lmao I actually said on here "I won't talk about Cromwell again until 2015" well guess what time it is.

The Mirror and the Light isn't out yet, though.

anyway, thoughts on recent things read:

[The Drunken Botanist] by Amy Stewart

read this one if you love plants, biology, weird tidbits of knowledge, gardening, or alcohol.

don't read it like a novel- it's kind of an encyclopedia of various plants used in the making of alcoholic spirits, and you can skip around.

there are many interesting tidbits of scientific and cultural information in there (as well as gardening and bartending tips that not everyone can use)

I definitely learned many things from apple genetics to how Chinese liquor almost set the Nixon white house on fire

[Jagganath] by Karin Tidbeck

lovely little short story collection of tales of weirdness and magical realism, self-translated by a Swedish author

the self-translation in this case may be a little too cautious, but it's still enjoyable

there's a tidiness to it, unlike [At the Mouth of the River of Bees] which it is oft compared to (and where you can practically feel the despondency and sensitivity in every line)

this one is often much more fable-like, with a tendency to delight in lack of solutions but not necessarily suggest a profundity behind them

it depends on your own preference which style you'd like more, this collection is also quite short so you can breeze through it in a day

currently reading: stuff by H.P. Lovecraft because why not

it's interesting to see how a lot of traditions in "weird fiction" and horror started

the writing and attitudes are a bit dated but he did have a vast imagination and some novel ideas for the time