Kestrell

Our guests of honor are Ursula Vernon and Jeffrey Ford, and our memorial guest of honor is Vonda N. McIntyre. We’ll also celebrate the careers of Carol Emshwiller and Rick Raphael, winners of the Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award for 2019 and 2020 respectively.
Read the announcement and further details on the website:
http://www.readercon.org/RC31virtual.htm

Kes: There's a surprising lack of overlap in these lists, aside from a number of us loving the character of Miles Vorkosigan in the books by Lois McMaster Bujold that was the character who inspired me to write my thesis on images of disability in science fiction)

Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction issue
edited by Elsa Sjunneson, Dominik Parisien, Nicolette Barischoff, S. Qiouyi Lu and Judith Tarr. Uncanny.
https://www.amazon.com/Uncanny-Magazine-Issue-24-September-ebook/dp/B07GV6TBMN/ref=as_li_ss_tl?keywords=disabled+people+destroy&qid=1565232671&s=gateway&sr=8-1&linkCode=sl1&tag=bogireadstheworld-20&linkId=911a07f0f17fd94297d1a93bd2c483b7&language=en_US

Disabled People Destroy Fantasy, edited by Katharine Duckett, Lisa M. Bradley and Nicolette Barischoff. Uncanny.
https://www.amazon.com/Uncanny-Magazine-Issue-30-September-ebook/dp/B07X2CBZ4T/ref=as_li_ss_tl?keywords=disabled+destroy+fantasy&qid=1576735622&s=books&sr=1-1&linkCode=sl1&tag=bogireadstheworld-20&linkId=f4fe86d5fa8c8ae4f51e9e8defa40f55&language=en_US

A Short List of Science Fiction & Fantasy That Celebrates Disability, by Elsa Sjunneson-Henry
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/sci-fi-fantasy/short-list-science-fiction-fantasy-celebrates-disability/

Disabled Heroes and Where to Find Them, by Elsa Sjunneson-Henry
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/sci-fi-fantasy/disabled-heroes-find/

DISABILITY AND BODY POSITIVITY FOCUSED SFF ANTHOLOGIES – A COMPREHENSIVE LIST, by Bogi
http://www.bogireadstheworld.com/disability-and-body-positivity-focused-sff-anthologies-a-comprehensive-list/

Devices and Desires: Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Disability in Literature for Young People, by Jane Stemp
Disability Journal Quarterly
Winter, 2004 Volume 24, No. 1
https://dsq-sds.org/article/view/850/1025
Thoughtful overview of children's fantasy and science fiction from the 1960s through 1990s, with a notable list for further reading.
Note: searching Disability Journal Quarterly
https://dsq-sds.org/
for "science fiction" produces many more results.

ed. Disability in Science Fiction: Representations of Technology as Cure, by Kathryn Allan New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. 217 pp. $95.00 (cloth), ISBN
Tor includes an excerpt
https://www.tor.com/2013/08/15/disability-in-science-fiction-excerpt/

Disability and Neurodivergence in Fantasy and Science fiction, from The Illustrated Page
https://www.theillustratedpage.net/disability-and-neurodivergence-in-fantasy-and-science-fiction/

Some Science Fiction/Fantasy with Disabled Characters, by Liz Henry, author of _Unruly Islands_ (Aqueduct Press)
https://bookmaniac.org/2018/12/08/some-science-fiction-fantasy-with-disabled-characters/

Finally, here is an annotated bibliography connected to my thesis, _Decloaking Disability: Images of Disability and Technology in Science Fiction Media_
Note: When I wrote this in 2006, there weren't many resources on disability in science fiction and fantasy, so I felt I had to begin at the beginning, by focusing on early instances of these intersections, from _More Than Human_ by Theodore Sturgeon through the original "Blade Runner" film.
http://www.panix.com/~kestrell/DecloakingDisabilityBiblio.html

So we missed Readercon this year
I organized a virtual Readercon with some friends so we could discuss what books we had been reading lately. Here's the list, with some additional comments by me. Note: ssorry I only began mentioning Bookshare/NLS availability starting around halfway through the list.

A Song for a New Day by Pinsker, Sarah
Available on Bookshare.org, and on NLS as an audiobook

Fritz Lieber "Coming Attraction", Our Lady of Darkness
Story about a man who gets caught up with occultists in San Francisco? and has a scene which explains why we no longer sleep with piles of books in our beds.
Available on Bookshare.org (Kes recommends geting the ebook which also includes "conjure Wife"), also available on NLS as an audiobook

Podcast "Our Opinions are Correct"

Audiobook Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi Audiobook

Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

Wings of Fire by Tui T. Sutherland

A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness
"dashing geneticist vampire" [it says so on the book jacket]
Enthusiastically panned by Kestrell, who had to review it when it first came out

The Magnus Archives
Enthusiastically recommended by three of us. The narrator has a *great* voice. This is like the old-school M. R. James/Algernon Blackwood kind of horror, with no violence toward women and only a few passing references to sex. Kes loves the evil books.
All sorts of ways to listen, including asking Alexa to play it for you, or listen to it online at
http://rustyquill.com/the-magnus-archives/

Does the dog die.com
doesthedogdie.com
Because we all hate stories where the dog dies.

Darcie Little Badger
Along with Rebecca Roanhorse, Little Badger writes great speculative fiction that integrates Native American myth and culture. Highly recommended by Kes.
You can read both of the following short stories on Darcy Little Badger's short fiction page at
http://darcielittlebadger.com/published-fiction/

"Skinwalker, Fast Talker" Coyote story in _No Shit, There I Was_ (available on Bookshare.org)
"Owl versus the Neighborhood Watch"
The latter short story is also available in _Mythic Journeys_ edited by Paula Guran (available on Bookshare.org and NLS as an audiobook)
_Mythic Journeys: Retold Myths and Legends_ anthology, ed. Paula Guran (available on NLS)
Recommended by Kes, who also mentioned the following stories:

"How to Survive an Epic Journey" - the tale of the Argonauts told by Atalanta, by Tansy Rayner Roberts
and
"A Wolf in Iceland is the Child of a Lie" - a woman meets one of Loki's children, by Sonya Taaffe
You can read this story online at
http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/a-wolf-in-iceland-is-the-child-of-a-lie/

Rebecca Roanhorse
This is Kes's favorite new (to her) author: she recommends a duology:
_Trail of Lightning_ and _Storm of Locusts_, and the commercial audiobook versions are wonderful (available on NLS, and ebook versions are on Bookshare.org)
Check out her GoodReads page
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15862877.Rebecca_Roanhorse
for a list of her books, including her upcoming _Black Sun_, and a link to Levar Burton reading one of her stories.
( many, many more books mentioned below the cut )

I don't actually listen to a lot of stories read out loud, but LeVar Burton is a truly amazing reader, and his podcast highlights a truly diverse selection of writers. His latest podcast features a Tananariv Due short story
http://www.levarburtonpodcast.com/
which is doubly exciting because 1, I love her writing, and 2, she will be the guest of honor at this year's Readercon.

Note that the previous story read by Burton, titled "Miracle," features a blind character and was written by a Nigerian writer. Burton also reads a lot of speculative fiction, but I haven't delved very far back into the archived podcasts yet.

Another major plus for Burton's podcast: check out all the ways you can access it, including through a very accessible
online player. Burton is so cool, sometimes I forget he isn't actually blind.