Goddamn China Miéville making me cry at the concept of a metaphor.
Anyway read Embassytown it's a perfect book
The thing is that when most authors try to write about how language is cool and magical and important it comes off as cheesy or self-aggrandizing. When Miéville does it? He makes me feel it.
Do you follow any blogs or podcasts about literature, writing, or individual books or authors?
I don't know if I "follow" any of these but they are in my rotation for whenever I feel like listening to a podcast.
Also if anyone else has recs, I'd love to hear them
Overdue is "a podcast about the books you've been meaning to read." Every episode the hosts take turns to read a book that they've been meaning to get around to and tells the other about it. The non-reading host does research about the author and the context in which the book was published, etc. I like it because they read a wide range of genres and years of publication and etc and they have interesting and fun conversations about it.
The Worst Bestsellers is reading the popular books that suck and talking about them. They have branched out and started reading non shitty books sometimes, and also every once in a while they surprise themselves actually enjoying the books, which is always fun.
Unresolved Textual Tension is three hosts reading and reviewing the same book. I like it because they go a bit more in depth than most reviewers and even if I disagree with them, they give me a better idea of whether I'll like the book or not. Or they may help me realize things about a book I've already read. Linked to their Patreon but they put their episodes up on YouTube and podcast feeds for free.
Rite Gud they are kind of the "contrarian" podcast to the mainstream speculative fiction industry and community. They've introduced me to great literary magazines and I find their analysis to be well thought out and insightful most of the time
Publishing Rodeo is less about writing and more about the traditional publishing industry. The two hosts published their debut novels with the same publisher, but one of them got a huge advance (and her career exploded) and the other got a tiny one (and his career stagnated) it's an interesting look at how different parts of this industry work, especially because it's such a secretive industry.
Missing Pages is mostly famous publishing industry drama. Like people faking their identity, scammers, etc.
Start With This is no longer releasing new episodes but they have a good backlog. It's pretty much a creative writing class by the guys that did Welcome To Nightvale and Alice Isn't Dead. It's aimed at creating audio narrative but by no means do they limit themselves to talk about podcasts. Every episode they chat about a specific thing in art and writing and they use examples from books, movies, theater, music, visual art, etc. At the end of each episode you get a two part assignment: something to read or listen to or watch. And something to create. Whenever I feel creatively stuck I go back to listen to any episode that sounds interesting and do the assignment. It usually helps.
Me, wisely: "I have a tendency to write forever and go on a lot of tangents trying to cover every angle of a topic and that's why it's hard to write a not-review of the Old Farmer's Almanac. I'll focus on this one specific aspect, which is the one I find the most interesting anyway."
Me, drowning in the same amount of words and tangents but this time related to the thing I find interesting: "by Talos this can't be happening"
So when I was a kid I dreamt of being an author the same way I dreamt of being a Power Ranger. Then I grew up and realized "oh shit, people can just become writers, nobody can stop you. So I started writing.
I love writing, enough that I kept doing it and I started to get involved with other writers and with the publishing industry.
And since then, my dreams have gotten smaller and smaller every year.
