JDN 2456678 EDT 22:41.

Neptune’s Brood by Charles Stross is an interesting book. It’s oddly compelling, but for reasons I can’t quite articulate. The world he builds is so odd and perverse—and yet as far as I can tell, absolutely nothing in it violates any known laws of nature. It is one of the hardest pieces of science fiction I have ever read, and yet it literally involves a mermaid being hunted by pirates as she searched for ancient treasure beneath the sea. (It makes sense in context… sort...