Chris Sharp > Recent Status Updates

Oof.

531-538 clash of the philosophies (new ver)
538-548 growing horror

469: Beautiful, heartfelt, and hilarious
489: Unmitigated horror

AA meetings

The YDAU Interdependence Day Eschaton

317-321: The 'learning to choose' /freedom-from/to conversation feels like it sits at the heart of this thematically

Three pages in, calls out neoliberalism... you sonofabitch, I'm in

Playing with subchapter and section headings? Cute

This was not the book to read if I wanted to meet my goodreads target for 2024

Fuuuuuuuuuuu-

I started this series back in 96; to be honest, I don't know why I stuck with it back then, as I was a terrible skim reader.
I'm frustrated by how poorly this has been promoted; the ten volumes leading to this encompass a story of grand scope; the writing is beautiful, and rich with themes. She's accomplished a remarkable thing, and so here, nearly thirty years later, I begin the end.

Long time between updates; I'd misplaced it.
This should be something I'm into but I'm finding it a slog; it might be due to using body systems as a framework metaphor for exploring connections between the health of people, community, and environment?

-Oceans Eleven(th metal)
-Obligators and Inquisitors are really into Smoking cessation

Was doing this by audiobook but it got remvoed from the Spotify Premium selection at the start of the month :/ Will miss his tones but probably best to read it anyway as I'd had to stop several times for exercises that couldn't be completed in-car.

Also, while trying to work out what accent his has, discovered he lives in Melbourne, which is weird.

*rolls dice* Come on, give me another 'The Power'-level concept! Book left me with a sense of dread and claustrophobia for weeks.

This is compelling, in a Christopher Nolan, skirting the edge of a cosmic horror puzzlebox kind of way

I can see the criticisms about the book's applicability outside of cishet relationships but I daresay cishets probs need the help with heteropessimism/heterofatalism.

Paused because I've put it somewhere during our move and I haven't found it yet

Wasn't expecting this to be such a slog. Definitely in contention for the rare 'Film is Better' Prize, and half of it is because point of view predominantly sits with someone thoroughly unlikeable, a misanthrope sitting in the filth of his own unprocessed guilt. Rather unlike the usual with film-as-text conversion, I think the addition of a character for the film also serves the themes of the story better.

This book is messed up.

FMG and it's representation aren't just bad; they're *exhaustively* bad. The next time someone tries telling me creativity is innately good, I'm pointing to this.

The tug of war between government (ministerial, regulatory, judicial) bodies over representing Yindjibarndi vs FMG interests too; Tony Burke MP just showed up, gives me another reason to not like the guy.

46 pages in and I'm already asking why we let Andrew Forrest in on any aspect of the national conversation.

Disturbed by the ending of Timebox, though I can't tell why.

It's eloquent and moving; the majority of the book so far is given over to the 18 months Thomas Mayor spent touring the artwork and gathering support, and by telling this tale as a series of vignettes/interviews with local Traditional Owners and community leaders, he really centers the issues at a personal level.

I was ten pages in when I first thought that this was going to be a Sad Book, and so far that's been the main colour in the mood palette.

Chapter 2: People Speaking Out
Some names to remember; chiefly, Pearl Gibbs. Kevin starts the chapter with "'human rights' tend still to be accorded to minority groups according to their capacity to demand same", and shows the truth of it over a generation's change in speaking out about injustices imposed by white Australia. The harms of government 'stewardship' of wages echo to today's cashless welfare card.

Chapter 1: Race Memories.
Glad the foreword prepped me for some of the anachronistic language, as I found caste descriptions to be jarring. Passionately written; it's all so very sorrowful, and the injustice of our history bleeds brightly from the pages.

Re-reading; this is one of my oldest adult fantasy books, and it's a shame I can't show you how battered it looks. I honestly have no fucking clue how I worked through a half dozen books in this series from Grade 5 onward; the prose is dense and relies upon an extended vocabulary which didn't combine well with my tendency to skim read.

All of which makes for a surprise this re-read, as it feels easier than Malazan.