Second paragraph of third day of journal:

That was the way of our relationship. The way of the vast majority of brotherly and sisterly relationships that crossed sunrise and sunset in the Kingdom of Reikova. We had some power to make our night- or day-brothers aware of something specific; a power often exercised through saying a thing repeatedly, perhaps with the aid of a mirror, or the written word – as I had chosen that day. But total certainty was impossible. An obstinate day-brother could do their utmost to ignore the night before, or see a note and choose not to read it. In that sense there was some degree of control – or the illusion of control – in what we remembered of each other. It was possible, for instance, to be the prying sort. I might know much of what my day-brother did with his sunlit hours. Instead, I had long ago decided his doings were tedious at best, distasteful at worst. I preferred to ignore them as best I could. I imagined he felt the same way of my nightly endeavours. But as with all Reikovan citizens who made something of their lives, who avoided the clutches of St Leonars prison and the like, we lived in a peaceful enough accord with each other. An accord that, on occasion, relied on wilful ignorance.

One of the Clarke submissions that I put aside at the time as clearly fantasy and therefore ineligible, but worth coming back to. The setting is a world (or at least a country) where everyone transforms into a different person at sunrise and sunset, meaning a whole different set of relationships, economic activities, habits etc. The protagonist and his shadow become involved in an occult murder mystery up-country (a frequently used trope, where the author explores their secondary world through the medium of a crime narrative). Quite nicely done, with very good plot pacing as we discover more about the world. Though I did find myself wondering about the personal inconveniences of the setup – the author touches on the intricacies of childbirth, but there’s a lot more to intimate personal interaction than that. You can get Equinox here.

This was the sff book that had lingered longest unread on my shelves. Next on that pile is Twenty-first Century Blues, by Steve Walker, but that will have to wait until I have finished my non-fiction acquisitions of 2022.