Catherynne M. Valente

Part 3: Each Man Gets The Chance to Be His Own Kind of Hero: What Happened to Farscape and How It Made Me the Writer I Am

Part One 

Part Two 

We were all just children when this essay began, weren’t we? So long ago. A more innocent time…in February.

Well, this is the more personal part. I mean, yeah, I’ll talk about Farscape getting canned, because that’s a real (garbage) thing that really (garbagely) happened in real (...

Monthly Discussion Post!

Here is your space to talk about life, the universe, and everything--whatever you want to chat about, gossip about, get off your chest, ask for advice about, or just squee about a TV show you like.

Don't forget you can hang out with all of us over on the newly and very well moderated Discord server any time!

Here is a link to join if you're new or haven't checked it out yet:

One of us, one of us...  2022-08-27 17:00:06 +0000 UTC View Post

ALLCAPS COOKBOOK PRESENTS: Strawberry-Balsamic Black Pepper Jam

I have been meaning to make fresh seasonal strawberry jam again basically since the year before I had Bastian. I used to make it with my...er...first ex-grandmother-in-law (look, I'm a mysterious dangerously sexy young divorcee, don't judge) every year, and it was so infinitely better than storebought that even plain strawberry jam tastes like a jar full of California to me.

But by this point, you all know me well enough to guess that many years hence, I have left the entire concept of ...

Note Regarding the Late July Essay

Hey everyone.

I know I did not get last month’s essay done in time! I feel terrible about it! It is literally 1000 words from being done!

But Bastian is incredibly sick, and his daycare shut down due to Covid exposure which may or may not be what he has—he’s negative on tests but I’ve never seen him so ill. I think, hopefully, maybe, he’s turned the corner tonight as he’s eating and drinking again, but it’s been grueling.

So this and the no childcare (and other...

Audiography, Volume Sixteen: That One Summer Road Trip When We Were Little

"He's TOUCHING me!"

"Am not! She's LOOKING at me!"

"They're breathing loudly, ON PURPOSE!"

"So help me, I will turn this car around!"

"Punchbuggy!"

"Alaska!"

"Corn! Not corn!"

August, y'all. Last month before school starts, stagnant heat, sun shimmering off the asphalt of the open road. Maybe you were squashed in the backseat between siblings or cousins, maybe you were allowed to lay down in the backy-back (can I get an amen from my '80's s...

ALLCAPS COOKBOOK PRESENTS: TAX SHELTER CAKE! (Chocolate-Espresso Poundcake)

So we’ve been reading In the Night Kitchen a lot lately. And in that book, bafflingly, the message that there are magical bakers who really need to get a cake made every night so we can “have cake every morning” is just…SUPER emphasized.

And naturally, the three-year-old didn’t take long to be all: Um…what are we doing wrong in this, our lives, that we don’t have cake every morning like this authoritative book clearly says we should be?

Thanks a lot...

Bonus Summer Cocktail Recipe!

We will be having TWO recipes this month, because I've been quietly falling apart under pressure and I want to reward everyone who's stayed, and also because IT'S TOO HOT FOR THE WHOLE-
ASS CAKE I'M GONNA POST LATER TODAY so I wanted you guys to have a recipe you might actually make in the next month.

The gorgeous recipe design is by Kris McDermott, my darling gifted merch-wizard (and there's new shirts up today from my ...

Mama, Why Are You So Sad? Explaining the Roe Decision to a Toddler...and Myself

I’ve been trying to sit down and write whimsical science fictional things for all of you. To wax enthusiastic about…anything. I really have. But the whimsy, the enthusiasm, they are not coming easily at the moment. I know so many of you (I hope all of you) feel the same way.

I sit and I stare a lot. It doesn’t seem like it should be allowed to be so sunny and bright out there. Not anymore. I don’t know how to get any work done; this is all I’ve thought about for four days. I d...

New Code of Cozy Conduct for the Discord Server

This is the new Code of Conduct for the Discord Server--please read it and if you have any feedback or comments or even adjustments you want to suggest, do so in the comments here or in the Lounge discussion on the server.

The Cozy Code

This document is a place where we attempt to make explicit the behaviors we expect from members of the Cozy Cult server.

Preamble

Concerning Recent Events on the Discord Server

When I created a Discord server for members of this Patreon a year ago, I didn’t truly know what to expect. Mostly, I thought no one would care too much.

Instead, the Cozy Cult server has become an extraordinarily lovely, inclusive, and to my mind, precious space, a clearing in the wood the ugliness of the internet at large does not touch. We have all made friends, learned things, shared memes and advice, had laughs and tears and processed world events together. It’s a place I have ...

Audiography, Vol. 14: Regrets

Be sure to have tissues handy and something snuggly (alive or inanimate, your choice)

To be fair, I will only provide the link to the playlist here - you can share it if you choose! But initial access will only be through this site, for all patrons.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7JPn3eUKyCyXDy9U7s9YnA?si=b0662c39587c4641

Got something to say? Discuss

Audiography, Vol. 13: City Mouse

For the first playlist of our Second Year of Audiography. . .I bring you a city built of your musical selections!

To be fair, I will only provide the link to the playlist here - you can share it if you choose! But initial access will only be through this site, for all patrons.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/33Ry8wUa5d2AIGxQiKkrTA?si=ca3c0806e6c04808

Got something to say? Discu...

Audiography Volume Fifteen: Dystopia Drive Time Radio

Hello, best beloveds! 

An on time Audiography! The beginning of summer (sort of)! Last year we did Songs of Summers Past and this year. . .this year is different.

So roll the windows or top down, crank the music, slide on your coolest pair of sunglasses, and floor it - we are driving into the dystopia in style!

Eternal Rules Reminder:

-Three songs

-If it's not on Spotify, provide a link where it can be found

-Any genre, era, artist, style, etc. "Song" ...

Very Secret Exclusive Pre-Release: Audiobook of L'Esprit de L'Escalier

I'll be releasing this formally later this week, but as you are all my best beloveds, and definitely deserve treats, you get it first!

This is the official audio version of my Hugo-nominated novelette L'Esprit de L'Escalier, read by me!

I hope you all love it!

2022-05-30 23:36:33 +0000 UTC View Post

Sesame-Crusted Salmon Over Nutty Wild Rice and Seaweed Salad

Sesame-Crusted Salmon Over Nutty Wild Rice and Seaweed Salad

This is the first recipe I’ve reverse engineered from a restaurant. 

In this case, The Cockeyed Gull on Peaks Island WHERE I LIVE BECAUSE I AM A SILLY BISCUIT.

Is it exactly the same? No. Is it close? Oh, VERY.

The Gull’s sesame-crusted salmon has been one of my comfort foods for years now. And it is very unfortunately when a comfort food hits the inflation/pandemic price ski-jump an...

Audiography Volume Fourteen: Je regrette toute , je ne regrette rien

Hello, best beloveds and greetings from the trenches of Sekrit Things. I do wish I could tell you - I know you would be overcome with excitement, but alas, not yet.

The Sekrits are the reason this month's Audiography is late. Spring is in full bloom here and as delightful as it is to see the flowers blooming and the wind getting warmer, I've often thought this season has an air of melancholy.

Therefore, Regrets seemed like an appropriate theme for the remainder of this month, star...

Book Birthday!

Osmo Unknown and the Eightpenny Woods, whose early chapters many of you read right here over the last two years, is out in the world today!

I do hope you’ll give it a chance and read or listen (audiobook narrated by Heath, it’s a family affair!) soon. I’m terrible proud of it—Osmo is Redwall meets Where the Wild Things Are…but with Big Gender Feels, Finnish folklore, a social distancing pangirlin, a VERY cross half-wombat/half-badger, just SO MANY ghosts, a pirate named Captai...

ALLCAPS COOKBOOK PRESENTS: Theseus' Chimichurri

So....I love chimichurri sauce a lot. Like A LOT a lot. And I've never really been able to get it right at home, even though I try all over again every couple of years. 

And I got it in my head to do so again last week. SURELY THIS TIME TRIUMPH IS MY BESTIE.

Welllll...I seem to have temporarily forgotten that I live on an island in the middle of the m-fing ocean and on said island the only shop closes at 6pm now because covid means there's no decency anymore and nothing matte...

Audiography Volume Thirteen: We Built This City

One of things we always planned to do with Bastian was take him on lots of adventures, especially with all of the conventions I get to attend. And then (say it with me, everyone), COVID. Lockdown hit when he was around 18 months old and we haven't taken him anywhere.  However, if there is one thing my baby has in abundance, it's imagination. He loves the idea of cities, even if he's never been very far off our small island.

And so in honor of that, as the April rains bring mostly m...

Audiography, Volume 12: Years

As I went back over the playlist before publishing, I realized I accidentally named it Autobiography, Vol. 12: Years. Make of that what you will, my darlings.

So for your listening pleasure, herewith our last playlist of the First Year of Audiography, the Reboot: Now With Less Piracy!

To be fair, I will only provide the link to the playlist here - you can share it if you choose! But initial access will only be through this site, for all patrons.

2022-04-01 02:05:50 +0000 UTC View Post

Leviathans for Dummies: The Big Blue Farscape Essay That Never Ends Part 2 (of 3 and That's It, I Swear)

Part One 

I Love Hanging With You, Man: My Buddy Farscape and Me

So here we are, you and me.

I’LL PAINT YOU A PICTURE.

It’s 1999. We’re in San Diego, right before I start at UCSD, in a two-bedroom North Park apartment that cost $800 a month total between me and my fundamentalist Christian yet also deeply closeted...

Character Postcard: Bunny from White Lines on a Green Field

I was delighted to see love for Bunny from White Lines on a Green Field, which is definitely one of my favorite of my own stories!

Thanks for remembering decade-old stories, guys. It really is what authors hope for, that someone will remember our babies long after we make them.

ALLCAPS COOKBOOK PRESENTS: Superhero Waffles!

Superhero Waffles

I am so FUCKING proud of myself right now, you guys.

I feel SMUG. I feel BRILLIANT. I feel vindicated. I feel like a goddamned GENIUS.

You see, like most Smol People, my Smol Person of three and a half years is a fairly picky eater. And he does not like vegetables.

But what he does like? And always has since he first started gumming solid food? Is WAFFLES.

This kid will happily eat you out of Waffle House (ha!) and Waff...

AUDIOGRAPHY VOLUME TWELVE!!!!

Beloved patrons, Denizens of the Lands of Cat, we have done music for a year! A fantastic, frightening, wonderful, wrenching,  ridiculous, radiant, You Have Got To Be Kidding Me, yawping Year.

And so in honor of that, as the March winds scourge the land, this month's theme shall be: YEARS. This one is really open to interpretation - the actual word years, various forms of it, or going more conceptual, like time passing and/or history.

As always

Rules Reminder:

-Th...

Audiography Volume 11: Love. It's Weird

Month Eleven of the Audiography Reboot: This Time with Less Piracy!

Beloveds - we have been at this for almost a YEAR. How time does fly when you set it to a soundtrack.

Winter is loosening its icy grasp (finally). While we wait for spring, lay back, put some earphones in or headphones on, and let the tides of music sweep you away to the Island of Truth - Love. It's Weird

To be fair, I will only provide the link to the playlist here - you can share it if you choose! But init...

ALLCAPS COOKBOOK PRESENTS: Kuku Sabzi (Persian Vegetable Frittata)

What is that? Other than fun to say?

It’s a Persian frittata, basically.

Sassy Egg Puck.

Spicy Grass Circle.

This is what I make at home, tweaked from several recipes. It’s SO good for you, packed with leafy greens but also FLAVEUR. It’s especially great if you have a bunch of spinach or other leaf that has to be used immediately or it’ll go bad, which seems to be as soon as you get it home with the leafs, I tells ya. 

This is SUPER variable. Keep th...

MORE LIGHT! Farscape and Me and You and Everything That’s Ever Mattered In Art and Space and Time and Art That Is In Space At a Time

Remember when I told you all about Ted Lasso, back when everyone wasn’t watching Ted Lasso, and said very emphatically that everyone needed to be watching Ted Lasso? Was I wrong?

You know I wasn’t.

And now, even though correlation does not equal causation, everyone is watching Ted Lasso, which is inarguably a better timeline.

Well, as the meme dog says, I’...

Character Postcard: Comfort Me With Cascavel

We have inched back up over the patron-count to unlock character postcards again, so here we are! 

This month you lovely folk chose Cascavel from Comfort Me With Apples, who was a VERY delicate customer to handle without spoilers! I hope you enjoy him, I certainly do.

Audiography Volume 11: Love is Weird

'Tis February, when all* the world sings of love. Chocolates and roses and mass produced stuffed animals abound. . .but what about the deeply weird side of love? The type of love that is immortalized in songs like "Where the Wild Roses Grow", "Fairytale of New York", and Lovely Assistant's personal favorite, "I Am Unworthy of Your Love", a beautiful duet between Squeaky Fromme and John Hinckley.

So bring me your love songs - your tired love, your unrequited love, your on the other side ...

Audiography Volume 10: It's Cold Outside

Month Ten of the Audiography Reboot: This Time with Less Piracy!

In retrospect, I hope making the theme of 2022's FIRST Audiography "It's Cold Outside" isn't going to be a OMEN or anything. I suppose I could have picked Lollipops and Candied Sunshine, but we all know that's not really ME. And on this Patreon, where we are together in our little corner of the internet, where you all give so much to me, I think it only right that I be ME, first, last, and always.

So. Pull up to the ...