Reading Wednesday

 Just finished: A Hero Of Our Time by Naben Ruthnum. Look, I loved this so much that I got my writing collective to reach out to the author for an interview. Because it needs more love. I haven't seen anyone raving about it, which amounts to a war crime. It's a blistering satire of race relations, edu tech, and neoliberal academia, and I related too hard. It's one of those novels where everyone is terrible and everything hurts, and yet it was a very cathartic read for me in terms of the way progressive language gets manipulated to screw over workers, privatize, and automate education. I get the impression that it was started pre-pandemic, but when covid happens towards the end, it's inevitable and prescient. Anyway, read it so I have someone else to scream about this with.

Currently reading: A Snake Falls To Earth by Darcie Little Badger. Continues to be really good! The plot is gentle and meandering, in stark contrast with practically everything else I read, but the characters are vividly drawn and the writing is lovely and luminous.

The Past is Red by Catherynne M. Valente. I love everything this author writes so it's unsurprising that this is great so far. Tetley is the most hated girl in Garbagetown, a floating city on a flooded world filled with the detritus and folly of a fallen civilization that its residents call the Fuckwits. Years ago, she revealed the truth behind a false hope of dry land, and she's been punished for it ever since. Her exuberant, manic narration brings the inherent bleakness of the setting to life and weaves a thread of black humour throughout Tetley's wanderings.