Grace Lavery / Joseph Lavery & Daniel M. Lavery / Mallory Ortberg - "Straight with extra steps" couple trooning out to avoid "dwindling into mere heterosexuality"

[Zemblan Physics]

she has a strong queer relationship, an esoteric dissertation proposal, and inherited generational trauma

Lawd, I cringed so hard I almost threw up.

 

[Bookwork]

I've said it before and I'll say it again, at least Mal is taking wild stabs at writing literary fiction instead of queer young-adult romantasy like every other "author" of her generation.

I would like Mal to write a coming-of-age story about a lad in a Christian home who's pervert sister decides to destroy his life by lying.

 

[Autistic Nonetheless]

There will be a wave of transgender misery memoirs, just like we had with the hippies/communes and gay men, where the general public suddenly finds out it wasn't all free love and top shelf weed. If Please Miss was the 70's of 'gosh, we are so liberated. Why aren't you having loads of fun, consequence free sex?' then this will be the 90's and early 2000's of 'HELP we all have AIDS and our prostate is leaking out of our butholes'

Tranny A Little Life will sell gangbusters.
NYT podcasts will discuss it, the Paris Review will release profiles the author, Booktubers will cry in thumbnails, and I will have to nod my way through countless conversations about how tragic and profound it all was.

Cant wait.

 

[OttoWest]

Tranny and pooner bitch about their families. Sounds like a good time for permanent adolescents.

Here’s what Charlie Jane’s latest is about

Spoiler: spoiler alert

In the vein of Alice Hoffman and Charlie Jane Anders's own All the Birds in the Sky comes a novel full of love, disaster, and magic.

A young witch teaches her mother how to do magic--with very unexpected results--in this relatable, resonant novel about family, identity, and the power of love.

Jamie is basically your average New England academic in-training--she has a strong queer relationship, an esoteric dissertation proposal, and inherited generational trauma. But she has one extraordinary secret: she's also a powerful witch.

Serena, Jamie's mother, has been hiding from the world in an old one-room schoolhouse for several years, grieving the death of her wife and the simultaneous explosion in her professional life. All she has left are memories.

Jamie’s busy digging into a three-hundred-year-old magical book, but she still finds time to teach Serena to cast spells and help her come out of her shell. But Jamie doesn't know the whole story of what happened to her mom years ago, and those secrets are leading Serena down a destructive path.

Now it's up to this grad student and literature nerd to understand the secrets behind this mysterious novel from 1749, unearth a long-buried scandal hinted therein, and learn the true nature of magic, before her mother ruins both of their lives.

TL;DR queer literature nerds save the world.

This reads like a man super angry at well-meaning but clueless mommy.

Charles Anders Kupperman is the son of two well-known academics, his mother’s work is specifically about colonial-era New England. I remember Charlie back when he was the editor of io9, one of the Gawker family of blogs, this one specializing in science-fiction and related fandoms. He’s a big ol’ hon:


Oedipal complex or Electra complex? With Mal and Charles, you get both!

 

[monstrous bubo]

This reads like a man super angry at well-meaning but clueless mommy.

Interestingly he has a Wikipedia entry, which does not mention his parents or brother, all of whom have Wikipedia entries of their own. His mother’s entry uses his birth name and only links to his older brother’s Wikipedia entry. Ditto for his dad’s. Neither parent’s entry has an edit war over this either. His brother’s doesn’t mention him at all. He is quoted in his dad’s obit as his daughter, but the other son, who actually wrote a biography of his father, is not. Read into all of this what you will.

ETA I’m a retard, the obit did quote Michael as well as Charlie

 

[Law]

There will be a wave of transgender misery memoirs, just like we had with the hippies/communes and gay men, where the general public suddenly finds out it wasn't all free love and top shelf weed.

Autogynephiles lack the insight to feel remorse, so you're never going to get a sad memoir from a hon. They'll just endlessly crank out "my penis, my penis, and me" styled dreck like Please, Miss. There already have been several memoirs by trans widows (Eighteen Months by Shannon Thrace, Sex Changes by Christine Benvenuto) and children of transitioners (Rough Draft by Katy Tur). We might see memoirs from the minors involved in lawsuits (like Kiera Bell) or women who transitioned due to mental illness and trauma. The problem there is that a lot of women who transition are so consumed by their mental illness and trauma that they can not write coherently (Gabriel Mac).

 

[GenderCop]

children of transitioners

don't forget Susan Faludi's In the Darkroom --maybe one of the first of its kind.

76 years old-- can you believe AGP-perversion grabbing some old man at that late date? Gross! The scene at the end, after his death, where she finds her dad's stash of lady-drag (a whole room full, carefully organized), is harrowing.
Surprised Faludi wasn't roasted alive as a transphobe, but then that is hard to do when she's busy extending her awful father every courtesy that he does not deserve.

I think all the Jew/WW2 stuff also bought Faludi (original family name=Friedman) a pass. She goes on & on about the fate of Hungarian Jews as much as she does the tranny crap.

If a Jew is traumatized by ww2, they are totally untouchable, as is the person writing about it.

I thought I mentioned this before, and I did. The trannies packed some festival where Katy Tur was, which reminded me of the way they packed a book-festival for Faludi, but nobody wanted to talk about the trannies, this being Miami, they just wanted to talk about Jews instead.

 

[Law]

76 years old-- can you believe AGP-perversion grabbing some old man at that late date?

Oldest I've seen documented was like 92. Age truly is just a number when it comes to men ruining their wives' lives with their boner-obessesions.

 

[Potatis Salad]

Hear ye, hear ye! Tard Baby will be giving a distinguished keynote address! Come one, come all, to the...Betsy Tacy Convention in Makato, MN?

Da fuq is this? Caption says:

Your Class Day planners are very excited to announce our two keynote speakers, both talented, popular authors who love Deep Valley the way we do!

Mitali Perkins has written many books for young readers, including You Bring the Distant Near (nominated for a National Book Award) and Rickshaw Girl (adapted into a film), all of which explore crossing different kinds of borders. Her goal is to make readers laugh or cry, preferably both, as long as their hearts are widening. She's also written two nonfiction books for adults, including one that features an entire chapter on our beloved Emily: Steeped in Stories: Timeless Children's Novels to Refresh our Tired Souls. Mitali's next book, The Golden Necklace, will be out in October. Mitali will be speaking on Saturday evening.

Danny M. Lavery is a co-founder of the Toast and the author of Texts From Jane Eyre, The Merry Spinster, Something That May Shock and Discredit You, and Dear Prudence: Liberating Lessons From Slate.com’s Beloved Advice Column. Lavery wrote Slate’s Dear Prudence column from 2016 to 2021. He currently writes an email newsletter at Substack called The Chatner. Danny will be speaking on Sunday afternoon.

Register now! https://betsy-tacy-convention.square.site/registration

Women's Hotel and Women's Hotel 2: Christmas Bullshit are conspicuously absent from Tard Baby's bibliography.

Joe usually provides a proof of life via a few dozen gross Instagram story reposts per week, but he's been totally silent lately.

 

[Diana Moon Glampers]

The failure of Women's Hotel is attributable to Mallory's consistent stance that anyone telling her big flaws with her work is just being a mean jerk who hates her.

Anyone who might have been honest enough to say "this is a really interesting setting but (like most first drafts of historical novels) there are significant anachronisms and it seems like a setting looking for a plot, you need to workshop some plot ideas that tie these people together with a throughline" would have been seen as personally attacking Mallory, rather than telling her the one thing that could save her book.

Plot, Mallory. All those 19th century novels you lovingly make fun of are full of it. They're not just settings where nothing connected happens.

 

[Bookwork]

(1) Mal needs to get someone's photographer friend to make her a better PR photo. That one's just gross and she uses it for everything.

(2) Mal's chosen lifestyle and frequent pervo outbursts should preclude the Betsy-Tacy Society from including her in a fab fest for five-year-old readers delighted by WWI-era preciousness, but no. Is a hon now presiding over Betsy-Tacy story hours or something.

 

[monstrous bubo]

Hey hey hey, wait a minute! It wasn’t just the lack of a plot! Tard Baby can fail at lots of things!

Just kidding. You’re absolutely right. Her readers would have forgiven her other literary flaws if the story were interesting. It turns out she could only give them a bunch of Chatner posts.

 

[Law]

Women's Hotel and Women's Hotel 2: Christmas Bullshit are conspicuously absent from Tard Baby's bibliography.

B-b-b-but the toast! The TOAST! Remember The Toast? The Toooooooast!!

Anyone who might have been honest enough to say "this is a really interesting setting but (like most first drafts of historical novels) there are significant anachronisms and it seems like a setting looking for a plot, you need to workshop some plot ideas that tie these people together with a throughline" would have been seen as personally attacking Mallory, rather than telling her the one thing that could save her book.

The "no plot who cares" problem is something that also seems to plague the "queer" YA Charlie Jane project about magical disasters (correct me if I'm wrong, cause I'm not reading that). I think that it comes from not wanting anything bad to happen to your precious donut steels. It's why Mallory's plots end up being shit like "thinking about a mildly soiled doily" instead of shit like murder or running from the mob or a character making a terrible mistake and dealing with the consequences. It's also why I think the women and pretend-women involved in this writing subculture love "slice of life" so much. The novels don't really end up with themes besides "stuff the author likes".

 

[Larry David's Opera Cape]

(1) Mal needs to get someone's photographer friend to make her a better PR photo. That one's just gross and she uses it for everything.

The graphic design flair added to this one is really helping to make it look like the Humane Society Volunteer of the Month poster, featuring a developmentally disabled young feller.

 

[Law]

Plot, Mallory. All those 19th century novels you lovingly make fun of are full of it. They're not just settings where nothing connected happens.

Actually, now that I think of it, even children's books are plottier than Mallory's stuff. "Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill" - these characters have a goal. The plot of Christmas at the Women's Hotel is that there's a women's hotel and it's Christmas there.

Thinking about this even more, it doesn't really seem like fiction is Mallory's thing at all. Her books are a gimmick/gag gift based on an existing book, a collection of essays about stuff that happened to her, a collection of short stories where she re-writes existing stories by other authors, and Women's Hotel. Even The Chatner, where she's allowed to do whatever the hell she wants, never has her imagining fictional scenarios or characters, she only ever writes about things that already exist that she's encountered personally, or other people's books or writing. When she does try to write fiction on The Chatner, it's shit like "There are three transmen. They talk. It is awkward, but mildly so. The End." The more I think about this, the more Mal's poverty of imagination stands out. It's something that's kind of weird for a professional writer.
Maybe she's a novelist the same way she's a man - an ersatz imitation, based on re-hashing someone else's ideas (and not just the good ideas).

 

[Autistic Nonetheless]

Autogynephiles lack the insight to feel remorse, so you're never going to get a sad memoir from a hon.

Age will have its effect.
Young people will always attach themselves to causes, and for a while gender was simply it.
If you were a university going bright young thing (or, alternatively a terminally online weirdo) you were involved in this discussion almost by default. Gender took the spot of apartheid or atheism as the go to young person crusade to get involved in. Now multiple generations, have either attempted some sort of transition, or became, if only for a while, some kind of nondescript gender blob. They will write about it.
Another subgenre will be lifelong trannies trying double dip on pity points. First for not being allowed to transition and then for transitioning too hard. Then there will be the lost cause memoirs, aimed at a public all to ready to find redemptive value in young people suffering.

One thing i dont expect is any kind of liberal epiphany where NYT readers suddenly fall on their knees and exclaim 'My god! what have we done.'
rather there will be a slow gradual shuffle to the right, with these people simply pretending they never held those opinions in the first place.
Just look at Buttigieg or Newsom for how that will go .
'I always thought it was a bit weird' says a guy who 15 years ago almost broke up your friendship over the proper way to refer to Caitlyn Jenner.

 

[Constellationzero]

Hear ye, hear ye! Tard Baby will be giving a distinguished keynote address! Come one, come all, to the...Betsy Tacy Convention in Makato, MN?
View attachment 7767452
Da fuq is this? Caption says:

Women's Hotel and Women's Hotel 2: Christmas Bullshit are conspicuously absent from Tard Baby's bibliography.

Joe usually provides a proof of life via a few dozen gross Instagram story reposts per week, but he's been totally silent lately.

They NEED to get on of my favorite childhood books out of their fucking mouths. Especially since FAILory cannot write.

Also--Much MANLY MANLY DOODY DOOD who associates xirself with Besty-Tacy.

 

[Dr. Butt]

The plot of Christmas at the Women's Hotel is that there's a women's hotel and it's Christmas there.

White girls fuck Wes Anderson.

Age will have its effect.
Young people will always attach themselves to causes, and for a while gender was simply it.
[...]
'I always thought it was a bit weird' says a guy who 15 years ago almost broke up your friendship over the proper way to refer to Caitlyn Jenner.

Christopher Hitchens says exactly this in his schoolboy-rape-heavy memoir - 68ers became chickenhawks, people who follow the trends of their age group at 20 follow the trends of their age group at age 50.

 

[Autistic Nonetheless]

Christopher Hitchens says exactly this in his schoolboy-rape-heavy memoir - 68ers became chickenhawks, people who follow the trends of their age group at 20 follow the trends of their age group at age 50.

I think it was he who called the generational solidarity as the most contemptible of its kind.

To quote another member of that New Statesman Bloomsbury group, Clive James once wrote that:

On television [people] see the sufferings of the deprived and oppressed all over the world, and they hear voices saying that all the deprivation and oppression are the fault of the society they themselves live in. The best of the young will always tend to believe this, because compassion is a powerful motive among the good.

I think for many the gender abolition stuff came from a good place.
And the people who early on signed up to evangelize on its behalf did so because they honestly believed they were helping kids become more themselves.
Many of those who attempted to transition did so because of political commitments rather then any dysphoria or mental illness. It was just what you did. it was generational solidarity.

 

[Law]

They NEED to get on of my favorite childhood books out of their fucking mouths.

I feel bad cause this thread is the first time I've heard of Besty Tacy and they sound so beloved. Mal has never mentioned them before I don't think.