2020 Things
Dec. 20th, 2020 04:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jhameiaWHAT A YEAR AMIRITE
A quick rundown:
VISA SHENANIGANS:
Re-applied for the O1B; got approved. I was visiting Singapore at the time (it was fun!) and so didn't actually apply for a visa appointment until I got home, and even then I faffed about because I had to get a new passport since it was going to expire in a year or so.
Ten days before my visa interview, Malaysia went on its first COVID lockdown. I couldn't schedule a fresh appointment until late June, and by that time, the first available appointment was in January 2021.
(And that, too, has been cancelled, so my appointment is in March, because what the hell.)
EXERCISE:
I started playing Just Dance Now in my room, since I can't go swimming! For a time I was swimming very regularly at the Holiday Villa, and learned to go only at certain times of the day because otherwise the guy at the desk would get all "You need to pay bc you're a guest, not a member" since I was using my mother's membership card.
- I got a FitBit! It's an Inspire HR. I've gotten used to wearing it a lot, though I've stopped logging my water intake.
BLEH:
I do not like living with my parents. I wake up anxious in the morning waiting for my parents to quarrel and bicker and I don't go downstairs until my mom is gone because she's going to comment on my morning drink because it's too much sugar and just URGH. My dad knocks and comes in without my saying so or calls me for stupid inane things like "don't forget to take in the clothes when it's raining" or "flatten the boxes" or something that I would get to eventually, just not as quickly as he wants me to do it.
- I lost not just one, but TWO computers. My ASUS has konked out again despite promisingly working so well for a while longer. The novel I had been working on there in Scrivener is not completely lost? I still have an earlier draft with the first 1/5, but most of it was handwritten, and that handwritten material... is in California. There was also a short story draft that is now gone. I'll have to start it from scratch again--it was a difficult thing to work on though, so maybe re-starting will be better.
My old HP has also died, after about almost 10 years. The hard drive, comprising ten years of memories, is also gone, and I was so sure I had backed it up somewhere, but cannot for the life of me find the external drive. I've got bits and pieces here and there, and my writing folder is often backed up. I especially mourn the pictures I took in 2012 when I took my road trip across the States.
I'm now on one machine for both work and writing, and would like to change that. I'd like to get another ASUS T1 because the keyboard layout was very suitable for me.
GOOD:
- I made a sweet potato cheesecake. I should make another one.
- I've been doing more embroidery and invested in a 200-skein packet. I need to do more of it!
WEIRD:
- I'm now Vice-President for the Malaysian Writers Society?? I guess I am. I should do more stuff while I'm here.
- All in all, I'm a bit amazed that I've spent over a year in Malaysia now?? Since 2003, I haven't been back for more than a summer season. I'm definitely going to move the fuck out if I ever come back and re-settle here.
EDITOR THINGS
- The first two long-form debuts I ever edited have come out! THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES got like FOUR Starred Reviews, and NUCLEATION is such a fun space opera. They're both debuts as well, so that is also super cool. I also edited Marie Brennan's DRIFTWOOD, a fix-up novel, another first!!
- I'm also editing an anthology which has parenthood as its core theme. I'm quickly realising I... uh, would prefer working on an anthology where I get to pick out of slush, rather than one with a committed roster.
- I've also signed an NDA for a cultural consultant project.
- The last volume of HOW TO TREAT MAGICAL BEASTS that I'm adaptation editor of is out in March! I really enjoy this job, so I hope to have more chances to do that stuff.
- I was on a panel talking about food, colonization, and diaspora for the Carl Brandon Society!
- I was part of yet another Worldbuilding Master Class for Writing the Other. I think I'd like to re-visit the video and update it. I'll have to ask Tempest about that.
WRITER THINGS
I published four things this year:
"Trials by Whiteness: Definitions of Whiteness and Eurocentrism, and Their Relevance Post-RaceFail" at Strange Horizons: http://strangehorizons.com/non-fiction/trials-by-whiteness-definitions-of-whiteness-and-eurocentrism-and-their-relevance-post-racefail/
"Scholar Miaka’s Brief Summary of Memories Imbued in Memory Object Exhibit 132.NW.1" in RECOGNIZE FASCISM, ed. Crystal Huff: https://www.worldweaverpress.com/store/p171/Recognize_Fascism.html
CW: gendered violence, transphobia, slavery, physical & reproductive violence
"Mid-Autumn Incense" as part of Circlet Press' last Halloween Microfiction series: http://www.circlet.com/halloween-microfiction-mid-autumn-incense-by-september-sui/
CW: suicide
"In The Glass Hall of Supreme Women" at Fireside Fiction: https://firesidefiction.com/in-the-glass-hall-of-supreme-women
CW: body horror, misogyny, fungi
My 2019 short story "The Freedom of the Shifting Sea" got more press:
- reprinted in John Joseph Adams' BEST AMERICAN SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY 2020, guest edited by Diana Gabaldon: http://www.johnjosephadams.com/best-american/projects/best-american-science-fiction-and-fantasy-2020/
- Carl Brandon Society Parallax Award Honors List: http://carlbrandon.org/awards/
My friend Stephani Soejono and I worked on a listicle, "Top 5 Hunting Grounds This Summer Season" which features fake local places for man-eating mermaids to go hunting: https://curiousfictions.com/stories/3278-jaymee-goh-top-5-hunting-grounds-this-summer-season
My Curious Fictions is sadly neglected because I am no good at keeping up anything regular, apparently. I do like it a lot as a platform though!
I also finished a 128k-word draft of a novel, which started out as fanfic of How Raeliana Ended Up At The Duke's Mansion (which was a manhwa I was enjoying until recent episodes where it turns out the core concept is actually quite WRETCHED and I am FURIOUS) and I've since made it its own thing. I'm doing a major re-write which is currently at 98k words and that's probably 2/3rds of the way through. I was hoping to have a better draft by the end of the year but that doesn't seem to be happening? We'll see--I'm stuck at a character death right now but maybe I'll figure it out in a bit.
The quick pitch: "A promising young woman wakes up in the body of a side character from a murder mystery romance webserial. Thing is, this character's doomed to be fridged before the story even starts! Not to mention that for a romance, there is a very high, very politicised, body count. Our intrepid side character is off to discover secrets that fanlore could only guess at, and help the hero, a duke of the kingdom (of course he is!) stop his enemies before they get the better of him."
I'm also now on AO3! My handle there is septembersongs but I don't have much, just some Girl Genius fic and Strange Magic stuff.
A quick rundown:
VISA SHENANIGANS:
Re-applied for the O1B; got approved. I was visiting Singapore at the time (it was fun!) and so didn't actually apply for a visa appointment until I got home, and even then I faffed about because I had to get a new passport since it was going to expire in a year or so.
Ten days before my visa interview, Malaysia went on its first COVID lockdown. I couldn't schedule a fresh appointment until late June, and by that time, the first available appointment was in January 2021.
(And that, too, has been cancelled, so my appointment is in March, because what the hell.)
EXERCISE:
I started playing Just Dance Now in my room, since I can't go swimming! For a time I was swimming very regularly at the Holiday Villa, and learned to go only at certain times of the day because otherwise the guy at the desk would get all "You need to pay bc you're a guest, not a member" since I was using my mother's membership card.
- I got a FitBit! It's an Inspire HR. I've gotten used to wearing it a lot, though I've stopped logging my water intake.
BLEH:
I do not like living with my parents. I wake up anxious in the morning waiting for my parents to quarrel and bicker and I don't go downstairs until my mom is gone because she's going to comment on my morning drink because it's too much sugar and just URGH. My dad knocks and comes in without my saying so or calls me for stupid inane things like "don't forget to take in the clothes when it's raining" or "flatten the boxes" or something that I would get to eventually, just not as quickly as he wants me to do it.
- I lost not just one, but TWO computers. My ASUS has konked out again despite promisingly working so well for a while longer. The novel I had been working on there in Scrivener is not completely lost? I still have an earlier draft with the first 1/5, but most of it was handwritten, and that handwritten material... is in California. There was also a short story draft that is now gone. I'll have to start it from scratch again--it was a difficult thing to work on though, so maybe re-starting will be better.
My old HP has also died, after about almost 10 years. The hard drive, comprising ten years of memories, is also gone, and I was so sure I had backed it up somewhere, but cannot for the life of me find the external drive. I've got bits and pieces here and there, and my writing folder is often backed up. I especially mourn the pictures I took in 2012 when I took my road trip across the States.
I'm now on one machine for both work and writing, and would like to change that. I'd like to get another ASUS T1 because the keyboard layout was very suitable for me.
GOOD:
- I made a sweet potato cheesecake. I should make another one.
- I've been doing more embroidery and invested in a 200-skein packet. I need to do more of it!
WEIRD:
- I'm now Vice-President for the Malaysian Writers Society?? I guess I am. I should do more stuff while I'm here.
- All in all, I'm a bit amazed that I've spent over a year in Malaysia now?? Since 2003, I haven't been back for more than a summer season. I'm definitely going to move the fuck out if I ever come back and re-settle here.
EDITOR THINGS
- The first two long-form debuts I ever edited have come out! THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES got like FOUR Starred Reviews, and NUCLEATION is such a fun space opera. They're both debuts as well, so that is also super cool. I also edited Marie Brennan's DRIFTWOOD, a fix-up novel, another first!!
- I'm also editing an anthology which has parenthood as its core theme. I'm quickly realising I... uh, would prefer working on an anthology where I get to pick out of slush, rather than one with a committed roster.
- I've also signed an NDA for a cultural consultant project.
- The last volume of HOW TO TREAT MAGICAL BEASTS that I'm adaptation editor of is out in March! I really enjoy this job, so I hope to have more chances to do that stuff.
- I was on a panel talking about food, colonization, and diaspora for the Carl Brandon Society!
- I was part of yet another Worldbuilding Master Class for Writing the Other. I think I'd like to re-visit the video and update it. I'll have to ask Tempest about that.
WRITER THINGS
I published four things this year:
"Trials by Whiteness: Definitions of Whiteness and Eurocentrism, and Their Relevance Post-RaceFail" at Strange Horizons: http://strangehorizons.com/non-fiction/trials-by-whiteness-definitions-of-whiteness-and-eurocentrism-and-their-relevance-post-racefail/
"Scholar Miaka’s Brief Summary of Memories Imbued in Memory Object Exhibit 132.NW.1" in RECOGNIZE FASCISM, ed. Crystal Huff: https://www.worldweaverpress.com/store/p171/Recognize_Fascism.html
CW: gendered violence, transphobia, slavery, physical & reproductive violence
"Mid-Autumn Incense" as part of Circlet Press' last Halloween Microfiction series: http://www.circlet.com/halloween-microfiction-mid-autumn-incense-by-september-sui/
CW: suicide
"In The Glass Hall of Supreme Women" at Fireside Fiction: https://firesidefiction.com/in-the-glass-hall-of-supreme-women
CW: body horror, misogyny, fungi
My 2019 short story "The Freedom of the Shifting Sea" got more press:
- reprinted in John Joseph Adams' BEST AMERICAN SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY 2020, guest edited by Diana Gabaldon: http://www.johnjosephadams.com/best-american/projects/best-american-science-fiction-and-fantasy-2020/
- Carl Brandon Society Parallax Award Honors List: http://carlbrandon.org/awards/
My friend Stephani Soejono and I worked on a listicle, "Top 5 Hunting Grounds This Summer Season" which features fake local places for man-eating mermaids to go hunting: https://curiousfictions.com/stories/3278-jaymee-goh-top-5-hunting-grounds-this-summer-season
My Curious Fictions is sadly neglected because I am no good at keeping up anything regular, apparently. I do like it a lot as a platform though!
I also finished a 128k-word draft of a novel, which started out as fanfic of How Raeliana Ended Up At The Duke's Mansion (which was a manhwa I was enjoying until recent episodes where it turns out the core concept is actually quite WRETCHED and I am FURIOUS) and I've since made it its own thing. I'm doing a major re-write which is currently at 98k words and that's probably 2/3rds of the way through. I was hoping to have a better draft by the end of the year but that doesn't seem to be happening? We'll see--I'm stuck at a character death right now but maybe I'll figure it out in a bit.
The quick pitch: "A promising young woman wakes up in the body of a side character from a murder mystery romance webserial. Thing is, this character's doomed to be fridged before the story even starts! Not to mention that for a romance, there is a very high, very politicised, body count. Our intrepid side character is off to discover secrets that fanlore could only guess at, and help the hero, a duke of the kingdom (of course he is!) stop his enemies before they get the better of him."
I'm also now on AO3! My handle there is septembersongs but I don't have much, just some Girl Genius fic and Strange Magic stuff.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-12-20 05:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2020-12-20 08:32 pm (UTC)At some point I think we're going to have to collectively write The Fail, And What We Did After, but I've been too busy doing things, myself, to put a lot of attention into that project. I think it was a big mental shift even for those of us who recreate in speculative fiction rather than do it for a living. I know it had a big impact on my own professional practice.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-12-21 02:31 am (UTC)I sometimes feel like RaceFail was just a big conversation that's going to get forgotten in five more years *sigh* I think I'm seeing a lot of the same conversations happening again? It's kind of frustrating.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-12-21 03:01 am (UTC)I mean I know that in the US we're struggling around in a postapocalyptic hellscape and all but I'm afraid that after a long day of postapocalypticking I don't have the mental energy to do that with my recreational time as well and I just want, idk, something with swords in it where we're imagining that people can sometimes get along with each other despite being from different cultural backgrounds.
I had hoped that for the ten year anniversary someone would write a history of the Fail, but obvs I didn't do it and I don't think anyone else has, either. I see it as having kicked off SUCH a seismic shift in genre, but one of the outcomes of that is that many of us who got kicked are now very busy mid-career people. Which is actually great. If you had told me then that people would go on to write and do some of the things I've seen come out of that? We were a bunch of mouthy young people, mostly women, getting into fights on the internet. Who would have thought we'd ever.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-12-21 03:52 am (UTC)When you put it THAT way...... now I'm SUPER curious to see what's become of those of us picking those fights! I met
#10YrsPostRaceFail would work as a hashtag, right?
(no subject)
Date: 2020-12-21 04:07 am (UTC)For me it's a more complicated business, because I do not discuss fannish stuff at Dayjob (some work doesn't go on LinkedIn, lol, and most work stuff doesn't come over here) but what I do has absolutely been informed, for years now, by the Fail. And I know I'm not the only person like that, who's carried those lessons into other work whether or not we talk about it much in public.
I'm not on twitter any more but I'd be very curious if you want to run with it.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-12-21 03:58 am (UTC)It's probably why I've written almost 200k words of content because that's the kind of setting I'm writing where it's not like things are intensely terrible, but a setting where the status quo is actually okay!!!! it just has undercurrents of disruption because low-key corruption is routine but the status quo is to consistently look out for it!!!! And so it's my pleasure writing because I just.... don't see a whole lot of it outside of fandom. It's like misery is always commercially viable.
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