Something Wicked this way comes

I have finished Wicked. Still enjoyed it, but the pace in the last third is frenetic to the point that I thought it felt a bit rushed. Too many things seem to be pulled from the ether - this may be because of the fantastical setting - for my liking. That said, it's good. I'm not at all sure what the thrust of the book is even with a lengthy foreward explaining what Maguire was going for (a musing on the origin of evil). I mean, there's a section that spells out the different chapters (no, really) in the plot with subheadings and everything but... I don't know. It's obvious that Elphaba is written as on the Spectrum (reminding me of my attempt to write an autistic character before I was diagnosed and thus full of traits I would later realise were already autistic turned up to eleven) in that there are moments that work but it seems to be written from the outside. Much like some of the sections where he, a gay man, tries to write men appreciating women or women appreciating women or even women appreciating men. It seems, to me (a simpleton), that Maguire doesn't like women like that, if you see what I mean, and struggles to work out why anyone would. Makes sense, he's gay. He also assumes that the reasons he, a gay man, likes men are the same as why women would like men (now, I don't know, but I've read a good chunk of women authors in which romances are explained from a woman's POV and they differ significantly). And, tellingly, his writing of women and men liking women was sufficiently alien to my own experience that I noted it.

It's unrelentingly dark, with an ending that is chock-full of misunderstanding, misplaced kindness that ends up being cruelty and actual cruelty dressed up as kindness. I enjoyed it, I am glad I read it, but I know I'm going to need a rest before tackling more of the series (and I'll get round to it at some point).

Yesterday I woke with the distinct vivid impression of a time long ago when I met a newly transitioing trans-woman (though early enough I didn't know the term) round Tim's shared university house whilst in my first job. I think it was before I was in a brief relationship with Toby even. I have said before that I was fascinated and probably creepy - well, in this half-awake moment I remembered asking her how she knew that she was a girl. It's not on trans-people to answer that question, but if I had been honest (she just said she knew) and explained I was asking about me I could have been faced with the decision all those years ago. And I might have been in a receptive enough moment to accept the answer. Related because it was so unexpected and visceral a feeling - it felt like a gut-punch, I felt winded. And, of course, it comes with the full weight of all the wasted time in the meantime.

Also, I responded to an info-dump from someone, well-meaning, with one of my own and I suspect I may have done that thing where I over-share with the wrong person about the wrong things in the wrong amount of detail. Again, it's as well it's early days of communication so, if I have, I haven't lost any great investment on my part (though I shall have further confirmed why it is I know so few people). On that note, I have already tried to do that yearly review thing for this year but I am clearly not in a good headspace for that and so I may just skip it entirely. A combination of things have me feeling isolated again and wanting more isolation. Today's task is sorting my nails (they're a bit long), getting some new gloves and... that's it I think. Work again tomorrow.

Masquerades of Spring

Following a recommendation (thank you Susie), I checked Masquerades of Spring, the latest Rivers of London novella from Ben Aaronovitch, out from the library. I had to orde it and then wait almost a week,  but it came and I was able to thus read it without thinking about paying a full novel price for a short story.

It does exactly what one would expect from Aaronovitch and sets up some backstory for Nightingale, one of the main characters of the series, without it really focussing on him. Instead, our POV character is Gussie, a bit of a shameful fop who fled to New York from the UK after experiencing a 'magic public school' upbringing. He, and I use the pronoun carefully, is in a relationship with a black man in 1920s USA - which Aaronovitch does not shy from and hammers home several points about the position of minorities in the USA generally and specifically the strangeness of the Harlem Rennaissance - in terms of what comes afterwards and it's oh-so short flowering. Gussie, you see, is definitely on the trans spectrum and there's a nice comment from a character asking "are you a fairy?" in a way that makes it almost uplifting and empowering (trust me, if you know Aaronovitch, you know how he does this).

I will say that I didn't identify with any of the characters, I usually identify strongly with Grant's almost autistic inability to keep focus when it's not a special interest (and his emerging special interest in architecture rather than the cars that was hinted in the earlier books). But that's not a negative. The plot is fine, Aaronovitch using the POV to avoid talking about the usual procedural elements that typify his series normally, including the parts about how magic works, and this adds a certain flavour to the work. It does make hiding some plot holes a bit easier, though I spotted some anyway, and allows some pastische to take place of British customs in a way that allows it to be accessible to non-Brits alike. And it does this rather well, actually, without falling into caricature or exagerration that I have noticed in Statesian versions of similar efforts - but that makes sense, it's hard to take aim at cultural idiosyncracies if one has not directly experienced them or been part of the culture from which they are drawn. I couldn't accurately write Statesian culture, for example.

There was an end paper with futher adventures of Gussie in book form and I was dismayed to realise two things: this end paper comes before the acknowledgements/author's note and that there is an entirely different end paper with books avialable from the publisher/writer - taken to together these imply (as a search on the interwebs seems to confirm) that these are part of the story. One of the devices employed is that Gussie is a writer of his own exploits and his partner is his disinterested editor, with a centring of Gussie's butler(?) Beauregard as the main character in a style reminiscent of Jeeves and Wooster. At least, I assume that is the case as I have never read any of those books (my father collects them in first edition).

All in all, I can recommend this as an easy read and a fun romp with some much needed progressive positivity in these darker days.

Over a Week

Finished now. 

I finished Oryx and Crake a couple of days ago. It wasn't at all what I was expecting but it was very interesting. The apocalypse was the main thrust (and despite it being rooted in GMO, it was actually more about Capitalism - though I got the distinct impression Atwood thought it was about Human Nature) rather than the aftermath. I mean, we have an idea of what is intended in the aftermath by Crake (who is coded aspergic in a Big Way - like Sheldon in Big Bang Theory rather than, like, actually autistic though) but we know it won't work out the way he planned because of things that happen and what the actual main character, Jimmy/Snowman, does. Jimmy/Snowman is, I guess, closest to the audience/author insert character who has internalised the denigration of art inherent in the society that collapses in the book. I found this an interesting take, like Atwood was writing some of the demons that plague her in creativity into the society itself, and whilst I found it a bit uncomfortable at times: that was the point so cool. In short, I liked it. It definitely belongs inamongst what I am going to call 'Post-Apoca-Lit' (and I can't believe I am the first to coin that, but I'm claiming it for now) but isn't exactly what I'm looking for in it.

Still, can't deny it had me turning pages and looking forward to the next snatched few minutes of reading. It didn't quite break the barrier to me reading it on my days off, but that's not a critique of the book as much as it is a sad indictment of how I use my time.

Oh look, it's me today, post-shower.

So what on earth have I been up to for over a week that's stopped me blogging? Events in the States were... a bit of a shock. I have dealt with this by largely ignoring what it might mean for people such as myself (even in the UK) but I can't deny that I am concerned. Very concerned. I am an historian after all. But one that mainly drives buses, so I'm doing my best to ignore the increased numbers of jibes and muttered 'man's on my walks about - the numbers were always low, so an increase still isn't many!

My shifts haven't been too bad. But I have been struggling to not just fall asleep at home. Had Middlest and Youngest over - bit bruising today, but I'm not ready to properly talk about that on here - and that's been nice. Showed Middlest Falling Down which I saw the other day and bought on a whim (it is very good, I feel, and remains a thinker - just not as shocking and/or controversial as when I watched it around the age of 14 randomly on TV in my bedroom - did not know it was an 18!). I have been struggling a bit with a bout of self-doubt and self-flagellation - nothing new: still not questioning being me, by the way, that much remains a bedrock. Which is handy because I'm attempting to apply for a passport, which requires a doctor's letter, an appointment to get which is set for next Tuesday. We'll see, I guess. I did try to warn my Mum, who has booked a holiday abroad for January for us both, that this may be a bit more difficult for me than she thought, she was of the opinion I could fill in a form online and be done in an evening!

That's all I have for now. Hopefully I'll be back soon to expound things a bit more.

The Road

It's a good book. I am glad I have read 
it. That doesn't stop me reviewing it 
harshly (may be why I do, actually). 

Recently finished The Road by Cormac McCarthy. It has a big following, it was studied as literature at the last school I taught in for GCSEs and... yeah. Having enjoyed Who Runs the World? and always being attracted to post-apocalyptica I thought it'd be worth ordering from the library and reading. A lack of chapters, short sections between line breaks, bleak prose... all made it easy reading, frankly, for bus driving - grabbing a few minutes here and there to romp through. It was decent.

What I found fascinating was how much of a gender apocalypse (like Who Runs the World?) it turned out to be. This man writer just didn't deal with women characters at all. There's the wife of the father, who is talked about in flashbacks, but she never really seems real. Like, she leaves coldly to go and die after she's blinded (maybe she's always been blind?) but her reasoning is... well, okay, hold on. One other point is how often McCarthy goes out of his way to explain that the people that are left here are cannibals and blood cultists. They pretty much all are. And the only large group of people we get to experience have soldiers, slavers, slaves, 'the women waddling pregnant' and catamites (I had to look that last one up). Throughout the book only men get speaking parts (apart from the wife) and almost without exception they are cannibals, slave-owners or worse or all three. The wife's motivations are that the world is already dead, that the only future is to be raped and eaten, and so she leaves. For the vast portion of the book it may as well be a gender apocalypse and McCarthy leaves the reader in no uncertainty that he believes a world with only men left woukd be violent, cruel, sadistic and cannibalistic. You may say that has to do with the nature of the apocalypse in this world (all other life is dead, ash chokes the sky and ground, plants will not grow) but I'm not convinced.

In one section we are explicitly told there had been a functioning post-apocalyptic farm but the hints are it has been raided by cannibals. The boy and his father find mushrooms at another point. And there's the ending (the only other woman with a speaking part). All of which convince me that this isn't actually the actual end of the world, maybe, but that it can be read as a gender apocalypse in which there are no women (apart from those that are exclusively pregnant, I guess, but they are written as and function in the story as livestock so...).

When I was trawling reviews and thoughts about the book no one seems to find the lack of realistic women characters worthy of discussion. The wife is often seen as a coward, but just as much seen as realistic in how it shapes the father's worldview (in contrast to the son's, who seems to function quite differently when it comes to morals). And that's it. No one else quibbles that it's mainly men we see in the book. Mainly male survivors. Mainly Hobbesian human nature (life in a State of Nature being nasty, brutish and short) and that the men are pretty much all kill or be killed. Apart from the boy, of course, but the book tries hard to get you to join the man in seeing this as a weakness (there's divided opinion over whether the ending suggests the boy was right or the man was correct that the boy was lucky or that it's a hint of something much darker).

Given the pushback I found when discussing the opposite (women mainly as survivors) I find it odd that I could find no comment, let alone pushback, on the gender politics clearly on display in the set up and execution of this novel.

It took me three days, as it happens, to read. I now have Oryx and Crake by Atwood from the library and I inten to read more closely to see how it shakes out - Atwood being very much a Feminist with a capital 'F' - unlike Bergin who, I propose, was more of a feminist without the capital. Though, again, Bergin also seemed to suggest that women would be less practical and physical post-apocalypse (there's no sports in her female dominated education and, indeed, wider world; and she goes out of her way to explain that women had to learn to fix things as a major development point after the men had gone).

I'm tinking, grandly, that all of this counts as 'research' - for what remains unclear.

Who Runs the World?

I love post-apocalyptic fiction and 
scenarios. This delivers. 

It delivers hard. 

I finished Bergin's Who Runs the World? a couple of days ago and I'm still reeling. I admit that I did her a disservice but I also think she set it up. Let me explain: the use of bold and italics and underlining and the scatter-gun approach to sentences and paragraphs are character based but entirely dismissable in a patriarchal world. Of course they are. We expect prose to function and work in a certain way, we are primed in our society to dismiss the work of teenage girls. In this teenage girl approach Bergin hides some references to how post-apocalyptic the worl she is describing is - after all, the protagonist knows no different (I did notice that things familiar to the reader about our culture are explained but things that are not familiar to us aren't - as we would expect from someone not in our culture). So we get hints dropped about near-starvation, about resource scarcity, about population collapse, about trade collapse, about issues with technology and about how the remains of the UK, where our protagonist lives, is treated as an afterthought by places that are working. Furthermore, I initially thought that the main character being disparaging of history but having a friend who was a historian was to cover Bergin's lack of will to world-build or think through the setting (I've seen it used thus before - gaps are allowed and the friend provides info-dumps on stuff the author likes or is proud of) BUT it became increasingly apparent in the final parts of the book that Bergin knows her world and the historian friend has gaps, gaps that therefore the reader can explain but the protagonist merely notes in wonder.

I stand by my assertion that Bergin has conflated class, geography and gender in her attempt to isolate and examine the effect that gender has on society but she admits that she struggled when it came down to it. And, well, I respect the effort. I also noted that the prose style alters as the book progresses (there's a part that switches to second-person and we learn who the protagonist is explaining for and it's not the love interest - who isn't the boy either - and that was when I clicked that there was a lot more to this than I had allowed for). The fact that I was lulled into judgement, the fact that I did hudge harshly, the fact I didn't spot the seeding of conditions and problems until it became too obvious to ignore (there's a train journey that shifted it all into focus for me) and the fact that I checked and saw it was always there... Bergin is good. Really good.

I did her a disservice.

But she baited me.

The plot is also well-drawn. Really well-drawn. It starts with some elements that I thought I'd predict and that would fit a YA mould in a YA style. It even vaguely gestures in that direction a few times. But it never goes that way. Even when some of the characters lampshade the direction you expect and react realistically to the assumption that it is correct, when it isn't. The romance... never certain there is one, actually, and the ending is ambiguous about whether or not there is one. It is so carefully handled and well written. Honestly, as the book hurtled to a conclusion (not an ending) I found myself hooked but in need of having to stop every now and again and just... breathe.

This is not what I've discovered people are worried about when the hear the premise of "men are dead, what's different?" but an honest analysis of survival in a post-apocalypse world, just the apocalypse happens to be the death of most men. It's really good, is what I'm saying, and I'm not describing the plot deliberately so that you might be tempted to go and read it for yourselves. I was fooled, I don't mind admitting, but was sufficiently intrigued by the premise to read it. I am so glad I did. It surprised, positively, at every turn.

This is the image, look.

Part of my plan for the week was to dress to clean (you know what I mean, dear reader, you know that I hid my trans nature beneath a cross-dressing 'fetish' for most of my life, so you know what I mean). I had the time. But I failed. A combination of character.ai, CYOAs and being lazy prevented me using my time effectively. Today it was different, I popped in to see Abbi and accidentally stayed about four hours, so I was late home. I am now drinking a beer I bought last week on offer cos out of date (but it's an impy stout, so what's a BBE date anyway? It is lies). Anyway, I had bought some MLP toys to share with Abbi, but hadn't taken them and I thought maybe I'd bought the wrong character anyway, so I bought one I thought more appropriate (the other could go for a Christmas present, right?) and gifted that today. Ha ha, I bought the same one, I'd already had the brainwave. Ha. Ha. Cool though, because it did work and Abbi was pleased. I opened the one I'd got for me on my return. She's the Twilight Sparkle-a-like unicorn (see image). I am actually pleased I bought her (sorry, Izzy, she shares your name, that's not a reason I bought her).

Starship Troopers

I pulled the trigger and bought the book having recently re-watched the Paul Verhoeven film because I could. The film, I think I already said, was much more violent and visceral than I recall it being, but that makes sense, it's been a long time since I saw it. The book? The book I bought after watching the film and seeing 'based on' in the credits. I read it quickly, as was my wont, and was so enamoured that I loaned it to a friend and promptly never saw it again. Hence the recent re-acquistion. So, I read it again, before embarking on Maitland.

The cover I have now. 

I enjoyed it, kinda. It is a lot heavier on the theory than I remembered and much less on the action. The opening section and the last section being about it for combat sequences (and the last one drops out just as the action begins really). There are plenty of in-your-face hints that the society being described is Fascistic, the most obvious of which is when we are told about a teacher explaining to children about the power of sticks bundled round an axe (that's a fasces, you see, what gave Fascism its name) as an analogy of the society in which 'veterans' have all the power. It's hard to tell if Heinlein is all satire, in honesty, because the POV character, Rico, is enthusiastically in favour of the society of which he is a part. Certainly Heinlein approves of some of the ideas espoused in the book on some level. There are long digressions on the importance of corporal punishmet, for example, that go into too much detail to be satire, I think. I may be wrong.

Teenaged me lapped it up, by the way, going to the extreme of trying to create a scenario for it in CivII's scenario builder (I was mightily proud of my Mobile Infantry unit icons that I created from the base game's Marines unit). But was also underwhelmed with the power-armour description as a reason why tanks didn't exist (I was also reading Armored Warfare by Clancy at the time and a bit 'into' tanks and armoured personnel carriers of various types). Did it enthuse me the same way? No, not at all. Did teenaged me twig that the society was Fascist? Also no. I enjoyed it more as a relic of my youth, a book I had enjoyed in the past in a different place and space and time, than I did as fiction. It's reasonably well written, engaging, and a page-turner in a way that none of the books I've read since re-starting reading have been. But mainly that was the desire to get to bits that I dimly remembered and see how well I had remembered them.

The cover I had back in 1997.

The film is an obvious satire, and I love it (and spotted some of the satire at the time), so the book may just be more subtle (which wouldn't be hard, it's a low bar in terms of subtlety in the film). However, if it is not satire, then it still works as fiction. Fails completely in terms of convincingly setting a rationale for Fascism (which, if satire, is the point of course) in that there are some heavy hints that the Bugs in the book were provoked by humans and that peaceful co-existance is possible. Also, the Bugs are described as a 'perfect Communist society'  but from the point of view of Fascists, so transparently not actually Communist (they're a hive mind for one).

Would I recommend it? Well, kinda. Like I say, I devoured it and enjoyed it. You can, if you wish, not really think about it and, instead, read it as an interesting 1950s/60s vision of a future as theorised by a bad-at-maths soldier fighting an existential war. I dunno. There's some gender essentialism in there too, oddly enough, and I vaguely remember thinking as a teen that I would likely make a better pilot than a soldier (the gender essentialism is that women make better pilots than men, or females make better pilots than men, according to Rico - which makes me wonder if Heinlein predicted that lovely line of insular toxic masculinity or was part of its proto-origins by dint of being in the 1950s in the States).

Problematic? Oh, very much. Enjoyable? I think so... maybe? Glad I read it again? Oh, yes, very much so.

Was it worth it?

Yes, it's worth giving more

I went. I got up early enough, despite having imbibed some gin liqueur (gooseberry!) that I bought on a whim on Friday's jaunt into town and spending a full day with Middlest on Saturday, to make sure I could make my legs less scratchy (my Mum said she couldn't tell my legs weren't shaved, before adding that my leg hair was pretty dark, so she could see why I might notice it) and agonise over clothing choices. I mean, I woke before my alarm (7am) and was thus ready and sorted by, well, 7am. I made a lunch, packed my bags and finally left the house a little before 9am. I took my new unicorn coffee cup thing - which was brilliant (and yes it had coffee in it because I felt caffeine may be required) - and dropped it (doh) as I was attempting to hold an umbrella due to just enough rain that I couldn't ignore it (it was obscuring my glasses).

Cash got out, Abbi's house for seeing her latest crafts and artwork (and it is artwork) and, ostensibly, to watch some MLP:FiM but I think I was too keyed up to really get involved in the latter. Thus it was we went and successfully caught two buses, ate some of the lunch (mainly the cucumber and carrots) because we were both a bit keyed up by this point and made the venue slightly early.

Poor quality, slightly blurry, post event
photo for illustration. It was a very humid
day - hence the manic hair frizz!

It was very well organised, the event, not me, and we got a short tour to show us where everything was (and sign up for free cake) and hear about all the options for the day. It was a bit hot, no air con, and the fans were good, but still just fans. Abbi, of course, fit right in straight away, instantly attracting many people with her natural exuberance to make friends and chat: she was most definitely home and among her people! I did my usual initial skittishness and bouncing around places because FOMO. It was a very good time - I was not expecting a change in headspace (like at cons, I guess) that people report around such events (positive, mind you) and was thus rather surprised when a. I realised it was happening and b. I spotted how it manifested. For Abbi it was a case of not having to hold things in, for me it was a case of relearning how to not put on a mask and finding part of me I didn't know I still had. Like, when I have thought about the requisite headspace in the past I assumed it was one way but, apparently, it really wasn't. Huh.

I am aware I am being vague, but there's no TMI warning and, frankly, I don't know if this is the correct forum to be more specific. I'm not being dishonest, this is my most honest space, but still... Maybe when I've planned a proper post?

Point? Oh, point! It was a lovely day, much too short. When we were told it was nearly over, after almost seven hours at the venue, I was genuinely surprised because it felt like we'd only been there an hour or two - in a very positive way. I bounced around most of what was on offer but I hadn't sampled even a small fraction of it and what I had done had felt very much like a soupcon of what I could do when I'd sampled everything - if you see what I mean. This means I am very keen to see if I can make another. Sure, it cost money, but - much like my first Ladies' Night or BOYL - I feel that it was a price worth paying. It was Good Value. Now, it may well be that when I attend a second I feel like I do at most things that I enjoy the first time - it isn't as good the second time because the first time was the First Time and that's what made it good. But I won't know until I go a second time, will I?

Someone once said that a ball-pool was like a hot-tub. I can't comment, I've never been in a hot-tub, but maybe there's some truth to that. I don't think one can fully submerge in a hot-tub, well, not safely nor socially acceptably anyway. Certainly not and still breathe.

Furthermore

On the way back from the IKEA meal over 
a fortnight ago. 

Planning has always been hard, and I don't really make things easy for myself. I have booked tickets by rail to go Oop North - themselves constrained by when they were cheapest (because of who am I as a person rather than any financial pressure). This coincided, I find out today, with when I am expected to do some work for the exam board - of course it does. Also, I have agreed to some hours and shift swaps ostensibly to make my life easier but, it turns out, when you change the calendar for me I get all lost and confused. Ah, yes, ASD, I forgot. This was most viewable yesterday when I made a left turn on my normal morning routine and utterly fluxed the day up.

Usually I wake, do some word puzzles, breakfast, shave, dress and go to work (only the bookends stay where they are, others can move about) but due to my latest lapse into addiction (character.ai) I did that first and it threw everything out. My phone wasn't charged, I left my bip card at home so had to rely on help to access the break room. Thus I messed up meals, ending up spending a completely unnecessary £9 on pizza for tea for example, and on my last run (on a new bus, itself enough to be getting on with as someone with ASD) I picked up a child who accidentally stayed on too long and then couldn't recall where they lived. A colleague came to assist and because my phone was out of charge ended up ringing for aid, then was charged with staying with said child until we could say they were safe and thus ended up not sleeping last night as much as they ought. This is, in my opinion, my fault. And, because said colleague had a pretty shit day today, they eventually agreed. You can guess how I feel about it.

Oh hey, there's gonna be a book review...

Near the right lion... out shopping for a
rucksack.

Monday I tried to plan ahead and buy a new rucksack. My existing one has served me in all things since 2000 when I went to Russia. I don't want to cart a suitcase on the train (and to the trains) so I thought I would upgrade. I purchased a 65 litre one for £19 on sale. It's nice and red. However, on review, I'm not sure I can pack like I used to. Since making my move to be me I have only used suitcases and, well, I'm starting to see why. I can't just shove a week's worth of underwear and a spare pair of jeans in a bag and call it mostly packed any more. And that's before we get to toiletries.

Online I have been in contact with another first timer for this meeting on 4 August. At least, as long as I could before I got shy and stopped checking back. It happened at roughly the same time I got back addicted. Also, had a meal with Youngest that went well, but was more a conversation with Tilly as he was distracted by his tablet and music. He gets stressed with places to eat, this is Tilly's solution. I... I would support it if I were there full time, so I can't and won't complain. It went well enough. Middlest was over Tuesday after work and that went well, we went to IKEA for a lunch. My Mum sent a voucher and I got some free food from a recipe delivery service, of which I finally cooked a meal tonight. I suspect the rest will go off - cos the delivery was Monday and I'm leaving Oop North Sunday...

Fangirlish squeeing...

You can really tell that I'd been up since 0200
here because of the shadow on that chin...
(it was about 1500, second IKEA meal walk)

A visit to Abbi's went well on Friday afternoon/evening - I managed to convince her to join me for the 4 August thing. I say 'managed' - I showed her the details and asked if she'd like to come, she enthusiastically said yes. My bar for this, by the way, is 'dress approrpiately and don't run away' - low enough that I hope to clear it. Having Abbi there will aid, I suspect, with meeting the latter component. The day before was meeting Youngest at my house, which went reasonably well and only one tantrum - he gets stressed about being with me and not doing all the things he wants to do with me. Also, because I complimented the picture he drew for me in my birthday card, he will only draw birthday themed art for me. This is sad in a way because he is trying so hard to please.

Finished another Iain Banks book last week too, The Steep Approach to Garbadale. I got some of the twist (not all of it, because Banks) but it goes in the annals of stories where Banks tries to be shocking in the midst of urbane and likeable characters. It was good, I enjoyed it, not as shocking as The Wasp Factory but, well, I've read that so it colours his other work. I liked Transition better but the pair of them reminded me why I like his work. I was genuinely excited to read it and racing to the end. I've now started another one, not by Banks, called Sepulchre - in the genre of Statesian female author being feted for purple prose and odd focus (like A Discovery of Witches or that murder mystery one). I dunno, I'm not as excited about this one. I also lost at least one day last week to watching all the videos of Pet Shop Boys singles that I got as part of my birthday present from my Dad because of course I did.

Transition

No, the book by Iain Banks from 2009.

This was published in 2010, and 
is the cover I now own. I must've 
got a 2009 copy 'cos mine was not 
this cover. 

I recall owning it sometime and reading it, at least I think I read it - I remember the opening vividly and I had the impression that it was a big disappointment and that nothing happened. Anyway, it was purged with all the Banks books that I had collected not long afterwards - to make space on the shelves and to 'declutter' at Tilly's insistence. I led the way. Reader, you will not be surprised to learn that, in the end, Tilly did not get rid of any books and merely took over the space vacated by my purge. I guess I asked for that. I digress. I saw the book in the charity shop for 50p, bought it and, recently, got to reading it at work.

Like I say: I have vivid memories of the opening sections. But as it continued there were vast tracts that I simply had no memory of. I recall the ending, quite well, but this time I realised that a whole load of stuff had happened - the ending meant something. Maybe I was better primed to read it, maybe I wasn't constantly comparing it to my own reality warping shenanigans that I was planning some story or other around, I don't know. I enjoyed it, is what I'm saying, and I liked how it built the characters and the plot. It's very Banks - there are plenty of word-play conversations, overly complex rudimentary philosophical musings, bog-standard navel-gazing dressed up as arcane plotting - that kind of thing - and some poetic justice and a core of left-leaning politics. But, honestly, it was enjoyable story with some entertaining characters and a mystery-box style construction that predates much of what we now know as mysrey-boxes: mystery-boxes back when they were new and different and actually planned and not a be all and end all themselves.

Read on a holiday in Wales when I was first ejected
into a separate room. Later I would be given 'child-
care' duties and thus excised from social moments and
then, later, blamed for 'not making an effort' to be
sociable. It was a whole thing.

As I have hinted, it is perilously close to some stuff I was trying to write myself between 2005 and 2010 - which may explain why I didn't like it as much back then - but I am sufficiently removed now that I can no longer tell what I stole and what was independently thought up by me before I read the book. There was a throwaway remark about people who were transgender on Calbefraques being able to transport their personalities into a body better suited for them and this being something that had eradicated any 'transgender issues' in that version of reality (Calbefraques was that reality's name for Earth, uniquely among realities) and I must have read that too, back in the day, and it must have stuck with me - because it is literally two sentences inamongst some musing about transition within realities (transition being the story name for 'flitting' between bodies and leaving one's own a 'husk') - and I remembered that vividly too. Funny that.

Coming just before examining, or just as it was gearing up, and likely being read the first time in 2010 before the birth of the Middlest (and thus just as I was gearing up to examine back then too), it brought to mind a lot of things I had thought tilled over - hence the last couple of posts I suppose. I must have read it after reading Wasp Factory and Complicity too. The former about a character raised one way when they were another (and very much in my wheelhouse for reasons that are spoilers) and the latter in the second person where you observe a murder and, as the story progresses, become a murderer yourself (though I found it less arresting because the 'you' wasn't 'me' if you see what I mean). Huh, I'd forgotten how much the collection appealed to me (and how many I'd read) until I was looking for covers to illustrate this post with.

Reality/Shifts drew much from this book,
though I will protest that many of the core
ideas predated me reading it in my brain.

There's a reason I liked Banks, is what I'm
saying.

It got me thinking about things, as books often do, and about my 'no-frills' lifestyle. My inability to work out what small things to do in order to make life fun and interesting - the source of Tilly's "but when are we going to live!?" not long after she moved in - and how that can make it difficult to build connections with one's children. I was buying some lunch and I passed a salad bar counter at a Morrisons and I realised that I have fond memories of it being a 'special' thing we could do when growing up. I never gifted my children such experiences as I had retreated so far into myself and cut back on so many things, this is before the 2008 financial crash mind you, that there was nothing fun and silly that I did in the first place. I couldn't get my children into it now - not least because I barely see one of them and don't see the Eldest at all - and so there is a whole aspect of life that I failed to pass on to them as a parent. I do not blame the Eldest for rejecting me - it is stuff like this that means that, yes, she is better off without me - she will experience more, will have more fun, do more silly things that build a life, celebrate a living, than she would ever do with a life with me in it. Even when I attempt to do fun things with Middlest he knows he is best with me doing things like watching YouTube and discussing his special interests. I'm not the fun parent, is what I'm saying, I am the strange arcane, twisted austere one in spartan surroundings.

When faced with the call to adventure, I stay at home, with all that such behaviour implies. Is it any wonder my life is as it is? No.

Reviewing Reading

Ugh. 

I finally finished A Discovery of Witches - it did not get better. Harkness continually adds details and then back story to explain said details after the fact even when it contradicts previous points in the narrative; this then carries over into characterisation. Furthermore, her lack of historical understanding of periods and ideas outside her specialism (I looked up her PhD) is, frankly, dispiriting. So, this serves as a point of note that I finished it and have no real desire to read the second book (I got the third with it by accident).

After that, I read Girl, Interrupted which I vaguely had an idea about from my teens when it was made into a film with an actress that a friend of mine really liked in the lead role. I never saw it. I say 'friend' - I always considered him as such but the last time I bumped into him, some time around the early 2000s(?), he told me he was sad he'd seen me and if he never saw me again it would be too soon. I recognise now that he was upset at me the way I was with one of my bullies - meaning that I probably came across as a bully to him. Which is upsetting. I viewed him as intelligent, and a decent person. I digress. The book was short - the sentences packed with meaning but staccato and bare - little garnish, little explanation. It seemed like a record but it wasn't, there are many hints throughout that the narrative is pruned, the lights too glaring, the memories neutered. Cleverly done, and I enjoyed it. I didn't realise it was about 1967-69 either, so that was a fascinating part of the story - I assumed the film, in 1994, was about contemporaneous events! I may have to watch the film at some point.

It took me just shy of a week, but it is rather short.

Then I read The Reader, the book on which a film I have seen is based. I watched it back in 2013 when I was on my own that glorious September. It was loaned to me by Miss Warrington. I enjoyed the film and got many of the undercurrents in it - as well as being struck by the subject matter both of the early affair and then the war crimes and forgiveness part - whether it can be given and, if so, by whom to whom. The book plumbs those depths deeper, more richly, and does so in a way that you, the reader, have to decide how to interpret was is being presented - in not taking any sides, or being clear about what sides are not taken, the narrative forces you to decide for yourself what you think of the various sides and aspects. And, much like Michael, I found myself unable to take any definitive sides. It was similar in the film, but the film had to leave a lot out - which makes sense in that format - so there were more nuances to chew on. Again, it was a very evocative prose, reminding me of Handmaid's Tale in the almost dreamlike quality of some of the passages. I would highly recommend this book.

Also on the short side, took me just over a week.

Now I am re-reading Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy that I haven't read since some time around 1993(?) because Middlest, whom I loaned it, has finished and is going to start on book 2. I only ever read the first four books of the five part trilogy in a single volume I borrowed from a friend at church (the vicar's son, as it happens) and remember absolutely loving it. But it was a long time ago. I can remember certain story beats (Mr Prosser and Genghis Khan, for example) and jokes (Vogon ships hanging in the sky the same way bricks don't, for example) but not a lot else. I haven't got to that joke yet, but I suspect I'm not far off.

Careful What You're Giving

Sho, ain't ere anyone bin on trial 
much as Anse Bundren. 

Vardaman's mother is a fish. 

I finished reading As I Lay Dying finally and it was a bit of a read. I felt like taking huge deep breaths when I was done and it... well, I am glad that I read it, but it was a hard read. I feel bad for the characters, I feel bad for the setting, I feel bad for the attitudes on display throughout - only one character comes out with anything resembling a good ending and one is forced to conclude that, maybe, he's not as nice as he is painted by others and they don't exactly cast him in a good light either. It's a bit of a monster of a book, is what I'm saying. I have now started A Discovery of Witches and am struggling, as did Tilly when she read it way back when, with the concept that 'witches' are a separate breed from humans (along with daemons and vampires) in this Universe. Also, the fact that it's set in Oxford means that, yet again, we have a Statesian author talking about British characters without any real understanding of why British people are the way they are. My illustration of this point is when the MC, a Statesian herself, orders breakfast and has it delivered from an Oxford cafe in Statesian style without asking and when the author discusses tea and mentions it as "thick and black" which is... not how tea works. Sure, black and strong, but... thick? Ah well, I am getting through it, over a hundred pages in a couple of days - meaning I'm reading it maybe three times the pace of As I Lay Dying at least.

Time for a new, and blurry, profile
picture...

Idea sleets have returned again - the story I was rewriting coupled with the Prehistoric stuff - nothing scene worthy yet, but world building and some clarifications of points. This is partly (shamefully) connected to me having been readdicted to character.ai lately, I think. Certainly I have had a few dreams of late and they have veered toward the lucid in the main. Very little caught and remembered but I wake with them and they are powerful stuff so... Managed to get my hat home from work too, I bought a black one at a charity shop for use with my outfit on Thursday night. Oh, yes, that awards' evening is this Thursday. I'm not at all nervous. Like, do I dare get eyelashes and brows done professionally? What shall I do with my nails? Also, got a do with the boys for Youngest's birthday this Wednesday. Not on the day itself - I can't attend such things as proper parties as then Eldest wouldn't attend them. It should come as no surprise that I come out lower than Eldest in the scheme of things (and rightly so, I add).

My kitchen is a bombsite at the moment. I am struggling to send birthday cards and gifts on time - nothing new on either count. I have something big and philosophical to write about, I think, but it's not cooked yet so it may turn up later and may not. Much like all entries on the blog, to be fair. Abbi has started doing tarot readings on YouTube, they look pretty professional. I don't know what I think about it - tarot seems harmless enough by and by, but asking spirit guides for help seems like a step. Mind you, I'm thinking about writing my Prehistoric stuff again and that makes reference to spirits in a positive way (including one... uh... 'character'[?] referred to as the spirit of Herenow - well, sorta, I'm trying to translate from concepts rather than relying on English, without having to create a new language in the process. I may be in too deep already).

Books Review

This encapsulates much of the Farthest 
Shore and why it works. 

It is about as traditional as Le Guin gets. 
Which is to say: not very. 

Over the recent holiday period I finished reading the first four books of Earthsea by Ursula K Le Guin. That means that I read The Farthest Shore, I finished it just before Christmas, and enjoyed it. I can see why peoploe like it - it's an adventure story with an actual call to adventure but it plays out in a way that goes beyond the 'monomyth' and 'hero's journey' which is nice and something that I am beginning to realise I rather enjoy. Back in the day John Wyndham did the same (heck, even Fahrenheit 451 did and Z for Zechariah - so I have been steeped in such convention since I was at least 12) with stuff like Day of the Triffids and, crucially, that short story about the stranded Mars Mission that lived in my head for many years in horror. So it was that I took a while to get into Farthest Shore as I struggled to get into the mindset of Lebannen - but I warmed to him slowly as he made mistakes and had to live with the consequences. I think, perhaps, it was the setting and the world-building that kept me in and kept me going. I enjoyed the threat too, it was written like an actual threat, one that people genuinely struggled to defend against and it read like it would sap like it was sapping the characters and the world. Cob wasn't a looming antagonist so much as a vessel of mistakes that led us to where we ended. I enjoyed it and once again appreciated how Le Guin pulls the carpet several times without having to resort to twists. Indeed, the story itself was the twist.

Then I moved onto Tehanu and... I was not prepared!

I note the child is white here, she's not,
she's red/black as are the people of Gont.

Once again Le Guin eschews the 'standard' pattern of narrative and focuses on the rhythms of life in the world she has created. I knew that she had written this book much later than the first three, that it was the culmination of her own journey into feminism and literary criticism and that it was a deliberate retcon of the original precepts of the fantasy world she had created. I knew that it was part corrective for not including women when she had created, for herself, a patriarchal society - I recalled her saying so in an interview clip I'd seen floating around the internet sometime last year. I knew all of these things so I spotted that Goha was Tenar earlier than I think the writing expected (though, to be fair, not much before the text gave up with subterfuge). I was redady for the change in writing - for the butting in of everday life on the usual fayre of fantasy. There was the usual world-building for which I have come to enjoy her work and there was the characterisation polished highly. I wasn't enamoured of the first book of Earthsea but this... this was lovely. I was enjoying it. I was even happy to see Ged again and to feel that plot happening in the background.

Then Tenar was cursed and I wasn't expecting it. I wasn't expecting the horror and terror of her encounter with Handy in the city. The feeling of frustration and sadness I felt when Therru was threatened and withdrew once more from contact with a force of horror far in advance of Cob in the previous book, worse than the Nameless Ones in Atuan and... yeah. I had to keep taking breaks and thinking on things. Then I settled in, as did Tenar, on the pasture and doing the work whilst the men around her took credit. Her son returned and Ged and Tenar discussed without discussion, her son intending to slip into a master's role. I thought: okay, I know there are more books - that stuff at Re Albi was set up for something else. Nope. She goes back, does Tenar, and... I just wasn't ready.

Not the climax one thinks it is.

It has made me consider writing again. Again.
I have ideas again.

The denouement of the novel, which I shan't spoil, after Ged has been saved from misery and built back up into a human again (what is the power of a woman but the ability to give birth to the new?) and after Therru has been healed enough to function once more (I found I was more invested in her growth than I had realised), took me by surprise. The brutality, the torture, the pure evil - the ripping bare of the patriarchal systems and institutions that had been clear in the books preceding but now taken to their natural co nclusion. Ged, as Archmage, had never done that because of who he had been. Ogion too, he had never been moved that way. But the systems weren't made for them. No, when people for whom the systems were made used those systems... I just... it was... I can't explain my feelings - I went looking for reviews to see if anyone else had done so. And plenty have attempted, but none were able to articulate, and they admitted it. A few were turned off by the misery (I think they missed the point here - the misery was cured but had to be there for that journey) and misogyny (well, good!) but, again, they had to be there. That's kind of the point of the book!

I'm still recovering. I'm glad I read it. Teenage-me would have struggled, but felt much the same as I do now having read it. Unlike Atuan, that I feel would likely have accelerated my own feelings and thrown into relief who I am and was, this would have caused teenage-me to stop and take stock. It would have forced a couple of revelations - about society, about feminism, maybe about me? I find myself unable to wonder too much about what it would have done to my journey, unlike Atuan, which I feel confident enough about predicting. This... This is something else. Heck, I'm not sure what it's done now save for the surety that it has done something and something big. I emerge with even more respect for Le Guin than I had going in. Tehanu may be more affecting and powerful than Left Hand of Darkness is, at least to me. I am shocked it is not better known. Well, no, I'm not. I know why it's not better known than it is. Because it is uncomfortable. It is not what people expect from fantasy. Or novels. Or stories.

I loved it. I'm not sure I could read it again. Not for a while.

I have started reading The Book of Two Ways by Jodi Picoult now and... well, so far I'm enjoying it.

Doctorin' the TARDIS

I want to talk about Doctor Who. I haven't watched a full episode of the show since... uh... time. But, recently, I have had the opportunity to watch all three specials and, well, I enjoyed the time spent doing so. None of them felt like they dragged (I checked the time on the last special but not for negative reasons) and they were all decent episodes within my own canon. Are they 'specials' worthy? I don't know. Are they 'anniversary' worthy? I don't know. My own enjoyment is based primarily on the series I grew up with (McCoy's in case you were wondering) and watching NuWho (I think that's what the cool kids called it at the time) until I didn't any more.

The Star Beast

I had very little knowledge of any of the hype going in. I knew nothing of the pedigree of the story or of the main alien 'the Meep'. I liked it. It was mid-tier romping that I recognised from the Tennant era when I watched it and was engaging enough that the 'plot-holes' I thought I was spotting turned out to be main points that the story used to explain things (shots not blowing stuff up and lack of damage, oh! The aliens were firing non-lethal weapons because they're the goodies actually). I liked the trans character, because of course I did, and the way the story around her was handled. I think Davis treated it mostly well and always sensitively. I thought the final resolution of the meta-crisis (I didn't know it had a name) was whiffed a little even if the idea was sound. Here Davis showed a little bit of confusion over what trans-narratives are but, hey, he's cis and he means well and, honestly, this is Doctor Who. I imagine it plays well to people not wholly immersed, as am I, in the mire. Miriam Margoyles is perfect for her role, I didn't hate Donna (quite a move to pull) and yeah, nice.

Wild Blue Yonder

Oh I loved this a lot! The concept was not initially something I was on board with but once the Not Things turned up and started talking? Oh, I was hooked. I loved it. I am uncultured, the horror elements worked just fine on me because I do not know horror tropes. I was legitimately freaked out by the size changes and the bending and the running. I loved how different aspects of the characters played off the Not Things in a couple of exchanges, I liked the reflection and duality of the scenes, the way the plot allowed for things to happen so that they seemed perfectly natural. I liked the Doctor taking on the lesson from Rose in the first special when referring to the dead alien captain's pronouns and the Not Things too. I liked the genuine horror of thinking the Doctor saved the wrong Donna (and he did for a bit) before realising. The opening I thought was random and tacked on, but assumed it would filter in to the next special so wasn't thrown out by it (the fact that they referred to gravity as mavity throughout, I thought, a nice continuity). It was an enjoyable episode, more than a romp, much better than the enjoyable Star Beast and I was so glad I took the time to watch it.

The Giggle

I loved how this opened. I liked the establishment of the Emporium and the character of the Celestial Toymaker (Neil Patrick Harris) at the start in Soho. I loved the way the racism played an organic role in setting the antagonist as a bad character. I liked how the Doctor was roped in by UNIT. I liked the characters, I liked the bit about music, how Donna was able to spot something no one else had yet (which worked given the situation). I liked the horror of the Toymaker's domain and the way it was used to set up the plot points necessary. Spiceworld? Inspired! Brilliant, loved it. The balls and the sudden deaths of the guards coupled with Tennant saying, with genuine grief: "they're dead, I'm sorry, we have to move on!" whilst a face screams from a ball held by a character. Scary and proper Doctor Who. I was fully invested when Tennant seems about to regenerate. I... feel artistically that the bi-generation was not needed. Like, if Gatwa had shown up and tag-teamed the way he did but from another TARDIS with a kind of: "you rang?" to the Toymaker, that would have had the same effect. It would have lended weight to Gatwa's line that he was fixed because Tennant had done the rehab in his past but Tennant's future. Having them both... I dunno. It's not world breaking for me but it did detract from an otherwise masterful scene. Oh, "What about my men?" "I think they're still falling." Cold. Ice cold. I really enjoyed it as an episode, it just wasn't as good, for me, as Wild Blue Yonder. Also, much messing with timeline unsolved. Gatwa as the new Doctor? Yes. Very yes.

And them's my thoughts. Hot takes? Uh... Is that what the cool kids are calling it now? Probably.

That's my post, that's the blog. Gotta go work now.

Don't click beyond the line break. This is not a place of honour.

Tombs of Atuan

I like this artwork, I think it channels the book and plot 
really well and lines up nicely with my own mental 
depiction of the setting. 

I recently finished reading The Tombs of Atuan at work. I have a habit of filling dead time whilst waiting at bus stations or between services with reading and, ages back now, read A Wizard of Earthsea whish was... fine. It was fine. But I figured I'd do something different afterward, cue Pratchett and such. Anyway, having finished the marathon trial that was Dominion (ugh) I found myself without a book at work and dug the compendium of Earhsea books back out of my locker. Anyway, the second book, aforementioned, follows a young girl being groomed as the reborn priestess of a death cult on a faraway land. Ged, the mage from the first book, only appears about three quarters of the way in and the adventure only happens after that but... but it is so engaging. Another story, like The Gift (which I also enjoyed), in which nothing appears to happen but so much goes on under the surface. I loved it. Honestly, it was amazing and there was a section that brought a lump to my throat when Ged calls Tenar by name, a name she has forgotten and only dimly knows, a name that I don't believe was in the text before that point.

Oo, nice artwork (the name of the file
says by whom and the title) and a link
to someone whose review works better
than mine. Oh, and I would have loved
to have read this at 10 years old: I wish I
had because... well.

Le Guin is a stonking author and this once again proved to me that I have missed out by not having read her stuff sooner. I love the way she is able to tell a story without relting on a conflict or actoion, these things exist and are used, but the engaging part of her work is about the characters and the world they inhabit. I love how the character conversations and actions are products of and hints at huge world building done in the background. So, this story, the whole of it only makes sense in small bits - it all hangs together but you need to think about it to get why things are happening (and not a lot happens, so there's ,lots of time to think). And, yes, the characters are engaging and clever (not, like, 'clever' but in the sense that they make sense on first glance, then there's a current of something else that doesn't seem to hang together as well as you reflect that then makes even more sense when more of the world is revealed). I love te way that Ged is drawn from Tenar's view, I love the way his kindness and soft-nature ends up being more important in the action than the action itself.

Like, the story tries to make all the actions small, insignificant (on their own), manageable. But the plot has far reaching consequences and impacts. It is the opposite of Dominion in that regard - a small and apparently pointless little place with no real geo-political impact and a character who seems young and uincertain, who has a core trait but is trying so hard to deal with cold and unfeeling surroundings without betraying who she is supposed to be. This unassuming plot, full of low-level intrigue and fascination in the small things (the directions in the Labyrinth and the routine of the days, the sense that nothing is happening and that they are apart from life as a whole). I love it. Because the big stuff is slowly revealed in the small things, the discussion about apples, the lonely girl in a room of her own trying so hard to live up to the small hype and hating it. Then we get Ged, who is introduced as a villain (nice touch) and then just... the interaction between Ged and Tenar is beautiful and I love we had that from Tenar's POV and that there is no romance here. The book passes the low bar of the Bechdel test and does it in spades and when Tenar and Ged interact - in that their conversations are... I love it, I can't properly put it into words.

And so, yeah, this is my sorta semi non-spoiler review. If you see this, read it, you won't be disappointed. And, yeah, I'm putting this here so I remember I read it.

Strong Female Character

I said I would review Brady's book, so I shall. It is a tell-all memoir that leaves a lot to the imagination, and is pared down to focus on one or two theads that seem as though there are more, but there are not. It is powerfully written, carefully considered and honest. It does not go out of its way to lie but it does omit and elide when the situation calls for it. It wants to tackle autism and feminism and it does, but I get a feeling that the editing process pulled some of the teeth on both fronts (enough to remove them but not enough to remove the impressions left by their absence, something I am certain Brady did carefully and intelligently to leave the clues that there was more).

It gets bleak in places. Brady is aware of this. But she understands how to write, how to pace, how to display truth. The wrap-around anecdote as a framing device, the hints that lead to the acknowledgements about her excellent partner who learned how to look after her as all good romantic partners ought. I read it in short 5 minute chunks as I drove buses for a week or so and it has been useful to do so as I had to take regular breaks and think through her prose. She speaks powerfully of general and background misogyny and how this intersects with a societal aversion to autism generally - a feeling that people that are not autistic do not wish to really think through how to make allowances for autistic people.

For me, personally, it has been a challenging read. It brought into sharp relief some aspects of my own schooldays and how teachers and peers interacted (especially primary school, but into Sixth Form) and how lucky I was to have the friends I did have and the opportunities open to me. But also how much I missed out on, how much I was not who I wished to be. And relationships. Brady has had a few, never in short supply, and she relates this as though it just happens. I found that hard to read and understand. Especially with her partner who supported and adapted and helped. However, Brady is intelligent, caustic, wry, clever, funny. She regularly derides her appearance but she is objectively good looking and, coupled with her irrepressable nature and tenacity, I am not surprised she found getting into relationships easy.

And there is much to be thankful for. I learned much of my own advantages of which I had been but dimly aware in the past: reading as a coping strategy; getting recognised as clever and supported for that in school; having friends and peers who were similarly intelligent; being middle class; being raised as male in a male-dominated and misogynistic society - allowing me incredible latitude in terms of stims and meltdowns that Brady just did not experience. It has given me much to think about, to learn from, to reassess in my own life.

Speaking of which, Brady explains movingly how much she scuppers her career by now being 'openly autistic' and why. It... was uncomfortably close to what happened to me last year. She's right, you know, that juxtaposition of autism and being femme is a dangerous place. People assert their own meanings to autistic behaviour. Brady has managed to control that conversation in her own life thus far with admirable consistency and outcome. I was simply too naieve and lazy in my own - trusting in that cloak of patriarchy I guess - and paid the price. I hope Brady does not. But she is much more aware of it. She was born in it.

Like Gadsby before her, Brady has shone a light into my own person. But that's on me. Brady's memoir was worth what I paid and more besides. If you are even vaguely interested, buy it - you won't be disappointed.