Ecce Signum

Brief update this week. I am tired and burned out, and need to focus my attention elsewhere.

The only new pages to arrive in the past week belonged to the latest issue of The Rain Taxi Review of Books, which never fails to be interesting and full of compelling titles. I considered cancelling this subscription as part of the Great Expenses Purge of 2021, but as it is only $24.00 a year, and the magazine takes up less than a quarter inch of shelf space, it easily made the cut.

In reading news I am about 200 pages into S.A. Chakraborty’s The Kingdom of Copper, and it is really good! I read the first book in the series, The City of Brass, well over a year ago, and I now regret not immediately diving into Kingdom.

I am also somewhat over 100 pages into A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders. So far he has gone through Chekhov’s “In the Cart” and Turgenev’s “The Singers”. We have just started Chekhov’s “The Darling”. I don’t think I have read any of these stories previously. Saunders is brilliant at showing how the stories are constructed without resorting to jargon to deconstruct the text. Though ostensibly aimed at undergrad or graduate level readers, these essays/teachings/contemplations are accessible and well worth the read.

In writing news, still not a lot to report, though I do have some more notes jotted down. I doubt I will find a useful intersection of time and energy for creative pursuits before the first of November.

This is my last post of the year wherein the days are longer than the nights. In just three days Autumn will arrive, and with it the slow slide into the winter months. Though if the outside temperature of the past month is any indication, we may well still be able to visit the beach well into December.

Three new volumes arrived in the Library of Winkelman Abbey in the past week.

On the left is the new anthology from the Calico imprint of Two Lines Press, Cuíer: Queer Brazil.

In the middle is the latest from And Other Stories, Oldladyvoice.

On the right is the new issue of Pulphouse Fiction Magazine, which is one of the few remaining subscriptions I have kept, though through the intermediary of their annual Kickstarter event.

In reading news, I finished Derelict, which I found to be an excellent collections of stories, and am now about 50 pages into The Kingdom of Copper by S.A. Chakraborty, the second book of her Daevabad trilogy. So far, I quite like it!

In writing news, I now have a plan for NaNoWriMo, which should give me the interest, the latitude, and the momentum to pump out at least 50,000 words in November, assuming the world does not, to be blunt, get even worse in the next three months.

Last week was the first week since mid-July to consistently have nights cool and dry enough to be conducive to comfortable sleeping.

The past week was a slow one for the acquisitions department here at the Library of Winkelman Abbey. Pictured above are the most recent issue of Poetry and the new shipment from my subscription to the catalog of Two Lines Press, Kaya Days by Carl de Souza, translated by Jeffrey Zuckerman.

In reading news, I finished Skull & Pestle and immediately picked up Worlds of Light & Darkness: The Best of Dreamforge and Space & Time, vol. 1 which, being true to its title, is full of extremely good writing.

I also started A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders, which is absolutely brilliant, and already one of the top books on reading and writing I have read in the past decade. I can see myself returning to this one, again and again.

In writing news, I have nothing to report. Family events took up all of my time and energy this week, and will likely be disruptive for some time to come. I hope to have equilibrium regained before the start of NaNoWriMo.