What I’ve Read:

Tender is the Flesh -Agustina Bazterrica
This book is a very detailed story of a man who works in a meat factory for industrialized cannibalism. It’s not shy or a surprise – it’s a story very much about what deciding to eat people has done to this man and his society, in minute and careful detail. The flesh is tender because society has decided to raise human beings for meat, and he works in a slaughterhouse. It’s absolutely as graphic as any PETA ad, but with the significant addition of being much more grounded. The story is absolutely brutal and told from a third person perspective very focused on the main character as he moves thru this world where everyone has made their peace with the fact that they are using real human beings for food.

This is not a redemption story – this reality slowly destroys the soul. And the character’s perspective is a great element because you watch this character’s disgust and dis-ease in all of these situations where this way this violence against other people has been legitimized – I swear one character in this book is just Dracula with the serial numbers filed off – and you think, from his internal narration, that you’re in the mind of someone who will *do* something, who will push back, and the whole book makes so clear that it is so impossible to stop this. There is no way out. It is DEEPLY upsetting and extremely well done. A skillful book making a really good point in the most upsetting way possible.  I am glad it was as short as it was. 


We Have Always Lived in the Castle – Shirley Jackson – A great novel, I am glad I read it. I would say this book has an ‘untwist’ in that, yes, information is revealed to the reader that might well be a surprise, but it doesn’t actually change how the story or characters are going to act. In some ways, it feels like a wish fulfillment in comparison Jackson’s stories. In the one I have been reading, often, a character with an anxious disposition is maneuvered into an uncomfortable and unjust position and must quietly endure unkindness from people with more social power. In this book, the bully from those stories thinks that he has the upperhand – and oh sweet goodness, is he out of his league! Pleasure to read.

What I’m Reading:
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York– Robert Caro – like 7% - I jumped on the 99% Invisible bandwagon where they are “Breaking Down the Power Broker” by reading Robert Caro’s book slowly over the course of a year. It’s really well written and the interview with the author for the first episode was a pleasure.

Reading schedule -
Episode 1 — January 19 — Introduction through Chapter 5
Episode 2 — February 16 — Chapters 6 through 10
Episode 3 — March 15 — Chapters 11 through 15
Episode 4 — April 19 — Chapters 16 through 20
Episode 5 — May 17 — Chapters 21 through 24
Episode 6 — June 21 — Chapters 25 through 26
Episode 7 — July 19 — Chapters 27 through 32
Episode 8 — August 16 — Chapters 33 through 34
Episode 9 — September 20 — Chapters 35 through 38
Episode 10 — October 18 — Chapters 39 through 41
Episode 11 — November 15 — Chapters 42 through 46
Episode 12 — December 20 — Chapters 47 through 50

Sabriel – Garth Nix – 27% - Necromancer book club – really good book to re-read, enjoying the technical skill that Nix brings to the book quite a lot.

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation Vol 3 – 35% God, this part is a bit brutal. The books leaves out a lot of the details about the attack on Lotus Pier that end up getting a fuller treatment in The Untamed, so I have some images in my head about how to handle this. I feel a bit torn about Madame Yu - the narrative is so clearly taking a social position of, 'This woman is bad because she is aggressive and won't be secondary to her husband and resents her lack of power in this patriarchal situation' so I am deeply annoyed that Madam Yu doesn't get much respect from the narrative. But those traits of frustration at her own powerlessness do turn out to mean that she is deeply cruel to a child in her care. It's a very Catelyn Stark situation. 

The Game of Kings – Dorothy Dunnett – Dense – recommended by the Be the Serpent kids. I started this and I am honestly not sure I am going to continue because this is one of those dense reads that, I think, would be really fun to read with the Dunnett Companion, and I don't know I have the spare brain right now to wallow in it. 

It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections in Horror - Joe Vallese (Editor) – SPN Seminar – 38% -On hold during Oscars season 

The Lottery and Other Stories by Shirley Jackson – 41%

What I’ll Read Next:

When Women Were Dragons - Xing Book Club
Lord of The Rings – in keeping with my vague sense that I should actually read the big books that everyone talks about!

Owned and need to read: Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology, California Bones, Raven Song by IA Ashcroft, At The Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard, Tamryn Eradani's Enchanting Encounters Books 2 and 3, Tom Stoppard, Invention of love, "You Just Need to Lose Weight" and Other Myths about Fatness by Aubrey Gordon