Elphrona Outpost

There's an odd duality to 2025 in that, while the year has been a very bad one for my country and for the world in general, it's been kind to me: I adopted my wonderful cat, went from a bad work situation to an excellent one, and moved into a much better apartment. So on a personal level, I'm looking back on the year fondly and hoping for more of the same in 2026, even as I fervently hope the coming year will be dramatically different on the broader scale.

Reading-wise, I was fortunate enough to pick up some real gems this year:

- I've already talked about A Canticle for Leibowitz here: it's a classic for a reason, and I think a good read for these times. Brilliant, moving, dark but never grim.

- Spiderlight, by Adrian Tchaikovsky, was recommended to me by fiona15351, whose taste is, as usual, excellent - this book is exquisite! Fiona described it as “a Last Unicornesque takedown of D&D alignments, with spiders” and noted that “there’s also a fireball-happy wizard.” The last is because she knows what I like - surprising exactly no one, Penthos was in fact my favorite character. One of the things I found structurally interesting about Spiderlight is that this is a book that doesn’t rely at all on surprise. I would go so far as to say nothing that happens is really surprising to the reader (though it definitely is to the characters!). Seeing things coming does not lessen their impact - if anything, it enhances it. I wouldn’t recommend Spiderlight to someone who hasn’t read a lot of fantasy, because much of the appeal lies in how Tchaikovsky plays with familiar tropes; I think at least some familiarity with the genre is required for full effect. But for someone who does have that familiarity, it’s a delight and I can’t recommend it more highly.

- I read Barbara Hambly's Windrose Chronicles books - the duology of The Silent Tower and The Silicon Mage, the sequel Dog Wizard, and Stranger at the Wedding, which isn't strictly speaking in the series but is in the same universe - and was immediately obsessed. I'd been dubious going in - '80s portal fantasy isn't something I'd have generally considered my cup of tea - but I really like a lot of Hambly's other works, so I gave it a try, and I'm so glad I did! This rocketed up the list to become one of my favorite book series ever, immediately. I love the wizard tropes, love the themes Hambly explores here (some of which are familiar from others of her books), and I even - unusually for me - really enjoy the romance between the protagonists, who are two extremely intelligent and pretty strange individuals meeting, perhaps for the first time, someone else who is operating on the same wavelength.

- Better late than never - this year was the first time I read anything by Jane Austen! I read Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion, at Fiona's urging, and definitely preferred the latter. (The yearning! Marvelous!)

- Other highlights included Ann Leckie's Translation State, which was excellent and may be my favorite Leckie yet, and Le Guin's short story collection The Compass Rose, out of which I loved best "The Author of the Acacia Seeds" and "Mazes."

I didn't write much this year - outside of work, at least. I posted two fics, one for the Silmarillion and one for Star Wars, both as part of exchanges and both written before I transferred to my current bureau in mid-May, so to the extent I predicted I might be writing more after the switch, I was wrong; the same goes for being more active here on DW. The day job has just kept me really busy, but it's the good, worthwhile kind of busyness.

So farewell, 2025, with gratitude for the good things you brought. And here's to the new year: May it be kinder than the last.