Julia Ember’s
Ruinsong isn’t quite the novel I thought it’d be. The cover copy gave me to expect more court intrigue, but that may be a function of having read far more non-YA than YA novels and
Ruinsong is very much a YA novel in the mode of
find your inner moral strength and overthrow tyranny while falling in love. This is an excellent mode when well-done, and
Ruinsong does it rather well indeed.
As an aside: I do understand, from a marketing and category-labelling perspective, why cover copy uses such phrases as “LGBTQ+ romantic fantasy” and while I suppose it is possible to be or have been all of L, G, B, and T during one’s life but I have this terrible tendency to break out into unhelpful laughter when “LGBTQ+” is immediately paired with “two women.” (Or “two men,” for that matter.) I feel like we’re
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M.A. Carrick is an open pseudonym for writing team Marie Brennan and Alyc Helms. Brennan’s track record needs scant introduction, with twelve books to her name including, mostly recently, the acclaimed Memoirs of Lady Trent series and its spin-off sequel
Turning Darkness into Light. Helms is perhaps less well known, though they have previously published two solo novels, 2015’s
The Dragons of Heaven and 2016’s
The Conclave of Shadows.
The Mask of Mirrors is the first novel to come jointly from their pens, and it reminds me strikingly of the Astreiant novels of Melissa Scott and the late Lisa A. Barnett’s Astreiant novels, albeit more in worldbuilding and tone than in characters and concerns.
I recall writing a Most Anticipated post in previous years that was full of excitement and optimism. This year, well, I’d like to pretend I’m excited. I know there are good books coming in 2021. I
know it. Right now, what I’ve got is the teeth-gritted determination to last long enough to read some of them and appreciate the experience. And that? Well, that’ll have to substitute for excitement.
Roll on a comprehensive vaccine programme for 2021!
And also good books. There are so many good books coming out this year that I’m anticipating with determined pleasure, in fact, that this will be an extra-long installment…
);
Aoife Martin: There are few people as expert in their own healthcare as trans people are - we have to be
Our new columnist writes about the importance of listening to trans people when it comes to healthcare, sparked by a recent visit to the doctor’s. By Aoife Martin Thursday 31 Dec 2020, 7:00 AM Dec 31st 2020, 7:00 AM 11,894 Views 0 Comments Aoife Martin
I HAD OCCASION to visit my GP just before Christmas, something I had avoided doing in these Covid-19 times, not wanting to burden my doctor unnecessarily.
I had been suffering for a number of months with intermittent pain in my lower left abdomen. Doctor Google had diagnosed me as having diverticulitis, a kidney stone and with not sitting correctly at my desk.