#LHoD

[ringneckedpheasant]

watercolors by trans artist tuesday smilie

[queereads-bracket]

FINAL: Queer Adult SFF Books Bracket

Book summaries and submitted endorsements below:

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

A groundbreaking work of science fiction, The Left Hand of Darkness tells the story of a lone human emissary to Winter, an alien world whose inhabitants spend most of their time without a gender. His goal is to facilitate Winter's inclusion in a growing intergalactic civilization. But to do so he must bridge the gulf between his own views and those of the completely dissimilar culture that he encounters.

Embracing the aspects of psychology, society, and human emotion on an alien world, The Left Hand of Darkness stands as a landmark achievement in the annals of intellectual science fiction.

Science fiction, classics, speculative fiction, anthropological science fiction, distant future, adult

The Locked Tomb series (Gideon the Ninth, Harrow the Ninth, Nona the Ninth, and others) by Tamsyn Muir

Endorsement from submitter #1: "An extremely fun, humorous romp! A heart-breaking, soul crushing catharsis inducing tragedy! A thoughtful piece on imperial structures and trauma. On queerness, Muir flawlessly and without announcement, cracks gender open like an egg and spills its disproven guts across the page. The Locked Tomb does it all also bones, bitch."

Endorsement from submitter #2: "Lesbian necromancers in space. So many fascinating, sort of fucked up sapphic relationships going on."

The Emperor needs necromancers.

The Ninth Necromancer needs a swordswoman.

Gideon has a sword, some dirty magazines, and no more time for undead bullshit.

Brought up by unfriendly, ossifying nuns, ancient retainers, and countless skeletons, Gideon is ready to abandon a life of servitude and an afterlife as a reanimated corpse. She packs up her sword, her shoes, and her dirty magazines, and prepares to launch her daring escape. But her childhood nemesis won't set her free without a service.

Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House and bone witch extraordinaire, has been summoned into action. The Emperor has invited the heirs to each of his loyal Houses to a deadly trial of wits and skill. If Harrowhark succeeds she will become an immortal, all-powerful servant of the Resurrection, but no necromancer can ascend without their cavalier.

Without Gideon's sword, Harrow will fail, and the Ninth House will die. Of course, some things are better left dead.

Fantasy, science fiction, horror, mystery, humor, series, adult

[estravens-tits]

- The Left Hand of Darkness out of context

[junefiress]

speaking of left hand trying to draw gethenians with all their androgyny is trult the genly ai experience minus a hot alien to pine over and maybe make it more bearable. smh my head

[meadowlarkx]

[anjael]

TLHOD SECRET SANTA 2023 - MASTERPOST

From top:

1.By Cat for Naq

2. By Anj for Wyatt

3. By Saffy for Sophie

4. By Wyatt for Saffy

5. Together We Come into the Hearthplace by Naq for Anj

6. Beechnuts by manny for cat

7. Driving out the Frost by venndaai for manny

Thank you to everyone for taking part! <3

[degenerate-perturbation]

If I had a nickel for every time I was profoundly emotionally compelled by a book about two people, one a cisgender man and the other some kind of genderstrange not-quite-human, who are very pointedly not having sex, traversing a glacier under difficult circumstances and experiencing profound transcendent connection with one another, concluding with one of their crushing deaths, then I would have two nickels. But still odd , happened twice ,etc

[iwritesometimes]

the only AI y'all need to be concerning yourself with is Genly Ai

is this anything

[saturnisms]

the greatest legacy i’ll ever have

[vincentpriceofficial]

The first time I read lhod i experienced it as a tragedy about never being able to reach full true understanding of another person who’s experiences are very different from your own

This time I’m experiencing it as a horror story about love. I’m like, absolutely viscerally gripped with horror about genly’s love for estraven and his inability to protect him or throw away all his other responsibilities to be with him and. the. The crushing inevitability of loss that resides within all love

[queereads-bracket]

SEMIFINALS: Queer Adult SFF Books Bracket

Book summaries and submitted endorsements below:

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

A groundbreaking work of science fiction, The Left Hand of Darkness tells the story of a lone human emissary to Winter, an alien world whose inhabitants spend most of their time without a gender. His goal is to facilitate Winter's inclusion in a growing intergalactic civilization. But to do so he must bridge the gulf between his own views and those of the completely dissimilar culture that he encounters.

Embracing the aspects of psychology, society, and human emotion on an alien world, The Left Hand of Darkness stands as a landmark achievement in the annals of intellectual science fiction.

Science fiction, classics, speculative fiction, anthropological science fiction, distant future, adult

Imperial Radch series (Ancillary Justice, Ancillary Sword, Ancillary Mercy, Provenance, Translation State, and other stories) by Ann Leckie

Endorsement from submitter: "Breq/Justice of Toren is a ship AI and doesn't have a gender. The Radchaai language only has one pronoun for people, so (almost) everyone in the empire is she/her, to the point that they're infamous for failing to correctly guess which pronoun to use with outsiders."

On a remote, icy planet, the soldier known as Breq is drawing closer to completing her quest.

Once, she was the Justice of Toren - a colossal starship with an artificial intelligence linking thousands of soldiers in the service of the Radch, the empire that conquered the galaxy.

Now, an act of treachery has ripped it all away, leaving her with one fragile human body, unanswered questions, and a burning desire for vengeance.

Science fiction, space opera, far future, series, adult

[estravens-tits]

My favorite moment

[vir-adahlen]

The Left Hand of Darkness is truly like What if a man was sent to make contact with an alien planet and when tasked to write a report about it was so overcome by his relationship with one alien from said planet that he was incapable of writing the report as anything but a tragic gay love story and tells the reader as much in the first paragraph. And they both were they/thems

[meadowlarkx]

estraven was so real for these

[anjael]

TLHOD SECRET SANTA 2023 - SIGNUPS OPEN

Yes, it's that time again!

As always, even if you aren’t participating, I’d be very grateful if you could signal boost by re-blogging!  I’ll also be cross-posting to my Twitter *here* so RTs much appreciated if you’re on there ~

What’s a Secret Santa?

For those who have never done a Secret Santa before, the way it works is you submit a gift request, which goes into a pool which is then randomised. The randomised requests are then handed out to the participants.

So basically, its Mystery Gift! Everyone draws/writes a gift for someone. You won’t know who it’s for, and you won’t know who is doing yours! Then at the exchange, the completed gifts are handed out anonymously to whomever they belong, via email.

Sounds good, where do I sign?

Send your email applications right here!   ->  tlhodsecretsanta@gmail.com

What do I write in my  application email?

1. Your name / tumblr tag / most used social media - a link to your blog would also be helpful so I know who you are and can contact you if emails are not working or something. A link to examples of your work (art tag, etc) is also appreciated!

2. Preferred gift rating.  NSFW requests are totally okay as long as they are not offensive/racist/sexist but if you’d like something NSFW, please also provide a SFW alternative request as not everyone is comfortable producing such content. If you don’t mind receiving NSFW but would prefer not to submit it, please tell me and vice versa.

3. Your actual request!  If you prefer shipping/non shipping, please include this in your signup email. Please try to word your request so that it can be filled by either an artist or writer, if possible, as your gift-giver is randomly assigned!

Examples of requests  (just for reference, there’s no required format):

- something with your fave pairing / a particular scene

- an AU you’d like to see (please provide some details)

Your requests don’t have to have any particular theme, request whatever you like!

4. Whether you would be able to pinch-hit (fill an extra gift if needed).

5. Whether you would like to remain anonymous to your gift recipient and/or on the master-post of entries (which will be posted up on Tumblr a few days after gift exchange)

———-   DEADLINES   ————–

Applications Close:  29th October 2023, 00:00 GMT

Prompts Sent Out to Participants: by 1st November 2023, 00:00 GMT

Gift submission: 20th December 2023, 22:00 GMT

(Please submit your completed gifts to tlhodsecretsanta@gmail.com)

Gift Exchange: 22nd - 24th December 2023 (TBC)

———-      RULES/GUIDELINES     —————–

- Don’t be a butt. (generally the best rule to live by)

- Complete the gift using your MAD SKILLS, be it drawing or writing fanfic! If you have other cool magic abilities like animating, you’re welcome to use those too!

- Please submit completed works only. Your gift should be fully coloured if it’s art (unless you are specifically doing a monochrome / inked piece), and properly formatted, spell-checked and at least 1,000 words if it’s a written piece.

- For written pieces, google doc links/word documents are fine for the email exchange, but if you want me to include your fic in the tumblr master-post please bear in mind you need to post it somewhere link-able such as AO3.

- if you are submitting NSFW art, AO3 hosts art too and can be a good alternative to tumblr/twitter restrictions.

- Please don’t post any completed gifts on your blog before the gift exchange date!

- if the deadline is approaching and you know you won’t be able to submit your piece in time, please tell me as soon as possible so I can arrange for someone else to fill your assigned prompt.

- if you’d like to remain anonymous, please tell me (there will be master-posts of all the submissions a couple of days after exchange)

- I’ll be tracking the tumblr tag ‘tlhod secret santa 2023’.

There’s also a Discord group - please let us know if you’d like an invite!

[mjjune]

Happy STS! What is the best novel you've ever read? What did you like about it, from a storytelling perspective? Has it influenced or informed your own approach?

Oh man, so many.

Recently, I would say my favorite was The Left Hand of Darkness! Which is, ya know, from 1969, and very old-fashioned in its storytelling and is 80% telling rather than showing, with whole chapters written almost like an academic journal article.

But honestly, I think it being in that style was what made it stand out compared to most modern scifi/fantasy I've read, and I personally have never minded telling (even though most would send me to my grave for saying so).

It did influence me in the draft I'm currently writing, because there was an issue with the way biological sex vs. gender was being handled in my current wip, basically because I didn't have the guts to do something similar to Ursula. But reading Ursula's, and realizing that something like that was published in 1969, pushed me to doing that direction for my own book which really made all my worldbuilding and themes I'm exploring fall into place.

But narratively? Not so much, I think, just because I don't see myself ever using such a science-y nonfiction-y way of writing.

Thanks for the ask!!