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PaperclipPerfector  16d ago (text post)   2461 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for April 6, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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So, what are you reading?

Still on my backlog. Retrying Korzybski's Science and Sanity. Getting interested in General Semantics again. Lovecraft moving slowly.

About a third of the way through The Door by Magda Szabó. I'm not loving it so far. In its focus on the blossoming platonic love between a woman and her housekeeper (who, to me, simply comes off as an insufferable, unpleasable bitch), it's definitely "women's fiction" in the same way Elena Ferrante's books are, so maybe I'm just not the target demographic for this sort of thing.

The Mauritius Command. Somehow Aubrey now has kids.

I wish the series were better spread out over the Napoleonic Wars, but I guess the author didn't realise how popular the series would get when he started writing it and timeskipped too much to cover the best bits of the wars.

I finished up Incurable Graphomania. After reading harassment architecture, I'm in a minor self-published author vortex. I saw this title....somewhere? Recommended? and bought it on only the basis of that, the title, and the cover art.

The blurb on the back is accurate. It intrigued even my wife. The writing is exactly what you'd expect based on the author's name. I see the same cadences, themes, and texture in many of the posts here from those who have hail from Russia or the baltic states.

This unfortunately means that despite the variety in subject matter, the short story collection felt very similar throughout. Anna did not utilize the technique I see from other collections like this where symbols are shared, or an overriding universe. It fixates on the geographic area near Washington D.C.. I've never considered it worth it to have a deep cultural knowledge of this region, so that effectively meant nothing.

The stories are consistently good. Light horror, dry comedy, irony, sadness. One of them was admittedly so awful that after a paragraph I scanned the rest, saw that it was just a jumble of meaningless words, and moved on.

For this post, I scanned another much more fawning interview/review to reference if you're on the fence. I have not finished it (longer than some of the short stories) but I respect her and enjoyed my time reading it.

4/5?

I'm now reading Gateway (Expeditionary Force 18). 12 Miles Below: Warlock was good and interesting, can't wait for book 6 there!

First 42 pages of Gates of Fire - fictionalized account of the Spartans holding the gate at Thermopylae - was banging. Ripped right through them last night … not really sure why I thought there would be weird prose.

Nothing ground breaking but I could read stories about soldiers being soldiers forever.

Basically an injured Spartan tells the tale of the Spartans to Xerxes after the battle.

Big fan so far.

I was fortunate enough to read this book near two decades ago, well before 300 vomited "SPARTA" into every corner of popular culture. I remember it being absolutely excellent, right down to the very last page.

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