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Recent reading
Jan. 26th, 2017 07:08 pmBlood in the Fruit by L. Timmel Duchamp (#4 in the Marq'ssan cycle)
This continues interesting. Again, I have never read books with such a focus on unequal-power relationships between women. Not in a kinky sense, but on the consequences on relationships of actual structures of power. The culture within different classes in society is pretty different in this future, so it doesn't really look like our world. For example, in the "executive class" (the ruling class in a world where nations have basically become corporations) the men undergo an operation to neutralize their sex drive, because it is thought to interfere with their capacity to do their executive jobs. The executive women never sleep with each other, but instead have unequal relationships with "service-tech" (=working class) women instead. And then characters from these social structures collide with the much more egalitarian culture of the Free Zone. Conflict ensues.
Oh, and I should warn that there is a very creepy father-daughter incest relationship. The daughter is sixteen, her father is super-manipulative and high up in the government but also in some way needs a woman to support him psychologically. Those parts are pretty hard to read. Also a previous book had prolonged scenes of (mostly psychological) torture, so yeah. Not light reading.
The Early Middle Ages by Philip Daileader (TTC lecture series on audiobook)
I listened to one of these lecture series on the French Revolution recently, and it left me wanting to read more history. I guess this is probably pretty basic stuff, but that's fine, I didn't know much about this period in history. Some episodes were a little too much about various kings and whatnot, but there were also really interesting sections on social and economic changes. After this book comes (surprise!) The High Middle Ages and The Late Middle Ages.
This continues interesting. Again, I have never read books with such a focus on unequal-power relationships between women. Not in a kinky sense, but on the consequences on relationships of actual structures of power. The culture within different classes in society is pretty different in this future, so it doesn't really look like our world. For example, in the "executive class" (the ruling class in a world where nations have basically become corporations) the men undergo an operation to neutralize their sex drive, because it is thought to interfere with their capacity to do their executive jobs. The executive women never sleep with each other, but instead have unequal relationships with "service-tech" (=working class) women instead. And then characters from these social structures collide with the much more egalitarian culture of the Free Zone. Conflict ensues.
Oh, and I should warn that there is a very creepy father-daughter incest relationship. The daughter is sixteen, her father is super-manipulative and high up in the government but also in some way needs a woman to support him psychologically. Those parts are pretty hard to read. Also a previous book had prolonged scenes of (mostly psychological) torture, so yeah. Not light reading.
The Early Middle Ages by Philip Daileader (TTC lecture series on audiobook)
I listened to one of these lecture series on the French Revolution recently, and it left me wanting to read more history. I guess this is probably pretty basic stuff, but that's fine, I didn't know much about this period in history. Some episodes were a little too much about various kings and whatnot, but there were also really interesting sections on social and economic changes. After this book comes (surprise!) The High Middle Ages and The Late Middle Ages.
