It’s a real dinkum thinkum

[bironic]

Halloween vid is done! It’s not even the Halloween vid I meant to make (it’s The Nightmare Before Christmas instead of deathstravaganza, the latter of which will be for a Kink Bingo square), but it came easier. Now to see if I can hold off on posting it until Friday/weekend on the assumption that more people will see it then or if I give in, like, tonight.

.

Am about a third of the way through Robert Heinlein’s The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, which I picked up a couple of weekends ago for a dollar. It’s not bad. Interesting style. I like how it took time to assess Manuel’s intelligence because his narration is in Luna slang, and it’s fun that matriarchal poly marriages are standard because of the high male-to-female ratio in the colony.

On top of Ender’s Game and Jumper, though, I have had enough of male protagonists with violent arcs and casual misogyny. Next must be a change.

Was considering Ursula LeGuin’s Earthsea series, since I love me some Ursula LeGuin and that’s the only stuff by her on the shelf that I haven’t read yet, but it still focuses on a boy (Ged), no?

Would you care to share some fem-centric/fem-positive SF recs? I know you know more of it than I do, and growing up as I did on short stories of the ’50s-’60s, you can assume I haven’t read it. In the past I have liked Kate Wilhelm, Vonda McIntyre and Esther Friesner, but I’ve never read Octavia Butler or Lois McMaster Bujold, for instance. Fantasy also OK.

Maybe it’s time to dive into this Vorkosigan business. Or maybe it would go better for festivids if I waited a couple of months. :)

True story: I used to think Kim Stanley Robinson was a woman.

Comments

[thirdblindmouse.livejournal.com]

Oh hey, I just started the Vorkosigan series. TBH, I'm finding the Miles novels easier to get into than the Cordelia novels, and they all feature threats of rape against female characters (not approved by the narrative, of course, but as part of the horrors of war, etc.).

Looking at my bookshelf, the collection of books I actually own isn't very encouraging. It appeast most of the female-centric books I've read are either YA or unfortunate in retrospect (MZB, Anne McCaffrey). I assume you've read Tamora Pierce's work? Patricia C. Wrede? How about Margaret Ball (I love Mathemagics)? Greg Egan and Gregory Benford write hard scifi with equal treatment of female, male, and other, even if neither is particularly strong on characterization in general (Egan in particular). Charles Stross's Merchant Princes series stars a female character and her mostly female team of family and friends/employees. His Laundry Files series center on a male character, but they are at least female-positive...

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Oh God, are there different series within the Vorkosigan series? There'd better be an index somewhere.

Assume nothing! I have read no Tamora Pierce and haven't heard of Wrede or Ball. Any particular recommendations for the former two, since you've indicated one for Ball?

I think I've read some Greg Egan and don't recall being impressed. Maybe because of the characterization issue you mention.

Thanks for these tips!

[thirdblindmouse.livejournal.com]

I loved the Song of the Lioness tetralogy when I was little, and I still love them now. The first book is Alanna: The First Adventure, in which Alanna and her twin brother decide they each would rather have the other's educational path, so Alanna disguises herself as a boy and rides off to become a knight. They come with classy YA covers these days instead of the amazingly and inappropriately trashy paperback covers I read them in. A lot of people seem to think Tamora Pierce's later novels are better, but I disagree with them. She gets into her stride writing-wise, but the worlds she writes about end up feeling much less raw and more "kid-safe".

Patricia C. Wrede wrote, among other things, the Enchanted Forest series, starting with Dealing with Dragons. They follow the life of a Standard Fairytale Princess who hates embroidery and would love to do something else, like cook or swordfight, so she goes and ends up finding employment with a dragon, which her Standard Fairytale family and suitors think is very much Not Done. A lot of women rescuing themselves, people being practical about silly fairytale things, and defeating of evildoers with cleaning supplies.

As I said, I'm a newcomer to Vorkosigan myself, so I might have this wrong, but I believe most of the books follow either Cordelia or her son Miles, with a few books being more distant relatives. The first one chronologically is Shards of Honor, which stars Cordelia. The first Miles book is The Warrior's Apprentice, which starts more quickly. They all come in omnibus forms -- Cordelia's first few books in Cordelia's Honor, Miles' first few books in Young Miles.

ETA -- I forgot we live in the same place right now (though you might be getting these in ebook form for all I know). I've got both the omnibuses out from the Cambridge Public Library, so you can't get them from the library until I'm done. :P But I would be happy to lend you (give you? I might have ended up with multiple copies of some) any of the others, which I own.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Thanks much for this. I am pleased to have so many choices so quickly. Minuteman network to the rescue if my local branch doesn't have anything, and thanks for the offer of loans! I'll let you know, and/or we'll chat over lunch or something soon.

[kassrachel.livejournal.com]

I tend to feel like The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is some of the only Heinlein that really stands up to the test of time. I read all of his stuff as an adolescent and still love some of it for sentimental reasons, but seriously, a lot of it is pretty appalling to my sensibilities now. *wry grin*

I read the entire Vorgosigan-verse this year (like: since January) and I adored EVERY INSTANT, pretty much. I give those books a huge thumbs-up.

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

What this awesome lady said! (Though I don't at all disagree with the other comment on the Vorkosiverse... um, at least the rape/rape threats are not limited to female characters? My personal favorites of Bujold's women are the female quaddies in Falling Free, Cordelia in Barrayar --Cordelia is consistently awesome, but Barrayar is the utter height of her agency -- and Ekaterin, who is a badass normal who first appears in Komarr)

For SF&F about awesome female characters, I would definitely recommend Octavia Butler (Wild Seed, Kindred) and Diane Duane (The Wizard series).
.. apparently I should have made this its own comment. *blushes at kassrachel*

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the Octavia Butler titles and for mentioning Diane Duane—I've only read her Star Trek tie-in novels and didn't think to look outside that arena.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

This I recall from your posts. :)

I'm looking forward to giving them a try, whenever it happens. Maybe post-festivids will be better, when there's more time for immersion.

[zulu.livejournal.com]

For Ursula Le Guin, I'd start with a lot of her short stories for main female characters. Birthday of the World has a lot of classics in it. "The Matter of Seggri" is another take on a widely disparate male:female ratio society. "Solitude" really makes you stop and think. You get the sedoretu stories, and "Growing up in Karhide", and lots of other really good stuff. "Old Music and the Slave Women" is a low point, I think. Another collection of hers that I love is Changing Planes. The Dispossessed has a male protagonist but does some feminist things with him--how he reacts to his own privilege in different situations, for instance, and his self-awareness. A little bit sad on the gay character, though.

With A Wizard of Earthsea, yes the first book is about Ged, a headstrong, powerful, egotistical boy (at first). But the second book is about Tenar, a young girl, and the fourth, fifth, and sixth books all address women much more powerfully. As a series it's really worth it.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I'd forgotten about Tenar. Who in my mind looks like Kristen Kreuk because my only exposure to Earthsea was the regrettable Sci Fi Channel miniseries. (OMG, though, are there six books altogether? I only have three.) Other than that, I'm pretty well-read in LeGuin.

[zulu.livejournal.com]

Yay Le Guin! The second trilogy was written much later, after Le Guin had time to think about the world some more. The fourth book is about an older Tenar, and I believe the other two are collections of short stories set in the Earthsea world. One collection has stories set all throughout its history, including the founding of the wizard school, and the other collection is almost a loose novel that ties things up for Tenar and Ged and some other characters you meet.

[laurashapiro.livejournal.com]

An Alien Light by Nancy Kress
A Door Into Ocean by Joan Slonczewski
The Steerswoman by Rosemary Kirstein

Best three books I've read in the past ten years.

[eruthros]

Definitely seconding the Steerswoman series! I love it a lot.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Noted! Thanks for chiming in.

[ellen-fremedon.livejournal.com]

Thirding Steerswoman!

[bironic.livejournal.com]

And here I thought you'd go straight for Vorkosigan. :) Thanks!

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Ooh. Thank you, I will check those out—apparently starting with Steerswoman, going by popular vote. :)

[laurashapiro.livejournal.com]

You will not be disappointed!

[nightdog-barks.livejournal.com]

I remember liking Nicola Griffith's Ammonite when it came out in paperback several years ago.

Also I will strongly second what Zulu said -- Earthsea is absolutely worth reading. Beautiful writing, riveting story -- I still remember being totally enchanted with it when I was a kid. Her The Left Hand of Darkness is also well worth a read, with its gender-twisty characters.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Cool, I hadn't heard of Ammonite; will check it out. And thanks for the additional vote for Earthsea. The Left Hand of Darkness and The Lathe of Heaven are my favorite two novels of hers.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

ETA Oh my goodness, I should totally ask for a Lathe of Heaven vid next year for Festivids. The one with Bruce Davison, more than the one with Lukas Haas.

[flywoman.livejournal.com]

I really like Vonda McIntyre too. Also Anne McCaffrey's early Pern novels (especially Dragonflight, Dragonquest, Dragonsong, and Dragonsinger), unfortunate or no. I recommend the Earthsea series as well. And I love late Heinlein - once he got over his sex/gender hangups and started writing awesome female and queer characters: The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, Time Enough for Love, To Sail Beyond the Sunset. Ooh, and The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

My sphere of reference is small on Heinlein; just this and Stranger in a Strange Land, which I don't think I even finished.

Do you think The Mists of Avalon is something that can be appreciated when first read as an adult?

[flywoman.livejournal.com]

The other books I mentioned are more like the one you're reading, except without the Luna slang. They are basically Heinlein making fun of his own Midwestern conservative mores from the perspective of a wiser, more tolerant old age, I think. They're full of adventurous (sexually and otherwise), whip-smart characters and a lot of fun.

I think that I appreciated The Mists of Avalon more when I reread it as an adult. But it's difficult for me to imagine what reading it for the first time as an adult would be like.

I went back to my shelves and found a couple more recs: Daughter of the Empire by Raymond Feist and Janny Wurts and The Gate to Women's Country by Sheri S. Tepper.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Hey, thanks!

What I expect I'll do is bring the list with me next time I'm at the library and see what strikes my fancy. And/or read blurbs online and request what appeals most through interlibrary loan. Either way, what's been recced so far should keep me busy for a while. :)

[bell]

If you're ok with YA, I really enjoyed The True Meaning of Smekday.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Is that related to Red Dwarf? Oh wait, no, that's smeg. Also I called it Black Dwarf before catching self. Sigh.

(Hi. :) )

[mific.livejournal.com]

Holy Fire by Bruce Sterling is extraordinary and has a female protagonist. Here's the wikipedia link. Not religious (re the name). http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Fire_(novel)

[cincodemaygirl.livejournal.com]

Totally random, extremely late rec--have you read Sheri S Tepper? She's not really in line with the other recs you've gotten, and tends more towards somewhat-crappy fantasy, but I think Gate to Women's Country is worth your time.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

I have not read it, and this isn't late at all, since I've barely begun exploring what people have recced. Thank you!