This Week, I Have Been Mostly...

READING: 'Quiet: The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking' by Susan Cain. This is an absolutely fascinating book. As an introvert myself, it was full of 'well, that explains a lot' moment.

Short Stories: 123 - 142 of 500. Faves this week:

Mantis Wives by Kij Johnson at Clarkesworld
Justifiably famous, this is gorgeously written with darkly creepy imagery and emotion. I'd imagine this hits people in different ways--it hit me as a meditation on the desire for pain and loss of self within relationships. Very powerful.

No Breather in the World but Thee by Jeff Vandermeer at Nightmare
Interesting take on the Lovecraftian 'unspeakable horror' that speaks to my love of aftermath stories. The fast-moving, multiple-POV style is rare in short stories, but it really works here, adding to the deep sense of dream-like paranoia.

WRITING: 'The Visiphorical Art,' a literary paranormal flash, and 2k words on a new SF story that's on schedule to become a novellette.

WATCHING: The finale of Being Human. Oh, show. Why did you wait until the very last episode ever to make me fall in love with Hal? I need the DVD boxset and someone to cast Damien Molony in something everything immediately. I need this man back on my telly. Also the first ep on the new season of Touch. Despite a deep and abiding twenty-five-year love of Kiefer Sutherland, I found this show unwatchable. Too many coincidences and too much cheese for my blood. But having heard that S2 was a bit of a reboot, I decided to try again - and so far, I'm very glad I did. This was a massive improvement, seeming almost like the pilot for a totally new show. No nicey-nicey, a proper story arc, interesting and engaging characters and Martin being proactive, resourceful and badass. Fingers crossed this continues!

ADMIRING: These. Both the sentiment and the pictures.

LAUGHING LIKE A LOON AT: This April Fool's submission received at Shimmer. Made me nostalgic for fanfic :)

RECORDING: One-Eyed Monster. From the synopsis, this is about Tara from Buffy battling the possessed-by-aliens detached penis of porn star Ron Jeremy. It may take a while to get up the courage to actually watch this.