Victoria M. Adams
@victoriamadams.bsky.social
Probably eats swans
Repped by Sara O’Keeffe at Nurnberg Associates.
Art above by the lovely www.sharonkingchai.com
Repped by Sara O’Keeffe at Nurnberg Associates.
Art above by the lovely www.sharonkingchai.com
Mood: cat refuses to cross the hot stone terrace.
June 21, 2025 at 7:59 AM
Mood: cat refuses to cross the hot stone terrace.
Some thoughts about recent reading ('Enlightenment', 'Orbital' - in passing) www.instagram.com/p/DK9p9Kko2ba/
June 17, 2025 at 11:13 AM
Some thoughts about recent reading ('Enlightenment', 'Orbital' - in passing) www.instagram.com/p/DK9p9Kko2ba/
May 30, 2025 at 5:45 PM
Rabbit, rabbit! It's April 1st, a great day to celebrate a great children's book: 'Watership Down' by Richard Adams. As a child, I wondered why anyone would write a story about rabbits. That was before I read it, obviously.
It's about people. This book has never stopped teaching me about people.
It's about people. This book has never stopped teaching me about people.
April 1, 2025 at 10:35 AM
Rabbit, rabbit! It's April 1st, a great day to celebrate a great children's book: 'Watership Down' by Richard Adams. As a child, I wondered why anyone would write a story about rabbits. That was before I read it, obviously.
It's about people. This book has never stopped teaching me about people.
It's about people. This book has never stopped teaching me about people.
Happy Nowruz! It's the Zoroastrian, Persian and Baha'i new year. Wherever you find Persians, you'll find Nowruz - the best spring festival. May blessings find you all this coming year. (This time, we didn't have a traditional feast but my husband made excellent fish cakes.)
March 19, 2025 at 8:30 PM
Happy Nowruz! It's the Zoroastrian, Persian and Baha'i new year. Wherever you find Persians, you'll find Nowruz - the best spring festival. May blessings find you all this coming year. (This time, we didn't have a traditional feast but my husband made excellent fish cakes.)
Reading Donne (thank you Katherine Rundell) and struck by this verse, which might be a send up of gen AI users, a few centuries in advance:
But he is worst who, beggarly, doth chaw
Others’ wits’ fruits, and in his ravenous maw
Rawly digested doth those things outspew
As his own things...
But he is worst who, beggarly, doth chaw
Others’ wits’ fruits, and in his ravenous maw
Rawly digested doth those things outspew
As his own things...
February 28, 2025 at 4:41 PM
Reading Donne (thank you Katherine Rundell) and struck by this verse, which might be a send up of gen AI users, a few centuries in advance:
But he is worst who, beggarly, doth chaw
Others’ wits’ fruits, and in his ravenous maw
Rawly digested doth those things outspew
As his own things...
But he is worst who, beggarly, doth chaw
Others’ wits’ fruits, and in his ravenous maw
Rawly digested doth those things outspew
As his own things...
In the midst of the dumpster fire that is currently the world, I deleted 2000 words of the wip and am pleased with the result. Half-pint miracles.
Here. Have a picture of a beach in New Zealand to celebrate. No, I don't remember where it was. Seatoun? Red rocks? There may have been seals involved
Here. Have a picture of a beach in New Zealand to celebrate. No, I don't remember where it was. Seatoun? Red rocks? There may have been seals involved
February 4, 2025 at 3:51 PM
In the midst of the dumpster fire that is currently the world, I deleted 2000 words of the wip and am pleased with the result. Half-pint miracles.
Here. Have a picture of a beach in New Zealand to celebrate. No, I don't remember where it was. Seatoun? Red rocks? There may have been seals involved
Here. Have a picture of a beach in New Zealand to celebrate. No, I don't remember where it was. Seatoun? Red rocks? There may have been seals involved
In a world on fire, the fate of one innocent might not register. But here she is. Mahvash Sabet has endured years of unjust imprisonment on trumped up charges. Now, after open heart surgery, she faces return to Evin. Please raise your voices today, 9th January to call for her release. #freemahvash
January 9, 2025 at 3:45 PM
In a world on fire, the fate of one innocent might not register. But here she is. Mahvash Sabet has endured years of unjust imprisonment on trumped up charges. Now, after open heart surgery, she faces return to Evin. Please raise your voices today, 9th January to call for her release. #freemahvash
Book advent: The Tombs of Atuan. It's hard to choose just one of Le Guin's books. She was able to accompany me from childhood to adulthood, giving me exactly the right book at exactly the right time. I discovered A Wizard Of Earthsea aged 9. Then, I found Tenar... Together, we looked into the dark.
December 15, 2024 at 11:54 AM
Book advent: The Tombs of Atuan. It's hard to choose just one of Le Guin's books. She was able to accompany me from childhood to adulthood, giving me exactly the right book at exactly the right time. I discovered A Wizard Of Earthsea aged 9. Then, I found Tenar... Together, we looked into the dark.
Book advent: Finn Family Moomintroll. I think this was the first of Jansson's books I read though it isn't the first she wrote. It's the characters that stay with me, rather than the story. These are the first books that said: 'It's ok to be you, look: people are all different and worthy of love'.
December 14, 2024 at 12:08 PM
Book advent: Finn Family Moomintroll. I think this was the first of Jansson's books I read though it isn't the first she wrote. It's the characters that stay with me, rather than the story. These are the first books that said: 'It's ok to be you, look: people are all different and worthy of love'.
Book advent: Finn Family Moomintroll. I think this was the first of Jansson's books I read though it isn't the first she wrote. It's the characters that stay with me, rather than the story. These are the first books that said: 'It's ok to be you, look: people are all different and worthy of love'.
December 14, 2024 at 12:02 PM
Book advent: Finn Family Moomintroll. I think this was the first of Jansson's books I read though it isn't the first she wrote. It's the characters that stay with me, rather than the story. These are the first books that said: 'It's ok to be you, look: people are all different and worthy of love'.
Book advent: Watership Down. Forget Oxford PPE - make your budding politicians read this book! It explores how badly traditional aristocracies, quasi-religious dystopias and totalitarian dictatorships do when faced with real existential threats. All through the eyes of... a bunch of rabbits. Genius.
December 13, 2024 at 11:04 AM
Book advent: Watership Down. Forget Oxford PPE - make your budding politicians read this book! It explores how badly traditional aristocracies, quasi-religious dystopias and totalitarian dictatorships do when faced with real existential threats. All through the eyes of... a bunch of rabbits. Genius.
Book advent: The Borrowers. A fantasy that presents as a natural history! The concept of tiny people living under the floorboards, making a home out of old buttons, thimbles and other domestic minutiae, is so intoxicating to a child... again, the thought that you just. Might. Happen to see one...
December 12, 2024 at 6:19 PM
Book advent: The Borrowers. A fantasy that presents as a natural history! The concept of tiny people living under the floorboards, making a home out of old buttons, thimbles and other domestic minutiae, is so intoxicating to a child... again, the thought that you just. Might. Happen to see one...
Book advent: The Silver Chair. The Narnia series was hit and miss for me. I adored The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Magician's Nephew, while The Last Battle made me want to throw the book in the bin. The Silver Chair was the best - magical settings, jeopardy, a quest and of course Puddleglum!
December 11, 2024 at 1:37 PM
Book advent: The Silver Chair. The Narnia series was hit and miss for me. I adored The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Magician's Nephew, while The Last Battle made me want to throw the book in the bin. The Silver Chair was the best - magical settings, jeopardy, a quest and of course Puddleglum!
Book advent: The Hobbit. The world-building that launched a thousand fandoms. Of course, what appealed to me, growing up with an Iranian family on an island in the Mediterranean, was the sheer exoticism. Bacon and eggs! Pork pies! Seed cakes! What was this extraordinary fare? Where could I find it?
December 10, 2024 at 10:25 AM
Book advent: The Hobbit. The world-building that launched a thousand fandoms. Of course, what appealed to me, growing up with an Iranian family on an island in the Mediterranean, was the sheer exoticism. Bacon and eggs! Pork pies! Seed cakes! What was this extraordinary fare? Where could I find it?
Book advent: The Phantom Tollbooth. Legend holds that this book appears when you most need it, then disappears. Verified: I had a copy in childhood, which I loved. It disappeared. Later, I bought it for my daughter, who adored it. Then her copy disappeared. We bought another. THAT DISAPPEARED TOO...
December 9, 2024 at 10:40 AM
Book advent: The Phantom Tollbooth. Legend holds that this book appears when you most need it, then disappears. Verified: I had a copy in childhood, which I loved. It disappeared. Later, I bought it for my daughter, who adored it. Then her copy disappeared. We bought another. THAT DISAPPEARED TOO...
Day 4 or 5-ish (yes, I've lost track): Tom's Midnight Garden. This book, people! As magical as Narnia and somehow more warm and vital, with a proper inter-generational friendship, an excellent approach to time travel, and the most grounded fantasy I have ever read. IT COULD BE REAL. Maybe it is!
December 8, 2024 at 11:24 AM
Day 4 or 5-ish (yes, I've lost track): Tom's Midnight Garden. This book, people! As magical as Narnia and somehow more warm and vital, with a proper inter-generational friendship, an excellent approach to time travel, and the most grounded fantasy I have ever read. IT COULD BE REAL. Maybe it is!
Day 3: The Dark Is Rising. Myth, magic, arriving on one snowy winter's morning to change a young boy's life. There was something in this book that made me shiver and thrill... The old ones! Wild magic! Cooper along with Garner was the first writer who truly tapped into the fear and wonder for me.
December 7, 2024 at 6:44 PM
Day 3: The Dark Is Rising. Myth, magic, arriving on one snowy winter's morning to change a young boy's life. There was something in this book that made me shiver and thrill... The old ones! Wild magic! Cooper along with Garner was the first writer who truly tapped into the fear and wonder for me.
How did she do it? Sutcliff took me by the proverbial collar as a child reader, dumping me bodily into ancient Rome, or fifth century Britain, amid cold iron and muddy boots and straw that smelled of piss. And I loved it. Her Arthurian saga still grips me in a way no other retelling does.
December 6, 2024 at 1:01 PM
How did she do it? Sutcliff took me by the proverbial collar as a child reader, dumping me bodily into ancient Rome, or fifth century Britain, amid cold iron and muddy boots and straw that smelled of piss. And I loved it. Her Arthurian saga still grips me in a way no other retelling does.
Day three of my book advent: The King Must Die. Mary Renault's retelling of the Theseus myth pulls off an extraordinary feat. It simply brings antiquity to life. This is no sanitized, bowdlerized version. People live, die, struggle, love. The past is another country. Somehow, she takes you there...
December 6, 2024 at 12:43 PM
Day three of my book advent: The King Must Die. Mary Renault's retelling of the Theseus myth pulls off an extraordinary feat. It simply brings antiquity to life. This is no sanitized, bowdlerized version. People live, die, struggle, love. The past is another country. Somehow, she takes you there...
So this is turning into my personal book advent! Day two: The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. How I loved this one! The banality of evil, explored for children. Those slimy villains. The gaslighting! That orphanage with its hierarchy of spies and tattletales... chilling stuff. Triumph = cheese for all 💜
December 5, 2024 at 10:23 AM
So this is turning into my personal book advent! Day two: The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. How I loved this one! The banality of evil, explored for children. Those slimy villains. The gaslighting! That orphanage with its hierarchy of spies and tattletales... chilling stuff. Triumph = cheese for all 💜
To start: A Wrinkle In Time. A fabulous story that includes space travel and properly scary evil. Also philosophy. Who can forget the simple fact of Mrs Murray cooking dinner on a Bunsen burner? You laugh, but a) she's a scientist and b) she's a mum and c) THOSE THINGS ARE COMPATIBLE. Feminism 101
December 4, 2024 at 12:57 PM
To start: A Wrinkle In Time. A fabulous story that includes space travel and properly scary evil. Also philosophy. Who can forget the simple fact of Mrs Murray cooking dinner on a Bunsen burner? You laugh, but a) she's a scientist and b) she's a mum and c) THOSE THINGS ARE COMPATIBLE. Feminism 101
