An apologia for it taking me a fucking YEAR to read "Blight" by Rachel Rosen
May. 12th, 2026 09:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rydra_wongIn my defence, most of 2026 so far has been spent dealing with incapacitating levels of fatigue, which might finally be getting better (and that needs to be a separate post).
But the major problem is that I wanted to re-read Cascade, the first book in the trilogy, before starting Blight.
And while I loved Cascade -- here is my rave from way back when -- it produces an overwhelming sense of dread in me, even more than it did so on first read, because it captures, with remarkable precision and effectiveness, the sense of living in a liberal democracy that is teetering on the edge of ceasing to be one, and the stomach-dropping sensation when things begin moving unspeakably fast.
It's a very good book, but -- you see the problem.
Anyway, in recent weeks I finally got myself to re-read Cascade, and then I tore through Blight in a few days. Weirdly, I found it a much less difficult read because it's (both politically and environmentally) a post-apocalyptic novel, in which some kind of fightback is beginning.
Anyway it's fucking fantastic, without any of the common middle-book-of-a-trilogy doldrums. A really spectacular and unique mixture of wild magic, cosmic horror, and organizing for revolution, the last written with gritty specificity. The author is dead and all that, I don't know what's firsthand knowledge and what's research, but this is a book that (for example) writes with deep credibility about what it feels like to be in a crowd being tear-gassed.
As well as being a very good book, it also feels it's maybe a psychologically useful book to read right now.
I would like to do a proper write-up but I still have no idea what my energy's going to be doing day to day, so in the meantime here's a hype post, and if you want a review here'sjames_davis_nicoll's:
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/land-of-hope
ETA: Also it's on the Aurora Award shortlist for Best Novel:
https://www.csffa.ca/awards-information/current-ballot/
Ob!disclaimer that the author is an internet acquaintance, but I do in fact love the book.
But the major problem is that I wanted to re-read Cascade, the first book in the trilogy, before starting Blight.
And while I loved Cascade -- here is my rave from way back when -- it produces an overwhelming sense of dread in me, even more than it did so on first read, because it captures, with remarkable precision and effectiveness, the sense of living in a liberal democracy that is teetering on the edge of ceasing to be one, and the stomach-dropping sensation when things begin moving unspeakably fast.
It's a very good book, but -- you see the problem.
Anyway, in recent weeks I finally got myself to re-read Cascade, and then I tore through Blight in a few days. Weirdly, I found it a much less difficult read because it's (both politically and environmentally) a post-apocalyptic novel, in which some kind of fightback is beginning.
Anyway it's fucking fantastic, without any of the common middle-book-of-a-trilogy doldrums. A really spectacular and unique mixture of wild magic, cosmic horror, and organizing for revolution, the last written with gritty specificity. The author is dead and all that, I don't know what's firsthand knowledge and what's research, but this is a book that (for example) writes with deep credibility about what it feels like to be in a crowd being tear-gassed.
As well as being a very good book, it also feels it's maybe a psychologically useful book to read right now.
I would like to do a proper write-up but I still have no idea what my energy's going to be doing day to day, so in the meantime here's a hype post, and if you want a review here's
james_davis_nicoll's:https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/land-of-hope
ETA: Also it's on the Aurora Award shortlist for Best Novel:
https://www.csffa.ca/awards-information/current-ballot/
Ob!disclaimer that the author is an internet acquaintance, but I do in fact love the book.
