@GreyShuck
@beehaw.orghttp://www.fellowshipofisis.com/junocovella.html
I'm enjoying this AMC show so far - and would say it is the best SF airing currently - that I am aware of.
I have not read the books but my SO has read the first of them and is also enjoying it. She can't recall a great many details from the book though - her memory doesn't work that way.
One tiny point that I am curious about - a detail that my SO doesn't remember - is whether the characters who have seen the Pez dispenser actually recognise duck as a duck? Do they know what ducks - or birds in general - are?
From episode 1, IIRC, it seems to be suggested that they did not understand what the things flying in the sky in the outside world were.
Anyway - what are your thoughts on Silo?
With the aim of stimulating discussion if there is anyone here...
With the solstice approaching, does anyone have any plans to celebrate?
I have very recently moved and although we now have a sizable garden surrounded by woodland and eminently suited to outdoor celebrations etc, anything that we are going to do this time will be pretty low-key - since we are still unpacking and generally recovering. We will have a fire of some kind - either outdoors or in the hearth that we now have indoors - I'm going to watch the sunrise and maybe we will plant the first thing in our garden: there is a pot of meadowsweet waiting.
Recently, I had The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher (the adult fiction pen-name of Ursula Vernon) recommended to me. It is inspired by, and is a approximate sequel to, Algernon Blackwood's The Willows.
The Willows - as with several other Blackwood tales - is clearly playing around with the original concept of 'panic' - the oppressive terror that you can experience in truly wild places, which was, according to the ancient Greeks, inspired by Pan. As such these tales are only a step or so distant from Lovecraft's cosmic horror - which embody the utter indifference of the universe.
Kingfisher's tales (I am now half-way through my second: The Twisted Ones) feature very engaging, very human protagonists and typically intersperse the horrific with cosy, mundane interludes and so have a very different tone to Blackwood (or Lovecraft), but do make for easy and enjoyable reading: still with some memorable imagery and concepts, but never really soul-raking stuff.
Has anyone else read any of her works? What do you think of them?
In my case it was very nearly a year ago. A contemporary opera, which I had my doubts about - having only seen one about 30 years back and finding it immensely dull (I should have twigged since they were handing out free tickets: the only reason I went. However this one was actually pretty good: Violet by Tom Could and Alice Birch - a metaphor on climate change with a great concept and some memorable performances.
It was part of a festival, and I also saw a couple of comedy shows in the fringe, both needing a deal of work before they would be going much further.
I was surprised to realise how long back these were. There was a time when I would expect to get to some type of stage performance at least every few months or so. However, I live in a fairly rural situation now, and it doesn't happen so often.
How about you?