ebooks to save space, but the covers just keep getting better and better and I know I’m going to have to have them for my shelf. And this is why my dreams of getting rid of all my stuff and living some kind of minimalist backpacker lifestyle will always stay just dreams. Seriously, though you should be reading this series. They’re sharply written, laugh-out-loud funny, and have some of the best action scenes you’re going to find in print. This volume went a little heavier on character development, but in the last one a dude fought an evil Easter Bunny demon thing and it was rad.

31707853Best Non-SFF Thing I Read – Difficult Women by Roxane Gay

I’ll just quote from my own review of this title to explain why I loved it so much: “The stories in this volume are, from start to finish, thoughtful, clever, funny, tragic and hopeful in turn. These stories are a rage-filled paean to the strength and resilience and weakness and fragility and everything in between of women. This is an ugly, heart-wrenching, beautiful book, and if Roxane Gay wrote three hundred forty-four more stories like this I would treat them like a devotional and reread them every year for the rest of my life.” There are a couple of stories in this collection that are slightly SFF, but for the most part this collection is deeply rooted in the real world and real women’s experiences.

Honorable Mentions:

  • Borderline and Phantom Pains by Mishell Baker – I skipped the first book in this series last year, but I’m so glad I finally got around to reading it now.
  • Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty – A riveting locked-door mystery in space, with clones.
  • Brother’s Ruin by Emma Newman – I loved this first book in a new gaslamp fantasy series by the author of Planetfall. Probably my favorite thing I’ve read yet by Emma Newman.
  • Seven Surrenders by Ada Palmer – This makes me feel about sci-fi the way that Crossroads of Canopy and The Fifth Season make me feel about fantasy.
  • Tor.com’s “Nevertheless, She Persisted” Short Fiction Event – This is well worth reading, but it just didn’t fit into any of my other categories here.

Biggest Disappointments:

  • Windwitch by Susan Dennard – I liked Truthwitch quite a lot last year, but this book only magnified all the problems of worldbuilding and character that were only minor plagues on the first one.
  • Miranda and Caliban by Jacqueline Carey – I was hyped to finally read something by this author, but this book felt unnecessary and self-indulgent, without much to say for itself or about Shakespeare or The Tempest.
  • The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden – I wanted to like this much-buzzed-about book more than I did, but I had a hard time getting past the casual normalization of marital rape, the villainization of the rape victim, and the trivialization of her eventual sad fate.
Book Reviews, Books, Fantasy

Book Review: Borderline by Mishell Baker

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25692886I’m not a great reader of urban fantasy and I’ve been (sort of and unsuccessfully) avoiding new series, so I’d skipped Mishell Baker’s Borderline when it came out last year. I cannot tell you how glad I am that I finally read it. It’s a solid story that ticks off a lot of run-of-the-mill urban fantasy boxes while still being clever and original enough to be interesting. Baker takes a smartly naturalistic approach to describing the setting—I’m not a fan of L.A.-set stories in general, but she does a wonderful job of conveying a sort of warts-and-all love for the city without either romanticizing it or dwelling on ugliness. And Millie Roper is a fucking iconic protagonist with a strong and uniquely relatable (for me) narrative voice.

While I don’t read a ton of urban fantasy, I like it better when the fantastical element is fairies, as opposed to vampires or werewolves, and I especially like the way Baker imagines fairies in this series. The Arcadia Project is a more-or-less government-overseen system that manages the interactions between Earth and Arcadia, which is otherwise a largely straightforward fairyland filled with the usual fairy creatures, high and low fae, and copious magic. It turns out that humanity relies on magic—specifically the inspiration of fairy “Echoes” (think personal muses for artists and thinkers of all kinds)—for most great human endeavors, artistic and otherwise, and the Arcadia Project acts as a sort of ICE for fairies traveling to and from Arcadia. To help maintain the secrecy of the Project, its administrators recruit agents primarily from psychiatric hospitals, with the idea that those who see the world differently may be more open to and accepting of the work, but also with the knowledge that those who are marginalized due to documented mental illness are unlikely to be believed if they do tell others about the Project. Millie, who has borderline personality disorder and is still recovering from a suicide attempt that left her a double amputee, is a perfect candidate for the job.

Millie also has a background in film—she was going to film school at UCLA prior to her suicide attempt—and the film industry features largely in Borderline. Many of the secondary and tertiary characters are in some way involved in the industry, and much of the action takes place in a movie studio. It’s a very specific part of Los Angeles that I’ve seldom read about, mostly because I don’t find it particularly interesting, but Mishell Baker shows real skill in making the L.A. of the Arcadia Project feel real and lived-in. There’s a great sense of place and plenty of specific-feeling details so that even the places that are obviously invented for the book fit right in to the broader aesthetic. I wouldn’t quite say that it rises to the point of the city itself being a character, which is common in urban fantasy, but it’s a vividly immersive setting nonetheless.

It’s Millie herself, however, who truly elevates the book and makes it one of the best and most interesting urban fantasies I’ve read in years. While I’m not sure how much of my own struggles with mental illness (mostly depression and anxiety) overlap with Millie’s, there’s so much about her experience that feels familiar, and I expect that this will resonate deeply with many people who have had similar issues. Many, many people have written and talked about the value of representation in fiction, and all of that is fully applicable here. Millie will be a highly relatable protagonist for many, and for many more she’ll be a character that will, hopefully, help readers gain some new understanding of an experience that isn’t often depicted in genre fiction. Here, too, Mishell Baker takes a naturalistic approach, refusing to sugarcoat the reality of Millie’s mental and physical conditions, and both Millie’s borderline personality disorder and her double amputations have obvious impacts on her ability to function, and sometimes just exist, in the world. Millie’s troubled relationships and fraught interactions with nearly everyone she meets make for compelling drama and add another level of specificity to the story that sets it well apart from other work in a subgenre often plagued by over-reliance on tired tropes and cliché storytelling conventions.

I may have been late to the party on this series, but Mishell Baker is an author to watch, and I can’t wait to find out what Millie gets up to next. Borderline is a superb first novel and a great start to a freshly compelling new series.

Into the Badlands, Television

Into the Badlands: “Force of Eagles Claw” goes a little slow, but with an eye to the future

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After last week’s excellent season premiere, “Force of Eagle’s Claw” slows things down a little and switches point of view less often for longer scenes and some quieter character work. Even the fight scenes this week were for the most part less flashy and even more utilitarian to the plot. It’s a good change of pace and provides an even fuller picture of the current state of affairs in the Badlands than we got last week. There’s a certain amount of unevenness, if only because Sunny and Bajie are so much more fun to watch than everything else, but it’s a solid episode, overall, that sets up some compelling options for the future of the show.

**Spoilers ahead.**

After being sold out to the Engineer last week, Sunny finds himself being prepped to fight to the death with Mouse for the privilege of being the Engineer’s new champion. He tries to refuse, stating that he doesn’t kill for others anymore, but he’s not being given an option. Instead, Sunny’s shackled to the treacherous Bajie and tossed into what passes for a fighting ring. Rather than staying and fighting for the Engineer’s entertainment, Sunny and Bajie flee up some stairs towards freedom, but they still have to fight their way out in a fight sequence that gets as bloody as I think this show has ever gotten when they escape through a huge fan and toss Mouse back into it, where the unfortunate man is practically vaporized into red spray all over the Engineer and his henchmen. As a fan of comic levels of gore, I appreciated this scene.

Sunny and Bajie finally escape the mines, but not without a vow from the Engineer that he’s not letting them go so easily. Nonetheless, the rest of their journey in this episode is largely uneventful. They hike through a land of rather lovely rolling green hills that Bajie calls the Outlying Territories, which is almost suspiciously devoid of any signs of other human life but provides a gorgeous backdrop to Sunny and Bajie’s bickering. Daniel Wu and Nick Frost have a great chemistry together, and their characters are near-perfect foils for each other. Watching Bajie’s seedy charm bounce off Sunny’s taciturnity is consistently entertaining with plenty of sharply-written dialogue and a couple of nice surprises. It turns out that Sunny isn’t completely humorless, and we get further confirmation that Bajie has some useful skills. They end the episode on the wrong side of an enormous, ancient wall that runs the whole border between the Badlands and the Outlying Territories, but I expect both their skills will come in handy in the weeks to come.

After leading her Butterflies to kill a group of rapist Clippers last week, Tilda is due for a stern talking to from Waldo, who is apparently working directly for and with the Widow now. Waldo advises Tilda that part of the key to being a good regent (and to just staying alive) is being able to bottle up one’s feelings and follow orders. Tilda insists, however, that killing those rapists was the right thing to do, and I agree. Waldo’s advice to Tilda in this scene comes off as somewhat mansplain-y, and I don’t love the way he compares her to the absent Sunny, especially when even Waldo admits that Sunny wasn’t immune to emotion, either. It’s also worth pointing out that Waldo is somewhat hypocritical here, since he’s apparently been subtly undermining the whole system for years, which seems like a much bigger act of rebellion than Tilda executing some rapists.

Later, we come upon Tilda and the Widow practice sparring, which Waldo is interrupting to have a sort of strategy meeting with the Widow. Ryder has called for a conclave of all the Barons, where he’s going to complain that the Widow’s taking back of her oil rigs is unlawful. It’s a way to avoid an all-out war, apparently, but it’s also baldly cowardly, which seems like a semi-ballsy move for a guy who has managed to get himself installed as the Baron of multiple territories. The Widow is ready for war, but Waldo advises caution and diplomacy. This conversation as well had the potential to come off as mansplaining on Waldo’s part, but I think it worked better than the previous talk between him and Tilda. The Widow is a mature woman, and Emily Beecham imbues her with a sort of ambitious, very physical energy that prevents her from ever seeming subservient. Whereas Tilda may look up to Waldo as a mentor, the Widow keeps him as an advisor and their interactions—even when they don’t entirely agree—have a strong sense of collaboration and equal footing.

Ex-Baroness Lydia ended last season by returning to her father’s religious commune, and we see her in this episode seeming to have settled back in nicely. At any rate, she’s officiating a marriage ceremony and looks as happy and content as we’ve ever seen her, though the rebuke she receives after thanking the community for accepting her back suggests that she isn’t quite as accepted as she thought. When a couple of Nomads arrive and disrupt the wedding, killing the groom and several more men before making to steal and rape the bride and other women, it’s Lydia who leaps into action to protect the group. This fight scene, brutal and harrowing as it is with the threats of rape, is probably my favorite of the season so far as it shows us a side of Lydia that we haven’t seen before and reveals just how much she’s been changed by her time away from her father and these people.

Unfortunately, Lydia’s reunion with her son Ryder later in the episode isn’t as successful a scene. It works well enough as a continuation of Lydia’s themes from earlier and to further highlight Lydia’s change in status since last season, but the revelation that Quinn was responsible for protecting Lydia’s father and his flock isn’t particularly surprising or interesting, and neither is the family drama between Ryder and his estranged mother. Judging from how much Ryder seemed to rely on Jade for leadership last week, it’s hard to disagree with Lydia’s assessment of her son’s abilities as a Baron, and if she was just planning to reiterate that hurtful truth I’m not sure what she hoped to gain by visiting her son at all. I feel like, ultimately, the real conflict here is still between Lydia and Jade, but we don’t see Jade in this episode at all, which is a shame. I can think of several ways that Jade’s presence, either to interact with Lydia or just to interact with Ryder about Lydia, could have improved this storyline.

At the temple, M.K. continues to train with the Master, who takes him to a room full of mirrors and tells him that there are many versions of himself living inside him and that it’s one of them that is blocking his progress. In order to move forward, M.K. must defeat this other self, which also turns out to mean that he must come to terms with a significant event in his past. It’s pretty straightforward, with some expected callbacks to Luke Skywalker’s similar journey in Star Wars, but things aren’t made so easy for M.K. While his showdown with Dark M.K. is the most visually striking fight scene of the episode, M.K. is ultimately unsuccessful in defeating his darker impulses and must be pulled out of the vision (or whatever it is) by the Master. I don’t expect this storyline to be narratively groundbreaking stuff, but it’s nice to see M.K. being allowed to face real obstacles in his path to enlightened heroism.

The final thread of this week’s story confirms that Quinn is, indeed, alive and not some kind of awful hallucination of Veil’s, and this is where things get weird. Apparently, after what looked like a fatal ass-kicking from Sunny, Quinn was found by Veil as she was leaving town. Instead of leaving him to die like she probably ought to have, she rescued him and doctored him up until he could turn right around and keep her a prisoner in his very creepy (kudos to the set designer and props department) underground lair. Quinn still has several dozen clippers who have remained loyal to him in his current exile, and he’s styled himself as something of a religious leader, blaming his previous failures and current problems on his lack of faith and failure to observe old rites. To avoid such failure in the future, Quinn has become newly dedicated to religion and is baptizing Veil’s baby, Henry, in blood. It’s strange and gross and melodramatic and Marton Csokas is really living it up as Quinn. I have no idea where this is going, but it’s fun as heck to watch.

Miscellaneous Thoughts:

  • Is it weird that I think Nick Frost is moderately sexy, even covered in dirt and wearing those awful overalls?
  • M.K.’s roommate has run away, which seems significant. I smell a future nemesis in the making.
  • So, is Lydia going to end up with the Widow or will she somehow reconnect with Quinn? Or is she going to do something else entirely, since she has tons of information and expertise about things? She pointed out that most of Ryder’s cogs worship the same gods as she does, and that feels like foreshadowing.