Blog Posts

Month of Joy: The Last Jedi by Jeannette Ng

/

It is astonishingly difficult for me to discuss how much I love THE LAST JEDI. I stumbled from the cinema, face utterly aching from all the ridiculous expressions I had pulled and mind a haze of images, but I was a different person. I say THE LAST JEDI is transformative because it transformed me. And that is very, very hard to quantify. My years and years of critical and analytical training fall by the wayside, not because I am incapable of seeing its flaws (this isn’t “turn off your brain” entertainment), but that whatever else one says about its negative qualtities, I could but numbly point to myself as testimony to its power: For the first time, I felt seen, truly seen by another in the medium of fiction. I felt reborn. The voices of doubt that have haunted me for so long are muted. I felt braver than I have in years and more able. I felt more at peace. I felt balanced.

Blog Posts

Paul Weimer’s Month of Joy: Sometimes Image IS Everything

/

27 years ago, I remember seeing commercials for the Canon Rebel film camera, with tennis player Andre Agassi saying “Image is everything”. And since the Internet remembers and stores everything, that thirty-second commercial from 1990 is on Youtube. Go ahead, watch it. At the time, I thought “Well, that’s dumb. Photography is dumb. Image is not everything, substance is. How shallow, how banal.” Heck, I didn’t even know what an SLR (Single Lens Reflex) camera was. Cameras could…change lenses? Who knew?

The Skiffy and Fanty Show Podcasts

345. Looking Back, Moving Forward: The 2018 Edition

/

https://media.blubrry.com/skiffyandfanty/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/archive.org/download/SandFEpisode345LookingBackMovingForward2018/Sandf–Episode345–LookingBackMovingForward2018.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadWow. It’s finally here! Our first episode on our new website, using our new feed! Hopefully everything works out and it ends up in your ears, because it’s time for the team to talk about what they loved in 2017 and what they’re looking forward to in 2018! We had reason to be a bit down about 2017. Last year was tough for many of us, but it still brought with it some amazing speculative fiction and some amazing growth on the Skiffy and Fanty Show. Our Patreon supporters allowed us to start 2018 fresh and shiny and new, and that brought with it a renewed sense of hope! For the last couple of weeks, many of our previous guests have been sharing what brings them joy. Hopefully, their joy has inspired some of your own. But sometimes it’s a struggle to find joy, to embrace joy. Our theme this year is “hope,” but hope often starts from a dark place, a place of struggle, fear, and pain. That’s where we leave 2017 and how we’re going to tackle 2018.

Blog Posts

Helen Lowe’s Month of Joy: From the Color Blue to “The End”

/

“These I have loved:         White plates and cups, clean-gleaming, Ringed with blue lines; and feathery, faery dust; Wet roofs, beneath the lamp-light; the strong crust Of friendly bread; and many-tasting food; Rainbows; and the blue bitter smoke of wood…”     ~ from The Great Lover, Rupert Brooke, 1887-1915   This excerpt from Rupert Brooke’s poem, The Great Lover, captures how seemingly small things can encompass joy. I recognize many if not all of the items contained in The Great Lover—from “the cool kindliness of sheets” to “blue-massing clouds”—but of course I have a list of my own…

Blog Posts

Month of Joy: A Few Candidates by Mike Reeves-McMillan

/

Thanks, Skiffy and Fanty, for asking what brings me joy — because now I’m thinking about that, and that’s a good thing. Especially in these times. There are a few candidates. Erin, my spouse of nearly 19 years. Marrying her still ranks as the best decision I ever made, and I’m still astonished sometimes that someone so amazing would choose me. Being married to someone with a chronic illness isn’t all joy, certainly; it can be tough. But I knew that was the deal going in, and going through the tough times together makes the joy stand out more against the background.

Blog Posts

Month of Joy: Signal Boost by Jen Zink

/

I know I’m beating a dead horse when I say this, but 2017 was a really tough year. There definitely were some amazing moments which brought me joy, including when the court granted my son his official name change and when he started his transition, when I got to share my daughter’s incredible artwork on the cover of the Robogoblin Gazette, and when my husband brought me home a beautiful flower he made for me out of molten metal. But I talk about those moments on twitter whenever they happen, so today I want to focus on Skiffy and Fanty.

Scroll to Top