The Corvid Cabaret

Mori: our headspace has started having weather and seasons, but it’s not as marked in changes as out here. It gets cold enough to snow sometimes but rarely sticks, it gets up to maybe eighty, warm but not HOT, and while it rains more often than it snows, it’s pretty much never windy. Rawlin has slept outdoors here her entire life (a woman her size finds human-size dwellings claustrophobic) and is fine; between her fur coat, a poncho, and her winter den above the hot springs, she’s always been able to make herself comfortable.

But this summer has been hot, and she’s been fronting way more, leading us to learn that she overheats pretty quickly. Makes sense, since she barely sweats.

What’s more, she SHEDS. Still not as bad as our roomy cat, though.

Mori: as a reward for getting through some crummy medical shit, I trawled a used book store for lady speculative fiction! (We’ve realized that it’s a lot easier to let ourself buy it with the glee that even if WE don’t enjoy it, the sci-fi library insures OTHERS will! And while the sci-fi library is well-stocked with “traditional” sci-fi publishers, it is really lacking in speculative work for queer and women’s presses and such.) I have taken on three of the four now...

1. “Sultana’s Dream”, by Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain. 1905 Bengali Muslim biting satire about a carless future society where women rule and all the men have to stay indoors and never be perceived by humans outside their servants and immediate family. The edition I had shared the short story and then all the historical, cultural, and personal context as to WHY the story got made, who the author was (a feminist who fought hard for women’s rights in now-Bangladesh) and why it matters. Very historically interesting and edifying! (Also, for real, I do love the fantasy of Garden Future where all roads look like gorgeous garden paths because cars don’t exist and everyone moves by walking or floating helicopter/zeppelin thingies! In 1905, a carless future was imaginable! When the narrator regrets treading on such pretty flowers, another character tells her not to worry, these are special street flowers that can’t be harmed by feet!)


2. Return to Isis, by Jean Stewart. 1992 lesbian separatist post-apocalyptic matriarchy story. Didn’t finish; everyone was just kind of unpleasant to each other, and if you’re going to write evil rapist men, I damn well require you understand how misogynist rape works. (I am probably the equivalent of the lawyer going “ugh” whenever they have to watch a courtroom drama, when it comes to the study of human sexual douchebaggery, though.) First book of five book series; maybe she got better as she went on, but I have other books to read!


3. Madame Aurora, by Sarah Aldridge. 1983 historical novel about two girlfriends in their seventies at the turn of the last century who, struggling with money and disability, decides to set one of them up as a spiritual advisor, and the events that follow. I really enjoyed this one! Old ladies who still bang! Sordid history! Is it psychic or is she just really intuitive? What’s the deal with that scabby old Colonel? Aldridge does a good job, I think, of writing even unpleasant characters with an understanding of why they are how they are. Refreshing!
   

All that remains now is Katherine V. Forrest’s Daughters of a Coral Dawn. Forrest is apparently a better mystery writer than sci-fi (and I read one and liked it!) but I am willing to give it a shot and declare it library-worthy if I can’t stand it.

A successful booking!