r. b. lemberg

December 2, 2020

R. B. Lemberg’s gorgeous THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES offers many pleasures

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Cover by Elizabeth Story based on initial concepts by Francesca Myman

Anna Paradox on PARADOX WORLD JOURNAL praises R. B. Lemberg’s THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

I love this opening sentence from R.B. Lemberg. It’s not a hook – it doesn’t strain with danger. It’s not a promise. There’s no weight on where the story goes next. The word “alone” suggests that “I” may stop being alone – or may not. The word “in” holds the possibility of “out” but doesn’t coerce that next step. There’s no giveaway to the genre of the story – an old goatskin tent could be historical or contemporary, realistic or fantastic.

I have a third type of first sentence I consider: the seduction. First sentences are seductions when they promise pleasure. I started looking at this sentence, and I wasn’t sure what pleasure it promised. Would I need to make a new category? “I sat alone in my old goatskin tent.”

No, as I looked longer, I saw the pleasures here.

CADL CAST, podcast for the Capital Area District Libraries (Lansing, MI), recommends the novella, starting around 8:04.

Lemberg joins Argo Bookshop’s Trans & Nonbinary Book Club to discuss THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES. Email to sign up.

Thursday December 10 | 7:00PM – 9:00PM

We are thrilled to have author R.B. Lemberg joining us for a discussion of their wonderful debut novella, The Four Profound Weaves!

REDDIT r/Fantasy continues their love for the book and the Birdverse.

Gorgeous novella about two elderly trans people on a quest for a magic carpet. Themes of acceptance, culture clash, and change.
Best fantasy novel you read in 2020?

I liked Grandmother-nai-Laylit’s Cloth of Winds by R.B. Lemberg, which is a prologue to THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

[…]

For longer, novella-length stuff, I enjoyed Ring Shout, The Haunting of Tram Car 015, THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES and The Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water!
What are your absolute favourite short stories in the fantasy genre?

THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES by R.B. Lemberg a bit of a wild card as it’s a West Asian inspired fantasy. Gotcha! Bet you forgot all about West Asia!
Asian inspired fantasy

Birdverse by R.B. Lemberg – So this isn’t exactly a series, but I read THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES for Bingo, and I’ve read the Cloth of Winds story, and I’d like to go back and read the rest of the stories (or as many of them as I can get my hands on).
Finish some of those series – a challenge and a plan

November 20, 2020

R. B. Lemberg’s dazzling THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES already has established itself as a queer must-read

Rick Klaw blog forest of glory, kris van der voorn, lgbtq reads, r. b. lemberg, review, revuu, the four profound weaves, tumblr

In REVUU (Autumn 2020), Kris van der Voorn loves R. B. Lemberg’s THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

A breath of fresh air is blowing through the literary scene, and amidst it is the voice of R.B. Lemberg. This queer, bigender immigrant from Eastern Europe and Israel has taken it upon themselves to force feed the public a beautiful debut masterpiece of inclusivity and diversity: THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

[…]

In this stunning debut, Lemberg raises matters that normally would be too sensitive to discuss, had it not been for their own experience with them. Most poignant is their treatment of trans-related topics. In addition to showing the struggle that can exist in a trans person’s life, Lemberg also celebrates the experience of being able to be one’s true self. Lemberg shows this conflict of identity within ‘The Nameless Man’, as he struggles with his former life, but they are delicate with how this experience is portrayed. His story feels like a love letter to the character and his struggles.

[…]

THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES already has established itself as a queer must-read. It normalises the notion of same sex and polyamorous love, of genderfluid characters and the use of pronouns other than “he” or “she”. At the same time, it is a book that does so in such a fluent, easily explained manner that no reader would ever feel like they require more knowledge of queer jargon to understand the story. In short: In THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES, Lemberg succeeds not only at constructing a fictional world that displays all the most important political points of the LGBTQIA+ community, they did so in a non-threatening and remarkably smart way. The book enacts the commitment to inclusivity it describes. Certainly, it is a debut, and there are some small elements that Lemberg ought to improve upon in future work. For example, they could have been more elaborate on storylines and character development. For a first-time author, however, Lemberg does it so well, and it is exciting to think about what can come after this. They have woven a fairy tale of inclusion that rises to the complexities of our time.

FOREST OF GLORY wants to read the book.

I love Lemberg’s Birdverse stories, so I’m very excited for this novella set in that world! It features trans elders and textiles!

LGBTQ READS offers up recommendations including on for THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

https://lgbtqreads.tumblr.com/post/634053609780281344/hi-friend-today-is-my-birthday-if-i-may-id

November 17, 2020

R.B. Lemberg’s hopeful THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES is perfect for those looking to escape into a fantasy world

Rick Klaw blog artur nowrot, kelly gallucci, netgalley, r. b. lemberg, r/fantasy, reddit, review, the four profound weaves, we are bookish, wysznupane 0

R. B. Lemberg’s debut book THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES continues to enthrall readers.

For WE ARE BOOKISH, Kelly Gallucci includes Lemberg’s novella among 2020 and 2021 Books by Trans and Nonbinary Authors for Your TBR.

R.B. Lemberg’s debut is on shelves now, and perfect for those looking to escape into a fantasy world. Weaver Uiziya is awaiting the arrival of her exiled aunt to learn the art of the Four Profound Weaves, which would allow her to create carpets of wind, sand, song, and bones. She discovers that she isn’t the only one waiting for Benesret. A trans man from a different land has arrived in their desert town to ask Benesret for a new name. The two decide to team up to find Benesret and along the way discover far more about each other and themselves.

Artur Nowrot at WYSZNUPANE feels much the same.

There is a structure that lends itself well to fantasy or a certain strain of it: a great evil descends and destroys the sheltered home of a young protagonist, sending them out into the world, on a journey where they will come into their own and defeat the evil. If you look hard enough, you can see the bones of that plot in R.B. Lemberg’s The Four Profound Weaves, but they twist that plot skillfully, introducing elements that change the story and make it very different from your typical Campbell-flavoured fantasy.

[…]

If there is anything that can topple dictators, it’s helping those who were hurt by them and a collective struggle. There will be bodies, dead or wounded, but eventually they will reach such numbers that their weight will crush the oppressors – as long as we, the living, keep remembering, and giving them voice, and pushing onward.
It is a grim note of hope – with an awareness of the terrible cost of fighting for justice – but it’s hope nonetheless.

GARIKI6’S SCIFI/FANTASY REVIEWS AND OTHER THOUGHTS praises the work.

This setup creates a story about hope and life (although the story instead refers to these concepts as hope and death), and about making one’s own destiny that is truly wonderful and must be read to be experienced. I’m sure someone can go deep into how this story takes the queer experience and makes it into a powerful tale of self-understanding and recognition, and it absolutely is, but well this is so short I don’t want to go too in deep. Read this, it’s great.

In The /r/Fantasy Monthly Book Discussion Thread, REDDIT continues its fascination with THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

I really loved the way the story developed from a search for personal meaning to a larger story of understanding and healing and bravery in the face of more powerful forces. The way emotions were central, not only in the storytelling but in the magic of the world itself, was also very powerful. […] And then the conclusion hit all the right notes for me, wrapping up the loose ends without feeling too perfect. Overall a beautiful book, and hopeful about a future of continued resistance to oppressive power structures, which is just what I needed at the moment.
TinyFlyingLion

November 5, 2020

2020 Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellow R. B. Lemberg’s amazing THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES is a beautifully articulated exploration of queer identity and transformation

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R. B. Lemberg and their debut book THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES continue to attract effusive attention.

LOCUS reports that Lemberg has been chosen as the 2020 Le Guin Feminist Science Fiction Fellow.

The $2,000 fellowship, sponsored by the University of Oregon Libraries Special Collections and University Archives (SCUA), is awarded “to encourage research within collections in the area of feminist science fiction.”

SCUA houses the papers of Suzette Haden Elgin, Kate Elliot, Sally Miller Gearhart, Molly Gloss, Damon Knight, Ursula K. Le Guin, Laurie Marks, Joanna Russ, Jessica Salmonson, James Tiptree, Jr., and Kate Wilhelm, and is in the process of acquiring the papers of other feminist science fiction authors.

Anna Burke at NEW YORK JOURNAL OF BOOKS praises the book.

THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES is a beautifully articulated exploration of queer identity and transformation. Lemberg’s prose is rhythmic and haunting. They do not flinch from truth, but neither do they dwell too long in darkness. “It is only in stories that change is easily found,” says Uiziya e Lali, but Lemberg’s first Birdverse novel is a testimony to how stories can do just that. The inventiveness of this world and its systems of magic reflects our own but does not mirror it; the possibilities presented offer hope for different ways and modes of being.

MI BOOK REVIEWS feels much the same.

THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES is AMAZING. The two MCs are trans and are totally the sort of heroes I needed to read.

In advance of forthcoming (Nov. 16) first issue, REVUU teases coverage of the acclaimed debut.

We also cover the debut of an up-and-coming writer who creates a fictional world based on the LGBTQ+ society in Kris van der Voorn’s review of THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

INSECTOID REVIEWS reveals Why You Should Read Birdverse.

I strongly urge everyone to read Birdverse, it is truly one of the hidden gems in today’s science fiction. I only scratched the surface of why these stories are great. Birdverse is shaped by R. B. Lemberg’s queerness, neurodivergence, and Jewishness creating a rich tapestry of immersive narratives full of hope and comfort for the othered and marginalized. Don’t know where to start? Start with “Grandmother-nai-Leyit’s Cloth of Winds”. You can find the entire bibliography of Birdverse at R. B. Lemberg’s website with many of the stories free to read.

In the REDDIT r/Fantasy discussion Why should I write fantasies? The struggle of a writer, eriophora of Black Forest Basilisks suggests THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES, Marie Brennan’s DRIFTWOOD, and several others.

Some books that I think are stand-outs when it comes to exploring philosophy, humanity, and getting into “deeper” ideas:
Deerskin by Robin McKinley
My Heart Struck Sorrow by John Hornor Jacobs
Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer (fantasy/sci-fi)
The Vanished Birds by Simon Jimenez (fantasy/sci-fi)
Silently and Very Fast by Caitlin Starling (fantasy/sci-fi)
The Winged Histories by Sofia Samatar
THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES by RB Lemberg
The Seventh Perfection by Daniel Polansky
The Pursuit of William Abbey by Claire North
DRIFTWOOD by Marie Brennan
Ringshout by P Djeli Clark

October 21, 2020

In their impressive THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES, R. B. Lemberg’s poetic mastery evokes Ursula K. LeGuin at her finest

Rick Klaw blog Der Feuervogel aufersteht, marlene harris, r. b. lemberg, reading reality, review, s. e. fleenor, syfy wire, the borrowed bookshelf, the four profound weaves

R. B. Lemberg’s intriguing THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES continues to elicit amazing responses.

For SYFY WIRE, S. E. Fleenor praises the novella.

Magic, polyamory, trans solidarity, epic journeys, political intrigue, fear, loss, love, healing, and even Aunt Death all somehow fit — and more impressively come together in a powerful way — in R.B. Lemberg’s new novella THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

It is a supremely balanced book, focusing only on the most necessary details to get the story across. In that sense, the book is both ethereal and ephemeral: graceful, delicately wrought, and fleeting. That said, THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES has an incredibly layered plot where we find that nearly every new character is someone our protagonists have met before. To me, though, what really distinguishes this work is how it embraces trans elders as leaders, changemakers, rabble-rousers, and magic users.

THE BORROWED BOOKSHELF agrees.

THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES is a short book, probably more around novella length. I’m impressed with how much culture and worldbuilding Lemberg managed to fit in, but it never feels too much. As you follow Uiziya and nen-sasair, you get more understanding into the different cultures they’re from and their own relationships with gender. Among Uiziya’s people, transformation is not shameful and she chose to make her transformation at a young age. Among nen-sasair’s people, transformation is not commonly done publically, and he struggles with his new roles the cloistered world of men after having lived as a trader, wife, mother, and grandmother for so long.

[…]

Recommended for: People who love prose, interesting magic, slow stories, and weaving

DER FEUERVOGEL AUFERSTEHT also recommends the tale.

Lemberg’s writing style is poetic without being impenetrably dense, and it reminds me of Ursula Le Guin’s prose at its finest. (I’m sure RB would be pleased with that comparison! I know that “Stone Telling” is meaningful to them.)

I highly recommend this book. You can find it at all the usual suspects.

Marlene Harris at READING REALITY enjoys the book.

THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES has the feel and the sense of a myth in the making, or perhaps a fairy tale. Reading it has filled my head with a weave of more thoughts – profound or otherwise – than one would think that a book this slim would hold between its pages.

It’s the kind of story that, although I’ve finished reading it, I feel like it hasn’t finished with me yet. Perhaps its that the lesson of the fairy tale is still being absorbed.

[…]

Escape Rating A-: I’m all over the map about this one. In the end, I loved it, but the beginning was slow. I think that part of that was because this was my first trip to Birdverse, and it took me a while to get my bearings in it.

Also, the story begins slowly because it feels like it is meant to. Both of the protagonists have spent 40 years not living their truths. That’s a long time to wait for anything, let alone wait to fulfill their dreams. But they’ve been holding themselves back, so it seems natural that it would take them a while to get moving toward a future that they’ve been inching towards at a snail’s pace for so many years.

September 27, 2020

Happy birthday to the enigmatic and acclaimed Birdverse creator R. B. Lemberg

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A queer, bigender immigrant from Eastern Europe and Israel, R. B. Lemberg is best know for their Birdverse, a complex, culturally diverse world with many LGBTQIA+ characters and different family configurations. Lemberg’s award-winning Birdverse stories and poems appeared in/at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Uncanny, Heiresses of Russ (2016), The Long List Anthology (2016), Transcendent 3: The Year’s Best Transgender Speculative Fiction 2017, Strange Horizons, Through the Gate, Goblin Fruit, and their patreon. The first Birdverse novella, THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES, was published last month to massive acclaim.

Many of their non-Birdverse works were published by numerous venues including Warrior Wisewoman (2008), Fantasy Magazine, Jabberwocky 6, People of the Book: A Decade of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction (2010), Daily Science Fiction, Bahamut, Sisters of the Revolution: A Feminist Speculative Fiction Anthology (2015), Queers Destroy Science Fiction! (2015), Sunspot Jungle (2018), Best of Uncanny Magazine (2019), Fireside Magazine, Glittership, and Disabled People Destroy Fantasy! (2019). Some of Lemberg’s poetry was collected in Marginalia to Stone Bird (2016). They have edited The Moment of Change (2012), Here, We Cross (2012), An Alphabet of Embers (2016), and the forthcoming Climbing Lightly Through Forests: Poetry in tribute to Ursula K. Le Guin (2021 with Lisa M. Bradley).

A sociolinguist, Lemberg works as an associate professor at a Midwestern university and lives with their spouse Bogi Takács, a fellow queer, trans, and Eastern European Jewish person.

All of us at Tachyon wish the magical, groundbreaking R. B. an amazing birthday!

September 22, 2020

Who is R. B. Lemberg, author of THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES and creator of Birdverse?

Rick Klaw blog birdverse, female first, food, fran wilde, john scalzi, mary robinette kowal, my favorite bit, r. b. lemberg, the big idea, the four profound weaves, the worldshapers, whatever 0

R. B. Lemberg, author of THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES, participated in several interviews and crafted some guest posts that offered glimpses behind the curtain of the debut author and their enigmatic Birdverse.

At FEMALE FIRST, Lemberg shares Seven things I’d like my readers to know about me.

1. I was born in the Soviet Union. It does not exist anymore, but while it existed, I lived in two different Soviet republics – Ukraine and Russia. After the Soviet Union collapsed, it turned out that I had retroactively lived in two different countries.

2. I am an immigrant now living in the US. I lived on three different continents. I write about wanderlust in my book because I am forever torn between the need to wander and the desire to stay in one place and be rooted in landscape and weather. Writing helps me wander even when I cannot leave the house.

3. I am a linguist. As a child, I dreamt of waking up knowing ten languages. I would lie in bed and fold my fingers, counting all the languages that I would know. As a teen, I got into medieval and ancient languages, and studied as many of them as I could in college. As a graduate student at UC Berkeley, I dithered forever between medieval and modern topics, finally settling on modern (I study multilingualism, as well as gender). One of my fantasy novels in progress is about a linguist. I hope to finish it one day.

With Fran Wilde, Lemberg discusses the food of Birdverse.

For the feature today, I was going to make a “this-world dish which would nevertheless be Birdversey,” and I promised some of my readers a meat-stuffed eggplant, which is something they might make in Iyar (with lamb, not beef). But I’ve been having some trouble eating meat lately, and so the feature today is Eggplant Stuffed with Itself and Its Fellow Vegetables. It’s definitely Birdversey, and could be made by the Khana grandmothers in Iyar – the Khana people do not eat meat, and this is vegetarian.

I do not follow recipes, and it’s extremely difficult for me to figure out how to convert my own cooking into recipes. Everything is improvisational. I invite you to taste and try as you go.

This dish is easy and very festive. You prepare the different parts separately, and assemble it before serving. The dish is grain-free and meat-free. It does have a bit of honey, so if you want to make it vegan, this is the only substitute you need to make.

On THE WORLDSHAPERS blog, Lemberg participates in an interview.

For John Scalzi’s WHATEVER, Lemberg contributes THE BIG IDEA.

My Big Idea for this piece has always been this: what if older transgender people get to tell their own stories, get to go on a quest, on a grand and tragic and hopeful adventure in which they can finally, in their sixties, truly begin their stories?

This shouldn’t be, perhaps, such a Big idea, but older people – especially older women and older queer people — are underrepresented in SFF unless they are mentors. And of course, there are barely any older trans people in SFF, even as mentors. Older mentors are often in the stories only briefly – they endow the hero with cool magical skills or the Really Big Sword, and then the mentors go on to be tragically killed, so that they can continue to inspire the much younger hero from a safe distance of being dead. I always wanted to write a “mentor’s own adventure” type of story, in which these brilliant mentors get to be in focus.

I was curious about the nameless man, the trans protagonist of my book. He transitioned in his sixties, after forty years of agonizing and closeted life. I wanted to know what he would do after he finally transitioned. Well, almost immediately he made a friend, another trans person, Uiziya, who became the other protagonist of The Four Profound Weaves. Together, they embarked on a mystical quest to find Uiziya’s exiled aunt Benesret, a master weaver who knows everything about death. Uiziya and the nameless man need to learn to weave from death itself to defeat an evil ruler who’d once, a very long time ago, imprisoned and killed the nameless man’s lover.

And for Mary Robinette Kowal’s MY FAVORITE BIT, Lemberg explored the relationship between Judaism and Birdverse.

One of the things I love so much about The Four Profound Weaves is all the Jewish-inspired worldbuilding. I talked about it a little in other interviews – the Khana people are basically secondary-world Jews. My worldbuilding about the Khana people is inspired by both ancient and medieval diasporic Jewish history, but it’s not a direct copy of any specific period or community. Instead, some overarching ideas and some details make it into the story in a way which is, I hope, inobtrusive. Hebrew roots are at the base of the Old Khana language which the men learn, and these roots are recognizable in some of the words and the names that the Khana people use. We learn that the Khana people are diasporic – they are exiles from Keshet, and there are Khana quarters in other places around the landmass. In the city of Iyar, the Khana people live in their own quarter, separated from the outside world by walls and a gate guarded by the Raw Guards (the meaning of the Hebrew word golem, is raw, amorphous, unformed). In one of my WIPs, which happens in a different corner of the landmass, the Khana quarter has been forcibly opened by a hostile government, and their Raw Guards removed or destroyed. The quarters help define a culture and protect the Khana people from hostile outsiders – but they also constrain the people both physically and metaphorically. I also love how there’s more than one possible afterlife in Birdverse – just like in Jewish culture, where there are multiple beliefs about what happens or can happen after we die, and that is certainly reflected in the novella.

September 16, 2020

R. B. Lemberg’s THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES took flight with a blog tour

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In celebration of the books release, R. B. Lemberg and their astounding THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES participated in a blog tour that featured interviews, excerpts, book reviews, giveaways, and more.

August 28th – Black Forest Basilisks celebrated the book’s release with the insightful essay “The Impact of R.B. Lemberg’s Birdverse: A Second Look at ‘The Four Profound Weaves’”.

While I’ve already waxed poetic previously on this novella’s merits in a full review back in March, a small reprise is called for as we near its release date. The prediction I made back then still holds true; I don’t think I’ve stopped recommending this book any time it’s even slightly relevant to someone’s interests.
— Black Forest Basilisk

August 29th – Way Too Fantasy shared an interview with Lemberg.

It’s rare to see elderly protagonists in high fantasy– they’re usually side characters. nen-sasaïr was a side character in the preceding story “Grandmother-nai-Leylit’s Cloth of Winds.” What made you decide to feature 60-year-old Uiziya and nen-sasaïr?

I think this was always their story, I just could not approach them directly before I told the first two parts of the story. It gave me the scaffolding I needed to approach what I see the heart of the story, which is about how our beloved cultures and loved ones may constrict us, may keep us prisoner even as they love us, or at least say they love us. The perspective of older people is very important to me. We have so many stories about younger people, that it almost feels like the process of self-discovery and embracing one’s identity is exclusively the business of youth. Don’t get me wrong, one’s teens and twenties are a prime time for self-discovery, and there is a very good reason why so many stories focus on this age group. YA is very important, and especially wonderful right now. Still, though, I feel that for people who have been oppressed, closeted, abused, denied their identity for any reason, it is important to know that it is never too late to move into your full triumphant self. But it is not the same process later in life. We need these stories. I need these stories, as a person coming from a deeply anti-LGBTQIA+ cultural context. Fiction should reflect our stories, and I feel passionately about both trans and queer rep, neuratypical rep, and rep of people of all ages. My characters run the gamut of ages. I hope to write more about protagonists who are older, as well as about middle-aged trans protagonists (and younger ones, of course!)
— Way Too Fantasy

August 31st – The Clipped Nightingale shared an excerpt.

Everybody seemed to have gone to the trading tents, and so I made my way there as well. I was hoping to see my grandchildren, always too busy those days to spend time with me. It was true that I did not want to be trading, but if someone was trading, Aviya for sure would be there.

The trading tents were open to the air, supported with carved poles to which the lightweight cloths of the roof attached festive woven ribbons. People milled under these awnings, mostly women—Surun’ weavers of all ages, each with a carpet or carpets for sale; and a few of their beloved snakes. The crowd parted as I entered, and in that moment my fears came true.

Three men stood in the middle of the trading tent. They had the gold rods of trade, and gold coins sewn onto the trim of their red felt hats. The men’s eyes shone; their dark beards were groomed and oiled, and adorned with the tiniest bells that shook and jingled as they bent over the wares. I sensed powerful magic from all three of them. Their magic – multiple short deepnames – shone in their minds, each deepname like a flaring, spiky star. I was powerful myself, but the strangers’ power was that of capturing, of imprisonment, of destruction, held tightly at bay. The vision made me recoil. These men—and it was always men—belonged to the Ruler of Iyar. The Collector.

I had been living here for three months with my grandchildren, among our friends the snake-Surun’. Almost three months after my transformation, my ceremony of change. I thought I had finally broken free from Iyar. But now Iyar came here.

September 1st – Phoebe’s Randoms

In this breathtaking debut set in R. B. Lemberg‘s beloved Birdverse, THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES hearkens to Ursula Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness, and offers a timeless chronicle of claiming one’s identity ina hostile world.
— Phoebe’s Rainbow

September 2nd – Queer Sci Fi celebrated with an excerpt.

I sat alone in my old goatskin tent. Waiting, like I had for the last forty years, for Aunt Benesret to come back. Waiting to inherit her loom and her craft, the mastery of the Four Profound Weaves. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been sitting like this, and it was dark in the tent; I no longer knew day from night.

When the faded red woven tapestry at the entrance shifted aside, I drew my breath sharply, waiting for my aunt’s thin, almost skeletal hand—but it was not Benesret. Of course not. Instead, one of my grand-nieces stepped in, plump and full of life, bedecked in embroideries and circlets hammered with snakes. Her eyes shone like stars in the gloom.

“Aunt Uiziya, don’t sit here alone. Aunt Uiziya, you should come to the trading tent. Aunt Uiziya, bring some of these weaves—” The girl’s bejeweled hand motioned at the weavings that hung, heavy and lifeless, around my tent. “You might sell something, and if not, just show your craft, yes?” And just like a flutter of wind, she was gone.

September 2nd – Utopia State of Mind

I adored THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES so much that I read the novella in one sitting! That’s right! If you’re a fan of queer fantasy, inventive magic, and novellas, then definitely check this out!
— Utopia State of Mind

September 3rd – Beauty in Ruins shared an interview with Lemberg by Tachyon’s Rick Klaw.

You’ve lived in a wide variety of fascinating locales. How did those locales color the Birdverse?

I am tempted to say that all of them affect Birdverse in some way, but that’s not quite true. I have not written anything resembling Vorkuta (in circumpolar Russia) in Birdverse, although it is influencing my space opera WIP now. Birdverse comes from my imagination, but some of it is definitely colored by how it feels to exist in some of these places – the feel of the desert at dawn, the smell of a quince, the feel of carved bone and cast brass, and very old music that can be heard when everything else is quiet.
— Beauty in Ruins

September 4th – MI Book Reviews

The ending and the themes throughout the book are pretty perfect….5 out of 5 stars. I would recommend this book.
— MI Book Review

September 5th – The Book Deviant

Everything about the story was as magical as I was expecting, and it had me turning the pages to find where they went or what they did next.”
— Book Deviant

September 6th – The Artsy Reader

I highly recommend this inventive, queer Middle-Eastern fairytale that offers a unique take on magic and has an excellent world-building.
— Artsy Reader

September 7th – Books & Tea

The prose is striking: delicate and measured, yet somehow pulsing with pain underneath, as we learn more about the main character’s past and how they try to heal both themselves and others from trauma.
— Books & Tea

September 8th – Pei Reads

The story is much more slow-paced than I’m used to, but it works so well with this story and allows the lyrical writing style to truly shine. The finale is grand and splendid and absolutely breathtakingly. beautiful.
— Pei Reads

September 10 – Dianthaa Dabbles celebrated with an excerpt.

Everybody seemed to be in the trading tents, but I dragged my feet—and not just because of the pain from sitting still for so long. The encampment felt empty. The carpet of sand on my shoulder whispered into my ear of the wide-open spaces where I wanted and dreaded to go. It was thin, almost weightless, as if it wanted to fly away from my shoulder. I tried to imagine what I would do next, after I traded the carpet away. Sell my tent and my weavings and move to some other encampment, where nobody knew me and nobody gossiped? Walk out into the desert without any water, and wait for the goddess Bird to come for my soul? Go look for that thing that I dreaded? Go back to my tent and sit once again?

I stepped closer and closer, my resolve liquefying like sweat, when I saw my old acquaintance, the nameless man. He was all but running away from the tents, his lighter brown face a grimace of anger-pain-anger I’d come to recognize in him.

Seeing me, he stopped, and averted his gaze.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Nothing.”

A thin green snake slithered in the dusk between us, as if drawing a boundary I should not cross. I stepped right over it.

September 4, 2020

Join Jill Roberts, R. B. Lemberg, Marie Brennan and others in virtual conversation at California Bookseller Virtual Discovery Lab 2020

Rick Klaw blog, Events Audrey T. Williams, California Bookseller Virtual Discovery Lab 2020, Greta Kelly, jill roberts, marie brennan, Mike Chen, Natalie Zina Walschots, r. b. lemberg, Sesshu Foster 0

Tachyhon managing editor Jill Roberts moderates the California Bookseller Virtual Discovery Lab Speculative Fiction Author Panel (Thursday, September 10 11am PST) with Tachyon authors Marie Brennan (DRIFTWOOD) and R. B. Lemberg (THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES) plus Sesshu Foster, Mike Chen, Greta Kelly, Natalie Zina Walschots, and Audrey T. Williams. RSVP Required.

September 3, 2020

Join R. B. Lemberg, author of the lyrical and complex THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES, for their REDDIT AMA

Rick Klaw blog, Events buzzfeed, chain reaction, dante's wardrobe, j. a. jablonski, jo ladziski, jo writes fantasy, r. b. lemberg, r/books, r/fantasy, reddit, review, the four profound weaves 0

R. B. Lemberg discusses their acclaimed debut THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES in a REDDIT AMA at r/books on Friday, September 4 at 2PM CST.

BUZZFEED includes the book among 7 New Books Coming Out This Week You Should Definitely Read.

THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES by R.B. Lemberg is a lyrical and complex fantasy novella featuring two elderly trans characters. Uiziya is trying to learn the four profound weaves. She’s mastered three out of the four and lacks the bone cloth. In order to learn how to weave the bone cloth, she needs to go to her aunt Benesret, who is an outcast in the desert who is weaving bone cloth for the evil Ruler of Iyar’s assassins. A nameless man referred to as nen-sasaïr recently changed into a man and is trying to learn about his identity in his heavily gender-stratified culture. He’s also trying to lay some of his past demons to rest. Their two quests both lead them to confront the evil Ruler of Iyar.
— Margaret Kingsbury

CHAIN INTERACTION agrees.

Overall this book surprised me with how much I enjoyed it and how powerful my feelings were by the end of the story, it’s emotional for sure and also hopeful and beautiful and tragic and all other emotions that it should not be possible to pack into a small package like this.

Jo Ladzinski on their blog JO WRITES FANTASY also enjoys it.

A delightful debut about identity, art, and friendship.

J. A. Jablonski for DANTE’S WARDROBE appreciates the soul-bearing THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES.

I am in the end, I guess one might say, a creature of the work, of deep storytelling, and of imagination. In Lemberg’s novella, I find all three. They craft their writing. There is cadence to the sentences, the narrative flow, and the plot itself. They know how language works to deepen the culture surrounding people and their doings. Character names sound real. The words used to describe artifacts, cultural behavior, the sociology of the different peoples all ring true. With regard to the journey that is imagination, Lemberg bends their mind (and heart too, one senses) into that gap between and emerges with the wings of the redwing hawk. This tale seems to have been torn from their soul.

At REDDIT r/Fantasy, leftoverbrine praises the novella.

The writing is beautiful, pacing very different from your standard fantasy. I loved getting to know the characters, their journey venturing into a world with bird gods, flying carpets and mountains of bones is so unusual. It takes a slow, thoughtful course, pondering the conflict between change and stability, the cruelty that rigid stability can wreak on the individual.

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