Rat 🛸

sooo fun to read. Clark Henley is a joy, the humour (while sometimes very dated) did really get me, and I looove the photographs. Great to read something like this that's prior to the full swing of the AIDS epidemic. Clark Henley your humour and insight will be remembered!!

As someone who wants to be more masc, this is so reminiscent of internal conversations with myself sometimes (don't cross your legs, speak in monotone etc).

omggg this queer thruple need to learn some basic self-preservation these guys were stressing me out!!!

love this continuation, the introduction of ART and world-building. Hope we get more developement of sex-bots and general bot-gender in the future.

This one was so silllayy but I still enjoyed a lot. I had a really vivid dream last night that i was in a strange house like this so I got the Immersive Experience.

I wish there were more pictures/blueprints tbh but I dont know what point it would serve.

Matt Parker is so fun, I love when someone is just obsessed with maths and problem solving.

Some excellent stuff, mixed in with stuff that I already knew and some stuff I don't think necessaily works as well in the written medium. I saw Matt Parker in person at the fringe and I think his enthusiasm and visualisations come across a lot more fun in that way. Kind of would have preferred the audiobook but then I wouldn't be able to see the diagrams?

fave bits of maths from this - imagined 4D aliens, different infinities, knot theory, mobius loops.

Fluctuated between thinking that this was brilliant and that it was extremely shallow. I think I landed towards the latter, but I did find it a really interesting read, and thought it had interesting things to say about acceptable seeing suffering as noble, and praising people rather than actually helping them. I thought a lot about Sarah Z's new videoessay on 'misery memoirs', where she talks about how feeling strong emotions from reading about 'noble' suffering can absolve people from feeling guilt.

I found both Pannonique and Zdena to be interesting characters but I'm not sure what to make of Zdena's arc and her predatory desire for Pannonique.

The book seems concerned with asking questions about what makes a person good and evil, and whether someone can be redeemed. I don't think it tackles this with much insight, and not much insight about concentration camps either. I wish Nothomb could have told this story in a way that just centred media/public response to horrors, because I think that was what was most interesting about this book.