Asha > Recent Status Updates

sometimes I find that queer media can skew after school special - because this is a period piece, the need to label everything isn’t there. Which makes the lowkey romance work really well for me. (I know label based identity can be super important to people but I haven’t got my shit figured out like that and so a story that isn’t trying to figure things out Like That is really working for me.

Can Lit but make it queer. Rural family. Untranslated French. The spectre of war. It opens with a child dying. There’s a hint of maybe something supernatural going on. We will see.

The first book was so bad. This one is much better. It still falls a bit into “if you weren’t fucking, what would you be doing” but makes that a plot point that the characters have to work through. It’s a little heavy handed but definitely fun.

Continuing on my AI dive. This one is a lot more like a biography so far of both the company and Sam Altman. I’m meh on it but not quite ready to DNF it. I’m more interested in the tech and the social implications than the shitty people building it.

Initial thought was as that the voice of the narrator was too present but I’m warming up to it as the story gets moving. The comedic tone is working for me as I get into it.

Ok the endgame as shit gets really bad?? Very fun.

All these people suck. It’s definitely intentional. I’d like a little more horror and a little less catty family drama but I have this idea rattling in my head where I need to write political/family intrigue so- I’m treating it as a case study.

I am intrigued. The promise of deals with a demon in high corporate governance is intriguing. I don’t like the main character yet but I’m curious where her arc will go. Is she going to get better or worse?

This is a horror novel specifically written to target every ick I’ve got. I cannot look away but everything about it is so awful.

I wonder how this would read if I was younger. I am taking so much psychic damage from the 15 year old logic chains. Again, very intentional. This book is very intentional. But it is upsetting. Give this kid a break. Give them all a break. (Again, that’s the point, the author is evoking the emotion in me).

This one is odd. It’s at turns horrifying and then it’s lololololol teenagers in 1970 hehe and then the next scene is about medical abuse and then it shifts again and it’s making fun of 1970s cooking and then it’s a campy exorcist vomit scene. I think that’s intentional. Like it’s doing the tone mashing on purpose but it’s weird to read.

The thesis of this part of book is basically: you can’t plaster an LLM on a cracked system like a bandaid. If you want to fix peer review or journalism or gaps in health care and education, you have to start at fixing the cracked systems. Chatbots can’t fix this shit.

Crying again.

The book runs much closer to my personal opinions on AI and is cited with more history and real world examples than the Khan Academy book so it’s more for me to read. We will see how I feel as I get deeper into the actual arguments

He’s talking about launch preparations and his whole utopian dream of a tutor for every student. It costs 35$/year per student. That’s a pretty substantial investment for a school district. It’s definitely not closing any achievement gap.

I’m down an AI rabbit hole. It’s interesting to read something from some guy in the middle of the tech bros. “When I had lunch with Bill Gates….” Because he’s building a myth and has that “tech utopia” flavor. I’m far enough in to e willing to hear him out but I’m still quite suspicious of AI especially in education.

I have this on audo and I can't listen to it outside of my house because I end up tearing up over academic decathalon.

As someone who has never read Dickens - I had this image in my head of it is inaccessible and old and maybe a bit stuff. But it is actually very immediate and human and .... not current exactly but like there's a sense of knowing people like that. And Esther's pov where she refuses to see the bad in anyone makes the way it shines through clearer.

This is going to take me months because it is above my reading level and I find it is much easier to follow when I read aloud. But. I am really enjoying it. The dense stacks of metaphors. The dripping contempt for lawyers and law clerks. The way it swaps voices very clearly between Esther and the narrator. I didn't expect to like it but I am invested.

This book is weird. Initial response - intense curiosity and it's funny. Second response (around 15%) - this thing is an allegory for mental illness and corporate Korea.... and I don't know how I feel about that. BUT. I am still very very hooked and keep on going.

Ehhhhh. This might be a pass. I am not keen on these people at all. The rich and powerful with magic powers is a genre of character I can be swayed to only under very specific circumstances. I will give this another chapter or two but all of the character introductions made me go "ew" so it's probably going to get dropped.

This book is so direct that it sometimes veers beyond the fairy tale vibe and straight into set help book. That said, I am enjoying it a lot. It’s very sweet.

I picked this up in a bookshop and was put off by the present tense pov but then thought about it for next week. I’m really glad I gave it a try. The “I dunno because” approach to explaining the corporatization of dreaming is my favorite kind of world building. I have gotten teary so far.

I’ve been working through this one slowly because it is high fantasy and it is densely packed with names and places. After about an hour of listening the names start to blur. But I am committed to the main cast. I love Kai and Zeide so much.

Is the undiagnosed unevenly masking autistic vibes an intentional piece of how this character was written or am I just projecting HARD?

I am attached to all these people.