queenlua | Network

Some good news:

Both Queen Demon and the Storyteller: A Tanith Lee Tribute anthology, made it on the Locus Recommended Reading List:

https://locusmag.com/2026/02/2025-recommended-reading/

with a lot of other excellent books and stories, including a new section for translated works.

You can also vote on the list for the Locus Awards. Anybody can vote here with an email address: https://poll.voting.locusmag.com/ though they have you fill out a demographic survey first with how many books you read per year, etc.

Of course a lot of great work did not end up on the list, like I was surprised not to see The Witch Roads and The Nameless Land duology by Kate Elliott, which I thought was excellent.

olivermoss

I started with the main/downtown section of the festival and boy do I have regrets. There is a reason I usually mind the outskirts of the festival for interesting photos and experiences.

The Portland Winter Lights Festival is a 2 week thing with over 200 art installations and events. Last year they ranged from giant metal fire breathing dragon at the waterfront to 'store that happens to sell a few glow in the dark items is open late'. Also, last year I saw a drag king performance based on I Saw The TV Glow. It is a highly varied experience, and the website is deeply unhelpful. I can tell you already that some of the images this year are concept art and not actually was what done. There is cool stuff, but to find it you just need to keep hopping around hundreds of sites and hoping.

I've had a good time at the festival in the past. One year it happened during that extended snowstorm/power outage Portland had and I remember trudging through deep snow to see the fire powered light events, a truly surreal experience.

Anyway, the main downtown space can get crowded and people can get pushy. I don't have a sense of balance so people pushing me side to make a hole for their group is A Problem for me. Some lady wanted to push through a line I was in, rather than go around. I asked her to cut behind me instead of in front for a specific reason, and she had a expletive filled crash out at me.

I hopefully got at least 2 good pictures, but yeah, there is a reason I usually skip the main area. I am *hopefully* hitting the Electric Blocks and some east side stuff tonight, then I'll start sorting through lists to see what else I want to hit. The only exhibit up on St John's is... an art exhibit that's been there year round for years.

Also, damn, just like I need a dedicated Mike Bennett folder I need to start a PDXWLF folder.

js_thrill

I can't really tell if I liked this book or not. Parts of the world-building felt underdeveloped or under-explored, and I never really felt like Stevland was as alien of an intellect as the premise suggested he was supposed to be. I think I might have preferred a narrower slice of time, with more depth, where a lot of the other details are conveyed because they are part of the collective history of the people in the story, but that would be a very very different structure for the book.

I think this book is about and raises a lot of interesting questions, but I'm not super satisfied with the way those questions were explored (it is not an enraging miss on its premise, the way Mysterium was, though).

ehyde

The fun development at our house recently is that we got a 3d printer for Christmas! We had been thinking of getting the kids a Nintendo Switch because there are a few games they've been interested in that aren't available for PC but Jeff and I were not ... excited ... about the prospect of litigating turn-taking between three kids and one device. At pretty much the last minute I was thinking about how eldest really likes playing with the 3d printed dragons her friend made her and idly wondered how much printers go for these days and lo and behold, there are models that cost less than a nintendo switch! So we pivoted to that plan and it's been great. So many articulated dragons. Jeff's been printing minis to play some combat games with the kids and I've been printing some bookbinding tools too. Along with various just, helpful gadgets! I have a lamp with a switch that's really hard to turn in a circle so I designed a cap for it that sticks out wider on the sides and it just snapped right on and works great! I'm still figuring out various 3d modeling software, I've tried OpenSCAD, Autocad Fusion, and TinkerCad (I'm also learning Blender against my will because Eldest is interested in some more artistic sculpting and it's a tricky program for a 9yo to figure out on her own). Not sure which I like best yet but I am having a lot of fun.

A couple of weeks ago we got a massive amount of snow and it hasn't really gotten above freezing since, so we still have a massive amount of snow. The kids got two whole snow days out of it and they're using "by the time the snow melts" as a timeline for their current computer gaming goal (getting into space in Factorio). I am enjoying the snow a little less (my boots have holes. Any recs for not-too-expensive snow boots for wide feet?)

I mentioned before that I had picked up the Guardian drama again, well, I convinced Jeff to watch it with me (apparently "it's a bit cheesy and kind of reminds me of early seasons of BTVS" was a convincing rec) so we re-started from the beginning. Forgot to mention it was based on a danmei but he figured that out for himself at episode 8. We're now up to episode 12 which is *almost* where I left off.

js_thrill

Today we have Snow Crush Killing Song

Watch on YouTube

We are in a stretch where the annotations are sort of short, and I often don't have a lot to say. Today's annotations are about the approach to narrative structure for this album, but I feel like I'd mostly be repeating myself to include my thoughts on this.

This is a nice sombre song, though. And I am shocked still by how much Mountain Goats I haven't heard before.

Current Music: Snow Crush Killing Song — The Mountain Goats

oursin

That was a week that felt a bit odd, which may have been quite a bit down to my not sleeping as well as have latterly been doing.

Also not getting out for accustomed daily walk as often as usual because RAIN.

Somewhat stunned by phonecall from friend with whom I am collaborating on various projects who has recently had some rather devastating health news.

Resumption of contact with two other friends: one of whom I had contacted after receiving what turned out to be, as I had suspected, spam email from her hacked account.

Having the February blahs, pretty much.

profiterole_reads

Blue Lock the Movie: Episode Nagi was a lot of fun!

Of course I was excited that they dedicated a whole movie to my OTP, Reo/Nagi! <3 There were also some nice Isagi/Bachira scenes.

It's available on Crunchyroll (new to me, but it's been available to the high-tier subscribers for a long time).

lightbird posting in

halfamoon

Title/Link: Cold Feet
Fandom: Quantum leap
Character(s): Donna Elesee, Verbena (Bena) Beeks (and appearances by Sam Beckett and Al Calavicci)
Rating: Teen and Up
Prompt: The Lover
Summary: Donna gets cold feet.

princessofgeeks

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has marked as possibly inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18. )

Current Mood: hung over

lovelytomeetyou posting in

halfamoon

Day 6 - Her Own Personal Code

Title: Out of all candidates, why you?
Fandom: Danganronpa v3
Characters: Shirogane Tsumugi centered + featuring the rest of the cast
Rating: T
Summary: There are some really awful dehumanizing shows out there. Thank God Danganronpa™ isn’t one of them. It’s the best of the best and therefore they need the best cast as well. Or Tsumugi's long audition day.

This was an already written piece that really fit with the theme. This story is set in an AU that assumes certain end game revelations are true, so very spoiler-ish.

Story in ao3

Lost in Lualand

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PXWLF Day 1

Semiosis (Sue Burke)

3d printing! and other life stuff

This Year 365 songs: February 7th

Deep blankness is the real thing strange

Blue Lock the Movie: Episode Nagi

Day 7: Fic Self-Rec - Quantum Leap - Donna Elesee, Verbena (Bena) Beeks

Heated Rivalry meta

DAY 6 - FIC - DANGANRONPA - SHIROGANE TSUMUGI

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