Then and Now #28 (15/8/22 - 21/8/22)

Happy Sunday! The Sunday Post is a blog news meme hosted @ Caffeinated Reviewer. See rules here: Sunday Post Meme. Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week.  It is hosted weekly over at Mailbox Monday and every Friday they do a round-up of some of their favourite, shared reads!

Last Week

As I've probably moaned about it regularly the past few weeks, y'all
are aware I'm planning my move to Germany to start my PhD. I'm still super excited, especially now that this week I once again met my supervisor, saw my office, and had a little tour around the city. It's going to be amazing, but also probably quite exhausting at the beginning as I get used to teaching in German etc. I also had a paper for a conference in Norway accepted so that's super exciting... now I just need to write the paper xD But the best news, which I got yesterday, is that I found an apartment to rent! It's been a nightmare trying to find something in the city, cause it's not very large and therefore doesn't have a whole lot of space. But through my godmother I found a nice place in the village right next to it, just a 20 min. bus-ride, so I've got somewhere to arrive and feel at home for a bit, and then I can conitnue the search while already there, which should make it a bit easier. But that means (almost) everything is ready and now I can just focus on saying goodbye to friends at home and getting myself and the cat ready to move!

I've spent over 30 hours on trains in the past week or so, so I've had a lot of time to read and listen to audiobooks and all that jazz, so it's been a productive week in that sense. But it doesn't entirely reflect on the blog, unfortunately. Maybe once I start working again I'll have a more set schedule and then I will be a little more productive here as well. Fingers crossed! And also fingers crossed for some rain, it's been so hot and sweltering and it just isn't letting up, which is the worst. 

Posted on the blog:

• Review: House of a Thousand Lies by Cody Luke Davis
• Reading Round-up: Hauntings, Dune, and Russian Nihilism
• Friday Friyay: Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights by Salman Rushdie

Recommendations

I'm hardly new on this, but please do watch The Sandman on Netflix! It's just so good, and so beautifully done, and they just released an extra episode telling both the 'A Dream of a Thousand Cats' and 'Calliope' stories from the Sandman comics, which are both stunning and such important stories. So treat yourself!

Mailbox Monday

Y/N: A Novel by Esther Yi (Astra Publishing; 2/28/2023)

Surreal, hilarious, and shrewdly poignant—a novel about a Korean American woman living in Berlin whose obsession with a K-pop idol sends her to Seoul on a journey of literary self-destruction.

It’s as if her life only began once Moon appeared in it. The desultory copywriting work, the boyfriend, and the want of anything not-Moon quickly fall away when she beholds the idol in concert, where Moon dances as if his movements are creating their own gravitational field; on live streams, as fans from around the world comment in dozens of languages; even on skincare products endorsed by the wildly popular Korean boy band, of which Moon is the youngest, most luminous member. Seized by ineffable desire, our unnamed narrator begins writing Y/N fanfic—in which you, the reader, insert [Your/Name] and play out an intimate relationship with the unattainable star.

Then Moon suddenly retires, vanishing from the public eye. She stumbles into total disorientation. As Y/N flies from Berlin to Seoul to be with Moon, our narrator, too, journeys in search of the object of her love. In Korea, an escalating series of mistranslations and misidentifications land her at the headquarters of the Kafkaesque entertainment company that manages the boyband until, at a secret location, together with Moon at last, art and real life approach their final convergence.

From a conspicuous new talent comes Y/N, a provocative literary debut about the universal longing for transcendence and the tragic struggle to assert one’s singular story amidst the amnesiac effects of globalization. Crackling with the intellectual sensitivity of Elif Batuman and the sinewy absurdism of Thomas Pynchon, Esther Yi’s prose unsettles the boundary between high and mass art, exploding our expectations of a novel about “identity” and offering in its place a sui generis picture of the loneliness that afflicts modern life.

As someone who enjoys dabbling in fanfiction, this book is definitely written for me! I can't wait to see where Esther Yi takes this because that fine line between interest and obsession seems veeerrryyy fraught from this blurb. Also, that cover is so striking and eye-catching!

Unquiet Spirits: Essays by Asian Women-in-Horror ed. by Lee Murray and Angela Yuriko Smith (Black Spot Books; 2/14/2023)

From hungry ghosts, vampiric babies, and shapeshifting fox spirits to the avenging White Lady of urban legend, for generations, Asian women’s roles have been shaped and defined through myth and story. In Unquiet Spirits, Asian writers of horror reflect on the impact of superstition, spirits, and the supernatural in this unique collection of 21 personal essays exploring themes of otherness, identity, expectation, duty, and loss, and leading, ultimately, to understanding and empowerment.

Unquiet Spirits is edited by multi-Bram Stoker Award®-winning author Lee Murray and Stoker®-winner Angela Yuriko Smith and includes a foreword by Stoker®-winner Lisa Kröger. This is the third in Murray and Smith’s series on Asian women-in-horror, which also includes the poetry collection TORTURED WILLOWS (2021) and the fiction short story collection, BLACK CRANES (2020), both of which have previously won the Bram Stoker Award®.

I love horror, it's such a fascinating genre because, when done well (which is a big caveat) it is such a good and constructive way to confront the things that scare you, to kind of construct new coping mechanisms for deep-set fears. So I'm very intrigued to see how the approach to horror in Asia may differ from the "Western" perspective, but also how it differs between Asian countries, since the cultures there are so varied!

To Each This World by Julie E. Czerneda (Astra Publishing House; 11/15/2022)

From an Aurora Award-winning author, a new sci-fi novel follows three intrepid humans caught up in a conflict that stretches across time and space.

Biologist Julie E. Czerneda's new standalone science fiction novel, To Each This World follows a desperate mission to reconnect with long lost sleeper ships, sent centuries earlier from Earth to settle distant worlds.
 
A trio of Humans must work with their mysterious alien allies to rescue any descendants they can find on those worlds. Something is out there, determined to claim the cosmos for itself, and only on Earth will Humans be safe.
 
Or will they?
 
The challenge isn’t just to communicate with your own kind after generations have passed. It’s to understand what isn’t your kind at all.
 
And how far will trust take you, when the truth depends on what you are?

Love me some sci-fi, love me a book that questions humanity! This feels like a novel that could be quite complex, but then I've had some great experiences with sci-fi that questions family, time, humanity, generational trauma, and ideas of the future. (I'm thinking specifically about Skyward Inn by Aliya Whiteley and The Actual Star by Monica Byrne!) I hope this novel will fall into the same category as those!

The Fish by Joanne Stubbs (Fairlight Books; 10/6/2022)

'There is a fish on the sand; I see it clearly. But it is not on its side, lying still. It is partly upright. It moves. I can see its gills, off the ground and wide open. It looks as though it’s standing up.'

A few decades into the twenty-first century, in their permanently flooded garden in Cornwall, Cathy and her wife Ephie give up on their vegetable patch and plant a paddy field instead. Thousands of miles away, expat Margaret is struggling to adjust to life in Kuala Lumpur, now a coastal city. In New Zealand, two teenagers marvel at the extreme storms hitting their island.

But they are not the only ones adapting to the changing climate. The starfish on Cathy’s kitchen window are just the start. As more and more sea creatures begin to leave the oceans and invade the land, the new normal becomes increasingly hard to accept.

This book just sounded so odd and yet, this is exactly how humans came about because at some point fish did get onto the sand and, you know, eventually involved into us... so... I can't wait to see where Joanne Stubbs takes this and how she intertwines the different storylines. 

So that's it from me this week! Hopefully the next few weeks will be a little calmer and full of meet-ups and happy see-you-laters! How was your week? And what's new in your Mailbox?