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Title: The Indifferent Stars: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride
Author: Daniel James Brown
Narrator Michael Prichard
Published: Tantor Audio, 2014 (2009)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 360
Total Page Count: 290,080
Text Number: 949
Read Because: interest in the Donner Party, audiobook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: The story of the Donner Party, focused on a young bride who was part of the Forlorn Hope. This focus means that later events at the winter camp are a little less substantial, a little harder to track (granted, the surrounding events have a lot of confusing redundancy re: the numerous reliefs). The impersonal tally of fates for the survivors and the unwieldy epilogue chronicling the author's journey are even less effective, and so the end of the book falls flat. But on the whole, the focus on a single figure helps to ground the history, making it human and accessible, and the cultural context and information about starvation/hypothermia paints a complete picture. It's atmospheric, harrowing, but refuses to be exploitative. The Forlorn Hope is the pinnacle of the text, realistically, sympathetically rendered; humanized and horrific.

(Here's a mistake you can make in the privacy of your own home neighborhood: read the Forlorn Hope section on audio while walking in at below-freezing temperatures! It was literally 29 degrees, it was "mildly uncomfortable," and "I am projecting way too much if I compare it even slightly to the text," but project I sure did!)


Title: Lovecraft Country
Author: Matt Ruff
Narrator: Kevin Kenerly
Published: Blackstone Audiobooks, 2016
Rating: N/A
Page Count: 50 of 370
Total Page Count: 290,460
Text Number: 952
Read Because: mentioned here, audiobook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: The depiction of racism is honest and doesn't appear to be exploitative, but reading it while wary of authorial missteps* is a double burden which is too much for me right now, especially without the payoff of early supernatural elements. I'd rather put my energy into an ownvoices book.

* I have no reason to anticipate them! The book has reviewed well on this particular issue! I just can't silence that paranoid voice right now. For another reader or me at a different time, this is probably well worth reading.


Title: On a Sunbeam
Author: Tillie Walden
Published: independent webcomic
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 545
Total Page Count: 291,135
Text Number: 954
Read Because: personal enjoyment, available for free online as well as in ebook & print
Review: A young woman joins a crew that repairs derelict, fantastical space structures, and discovers that they used to rescue refugees from the edges of the galaxy. This is some of the best science fantasy I've ever seen—the minimal, intentional color palette and thin ink lines are a perfect format for the massive, strange, evocative (playful, beautiful, profound) landscapes. The setting cradles a more intimate narrative about found family, love, and personal maturation with a likable and and diverse cast. Some of the later beats, both plot and emotional, are predictable; the narrative isn't as robust as I hoped for, or as closely tied to the setting's speculative elements. But the overall effect is superb. From the first chapter I wanted to inhabit this world and, by accompanying the protagonist, I can. I couldn't ask for better wish-fulfillment.

(really beautiful voids! the spacewhales are more in atmosphere than fact except, of course, that the ship is one! this is like a romantic fantasy version of my favorite nightmare aesthetics, and I couldn't love it more.)

I warn you that all that follows is pretty self-centered, angry, and immature, interspersed with vague gestures in the directions of Deep Thoughts. Also it's more or less about Homestuck. Read at your own risk.

I have a friend that has to blacklist a lot of media because they internalize it, take it personally, get sad over sad stuff and heartsick over romantic stuff. Of course it doesn't make sense to consume media you don't appreciate or enjoy, but I tend to think this is an extreme reaction; to be honest, I think they should get over themselves, and that taking it all so personally shows a certain amount of self-centered immaturity. But I just finished reading what so far exists of Brainbent, a Homestuck AU set in a residental mental health treatment center, and hey would you look at that: there's stuff that I take too personally, and most of it has to do with mental health and illness.

It's not the only thing I take too personally. I hate cats in popular media, because their representations are inaccurate clichés and I would know—and for the same reason that I know, it's a personal issue and I hate to see it butchered, over and over again. It's akin to someone making a mockery of me. Sometimes representations of mental illness trigger the same disgust, as well they should—even it means I'm getting mad over another goddamn saccharine advertisement where depression is symbolized by some sort of cute blob. Fuck you, Abilify, because no it doesn't feel like *sadface* and a cute little animated hole in the ground, and patronizing to me will not convince me to shove that or any other medication down my throat. It's a personal bias—because what medications I tried didn't work for me, and I don't have the faith or energy to find the ones that do—which I shouldn't project onto others—like those with the need of and resources to find effective medication, who should be able to make that search without my judgement or doubt—and so I'll admit to being selfish and short-sighted, but the anger is still pretty righteous.

But that's not what Brainbent does. It leans a little saccharine, or at least feel-good; it has competent doctors and respects patient rights; in short, it's a best possible situation with the best intentions: to provide a heartfelt and helpful story about living with and recovering from mental illness, instead of dwelling in the horrors of lack of recovery or corrupt mental health systems. But on the whole it approaches its characters and their illnesses with knowledge and respect, fetishizing their diversity just a touch but managing to be accessible and hopeful and real.

And you know what, I still don't care.

It's not righteous indignation at this point: it's bitterness. It's me reading it at the wrong time, and taking it too personally; contrasting the resources of St. Lobaf Residential Treatment Center residents against oh wait I have none, contrasting mod's promise of a happy ending or at least that residents won't be left in misery against oh wait I don't have that either, contrasting any sort of it gets better against fuck you. Of course it's a stupid reaction, and two weeks ago I probably wouldn't be such an idiot about it; but one week ago I started a steady descent towards feeling like shit—because there's some minor real world stress going on, because my brain is really damn good at feeling like shit, and for no other reason—and so I don't identify or think it's useful or find it hopeful; I think it's trite, and that anyone who can be helped doesn't have it all that bad, and that anyone with hope is a fool.

And look at me all self-centered, immature, and did I mention an asshole?

No deep thoughts here, no conclusion. This isn't a recommendation for or against Brainbent—I found it compelling enough to read the whole thing (even if I probably shouldn't've), but I just can't pretend any sort of objectivity. Nor is this a condemnation of junkmail, who recommended the AU—I warned her that I might have this reaction, and that the reaction is all me and says nothing at all about it, and that if there's any fault in my anger it's my own because I just should have put it down until I was feeling better. It's just a realization that I too can have such an arbitrary and selfish reaction, and that in fact I often do, and that to be honest I'm just ... not doing that well right now. This is a roundabout PSA that I'm about one week of anxiety/nightmares/depression/dizzy spells, and a repeat realization that perhaps I'll never be able to find the distance I need in order to not internalize this stuff—because even these years later, I'm still too deep in it.

But Devon is here for the weekend, snoring on my bed while I try to figure out if I'm still boycotting sleep. August is in my lap, napping until I decide same. It's not as bad as my unrighteous indignation would suggest. It's just not awesome, either, sometimes, to be me.

I have pumpkin bread in the oven; maybe if we're lucky, Devon will use it to make cream cheese-stuffed pumpkin bread French toast this weekend. So with that good, some bad.

A few days ago Devon and I watched the Star Trek: Voyager episode Extreme Risk, an episode about depression and self-harm which just made me want to punch something. Consider it the antithesis of Doctor Who's Vincent and the Doctor (which I rambled on here), because what Voyager lacks is permanence: sure, they never forget that Neelix has just one lung, but near every episode a cast member goes through something traumatic and every next episode they've forgotten it all—not because there's no continuity, but because it remains episodic. And it should—if all the PTSD did accumulate, it'd be one hell of a depressing show—but it still has a deleterious effect on everything that they try to take seriously. The episode doesn't give B'Elanna a magical breakthrough, except that it does: in a week, it's as if it never happened. No lasting effects, all problems healed, no one dies at the end. Issues-of-the-week are well-intended and even the maudlin ones can be successful, but this one was not only Othering, it was heartbreaking: ah, of only I could forget in a week.

And then yesterday, Hyperbole and a Half posted Adventures in Depression, which was like a kick in the gut. As I explained it to Devon, there are something like four groups of people: Group 0 is never experiences major depression. Group 1 experiences depression with some sort of external cause, and gets over it when that cause resolves or passes. Group 2 experiences depression with no external cause, and gets over it when the episode passes or through treatment. Group 3 experiences depression with no external cause, and continue to experience depression in some form or another indefinitely. These definitions aren't absolute; in reality groups overlap or aren't groups at all. Depression also isn't a competition: having a cause doesn't make a depressive episode any better or worse, and overcoming it doesn't make your experience more or less meaningful. Group 3 doesn't "win."

But as better as I am these days—and I am—I have weeks like those in the last two which remind me that my version of "better" can often be everyone else's version of "not very good at all," and that isn't going to change. I'm in Group 3. I'm not doing all that I could to help myself, I'm not in therapy or on medication, but my non-life is basically as good as it's going to get. Despite that, I will always be sick. I will always backslide.

Allie hasn't had a Lifetime Movie breakthrough because those moments don't exist. Breakthroughs, such as they are, are arbitrary and small, and far from magical; even if they occur, they are hardly the end of the journey. Her experiences aren't lesser than mine. I don't win the misery Olympics. But it still stings like a bitch to know that I haven't had my bike ride of pseudo-victory, and I probably never will. It stings even more after such an accurate depiction of depression, because yes, it is like that; and while it's no longer that bad for me every single day, I know that any day in the future could be that bad and there's shit all that I can do about it.

I think there's nothing to jinx when I say am doing better, now. I wiped myself out just making dinner yesterday, so "better" still may not be saying much, but some of my energy and a fair bit of my joy are back, and I'm looking forward to celebrating Halloween and seeing Devon this weekend. The pumpkin bread smells fantastic. But I was feeling like utter shite for a fair few days back there, and this for me is indicative of so much. I'm the issue of the week. I'm the problem without a solution, the breakthrough that never does plan to come, the unforgotten traumatic event. That sounds pathetic, and self-centered, and it is. But it's also true, and the reminders of that which keep on popping up simply hurt.

Ghost and Aaron: Master List | Next Update


Just a picture from the end of the day before.

( The next day dawns with ghosts and a butterfly +23 pictures. )

Which is where I think I'll leave it for now.

I expected sex this time, I really did—but kept the boys busy and just didn't get around to it. It's odd—and here I ramble and go overly thoughtful considering this started with a video game (and this is massively navel-gazy and TL;DR. I am writing it because I need to screw my head back on straight. I will not be offended if no one reads it.): ( Some thoughts on the webcomic Friendly Hostility, with spoilers. )

And then here I am telling the story of a couple falling in love, not being in love—with full knowledge that I probably won't continue telling it too much longer after they reach that plateau because what I'm doing is playing a game and the shiny attraction of new sims will pull me away eventually. I find Ghost and Aaron's story fascinating because it is new, semi-taboo, full of waiting and stumbling and nerves—precisely because it is developing, not status quo. But my total anxiety after completely Friendly Hostility has reminded me that a relationship is more than that. Does slashfic, told in pictures or otherwise, necessarily need to be? Of course not. But in my head it is right now very important that Ghost, that Aaron, be more than just two people falling in love because I find it exciting.

( On Ghost, Aaron, and the nature of their relationship; on progression vs. platueas; on telling a story. )

So where was I before I slipped down that unending spiral of words? Oh yes, hair! I love the hairstyle that Aaron had (and Ghost still does), but when I stumbled upon this new one I had to try it out. I intended it for Ghost but it looked awesome on Aaron—so I had to get him to the point of New Hair. It's nice to see Ghost and Aaron a bit more physically different but really what it comes down to is oooooh shiny hair. (But what really tickles me about the new hair—other than my outright love for it, of course—is that Aaron was inspired by a guy I know here in the real world and this hairstyle is eerily similar to one he used to have.)

But Juu, you say: We need portraits showing off Aaron's new hair! You never post enough pictures of him! Well, if you insist.



( One more. )