Reading

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books: newbery

Most Peculiar Newberys

rachelmanija asked about the most peculiar Newberies. This list has a lot of overlap with my post about Nonsense in the Newberys, since nonsense books are by definition usually pretty peculiar, but also they’re peculiar on purpose which perhaps takes away some of the weirdness.

But the Newbery book that most sticks in my mind for sheer and possibly unintentional strangeness is Peggy Horvath’s Everything on a Waffle. I mentioned this book in the Nonsense post as perhaps nonsense-adjacent, but I’ve never made up my mind whether it’s meant to be or not.

It’s tonally very weird. Everything on a Waffle got a Newbery Honor in 2002, which was peak Grim Dead Relative era for the Newberys, and generally speaking these books are mired down with Grim Dead Relative Feelings. The protagonists grieve so hard that there’s no room for anything else in the story.

However, although Everything on a Waffle begins with our heroine losing her parents at sea, there is no Newbery Grieving Process. Our heroine is blithely convinced that her parents have merely been shipwrecked somewhere, and will return in good time, and meanwhile she’s enjoying life in her weird little town. There is, for instance, an award-winning restaurant where everything is served on a waffle, hence the title.

It’s been quite some time since I read the book, but what has stuck with me for years is the way that the heroine just keeps bopping along no matter what happens. It’s not that she’s Pollyanna-ish exactly. It’s more that she’s aware that she’s in some sort of picaresque tale and doesn’t take it too seriously when she comically loses appendages: a finger here, a toe there.

Eventually, social services decides that a competent guardian would do a better job keeping the child in one piece, and our heroine is removed from her kindly but inept relation and taken into care.

But then! Her parents reappear! Our heroine was right all along. They were alive, they have been rescued, and the family is whole again, minus of course a few of the heroine’s fingers and toes.

Simply a strange book! Very peculiar! It isn’t really a nonsense book, because unlike the true nonsense books there’s nothing technically impossible happening. But it all seems so improbable that it has something of that dream-like nonsense book feeling anyway.

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bookses precious

The Nameless Land, by Kate Elliott

Review copy provided by the publisher.

This is the second half of what is being called a duology, with The Witch Roads as the first half of the story. I would say it's less a duology than a novel in two volumes. The first volume ends on a cliffhanger, and the second picks up basically immediately with no reintroduction to the characters, setting, and plot. So: one story in two volumes, now complete.

There were things I really liked about this and things that left me cold. I feel like the pacing was weird--the chapters are short, but that didn't really obscure how many pages were spent on basically one argument. I also found the ending deeply unsatisfying--the situation of having a character possessing other people was basically glanced at as problematic and then embraced as a happy ending that was entirely too convenient for all involved.

But the return to our protagonist Elen's past home, illuminating it with her adult eyes, was really well done, and I liked the courage and strength shown by the child she encountered there. I love having a fantasy that has an aunt/nephew relationship as one of its emotional cores. This duology simultaneously locates itself centrally in the secondary world fantasy genre of the moment and branches out to do things that I'm not seeing a lot of in other fantasy of this type.

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wax on wax off

The No Longer Littlest Black Belt Takes the Next Step

Nine years and eight months ago, I earned my black belt in shōrin-ryu karate.

Today, I became a second degree black belt.

It was supposed to happen sooner. But right when the head of my dojo began saying that maybe it was time for me to prep for testing, a pandemic started. Which put a dent in my training. And even once classes began again, various factors meant I wasn't able to go regularly. And then 2024 was, in hindsight, a rather abysmal year for my health. And and and, spring of this year rolled around, and I realized I was in danger of it being ten years since my previous test, and dammit, I did not intend to let that milestone pass without me at least trying to take the next step.

There were more than a few hurdles along the way. I've had wrist problems for years that meant I hadn't been doing kobudo (weapons training), but you're expected to do that as part of your test. So starting in August I began a crash course, scraping the rust off the sai kata I was expected to perform -- not too bad; it was one I used to know well -- and, uh, learning from scratch a long and difficult bo kata that I did not know in the slightest. I went so gung-ho on that, in fact, that I managed to give myself a repetitive stress sprain in my right ankle five weeks before the test (bear in mind that sprains take about six weeks to heal . . .). And then, to put the cherry on top of that sundae, I caught my big toe against the mat nine days ago and basically re-activated the hellacious sprain I had in that joint some years previously.

As I put it to several people, by the time I got to the test, I felt like I was being held together by chewing gum. Not even duct tape: that would have been an upgrade.

But these higher-level tests can only be done when our dojo's founder is in town (he moved back to Okinawa a few years ago), and his next visit will likely be for the seminar in April of next year. That would be past the decade mark I was determined to beat. So, come hell or high water, I was going to drag my sorry carcass through the test -- and I did! And, barring a couple of utterly bone-headed errors brought on by nerves (which got knowing nods of "yep, that happens" from other black belts later), I did acceptably well. I faced down literally an international panel of seven sensei -- Shihan being in from Okinawa, and also we have a contingent of Germans from one of our sister dojo here for the fall seminar -- whose collective belt rank totaled well over forty degrees, and I achieved ni-dan status.

You don't get a new belt, of course. It's still the same black belt as before. But there's kind of a joke that a truly experienced black belt becomes a white belt again, because over time the black threads fray and break, revealing the white canvas core underneath, so that a truly high-level sensei's belt can be tattered indeed.

And this afternoon, after I passed my test . . .

. . . I glanced down at my belt . . .

. . . and I found a tiny frayed spot on the corner of one end where the white canvas is peeking through.

I consider it my ni-dan badge. ^_^

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/u7LBNv)

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New Worlds: Circumcision

Nearly all of the essays for the New Worlds Patreon this month are going to be talking about genitals or other explicit topics, beginning this week with circumcision. You have been warned; now comment over there!

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/hYcOsz)

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opportunity food

Opportunity Food

At our house, Opportunity Food is defined as what you can make when you can't stand up that long today.

Currently, is Bowl o' Cronch:

take bowl
spread some nut butter on bottom/sides of bowl (note: INsides, not OUTsides) - today is peanut butter
throw some dried fruit at nut butter if you got some - today is raisins and some crystallized ginger
put in puffed brown rice (or whatever you got)
add milk, or if no milk, a couple really big spoonfuls plain yogurt
anything else you got that seems appetizing
get big spoon
eat

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Health Natter: still resting like a potato. also, possibly useful bureacracy

We are still getting through COVID.
We are still resting LIKE POTATOES.
(Still funny. Every time.)

A helpful person pointed out it is still open enrollment time for health insurance.
Well then.

Have inquired with health insurance broker.
(It doesn't cost anything. If you are in Minnesota or Wisconsin, and need one, I have references.)
There are things that can be done, it looks like.

For right now, though, my tasks:

Wash a few dishes - DONE
Have brekkie - IN PROGRESS
Take meds - IN PROGRESS
Sit Up because it helps breathing - IN PROGRESS

OK. Onward.

P.S. Love all of y'all. You are still the best.

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Electric Sheep online reading!

On November 12th, 8 p.m. Eastern (5 p.m. Pacific, 1 a.m. UTC), I'll be the Guest of Honor for a session of the Electric Sheep online reading series -- for poetry! Yep, I'll be reading my Hugo poem, "A War of Words," and possibly something else if time permits. But I won't be alone: my fellow finalists Mari Ness, Ai Jiang, Angela Liu, and Oliver K. Langmead will be joining us, along with Brian U. Garrison (the president of the Science Fiction Poetry Association) and Brandon O'Brien, who was Poet Laureate for the Seattle Worldcon. So it's a heck of a lineup!

Attendance is free, but you do have to register in advance, and space is limited. If you're interested in joining us, sign up now!

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/DgpOvt)

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Wednesday Reading Meme

What I’ve Just Finished Reading

Already posted about Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire, and there’s been nothing else of note.

What I’m Reading Now

Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. This is a LOT of undersea description, and sometimes I’m enjoying it and sometimes I’m like “That list of fish is LONG ENOUGH, Verne.” But the main thing pulling me along is the question “Captain Nemo, what is your DAMAGE?”, and also the source of his fabulous wealth.

Although I just learned the answer to this latter question in the most recent chapter! Retrieving the treasure from long-ago shipwrecks, of course. And he’s funneling the funds to revolutionary movements around the world, double of course, peak 19th century activity right there.

Also, I’ve discovered that the twenty thousand leagues of the title refer to the length of the voyage, not the depth, as twenty thousand leagues is apparently many times deeper than the actual depth of the ocean.

What I Plan to Read Next

My hold on Sachiko Kashiwaba’s The Village Beyond the Mist is finally on its way! I put this book on hold back in May or June, and it’s been dawdling because apparently it was too new to leave its home branch even though no one checked it out for ages and AGES… but finally it’s coming to me! The book apparently inspired Spirited Away (it looks super different though, so I’m not expecting any super direct relationship) so I’m looking forward to reading it.

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Health Natter: COVID, and continuing to REST LIKE A POTATO

Have had food. (Soup!) Have had meds. Vented on Bluesky, where I am

lionesselise. Am about to rest again for a while. LIKE A POTATO. If a potato could crochet, anyhow. I'm in a mood for a little crocheting before sleepage.

Love you all.
You are the best.

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Health Natter: insurance switchover bites me hard: stuff already in progress has bad timing

Because I recently turned 65, there were changes in my insurance.
I now have Blue Cross Blue Shield, which I used to have some years ago before I got switched to a different insurance.
They have now denied a med that is a cornerstone of why I am feeling better and breathing better these days.

The switch happened after my August birthday.
All the other meds are (allegedly, and I do believe them) on the way from the mail order pharmacy (who were good when I used to use them).
This med has been denied by insurance, which is BCBS. Even after special authorization, which they told me I needed, they denied it.

Am almost out.

(Yes, this is the med that the other insurance company kept only filling for one month, despite my doc writing a three-month scrip every frikkin time. Yes, this is one of the things I worry about running out of, because it matters a lot.)

Also you may imagine bitter laughter as various med and scheduling people explain to me that the insurance is apparently requiring the patient, me, go in to meet with the doc. The agoraphobic patient, these days. Though we did get to "virtual visit is acceptable," which is good, before we got to "the first virtual visit possible is a while after patient runs out of meds" which is not.

This stuff is what I was already making calls on and trying to handle before I got COVID. The two together is just a really horrible coincidence.

(Even if we did try to switch me to the insurance that was fine with it before (like Blue Cross Blue Shield was actually fine with it a few years ago when I had it!), there's no guarantee we won't run afoul of some new rule.)

There are options being looked into, for which details will be scant and the passive voice, for the moment, will be employed.

I do not have words that will cover exactly how I feel about this insurance bullshit. However the person just now taking the note to give my doc did write down faithfully that "patient is worried that without this med, she may not be around to keep this appointment," which is at least something I guess.

I am hungry. (I am the king now and I want a sandwich?) Actually what I want right now is soup. I wonder if I can stand up long enough to microwave some. Gotta put some food in or the meds might bounce, and it's meds time.

Grrrrr.

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Health Natter: COVID: Jelly Turtles from Spain

Still have COVID.
Still continuing.
Still resting like potatoes.
(With the caveat that I do get up and sit in a chair for a while each day, because my body needs that for some things.)

Today's things included talking on phone with multiple people at new insurance/pharmacy/et cetera.
Cried twice.
This is harder than it actually needs to be.
Told them, when they asked if med was medically necessary, that I like breathing and wished not to give it up.
(I DUNNO, WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU GUYS THINK, IS A MED THAT HELPS WITH MY ALLERGIES AND MY ASTHMA POSSIBLY IMPORTANT WHEN I AM IN ACUTE COVID RIGHT NOW? WHY COULD THAT POSSIBLY MATTER, RIGHT GUYS?)

Paxlovid mouth-taste is evil.
Only have to get through tonight and tomorrow and however long the aftertaste lasts.
Am combating it with gummy candies.
Decided why the heck not.
About to open bag of jelly turtles that tells me they are from Spain.
O jelly turtles from Spain, I put my hope in your benevolent tastiness.

Thank you all for being here.
Good words help a lot. Maybe tell me something good from your life today?
I like hearing about good moments.

I do have plans.
They are not vengeance unless vengeance is making really good art.
I just have to get well enough to realize them.
Meanwhile, jelly turtles from Spain, and also some weird blueberry planets that are freaking huge.
And you all. I like you people. Hello, people!
I may be slightly giddy again.

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Book Review: Interview with the Vampire

Last week, I expressed some disappointment about Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire, as I had hoped to be catapulted into a new obsession, but once I accepted that the obsession wasn’t to be, I actually did enjoy the book a lot. And it was super interesting comparing it to the 1994 movie, which Anne Rice wrote the screenplay for and apparently LOVED - like, “she took out a full page ad for the movie in the NYT” level of love.

Many of the changes are just streamlining. For instance, in the book both Louis and Lestat start out with living family members, who no longer exist in the movie (also movie Lestat is IIRC supposedly much too old to have living family members at all), and there’s also a section where Louis and Claudia go to eastern Europe searching for vampires but find only mindless undead bloodsucking revenants, which is cut in the movie to send them straight to Paris and Armand.

But there was one significant change I found fascinating: ( spoilers )

Many people have told me they liked The Vampire Lestat more than Interview with the Vampire, so I plan to read that next Halloween. Then possibly Queen of the Damned the Halloween after? Although let me know if you think I should either stop after The Vampire Lestat or else extend my purview to include any of the later books.

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health natter: "rest like a potato!"

The "rest like a potato!" protocol continues
and so do we.

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Health natter: Still COVID, still restine LIKE A POTATO

Juan and I still exist. We are still resting like potatoes, as the delightful advice I was given has it.

Paxlovid is quite something, and I see how people are tempted to overdue activity once it kicks in. Me, I will be sitting up long enough to have breakfast (my wake-up time had precessed around to 2-3 p.m. anyhow), taking morning meds including the aforementioned Paxlovid, sitting up for my body to do things that being upright facilitates, and then I will go back to assiduously RESTING LIKE A POTATO.

Still funny every time.

Entry tags:

bookses precious

Books read, late October

Philip Ball, The Water Kingdom: A Secret History of China. A history of China through its rivers. And other water, but really mostly rivers. Gosh they're important rivers. Some of it was more basic than I hoped, but the part where he talked about the millennia-long conflict between the Confucian and the Daoist views of flood management--that's the good stuff right there. That's what I need to think over.

Lois McMaster Bujold, Testimony of Mute Things. Kindle. A neat little murder mystery fantasy novella, earlier in the Penric and Desdemona timeline than most of the others in the series. I really like that Lois is feeling free to move back and forth in the timeline as fits the story she wants to tell.

Traci Chee, A Thousand Steps Into Night. Demons and time loops and complicated teenage relationships with oneself and others, this was a lot of fun.

Max Gladstone, Dead Hand Rule. The latest in the Craft sequence, and hoo boy should you not start with this one, this is ramifying its head off, this is a lot of implication from your previous faves bearing fruit. I love middle books, and this is the king--duly appointed CEO?--of middle books, this is exactly what I like in both middle books generally and the Craft sequence specifically. But for heaven's sake go back farther, the earlier Craft novels are better suited to read in whatever order, this has weight and momentum you don't want to miss out on.

Rebecca Mix and Andrea Hannah, I Killed the King. A fun YA fantasy murder mystery, better as a fantasy than as a murder mystery structurally but still a good time with the locked room and the suspects and their highly varied motivations. Are we seeing more speculative mysteries? I kind of hope so, I really like them.

Lauren Morrow, Little Movements. This is a novel about a choreographer who gets a chance to work slightly later in life than would be traditional, of a group of Black artists who deal with insidious racism, of a woman who has miscarried and is trying to put her life and identity and romantic relationship back together. In some ways it's a very straightforward book, but also it's a shape of story I don't think we get a lot of, the impact of being all of the people in my first sentence at once. It's a very intimate POV and nicely done.

Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, Our Dear Friends in Moscow: The Inside Story of a Broken Generation. The authors were journalists in Russia early in the Putin era and had a front row seat to watching people they respected and trusted become mouthpieces for Putin, and this is that book. Unfortunately I think some of the answer to "how could they do this" was that many of them--as described by Soldatov and Borogan!--were already those people, and Putin gave them the opportunity to be those people out loud. I was hoping, and I think they were hoping, for more insight on how someone could become that person; what we got instead was insight into how some people already are and you don't necessarily know it clearly. Which is not unuseful, but it's not the same kind of useful. Anyway this was grim and awful but mostly in a very grindingly mundane way.

Serra Swift, Kill the Beast. Discussed elsewhere.

Amanda Vaill, Hotel Florida: Truth, Love, and Death in the Spanish Civil War. Amanda Vaill does not like Ernest Hemingway any better than I do, bless her, but when she picked her other subjects in writing about a group of journalists and photographers in the Spanish Civil War, she was apparently kind of stuck with him. Did that mean she learned to love him? She sure did not, high fives Amanda Vaill. Anyway some of the other people were a lot more interesting, and the Spanish Civil War is.

Jo Walton, Everybody's Perfect. Discussed elsewhere.

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Health natter: COVID: REST LIKE A POTATO

Well, it was a good run. I managed to avoid getting the damn thing for more than five years. But it got me.

Am doing sensible things, and have a virtual visit with my GP (or I guess they call 'em PCPs now),and we shall see what she says. Meanwhile, my favorite advice from friends is REST LIKE A POTATO.

Juan has it too. And he was already disabled with Long COVID.

OK, heading towards sleep again.

Good wishes very much appreciated.

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fic,
memes

Alphabet fic meme

This meme has been going around Dreamwidth lately, and who am I to resist a meme!

Rules: How many letters of the alphabet have you used for [starting] a fic title? One fic per line, 'A' and 'The' do not count for 'a' and 't'. Post your score out of 26 at the end, along with your total fic count.

A — Angels with Dirty Faces (Winter Soldier, pre-war Steve & Bucky)
B — Birds of a Feather (Lord Peter Wimsey Mysteries + Inspector Alleyn Mysteries crossover, Harriet & Troy, 3100 words)
C — Chicken Soup (Agent Carter, Peggy Carter & Daniel Souza & Jack Thompson, 1200 words)
D — Dreams in Damask (Code Name Verity, Maddie remembering Julie, 1100 words)
E — Everything Is Awful: The Film Critiques of James Buchanan Barnes (Winter Soldier, post-WS Bucky gives the darkest possible reading to every film he sees, 4400 words)
F — A Final Parting (Anne of the Windy Poplars, unrequired Katherine/Anne, 740 words)
G — Give Me Your Hand (Winter Soldier. The series is Steve/Bucky eventually but this fic is one of their nadirs. 5600 words)
H — How to Be a Better Dictator (technically Hunger Games fic but actually historical/literary musings on how to succeed at dictatorship, 7200)
I — In Case of Emergency, Break Glass (Winter Soldier, Hydra-wins AU where they keep Steve in a glass case in the Smithsonian, 500 words. So scarring that someone wrote a fix-it fic. Very proud of this fact.)
J — Just Deserts (And Both Were Young, 1000. I wrote this for Yuledite and I’m afraid to reread it because I suspect it’s awful.)
K — Kissing Lessons (Anne’s House of Dreams, Anne/Leslie, 1300 words)
L — Look for Me by Moonlight (The Wounded Name, Aymar/Laurent, 1800 words)
M — Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary (Winter Soldier/Agents of SHIELD, Bucky/Skye-ish, 9000 words)
N — Nymphs and Bacchantes (Villette, Lucy/Ginevra, 1700 words)
O — Out of the Cold (Winter Soldier, pre-slash Steve/Bucky, 700 words)
P — Perfection Salad (American Girl: Molly McIntyre + Poirot crossover, Poirot visits the McIntyre family, 600 words)
Q — Questions (Vikings, Athelstan/Ragnar Lothbrok/Lagertha, 1700)
R — Reunion (The Changeling - Zilpha Keatley Snyder, Martha & Ivy, 2500 words)
S — Shackled (Agent Carter, Dottie Underwood, 700 words)
T — Tea for Two (Black Widow trailer, Yelena/Natasha, 1600 words. Really jossed by the movie itself)
U — The Unlikely Traitor (The Lost Prince - Frances Hodgson Burnett, Marco Loristan and the Rat and political drama, forever chasing the high of writing this serial, 14,600)
V — Virgin Martyrs (Vikings, Athelstan/Ragnar Lothbrok, 1300 words)
W — A Worthy Foe (Iron Man II, Natasha Romanov & Pepper Potts, 700 words)
X —
Y — Yalta (Hetalia, Russia & England & America, 1800 words)
Z —

Like so many other people, it was X and Z that tripped me up.

Maybe we should have an X and Z fic challenge. Rules: the fic must have a title at least vaguely related to its content that starts with X or Z. Anyone have any prompts you’d like me to try? (I’d also go for a J, just to relieve my shame of “Just Deserts.”)

Some title suggestions:

X Marks the Spot
X-Ray Vision
Xylophone Blues

Zero Tolerance
Zero Gravity
Zeno’s Paradox

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New Worlds Theory Post: Real Biology Is Stranger Than Fiction

It seems fitting for Halloween that the traditional fifth-Friday New Worlds Patreon theory post should focus on weird critters -- but in this case, real ones! Let's talk about drawing inspiration for science fictional and fantasy species from the aliens we share a planet with: comment over there . . .

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/HJO91g)

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(no subject)

The other Polly Barton-translated book I read recently was Asako Yuzuki's Butter: A Novel of Food and Murder, which I ended up suggesting for my book club on account of intriguing DW posts from several of you.

Butter focuses Rika Machida, a magazine journalist, on the cusp of becoming the first woman in her company to break the glass ceiling and join Big Editorial, who decides that her next big feature is going to be an insider interview with the infamous prisoner Manako Kajii. Kajii is accused of murdering several men that she met on dating sites after seducing them with a fatal combination of sex, personal attention, and French cooking; in the eyes of the public, however, her greatest crime is that she somehow managed all this femme fatale-ing while being Kind Of Fat.

After a tip from her best friend Reiko -- a housewife who quit her own promising career in hopes of starting a family -- Rika, despite having no previous interest in cooking or domesticity, writes to Kajii about getting her recipe for beef stew. This opens the door for a connection that gets very psychologically weird very fast; Kajii, behind bars, tests Rika with various little living-by-proxy challenges -- eat some good butter! go to the best French restaurant in town! eat late night ramen! after having sex! and tell me all about it -- and Rika, fascinated despite herself, allows herself to be manipulated. For the interview, of course. And also because it turns out good butter is really good, and that eating and making rich food for herself instead of working to keep herself boyishly thin (the prince of her all-girl's school! One of the Boys at work!) is changing her relationship to her body, and her gender, and to the way that people perceive her in the world and she perceives them.

This is more or less what I'd understood to be the plot of the book -- a sort of Silence of the Lambs situation, if the crime that Clarice was trying to solve by talking with Hannibal was societal misogyny -- but in fact it's only about half of the story, and societal misogyny is only one of the big crimes under consideration. The other one is loneliness, and so the rest of the book has to do with Rika's other relationships, and the domino-effect changes that Rika's Kajiimania has on the other people in her life. The most significant is with Reiko, which is extremely fraught with lesbian tension ( spoilers I suppose ) But there's also Rika's mother, and her boyfriend, and the older mentor that she has secret intermittent just-lads-together meet-ups with in bars to get hot journalistic tips; all of these relationships are important, and usually ended up in places I didn't expect and that were more interesting than I would have guessed.

Not everything landed for me about this book, but this was one thing it did pretty consistently that I appreciated -- Rika would think about something, and I would go, 'well, that was didactic, you just said your theme out loud,' and then the book and Rika as protagonist would revisit it and have a more complicated and potentially contradictory thought about it, and then we'd go back to it again, and it usually ended up being more interesting than I would have thought the first time around. It's a long book, possibly too long, but it's equally possible I think that it does need that space to hold contradictions in.

It was however quite funny to read this shortly after Taiwan Travelogue -- another book I have not written up and should probably do so soon -- and also shortly after What Did You Eat Yesterday and also seeing a lot of gifsets for She Loves To Cook and She Loves To Eat ... fellas, is it gay to be really into food? signs point to yes!

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stupid vertigo

Vertigo writing workshop!

Exciting news! I've been working all year on a vertigo arts project, collaborating with people in academia, physical therapy, puppetry, and dance. Now I'm running a creative writing workshop for people directly or indirectly affected by vertigo to process some of their experiences through the written word.

SUNDAY NOVEMBER 23 at 1100 a.m. Central Standard Time (5 p.m. GMT). This workshop is FREE TO ATTEND with funding provided by the Impact and Innovation Fund of the University of St Andrews, Scotland--but we do ask that you register in advance! For more questions or to register, please email ar220@st-andrews.ac.uk

We will draw on some of the complexities, difficult symptoms, and feelings that characterise the condition such as loss of balance, mobility, disorientation, dizziness, anxiety, impact on social relationships, etc. You will be given some prompts to work with, but you will be encouraged to write at your own pace, using forms or technique that are most comfortable to you.

I know that this doesn't apply to many/most of you, but please spread the word to anyone you know who DOES live with vertigo or someone who has vertigo. This is not the last thing I will get to tell you about from the vertigo arts project--this is just the beginning of the cool stuff we've been doing.