S&L Podcast - #456 - The Clarkesworld Flood
/Our “March that is Mad” tournament is live! 15 books enter, one gets to be the April pick, and everyone wins! Plus, please stop flooding Clarkesworld with AI-written manuscripts. Use ChatGPT for good! Also, we kick off our March read and wrap up our thoughts on Nettle & Bone.
WHAT ARE WE NOMMING? <-- name suggested by Ruth (tilltab) Ashworth
Tom: Eggplant Lasagna
Veronica: Spinach Lasagna
QUICK BURNS
Our March that is mad tournament is live! You can find it at Swordandlaser.com or in Goodreads.com. Huge thanks to everybody who nominated titles and best fo luck to all the books in the tourney. Special thanks to Rob for coralling the nominations process! Let's look over the matchups!
Jan: There is a new trailer for the adaptation of Frank Schätzing's Science Fiction novel "The Swarm". It's the most expensive German TV show ever made (which is why it's shot in English) and premiering in several countries in February/March.
The Swarm is about strange occurrences surrounding the world's oceans and its wildlife that could threaten the survival of humanity.
Jan: My part of the internet has recently been set "ablaze" by the news that Lego is releasing in March a 6,000+ piece Lord of the Rings ""Rivendell"" set.
It looks so good!
It has 15 mini figures!
And it's 500 $....
*sigh*
Ruth added: I was eyeing up this set on the Lego website yesterday evening! Our house is rapidly running out of space for Lego sets already… but it does look awesome."
Brian: Paper "examines Frank Herbert's science fiction classic Dune from the perspectives of economic history and institutional economics".
Veronica: I saw this on either Tiktok or Twitter via Charlie Jane Anders, but it's about how people are apparently "flooding" Clarkesworld with short story submissions written by ChatGPT!
BARE YOUR SWORD
Your favourite literary spaceships
BOOK OF THE MONTH DISCUSSION
KICK OFF
Under Fortunate Stars by Ren Hutchings
WRAP UP
Ruth: Re what Tom says about how eagerly he was listening to the audiobook of Nettle & Bone, I actually found myself doing the opposite of a binge read/listen: I was enjoying it so much that I wanted to take it slowly and savour the experience, so I restricted myself to listening to one chapter a day
SeréTW: I have been waiting to hear people's opinions about Marra's mother. I agree that she is playing a high level of chess. I don't think that it is dispassionately. In order for her to be effective, she can't afford to appear to be passionate. There is definitely a deeper story there. She has some terrible options to consider. I'm sure she knows the extent of the princes abuses, but the consequences of her responses would impact her immediate family and the entire kingdom. So she appears to be making some painful sacrifices. It's necessary for her to be strategic. She's definitely playing a much longer game. Perhaps her response is learned, experientially, the way Kania's is. She is passing that shrewdness onto Kania.
I think moving Marra to the convent was intentionally to provide Marra with a a different atmosphere to evolve/mature in, to provide temporary protection from the prince and to provide a potential means of escape; though it possibly played out in a way that she didn't expect. "
ADDENDUMS
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