“These two cunts are fully harden the fuck up, cunt.”
“Which two cunts, Chica?”
“Gideon and her hate crush Harrow.”
“Sounds sikk. Tell me more.”
“Lezzie dyke undying necromancer gothic space opera horror?”
“10/10 would nonverbal consent.”
“’Member in Iain Banks’ The Algebraist?”
“Iain wiv an M. Banks?”
“The one. Again and always.”
“Wif the creepy but kinda sexy in a bad extra way one wot had diamonds for teeth?”
“Yup. Archimandrite Luseferous.”
“Yup, and?”
“And ’member Ancillary Justice?”
“Ann Leckie who was your safe space when our Iain got indisposed on account of being dead?”
“Am still grieving an’ yup.”
“An’ you were like, if someone wrote a whole novel from the perspective of that toothy psycho and his Starveling Cult, plus pronouns and tea, that’d be Imperial Radch?”
“Pretty much.”
“Orrite, and?”
“Well Gideon the Ninth is like all of that plus Norwegian Black Metal corpse paint.”
“Hectic as.”
“Fully.”
“Goes to eleven?”
“Goes to 666.”
“None More Black?”
“None More Black, Chica.”
“Oooo!”
“Wot then?”
“Forgot. Gideon the Ninth is like all of that plus Norwegian Black Metal corpse paint plus …”
“Plus what?”
“Oglaf!”
“Sithrak! Cumsprite!”
“Sluts!”
“An’ who is the sharp cunt wot wrote it?”
“That’d be Tamsyn Muir. An’ she comes from Aotearoa.”
“Proper good. An’ who did that cover, ’cos a) that’s metal as fuck and b) cunt can destroy my bones any day or night.”
“That’d be Tommy Arnold and fukken fuck yeah.”
“And you’re smashing it?”
“Very much so.”
“And what else? You gonna tell me there’s a sequel?”
“Fukken sequel!”
“Siiikk! What’s it called?”
“Harrow the Ninth!”
“An’ have you ordered it yet?”
“I’m a tardy bint.”
“Get your shit together. Tell me a truth moment, Chica.”
“Hit me.”
“You finished it yet? Did it stick the landing?”
“Nah not yet. But if page 357 was the end, landing was totes stuck. Right horrorshow.”
“High praise from an intolerant cunt.”
“All that.”
“New fave author?”
“Read me to filth there.”
“Anything else?”
“Well obvz I want Gideon to be a righteous trans femme, ’cos I’m simple like that. Book of the Year in any case, not that I’m doing that anymore, but still, that’s where it’s at.”
