Katee > Recent Status Updates

This 600-page hardcover feels weirdly precious and heavy in my hands. There’s something about a collected works that feels raw, uncurated; it feels like I’m holding her ashes. I see that she liked Shirley Jackson — if I weren’t already eager to get to know the legendary Parker, that praise alone would have convinced me.

In purging cookbooks that my mom left behind in 2001, I realized that this wasn’t so much a cookbook as a contrived style guide for people who want to playact living in some old timey blend of countrysides. Should be fun!

The claims made in chapter 1 about attention and media landscapes are supported by sources from the late 1990s. This kind of book has only become more important since its last update, but its outdated commentary (the Internet and demagogue politics, for example, are glaringly absent) makes it a little harder to connect with.

The way I feel when I read the economics passages in this book must be how other people feel when they read physics

Lol I can't believe the beginning of this book is set in January of 2025, wild timing

In both Wicked and Earthsea, almost none of the characters we meet are particularly likeable. Unlikeability isn't necessarily a flaw, and I don't mind it at all in Earthsea, but I mind it a lot in Wicked. I think it's because it serves a purpose in Earthsea (teaching Ged lessons, worldbuilding) and thus far I don't see the point of it in Wicked.

I seem to be determined to kill myself this year by obsessively picking apart fantasy books from my past that I know are bad. I watched this musical-movie (bleh, so Broadway) and can't get the question "What would the best version of this story be?" out of my head. Don't want to slog through 500 pages of Maguire, and I have knitting to do, so Audible ho! Lol why am I doing this

I don’t know why it’s so hard for me to stick with this book. The writing is excellent, the science is detailed and insightful, the photos are cool . . . Too many names and too much science/math politics, maybe.

I've never known any other writer who can capture the fear of people and of the world the way Shirley Jackson does. She gets it. She's incredible.

You can't really get through a Nasuada scene without reference being made to her dark skin. People are even fashioning honorific titles around it and making puns. She seems pretty chill with it, which doesn't really sit right to me -- if people are constantly commenting on a superficial trait you have, wouldn't that annoy you or wear on you? Particularly when people focus on it over your leadership abilities? . . .

The minute Eragon returns to the real world from training, he's so full of his own Riderness ("I knew because I'm a Rider", snatching midair arrows, winning undying loyalty, bigdogging sorcerers on their magic grammar). Sometimes the author will intentionally give Eragon little flaws, but I don't think any of these were meant to be flaws. I think they were meant to add coolness. In reality, they add douchebaggery.

There isn’t enough white space in this book to keep track of all the people and acronyms!

I keep forgetting that one of Holly Black's biggest weaknesses is her constant violation of "show, don't tell". The sibling relationship infodump in the very beginning of the first chapter is a stark reminder. The fact that it's a sequel is no excuse!

Probably I’d be enjoying this more if I was into the history of human exploration, which I’m not. Peeved that the lone female lead character is defined, first, by her romantic past with the first protagonist/overall physical appeal/cruelty in love, and second as an accomplished mountain guide.

I've read the eight-page preface and two pages of this book, very, very closely, and taken notes. As somebody with a science background and a brain, I can already say with complete confidence that this book is replete with completely unsupported arguments meant to sell readers on *his personal* plan for Martian colonization. He is a con man, peddling fantasies to the incautious reader.

I’ve only read the first five stories (Richardson, Bowles, Nabokov, Borges, Vance) and every one has been rich with personality, atmosphere, and style. Each has made me want to pause to absorb it before moving on. Amazing.

Not sure if my pirated digital copy is a fan translation or not, but it's not a great translation -- missing articles, run-on sentences and clunky sentence flow.

To take a crumbling marriage and turn it into a horror story like this is actual art.

This prose is so purple. All of the “horrific” plot points are broadcast in advance, so their reveals fall flat even though Barker works hard to inflate them with that boring, melodramatic prose. Does not build compelling worlds or convincing scenarios (you ask “why” enough of the plots and the answer winds up being something like “just because”).

I sympathize so hard with Ann’s objection to terraforming holy heck what a cool world

Based on the way the female protagonist here is portrayed (first-person perspective) and the fact that women almost never appeared in The Martian without some sort of sexual or gendered commentary associated with them, I’m starting to suspect that Andy Weir has never had a genuine conversation with a woman in his entire life.

The Turn of the Screw holy geez damn wow

“List your ten favorite novels, and, in great detail, outline their plots, then renew your acquaintance with these to find out how you have scarred, beautified, or mutilated those incredible books.”

Reading this book seems guaranteed to piss off Our Fearless Leader, so read it I shall! Interested to see how well-stocked it will be at my various airport stops between Maine and South Korea. . . .

“You’re going to walk into that judging room and take a deep breath and say to yourself, ‘I am scared but I’m going to do this anyway.’ Wizards do this every day.” God I love Nita

Asimov's strength: brilliant feat of logic and strategic thought
Asimov's weakness: almost every scene is an office meeting

"Fear kills everything," Mo had once told her. "Your mind, your heart, your imagination."