- a spider weaves, weaves
- Posts
- #14 — a spider weaves, weaves
Hello again,
My novella BUT NOT TOO BOLD is finally out! It’s a very short read blending fantasy, mystery, romance and a tiny bit of gothic:
The old keeper of the keys is dead, and the creature who ate her is the volatile Lady of the Capricious House—Anatema, an enormous humanoid spider with a taste for laudanum and human brides.Dália, the old keeper’s protégée, must take up her duties, locking and unlocking the little drawers in which Anatema keeps her memories. And if she can unravel the crime that led to her predecessor's execution, Dália might just be able to survive long enough to grow into her new role. But there’s a gaping hole in Dália’s plan that she refuses to see: Anatema cannot resist a beautiful woman, and she eventually devours every single bride that crosses her path.
If you’re interested in knowing more about the book and the creative process behind it, here are some interviews, Q&As and even a podcast:
Interview on Dannie Lynn Fountain’s newsletter
Q&A with the Los Angeles Public Library
Interview on Paul Semel’s blog
Q&A on Nerd Daily
Interview on the Turn the Page Podcast
Column on John Scalzi’s The Big Idea
There’s more coming out next month, including an interview on Locus Mag tomorrow, where I had the pleasure of chatting with Arley Sorg.
See you next month,
Hache 🕷️
Cold Nights of Childhood 🇹🇷 Çocukluğun Soğuk Geceleri
(Tezer Özlü, 1980, trans. Maureen Freely)
Shifting from different cities in Turkey to Paris and Berlin, Cold Nights of Childhood chronicles autobiographical fragments of the author’s experiences as a girl and young woman.
Özlü’s style is labyrinthine, blending past and present from one sentence to the other in a hypnotic haze. The narrator’s childhood home, her lovers, the cafes filled with political conversations, the psychiatric clinics. All is one and the same. The parts focused on the long-lasting electroshock treatment—torture, really—she was subjected to for years are particularly harrowing (as are all the ways in which the hospitals dehumanized her and other patients), but this brutality is beautifully woven with descriptions of a rapidly changing world, her love for life, and her wry humor.