|
I shamefully only read one single book this month. I was recovering from surgery too, so I had an embarrassing amount of time that I didn't read during. Do reference books count?  if so, 47) ]Microsoft Office 2021 Step by Step by Joan Lambert - Now I know how to use the neats parts of the newest version of office! Thrilling!48) If Walls Could Talk - an Intimate History of the Home by Lucy Worsley - A poppy popcorny collection of bite-sized histories of each aspect of home life from the medieval age to modernity. History of the closet. History of toilets. History of menstruation. History of cranking it. This went down so easy, and the writing is really light and conversational. I don't know what possessed me to pick this one up, but I'm glad I did. Glosses a lot of stuff in the quest to cover as much breadth as possible, but it does so by zeroing in only on the really fun aspects. The chapters are all micro-sized too, so this was the perfect book to take when I was stuck in waiting rooms/lines etc. 5 minutes is all it takes to bang 2 chapters out.
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2025 04:30
|
|
|
|
| # ? Nov 10, 2025 01:04 |
|
|
July was alright, 3 books. She Calls Me Daddy: Seven Things Every Man Needs to Know About Building a Complete Daughter by Robert Wolgemuth - Parenting advice book, specifically for dads with daughters, I have 3 of them, so I'm always trying to figure out wtf I'm doing. It was good. Like almost all of these, there are things to listen to and things not to, this one had more good than bad, though, so it was good. Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson - Thread recommendation. Kind of a collection of short stories about a small town, but instead of being separated, they all kind of lazily dovetail into each other. Because of this, I kept expecting the story to swing back around to the people at the beginning but it never really did. Overall a pretty interesting read. Endymion by Dan Simmons - Working my way through this series has been a joy. This is the third book in the series, and somehow the third genre (style?) this series has gone through. Now we've rocketed ~300 years into the future, and this one was, at its core, a pursuit story, with elements and characters from the prior two novels woven throughout. The writing style was solid and surprises abound. I'm continuing to be impressed by this series; it's really good. I am taking a break with a nonfiction before jumping into #4, but I am excited to keep going quote:1. Oathbringer - Brandon Sanderson
|
|
#
?
Aug 4, 2025 00:00
|
|
|
How is it 17) The Bible and Flying Saucers by Barry H. Downing - I don't know the Bible well enough to say whether things have been cherry picked but I guess I can see the argument. Certain bits rely heavily on interpretation of translations. 18) Elantris by Brandon Sanderson - I think this was the first of his novels and I enjoyed the idea of fallen godlike beings. Some of the characters had pretty good arcs 19) Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Part 3—Stardust Crusaders, Vol. 6 by Hirohiki Araki - Getting close to DIOOOOOO now 20) High Vaultage by Chris and Jen Sugden - A detective mystery set in an alternate 1800s London where an alternate power source means London takes up the southern half of England. It's a continuation from their podcast Victoriocity and is a nice light read.
|
|
#
?
Aug 4, 2025 10:24
|
|
|
Some catching up: 4. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen - A classic for a reason. Austen's prose is full of beautiful, sparkling sarcasm, every character is bustling with life, and the pacing is insane. Probably my favourite element is the way Austen manipulates the reader's opinion of Mr and Mrs Bennet to mirror Elizabeth's own realizations about her family and its position. Mrs Bennet is so comically inane that Mr Bennet's attacks on her make him sort of irresistably sympathetic, and they have a very stock-character stage-parents thing going: stupid wife, long-suffering husband. But then you (and Elizabeth) realize that, in fact, his dry aloofness is in no small part the cause of the family's suffering, and Mrs Bennet's discomposure and hysteria almost certainly stems from the guilt of not being able to bear a son, along with a very practical and reasonable terror of suffering materially as a result of that. It's a crystal-clear criticism of the arbitrary patriarchal system, while also operating plotwise flawlessly and being wildly entertaining. I really love how that seriousness underpins the whole book, and how it balances the levity. It gives every funny scene a sharply pointed satirical quality, and expands every character both psychologically and socially. Mr Collins could just be a one-note obsequious doofus, but in Austen's hands, we can see how his overweening attachment to Lady Catherine and mercenary attempts at courtship are, in the terms of the system he's operating in, pretty well justified. Austen is able to write these characters to be satricial in their representation of outcomes of her society's rigidity, while maintaining a consistent and real inner life. Absolutely stunning. 5. Mansfield Park by Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice is a bright, sparkling, and clear send-up of Regency marriage games, and Mansfield Park is its muddy, unsettling shadow. I was not prepared for just how dark this book would be. My main criticism is that the pacing is kind of atrocious. Where Pride and Predjudice hustles along in short, vivid chapters that frequently mix-and-match the characters, Mansfield Park winds through long, dense passages, with the characters trapped and suffering together. It's also saddled with an incredibly difficult main character, and possibly even more difficult central romance. I say difficult not just because I had a really hard time liking her, but because it feels like Austen is directly challenging the reader to accept her, both as a protagionist and as a person, and that kind of opened the book up for me. What if "right" isn't "fun"? How far can our sympathy for the downtrodden extend when we don't enjoy being around them? Austen also populates the book with a set of characters so vividly warped that it's frankly kind of shocking. Mrs Norris is particularly nasty but pretty much every character has some dark, cruel element to them. I particularly liked how Sir and Lady Bertram were like a weird mirror of Mr and Mrs Bennet. Thomas Bertram is an overbearing, suffocating presence in his house, imposing upon it a set of strict (if spiritually unmoored) guidelines who only quits the premises to go beat his slaves in Antigua, while Lady Bertram is written as being so completely subservient and quiet that she's basically catatonic, just sitting on the couch in a daze while the house roils around her. And then there's the claustrophobic, white-hot psychological-horror nightmare of Henry's attempts to court Fanny, which plays out like a Kitty Genovese anxiety dream, Fanny being functionally the subject of an attempted rape in front of everyone she knows while they all scream "what's wrong with you, why are you resisting?". This is the most successful part of the book, mostly in that it's acutely terrifying. Fanny's trip to Portsmouth to visit her birth family, where she realizes that they're basically strangers and she doesn't really have a "home", is particularly good. There's a lot to this book, but it requires a lot more work on the part of the reader than Pride and Prejudice, so I'm not surprised that it's nowhere near as popular. 6. The Fall of Hyperion by Dan Simmons - I read the first book last year and loved everything about it except for the fact that it ends on a cliffhanger. Unfortunately, the sequel is much clumsier, and I found myself finishing it mostly out of obligation. There are some terrific ideas, in particular the revelation of what the fatline really is, along with where the TechnoCore actually resides, but losing the Canterbury Tales structure of the first book means that the second book is more of a boilerplate space opera. Sometimes the mysteries are more interesting than the answers. 7. Persuasion by Jane Austen - Lots of bits to love here, but there's something weirdly third-drafty about this book, particularly in how much of the dialogue is handled via description and summary, which makes it kind of difficult to follow. There's something very warm and subtle about it, and I found myself wishing for elaboration. I wanted to spend more time in these moments where the characters are shifting or being challenged, but Austen simply tells us that they are, and then provides a tidy psychological review of the situation, so it's kind of like being told third-hand about events occurring to people you don't know. The biggest flaw is that we just don't get enough Wentworth. He's repeatedly demonstrated to be a good person, but because Austen basically glosses over their initial courtship, and then denies the reader any real in-depth interactions until the very end of the novel, we don't have any reason to like him besides being told that he's likable, and we're also robbed of being able to contrast either of them with their earlier selves. Where P&P is rich with showing, not telling, Persuasion is basically the opposite, and though I can see how that's sort of thematically relevant, it's kind of frustrating. The fact that Austen died shortly after finishing it makes me think that it really was essentially unfinished, or at least under-edited, because it absolutely feels that way. A big shout-out to the Crofts, though. Of all the characters in the three Austen books I've read, they're possibly the most charming and lovable (I particularly love them blasting recklessly around the countryside in their carriage). The Harvilles are also adorable (Austen's description of how they turn their outwardly undesirable quarters into a thriving, bustling, happy home is wonderful). Even if we don't get enough of Wentworth, Austen populates the book with his friends and relatives, and they're all the most delightful people, people who married for love and glow from within as a result.
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2025 17:00
|
|
|
Here's my totals for July. Good month, gave me a bit of a buffer in case I have another 1 or 2 slower months. W: Non-male writer L: LGBTQ writer C: Writer of colour TP: Terry Pratchett T100: Helsingin Sanomat Top 100 list books
Still looking for wildcards (at least I don't think I've gotten any).
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2025 19:40
|
|
|
Kuule hain nussivan posted:
Choose a SF wildcard: Joanna Russ, The Female Man Emma Bull, Bone Dance edit: oh yeah, someone WILDCARD ME please Gertrude Perkins fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Aug 8, 2025 |
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2025 22:55
|
|
|
Gertrude Perkins posted:Choose a SF wildcard: The Female Man is available at my local library, so it will be picked up! Bone Dance sounds interesting, so I'll have to see if I can procure it by other means. This might not make for a good widlcard, since the english language release isn't until the 18th of November, but Iida Turpeinen's Beasts Of The Sea was a single sitting read and one of the finest finnish books to come out in the past decade. It is a blend of fiction and non-fiction following the lives (adventures?) of three nature scientists in three different centuries. I cried during this book.
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2025 10:23
|
|
|
36. The Third Reich at War by Richard J. Evans 37. The Air War: 1939-1945 by Richard Overy - Does everything that a survey text can be expected to do. Don't expect any thrilling dogfight descriptions. 38. Means of Ascent by Robert Caro 39. No Name in the Street by James Baldwin - As frustrated with American injustice as his earlier books, but with a note of despair this time after the deaths of Malcolm and Martin, the collapse of the Black Panthers. 40. The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman - this entry lumps in a bunch of short stories I read. 41. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides 42. The Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell - not quite as great as Homage to Catalonia, but greater than Down and Out in Paris and London 43. Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic by Tom Holland 44. The End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck - A woman lives through the 20th century in Europe, dying several times, never knowing the life she might have lived otherwise. 45. The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler - I don't think I like noir very much. Christie and Doyle are probably more my style. 46. Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke 47. Understanding Naval Warfare by Ian Speller - Didn't feel like I learned much here. 48. A Celebration of Cats by Roger Caras 49. Dangerous Laughter by Steven Millhauser - One of the top three short story collections I've read from this century. 50. Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar by Tom Holland - didn't care for the schoolboyish glee with which he described the perversions of the emperors. 51. The Campaigns of Napoleon: The Mind and Method of History's Greatest Soldier by David Chandler - Took 1090 pages, but I'm done. That's my New Year's Resolution taken care of. Not wholly sure where to head next - perhaps some lighter fantasy fare?
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2025 11:07
|
|
|
Kuule hain nussivan posted:This might not make for a good widlcard, since the english language release isn't until the 18th of November, but Iida Turpeinen's Beasts Of The Sea was a single sitting read and one of the finest finnish books to come out in the past decade. It is a blend of fiction and non-fiction following the lives (adventures?) of three nature scientists in three different centuries. I cried during this book. I got a kick out of the wildcard you gave me last year - Troll: A Love Story - so I'll try and get a copy of this!
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2025 16:51
|
|
|
Seeing how it is August it’s probably a good time to put an update together. I started off strong at the beginning of the year but I started to slack off during the summer. I only managed 1 book so far  . I defintely went on an Apple/Steve Jobs kick so far this year. Anyways here is my list for 2025: 1) The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare - G.K. Chesterton 2) iWoz - Gina Smith, Steve Wozniak 3) Getting Things Done - David Allen 4) Dragons of Autumn Twilight - Margaret Weis, Tracy Hickman 5) Steve Jobs - Walter Isaacson 6) Insanely Great - Steven Levy 7) Steve Jobs & the NeXT Big Thing - Randall E Stross, Lee Goerner
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2025 18:33
|
|
|
Steve Jobs is famously known as the Dragon of Autumn Twilight.
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2025 19:51
|
|
|
Books: 29 What I read in July. In reverse order. Coriolanus by William Shakespeare What a cold, strange story. It’s almost as long as Hamlet, and has twice the number of characters, but it feels less dense than Hamlet. Maybe because some of the characters felt more like the voice of a group than an individual. The stakes are just as intense, but more political. I keep comparing this to Hamlet, but it’s also been a while since I read that. I need to reread it to get my head straight. Making Sense of the Troubles: The Story of the Conflict in Northern Ireland by David McKittrick A more complete history of the troubles. I still have a couple more books on the troubles and n my to read list. I’ll get to them soon. I Am Not Sidney Poitier by Percival Everett More wordplay than usual in an Everett book, and he usually has a lot. Naming a character “Not Sidney Poitier” makes for some great dialog on par with “who’s on first”. Northern Ireland: A Very Short Introduction by Marc Mulholland Dense. And organized by theme instead of date, which is fine in a book this short where you can easily jump back and forth, but was a bit confusing. Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith A philosopher writes about intelligence, evolution, parallel evolution, and death—all inspired by octopodes. There’s a simple statement early on that consciousness is probably not a boolean and likely evolved and changed over time, just like anything else. I’ve spent a lot of time since reading that wondering what it would mean to have “more consciousness” or a “more developed consciousness”, like having a “more evolved sense of vision”. But maybe the word “more” is the wrong word, since if it is an evolved trait, then we would have the conciseness that evolved to best fit our environment. And all that might sound like a bunch of college students sitting in a dormroom after their first philosophy class, but it’s great to feel like that again, and that’s why I’d recommend this book. Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe This books does exactly what you want a popular history book to do: it tells the very personal stories of people whose lives mirrored the larger historical movements they were a part of. Which is very hard to do well, and this book nails it. This books starts with the disappearance of one mom, and uses her story to spin out into larger story of the troubles, and circles back down into the personal lives of people related to her disappearance. But this personal style of writing popular history is always a sacrifice, because a nicely formed novelistic story won’t intersect with the totality of “what the gently caress happened.” And there’s some stuff missing here from the troubles that a proper history book would go deeper on: the loyalist paramilitaries, internal IRA disagreements, John Hume. Say Nothing also pulls off a little trick with the people it does a deep dive on, because it spends a lot of time with people who were adjacent to Gerry Adams, like Hughes, and you get so many anecdotes about Adams that you almost believe you know who he is and what he’s about. It’s not until near the end that you realize you were always on the outside, and you never really knew him at all. Which represents the opinions of more than a few people who thought they knew him too. He’s a mysterious character, and the book handles him as such.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2025 16:12
|
|
|
Gertrude Perkins posted:
Finished twelve books this month, including more comics because why the hell not. 76 - Junky, by William S. Burroughs. His first proper novel, drawn from grim and desperate personal experience and filtered through a noir lens. Matter-of-fact descriptions of the quotidian struggles and joys and discomforts of opioid addiction and drug selling, but told with an obsessive momentum that kept me engrossed. Like all of the Burroughs I've read, it's ugly and full of the gross realities of living in a human body whose processes are deeply tied to psychology and habit. Not hard to see why this one was such a success. 5. Read something fictional about a real person - roman ŕ clef 77 - Cloudcry, by Sydney J. van Scyoc. Strange SF adventure about two researchers on an alien world on the cusp of developing sapient life. Accompanied by a grumpy, flightless bird-man, they explore ancient ruins and uncover a secret of crystals and flutes and cruel hierarchy. Concurrently, a young woman from a native alien species has the spark of intelligence and ambition inside her, and is on her own quest to gain the power to change everything. It took me a while to get into this but I really ended up enjoying it. I was constantly distracted by the deluge of phallic imagery, with towering pink mesas and lovingly-blown flutes. I liked how van Scyoc contrasted the different characters and species; the coming-of-age/coming-of-intelligent-life dynamic was also cool. Glad I picked this up! 6. Read two books published in the same month - January 1977, same as Towards A Gay Communism and The Howling 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. 78 - Believe Me: A Memoir of Love, Death, and Jazz Chickens, by Suzy Eddie Izzard. Gosh, this was lovely. The audiobook is read by Izzard herself, which (with her idiosyncratic ditheting and endless audio footnotes) adds about fifty extra pages to the experience. A broad discussion of her life and career, from losing her mother at an early age to becoming obsessed with films to spending a decade as a struggling street performer, then eventually to immense success with comedy and acting and long distance running. Throughout the book there are asides, anecdotes, rants, and quirky observations, as any fan might expect. There are some recurring gags and fixations that get a little grating - her constant cheeky references to being atheist are a particular broken record that I tired of quickly. One of the highlights of the book is an extended exploration of gender and Izzard's own transgender experience, which is related with defiant frankness and openness. I liked this book very much, and am especially happy that I chose to listen to her read it. 7. Read a book by someone known better for making other art - comedy & acting 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. 79 - The Yage Letters, by William S. Burroughs & Allen Ginsberg. A neat little writing exercise between friends and collaborators that seems like a bridge between Queer and Naked Lunch. Burroughs does the bulk of the writing here, with an unhappy and ravenous travelogue through Ecuador; Ginsberg provides his own version of the search for the legendary yage and the psychedelic transcendence it brings. This is a quick read and feels mostly ephemeral but has some good highlights and lowlights of each man's relationship with drugs, as well as their different brands of Ugly American imposing themselves on a foreign "third world" country. 5. Read something fictional about a real person - fictionalised correspondences 80 - Prince of Cats, by Ron Wimberly. Gorgeous artwork and an unexpected genre mashup that provides a "B-side" to Romeo & Juliet, focusing on Tybalt and the Capulets. Wimberly transposes the teen melodrama to 1980s Brooklyn and steeps every page in contemporary Black American culture...and also adds samurai duels to the Montague-Capulet gang rivalry. I got serious Afro Samurai vibes from some of this - there's even a duellist leaderboard! - but this is much less bleak and more colourful. The dialogue is half taken from the original play and half original, but peppered with thees and thous and written with juuuuussssst enough iambic flow to sound authentic...and juuuuuusssssst enough inconsistency with metre and rhythm to give me a headache. Outside of that the writing is really fun, though, including some fantastic insult-trading and some sweet, earnest teenage heart-to-hearts. This is a fun and cool comic that's worth checking out. 81-83 - Dinosaur Sanctuary, Vol. 2 & 3 & 4, by Itaru Kinoshita & Shin-ichi Fujiwara (trans. by John Neal). Down-to-earth procedural manga about dinosaur zookeeping. The adventures continue, with more characters, more dinos, and a little more drama. Very cosy and entertaining, still! 6. Read two books published in the same month - vol 3 came out in September 2022, same as A Minor Chorus 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. 84 - Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, by Haruki Murakami (trans. by Alfred Birnbaum). I was unsure about this, but I'm grateful I gave this one a chance. It's pretty drat brilliant, even with all of the caveats and Murakami-isms I expected. The twin narratives are fun and pacey, and there's a bemused matter-of-factness about the Hard-Boiled narrative that I found surprisingly endearing. The last third of the book had a great sense of building melancholy and the anticipation for the titular "end of the world" really worked for me. The blend of magical-realism fantasy with dreamlike contemporary cyberpunk elements was also really neat and helped offset the "boring technician in his mid 30s who likes whiskey and Bob Dylan and old movies" thing. It's remarkable how much I enjoyed this, given how pessimistic I was going into it. Good stuff. 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. 85 - Breaktime, by Aidan Chambers. Quirky coming-of-age novella about a troubled adolescent boy in the North of England who sets off on a series of misadventures with the hope of escaping familial strife - and of losing his virginity. He falls in with a pair of queer troublemakers, tries to reconnect with the girl of his dreams, and does it all to try and convince his best friend that literature has meaning. This was a charming and exciting read full of postmodern stylistic flourishes and precocious over-educated teenage banter. Ditto, the protagonist, is earnestly embarrassing and Chambers does a great job of capturing the vertigo on the edge of adulthood. 86 - The Stars My Destination, by Alfred Bester. This is a really phenomenal science fiction novel, that I'm really glad I finally read. Even with the big glaring caveats about it being a nasty relic of mid-50s white paternalism, the story itself is so exciting and the setting so rich with ideas that I surged through the entire novel on one long-distance bus journey. Foyle is a fantastic arsehole from start to finish, driven by revenge for unimaginable suffering and willing to destroy everything and everyone in his path. The supporting cast are fun too, even though the female characters are all subaltern to Foyle's transcendent adventure. And the ending...wow. I've seen similar things done two dozen times across different media, but the way Bester writes the book's dimension-tearing climax had me glued to the page. It's really an amazing book, warts and all. 15. Read something with a high body count. 87 - Black Blood, by Hayate Kuku (trans. by Kat Skarbinec & Krista Grandy). Gay romance between a retired military cyborg and a nerdy little botanist on an alien planet. Fun SF character designs, and a great balance between "oh, does he like me the way I like him?" and actual exploration of intimacy. Shame it's only one volume, but it's a nice little romance that I enjoyed a lot. Also there's robot loving if that's your cup of tea. 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. 16. Read something with a happy ending.
|
|
#
?
Aug 28, 2025 01:52
|
|
|
8one6 posted:53 - 56. Villain for Hire books 3 - 6 by Jay Aury Summer continues to be pretty light as far as reading goes, but I did make progress in the last few weeks. 60. The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher It's got a few pacing issues but is compellingly creepy. The author does a solid job painting a picture of the horror beyond the walls of reality and capturing the struggle of the characters to describe the indescribable. At least she does in-between the 'cozy vibe' poo poo where main character is hanging out at the next door coffee shop or dodging awkward calls from her ex-husband. 61. Born Different: A Monster Evolution LitRPG by V. Nator Paint-by-numbers LitRPG 62. War Effort (the War Game 7) by August Aird Pretty heavy on the space battles which, if we're being honest, isn't where the author's strength lies. There are a few interpersonal scenes and the chapters where the POV switched away from the main character were enjoyable. The ending is also pretty satisfying so on the whole it's an easy and enjoyable read. 62. Taken to the Stars by J.N. Chaney & Rick Partlow t's fine. Nothing really stands out as worth mentioning good or bad. It starts out slow and it took about half of the book to go from feeling like store brand Farscape to store brand military scifi, but the pace of the novel does eventually pick up. I'm probably not going to bother with the rest of the series. 63. Fine Structure by qntm (aka Sam Hughes) If it weren't for Ed this would be my least favorite qntm book. This is pretty much a collection of all of the flaws from qntm's other books: Too many short stories all later connected together by a handful of interesting ideas and shared characters, all of it wrapped up with the least satisfying conclusion the author can muster. There Is No Antimemetics Division was legit great, Ra at least felt like it all held together better until the inevitable disaster conclusion, this was just unsatisfying to read. 64. Elric of Melniboné by Michael Moorcock (classic) I can see why this became popular and it's obvious that it influenced a lot of later fantasy, but I feel like it's just okay. Maybe that's me not being fair, I'm coming to this decades after it's helped shape generations of stories and authors, all of whom have refined and iterated on the themes and ideas. 65. The Dracula Tape by Fred Saberhagen One of the better retellings of Dracula that I've read. It starts off a little weak but by about midway through I was sold on this version of the Count. I love how it pokes a little fun at the original novel while still obviously having respect for it. I'm definitely going to check out the next book in the series. 66. Gathering of Gamers: Dungeons & Dragons and Other Games Through Gen Con by Matt Shoemaker (non-fiction) A comprehensive and mostly academic look at the history of Gen Con and the surrounding gaming industry that it directly influenced. I'd recommend it to anyone interested in the history of the best four days of gaming. 67. The Flood (Heaven's Vault #3) by Jon Ingold Part one of a two part sequel to the original story/the game, the flood dives into the lore and background of the setting and the main character in a satisfying way, answering some questions while setting up another mystery for the final book. 68. Masked by Lou Anders A joyless slog of an anthology. If it weren't for the names of comic writers that I recognize like Peter David or Gail Simone I would have assumed the editor picked the authors specifically because they don't like superhero comics. 8one6 fucked around with this message at 11:40 on Aug 30, 2025 |
|
#
?
Aug 29, 2025 16:41
|
|
|
I read some books again this month. my current read is books of jacob by tokarczuk, which is pretty great. 2. Make sure at least 25% of the books you read this year are not written by men. 3. Make sure a least 25% of the books you read this year are written by writers of colour. 4. Make sure at least 10% of the books you read this year are written by LGBTQ writers. 12. Ask someone in this thread for a Wildcard, and read it! 13. Participate in the TBB Book Of The Month thread! 47, 3/4 tomes (>800pp.) 1. Shëkufe Tadayoni Heiberg (2024): Livets verber: Tilfřjelser til Nudansk ordbog (Life's verbs: additions to the modern danish dictionary) 2. Thomas Hylland Eriksen (2024): Det umistelige - Fra global ensretting til et nytt mangfold (a title that's difficult to translate well. The unlosable, perhaps? a non-fiction book about all the ways modern capitalism homogenizes everything in its path, from culture and language, to biodiversity, our ways of living, etc. and how that loss affects us.) 3. Gunnhild Řyehaug (2024): Her kjem sola (here comes the sun). 4. Johan Harstad (2024): Under brosteinen, stranden! (971 pages. the title is taken from a slogan of the 1968 protests in France, which was "Sous les pavés, la plage!") 5. Miroslav Krleža (1932): The return of Philip Latinowicz 6. Nils Bjelland Grřnvold (2024): Den grřnne boka 7. Eva Vezhnavets (2023): What are you looking for, wolf? 8. Stig Dagerman (1945): Ormen 9. Christian Kracht (2012): Imperium 10. Ovid (8): Metamorphoses, translated by professor Thea Selliaas Thorsen (the translation is just about 800 pages, with a long introduction, translator's notes, and a whole host of appendices) 11. Jon Fosse (2004): Det er Ales (Aliss at the fire) 12. Hanne Řrstavik (2020): Ti amo 13. Max Porter (2019): Lanny 14. Antonio Scurati (2020): M. L'uomo della provvidenza 15. W.G. Sebald (1995): Rings of Saturn 16. Řyvind Rimbereid (2023): Hvorfor hjerte nummer to 17. Lea Ypi (2021): Free: Coming of age at the end of history 18. Alfred Döblin (1929): Berlin Alexanderplatz 19. Patrick McCabe (2022): Poguemahone 20. Alberto Moravia (1951): Il conformista 21. Annie Ernaux (2000): L'événement 22. Charlotte Brontë (1847): Jane Eyre 23. Edith Södergran (1949): Samlade dikter 24. Burhan Sönmez (2020): Stone and shadow 25. Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (2020*): Murder in the age of enlightenment and other stories - *I know all his stories were written in the 1910s and 1920s, the year is for this translated collection 26. Wisława Szymborska (2009): Here 27. Alice Oswald (2011): Memorial: An excavation of The Iliad 28. Witold Gombrowicz (1939): The possessed 29. Percival Everett (2024): James 30. Kathrine Nedrejord (2024): Sameproblemet (the sami problem) 31. José Donoso (1970): The obscene bird of night 32. Osamu Dazai (1947): The setting sun 33. Eimear McBride (2025): The city changes its face 34. Mathias Énard (2020): The annual banquet of the gravediggers' guild 35. Flann O'Brien (1939): At swim-two-birds 36. Ida Hove Solberg (2024): Var det grřnt 37. Marguerite Young (1965): Miss Macintosh, my darling (1321 glorious, ethereal, hallucinatory pages) 38. Luka Holmegaard (2023): Havet i munden (digte) 39. Caro de Robertis (2021): The president and the frog 40. Alfred Döblin (1925): Reise in Polen 41. Georgi Gospodinov (2020): Time shelter 42. Alain Robbe-Grillet (1960): Jealousy 43. Thomas Mann (1901): Buddenbrooks 44. Anne Carson (1998): Autobiography of red 45. Han Kang (2021): We do not part 46. Virginia Woolf (1922): Jacob's room 47. Lars elling (2025): Nei, dette husker vi
|
|
#
?
Aug 31, 2025 10:06
|
|
|
Only four books again for August. 45. Problematic Summer Romance by Ali Hazelwood I've lost track of how many Hazelwoods I've read this year. Somebody stop me 46. The Sunken Land Begins to Rise Again by M John Harrison Picked this up because I absolutely loved Climbers. This one's hard to describe: on the surface, it's about two middle-aged people engaging in a tepid romance, and one of them has a job that's kind of weird and the other one is renovating a house in Shropshire. However the plot is less in what the two protagonists are doing, and more in the unnatural events going on around them that they fail or refuse to notice. This willful ignorance is exacerbated by their inability to really communicate with each other (Harrison described them as "emotionally incompetent", which seems about right). I found Victoria's sections of the story a lot more interesting than Shaw's. I get what Harrison was going for here (the urban middle class's confusion at rising populism and Brexit) but I'm still not sure if it worked for me or not. Certainly effective at leaving me with a lingering sense of unease though. 47. The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka At the end of the 1980s, a Sri Lankan war photographer wakes up as a ghost just in time to watch his own dismembered corpse being dumped in a lake. He sets out to solve his own murder, but thanks to his work and his messy personal life, the list of people who might have wanted him dead is very, very long. Meanwhile, his boyfriend and his best friend are also trying to work out what happened, and various afterlife entities are engaged in a battle for the fate of Maali's soul. There's a lot going on in this book, and its extensive cast of characters and the complexities of the political situation in Sri Lanka made me feel disoriented at times, but the momentum really picked up in the second half, making this my favourite of the month. (And I can tick another Booker winner off my list.) 48. Anything Once by Joan Wyndham Read 5 physical books (1/5) One of the best things I've ever randomly bought from a charity shop was Joan Wyndham's Love Lessons, a collection of her teenage diaries from the Blitz, when she was trying to become an artist and mingling with various terrible bohemians. In one of my favourite entries, a writer friend's house is bombed and Wyndham spends a very tense night trying to find out if they've been killed, then declares, "It's not surprising they were hit – if anything calls for a bomb on them, it's those poems!" I'm mostly saying this to recommend Love Lessons, rather than Anything Once. The latter is Wyndham's memoir of what she did in the 50 years following WW2. There are some diary entries, but a lot of it is just gossipy ramblings about the various scrapes she got into, mostly being a cook at awful-sounding hippie cafes and having unrequieted crushes on gay men half her age. She has a fling with Lucian Freud, throws outrageous house parties with April Ashley, and burns Ian McKellan's sausages (on his request) while working as a chef at a theatre. It's enjoyable enough to read, but too broad and too self-aware to have the same appeal as those diaries.
|
|
#
?
Aug 31, 2025 10:34
|
|
|
Had a pretty intense project at work this month that melted my brain a bit, so half of the six books I read in August were graphic novels and most of the rest were very short. I'm also still picking away at The Name of the Rose and really enjoying it but that'll probably be finished next month. 55. The Vow by Arden Ripley and Julian Cormac This is a queer horror fantasy erotica graphic novel I found sort of at random. It was pretty good, especially for the category. There are definitely some contrivances in the plot (the two main characters have a sort of rivals-to-lovers thing happening and I never really fully got why they disliked each other to start with, but whatever.) It's about a pair of monster hunters assigned to hunt a bride-stealing monster but it only shows up when a couple consummates their marriage. The monster design was neat. 56. The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World by Virginia Postrel I loved this! It's an overview of the history of textile development divided by the steps of the process (i.e. fiber, spinning, dyeing, weaving. etc.). Postrel also goes to understandable lengths to point out just how important various aspects of textile production have been to the development of other technologies (like how many of the big pharma companies today started out as dye manufacturers and many early synthetic drugs came from attempts to find textile dyes). I already knew a fair amount about textiles but this was so rich with information and had a lot of stuff I hadn't encountered yet. 57. Agony's Lodestone by Laura Keating This is a horror novella about a family with a long-missing sister and the weird paranormal events that happen as they reunite years after her disappearance to find clues. This has a little bit of a spooky/lost media angle with a very weird security tape being what kicks everything off. I liked the concept of this but I will admit I found the prose a little clunky a lot of the time (looooots of "was like" similes packed together). It was a quick 100 pages though so not the worst way to spend an afternoon. 58. Skull & Laurel 001 Tenebrous Press (the same publisher as Agony's Lodestone) started doing an in-print New Weird magazine this year and I picked up all 4 current issues. This was extremely solid! As I've been getting more into short story magazines, I'll usually run into one or two stories that don't land but I have almost no complaints here. There are fun little illustrations throughout and it's published in a two-column format, so even though it's only 48 pages there's a lot packed in. Really excited to check out the other issues soon. 59. Ew, It's Beautiful: A False Knees Comic Collection Joshua Barkman What it says, a collection of False Knees comics arranged by seasons. False Knees is that webcomic with the really detailed birds that gets sort of surrealist sometimes. I've been reading it online for a while and liking it a lot and I was happy to be able to get a hard copy of some of them. Barkman's attention to detail is fantastic and the emotional range in the comics is really nice -- some are funny, some are contemplative, some make me tear up a little. I've also been getting into birdwatching and his illustrations are accurate enough I can even tell the sparrows apart, which I think is neat. 60. The Worse Journey in the World, Graphic Novel Volume 1 Sarah Airriess (based on the memoir by Apsley Cherry-Gerard) Another graphic novel! I bought this a while ago but only just got around to it. I haven't read Cherry's memoir yet but I have read about Terra Nova and read one of the other memoirs from one of the party members (Ponting, the photographer's book). This covers the crew being assembled and ends just as they reach the Ross Sea. It looks like Airriess intends to have 4 volumes total, so I'll be keeping an eye out for the rest. The comic has a good pace and I never really got lost since I already know a lot about the expedition, but there's also a huge works-cited in the back that goes panel-by-panel for people who want to dive in more. Really impressive work overall especially because of that citation section. 1. Set a goal for number of books or another personal challenge! 60/52  2. Make sure at least 25% of the books you read this year are not written by men. 30/60~ 3. Make sure a least 25% of the books you read this year are written by writers of colour. 18/60~ 4. Make sure at least 10% of the books you read this year are written by LGBTQ writers. 18/60~ 5. Read something fictional about a real person. -- Little 6. Read two books published in the same month. -- Waste Flowers + Walls of Shira Yulun 7. Read a book by someone known better for making other art (music, sculpture, film, etc). 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. -- Pride of Chanur 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. -- Dehiscent 10. Read something that recently entered the public domain. -- Red Harvest 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. -- In The Kingdom of Ice 12. Ask someone in this thread for a Wildcard, and read it! -- Three Men In a Boat 13. Participate in the TBB Book Of The Month thread! -- Red Harvest 14. Read something in verse. -- William and the Werewolf 15. Read something with a high body count. -- The Daughters' War 16. Read something with a happy ending. -- The Hellion's Waltz Read at least 10 hardcopies I already own: 13/10
|
|
#
?
Aug 31, 2025 15:21
|
|
|
4. Golgo 13: Gravestone in Sicily by Takao Saito It was good as hell. He used birds to transport gun parts to a locked down mafia island (Sicily), and a guy pops out of a coffin and stuff.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2025 07:44
|
|
|
How is it 21) The Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson - Time skip from the previous Mistborn books, it's cool to see progression in the world 22) The Vision of Escaflowne, Vol. 7 by Katsu Aki, Lianne Sentar - Picked up vol. 7 on the cheap thinking "I've seen the movie and the show so it doesn't matter that the story is so far in. No apparently the manga is yet another utterly different interpretation of the story so now I need to get the others
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2025 10:11
|
|
|
Gertrude Perkins posted:
88 - Wizard of the Crow, by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o. It's bloody long, but it's really good. I was thoroughly entertained throughout, it's such a dense and ridiculous farce. The only section that dragged a little was the long internecine arguments between the Ruler's cabinet after returning from America, but it made sense to untangle all the knots and lies and miscommunication built up over the rest of the book. The magic(al realism) was fun and interesting in its blend of vibes and actual metaphorical bizarreness. It's...very prolix, but I didn't really mind because I was enjoying the roundabout conversations and monologues and all the different characters' perspectives. 13. Participate in the TBB Book Of The Month thread! 89 - Boys Weekend, by Mattie Lubchansky. Transfemme oddball Sammie gets roped into a bachelor-party getaway weekend at a bacchanalian seasteading resort. Things spiral out of control as our protagonist starts to see strange and terrible things that threaten not only her friends, but her very sense of self. Lubchansky brings their own wacky art style and doubles down on both the over-the-top weirdness of earlier work, especially in their depictions of the amoral near-future bizarreness of the resort. It has the vibes of a Futurama story filtered through the exhausted fury of a queer millennial lefty. The quieter moments do get their own space, though, and scenes of Sammie's anxiety and discomfort see the strongest marriage of art and writing. I liked this a lot! Definitely worth checking out. 15. Read something with a high body count. 16. Read something with a happy ending. 90 - Story of the Eye, by Georges Bataille (trans. by Joachim Neugroschel). Yeah, this is still a hell of a thing. There's a gleeful revelry here that I don't remember feeling in my first reading a decade ago; maybe that could be attributed to having so much more experience with transgressive and out-there writing since then. Bataille's writing is as grippingly unpleasant as I remember. The edition I read this time wasn't bookended with essays, just presenting the work on its own with Bataille's afterword, and I think I "enjoyed" it more this time. 91 - Other Voices, Other Rooms, by Truman Capote. Considered an important work of mid-20th Century queer writing, and a work of early genius from a famously influential author. I thought it really pretty but also totally dull for almost its entire length. The prose is beautiful southern gothic, full of melancholy and foreboding, but I didn't find myself getting invested in any of the characters - with one exception. Chapter 8, Randolph's story, is by far the most interesting and engrossing narrative in the whole book, and one I can see myself coming back to on its own. 5. Read something fictional about a real person. - based on Capote's own childhood 92 - The Dragonet Prophecy: Wings of Fire, Book 1, by Tui T. Sutherland. A fun and violent adventure about dragons that managed to surprise me! I'm way past the age of the target demographic but still had a good time with it. Much more graphic and emotionally intense than I was expecting, much more in line with what I enjoyed about Animorphs back in the day. I'll probably come back to the sequels soon. 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. 93 - Naked Lunch, by William S. Burroughs. The 1966 Grove Press edition begins with excerpts from the obscenity trial concerning the book's original publication, in which Norman Mailer and Allen Ginsberg defend the book's literary merits and its importance as an artistic statement. It's still a whirling, churning morass of a book, and I was much more attuned to the running themes in Burroughs' work, especially ideas of control and security. Glad I revisited this; I imagine I'll come back to it again soon enough. 5. Read something fictional about a real person. Kind of. Certainly some of it's based on Burroughs's time in Tangier. 15. Read something with a high body count. 94 - Super-Dimensional Love Gun, by Shintaro Kago (trans. by Andrew Castle). I knew the name Shintaro Kago and have probably read one or two of his one-shot manga before, but this was my first time reading a full collection. There's incredible violence and gore, graphic sex and visceral body horror here. There's also a running theme of lackadaisical attitudes to extreme and disgusting circumstances throughout these stories. Some of it reads like vicious, biting satire; most of it feels a little samey after the first few entries. Still got some laughs and some grimaces out of me, but my curiosity is satisfied. 6. Read two books published in the same month. - January 2015, same as Henshin 15. Read something with a high body count. 95 - Fahrenheit-182: A Memoir, by Mark Hoppus (with Dan Ozzi). I'm not a die-hard blink-182 fan but I found this pretty fun and engaging. Hoppus's life seems to be one of extremely good and extremely bad luck, and this becomes one of the book's main themes. The others are, of course, the rise and fall and reunion of the band itself, and Hoppus's increasingly strained relationship with Tom DeLonge. (I want a DeLonge book next, ideally, to hear his perspective on things.) There are the episodes you'd associate with rock stardom: jet-setting around the world, massive arena shows, the exhausting schedule of touring and promotion, the turmoil of creative differences. The lows are pretty drat low, though, and the book is at its most engaging when Hoppus is being candid and vulnerable about his struggles with anxiety and tragedy. I was frequently struck by how much of a "regular dude" Hoppus is. Totally apolitical beyond "9/11 was terrible, hanging out with US soldiers was exciting, they seem like nice guys", entirely focused on music as a tool of self-expression, emotion and catharsis. Maybe there was a lot that got filed off through ghostwriting or editing, I don't know. Still enjoyed the book, though! 6. Read two books published in the same month - January 2025, same as Meaning Is Embarrassing 7. Read a book by someone known better for making other art - Musician 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. 96 - Dinosaur Sanctuary, Vol. 5, by Itaru Kinoshita & Shin-ichi Fujiwara (trans. by John Neal). More DinoSan! This time with some rougher medical crises, a glimpse at dinosaur poachers in Australia, and a really beautiful festival chapter to even things out. 97 - Small Beauty, by jia qing wilson-yang. A short , bittersweet novel about a trans woman moving into her cousin's house in the middle of nowhere. Difficult family secrets, musings on the immensity of nature and the smallness of human lives, racism and immigrant stories, misdirected violence, catharsis. It's good, and feels very Canadian. 98 - Only Trust Your Fists, by Paris Green. Acidic and furious short stories and poetry about the world in collapse. Golems fight in an arena for the baying crowds. The gestalt AI of GTA Online talks about what it's like to be played with. Violence, cruelty, the unfathomable made mundane and frustrating. Rent is due and nobody's coming to help. 6. Read two books published in the same month - September 2021, same as Dinosaur Sanctuary Vol. 1 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. 14. Read something in verse. 15. Read something with a high body count. 99 - Henshin, by J.M. Ken Niimura (trans. by Ivy Yukiko Ishihara Oldford). Exceptionally pretty and stylish artwork used to tell a baker's dozen of pretty uninteresting stories. There were some highlights of course - "The Victory Sign" is a sweet comic about lifelong friendship, and "The Last Train" is a gentle little love story. But most of them, especially the comedy ones, left me shrugging. That said, I'll likely come back to this just to gaze at the artwork again, especially the lush full-page spreads. 6. Read two books published in the same month - January 2015, same as Super-Dimensional Love Gun 100 - Brainz, Inc. by Ron Goulart. A real waste of a fun premise: married detectives in a satire-infused 80s cyberpunk dystopia. An android double of a murdered heiress hires them to solve her own murder! Disguises, larger-than-life-characters, endless neologisms! Shame that the jokes are dreadful and dated, the witty banter isn't witty, the plot is totally uninteresting, and the whole thing has the flop-sweat stink of bad sketch comedy. What a shame. Maybe the previous books in the series are tolerable? 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. 101 - Queerly Classed: Gay Men & Lesbians Write about Class, ed. by Susan Ruffo. An interesting collection, almost 30 years old but still containing some vital and stirring pieces. I particularly enjoyed the pieces by Eli Clare ("Losing Home"), Kennette Crockett ("Putting Down Roots"), and the two chapters written as dialogue. There are also some poems included, which help save this from feeling too academic. There are a lot of recurring themes of course: ideas of "coming out" about one's class position as well as one's sexuality; exploring intersections of class and race and queerness; the need to reach out to other oppressed groups in society and acknowledged a shared struggle. Also, the time and place where most of these chapters were written are uncomfortably resonant: America's ascendant right wing, the precarity of queer rights, all felt a little too close to home. 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. 14. Read something in verse. 102 - Crossing The Stream, by Elizabeth-Irene Baitie. A story about a young boy's fraught relationship with his mother, who has dedicated her life to following the teachings of a local "Prophet", and the mysterious grandmother whom he starts to visit on weekends. Between learning about family history, class struggles, and the power of fear, our young hero Ato brings his friends together for a high-stakes mission to save the day. It's a satisfying adventure, with as much emotion as excitement. 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. 16. Read something with a happy ending. 103 - The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury. This collection is extremely of its time. Bradbury's SF stories have a lot of common themes: automation of every facet of human life; mass censorship and government control; the impact of new and frightening Space Age technology on the ordinary American family; early Cold War paranoia and the threat of nuclear annihilation. Lots of references to "rockets" as the default means of interplanetary travel. This is a book about men making hard decisions and women being either beautiful companions or doting, troubled mothers. Even with all of that dust on them, though, these stories go really hard. Genuinely scary, uncomfortable, exciting, creepy. 15. Read something with a high body count. 104 - Moonflow, by Bitter Karella. Full disclosure: I was a beta reader for this novel. This book rules. A down-on-her-luck trans mycologist and an inept tour guide get lost in an extremely haunted forest and end up in the clutches of a lesbian separatist cult. Gross, nasty, icky, yucky and other adjectives. A wacky cast of weirdos engage in horrendous violence and gore, psychedelic mushroom rot, weird misfit goons (in the classical "henchwomen" sense), and unhelpful, questionably healthy sexual fixations. Karella writes with a contagious sense of fun and indulgence that really elevated the splatterpunk extremity for me. 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. 15. Read something with a high body count. 105 - Setting Fire To Water, by Phoebe Tsang. A collection of short stories that range from sweet and adorable childhood story "The Real Macaron" to the sad fable "Hunger" and the meditation on art and purpose in "Model Shown Is Actual Size". There are seventeen stories in this book, and unfortunately only a handful of these really stirred any emotion in me; many of them left little impression other than a vague sadness. Tsang does has a great sense of beauty and how to use language sparingly to evoke it, but too many of these pieces felt immaterial. 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. 106 - Shine Bright: A Very Personal History of Black Women in Pop, by Danyel Smith. Intertwined biographies of a number of prominent and lesser-known Black Women In Pop, with Smith's own life story providing extra connecting passages. This is dense and as personal as the title promises, going deep into the personal lives of different artists and mapping their careers within contemporary social politics. There are of course recurring themes of racism, sexism (and the intersection of both), and the struggle for these women to be taken seriously by the white-male-dominated music industry and press. It's quite moving, and filled in a lot of gaps I had for different pop genres of the 70s-80s in particular. Good book! 6. Read two books published in the same month - April 2022, same as Dinosaur Sanctuary Vol. 2 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. Phew! Gertrude Perkins fucked around with this message at 21:07 on Sep 30, 2025 |
|
#
?
Sep 30, 2025 20:54
|
|
|
code:I would happily take recommendations for any works that satisfy any combination of those requirements.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2025 00:18
|
|
|
september was a great month for reading. it's impossible to pick a highlight, because everything I read was good. also met both personal goals. 2. Make sure at least 25% of the books you read this year are not written by men. 3. Make sure a least 25% of the books you read this year are written by writers of colour. 4. Make sure at least 10% of the books you read this year are written by LGBTQ writers. 12. Ask someone in this thread for a Wildcard, and read it! 13. Participate in the TBB Book Of The Month thread! 54, 4 tomes (>800pp.) 1. Shëkufe Tadayoni Heiberg (2024): Livets verber: Tilfřjelser til Nudansk ordbog (Life's verbs: additions to the modern danish dictionary) 2. Thomas Hylland Eriksen (2024): Det umistelige - Fra global ensretting til et nytt mangfold (a title that's difficult to translate well. The unlosable, perhaps? a non-fiction book about all the ways modern capitalism homogenizes everything in its path, from culture and language, to biodiversity, our ways of living, etc. and how that loss affects us.) 3. Gunnhild Řyehaug (2024): Her kjem sola (here comes the sun). 4. Johan Harstad (2024): Under brosteinen, stranden! (971 pages. the title is taken from a slogan of the 1968 protests in France, which was "Sous les pavés, la plage!") 5. Miroslav Krleža (1932): The return of Philip Latinowicz 6. Nils Bjelland Grřnvold (2024): Den grřnne boka 7. Eva Vezhnavets (2023): What are you looking for, wolf? 8. Stig Dagerman (1945): Ormen 9. Christian Kracht (2012): Imperium 10. Ovid (8): Metamorphoses, translated by professor Thea Selliaas Thorsen (the translation is just about 800 pages, with a long introduction, translator's notes, and a whole host of appendices) 11. Jon Fosse (2004): Det er Ales (Aliss at the fire) 12. Hanne Řrstavik (2020): Ti amo 13. Max Porter (2019): Lanny 14. Antonio Scurati (2020): M. L'uomo della provvidenza 15. W.G. Sebald (1995): Rings of Saturn 16. Řyvind Rimbereid (2023): Hvorfor hjerte nummer to 17. Lea Ypi (2021): Free: Coming of age at the end of history 18. Alfred Döblin (1929): Berlin Alexanderplatz 19. Patrick McCabe (2022): Poguemahone 20. Alberto Moravia (1951): Il conformista 21. Annie Ernaux (2000): L'événement 22. Charlotte Brontë (1847): Jane Eyre 23. Edith Södergran (1949): Samlade dikter 24. Burhan Sönmez (2020): Stone and shadow 25. Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (2020*): Murder in the age of enlightenment and other stories - *I know all his stories were written in the 1910s and 1920s, the year is for this translated collection 26. Wisława Szymborska (2009): Here 27. Alice Oswald (2011): Memorial: An excavation of The Iliad 28. Witold Gombrowicz (1939): The possessed 29. Percival Everett (2024): James 30. Kathrine Nedrejord (2024): Sameproblemet (the sami problem) 31. José Donoso (1970): The obscene bird of night 32. Osamu Dazai (1947): The setting sun 33. Eimear McBride (2025): The city changes its face 34. Mathias Énard (2020): The annual banquet of the gravediggers' guild 35. Flann O'Brien (1939): At swim-two-birds 36. Ida Hove Solberg (2024): Var det grřnt 37. Marguerite Young (1965): Miss Macintosh, my darling (1321 glorious, ethereal, hallucinatory pages) 38. Luka Holmegaard (2023): Havet i munden (digte) 39. Caro de Robertis (2021): The president and the frog 40. Alfred Döblin (1925): Reise in Polen 41. Georgi Gospodinov (2020): Time shelter 42. Alain Robbe-Grillet (1960): Jealousy 43. Thomas Mann (1901): Buddenbrooks 44. Anne Carson (1998): Autobiography of red 45. Han Kang (2021): We do not part 46. Virginia Woolf (1922): Jacob's room 47. Lars elling (2025): Nei, dette husker vi 48. Olga Tokarczuk (2014): Books of Jacob (912 pages) 49. Jon Fosse (2025): Vaim 50. Solvej Balle (2025): Om udregning af rumfang VI 51. Alice Oswald (2016): Falling awake 52. Jon Fosse (1989): Naustet 53. Curzio Malaparte (1944): Kaputt 54. Elsa Morante (1974): La Storia
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2025 08:20
|
|
|
I finished 8 books this month but most of it was a mix of novellas and short story magazines, so the overall pagecount wasn't that high. I have also completed the full Booklord challenge for this year! Godhusk is a book by a person primarily known for being a visual artist. 61. The Arrival of Missives by Aliya Whiteley A sort of speculative novella set in a small English village right after WWI. It's mostly about an older girl/young woman and starts with the crush she has on her teacher but it turns out he has a weird rock embedded in his body that gives him visions of the future and he's trying to manipulate current events because of it. Perfect length for the concept. I have a few other books by the same author because I bought this as part of a publisher's going-out-of-business sale and I look forward to reading more of her work. 62. Skull & Laurel 002 by Tenebrous Press Another issue of this Weird fiction magazine and another solid entry! They have some fun back matter in these too, like this one had a page of pseudo-horoscopes and a 'personals' section that's really just small blocks of ad space for small business and people's personal projects and the like. 63. The Library at Hellebore by Cassandra Khaw I finished this in one day on audiobook while I was having a bad migraine episode and couldn't do much else. It's about a very hosed up magical school (some kids go voluntarily, many are kidnapped for having dangerous abilities) where the faculty pull a Society (1989) during graduation and a small handful of kids hole up in the library where they're expected to battle royale until only one is left. It's extremely gruesome and gorey which I enjoyed, but not exactly a masterpiece? Very love-it-or-hate-it sort of book. 64. We Who Are About To... by Joanna Russ This is a blistering novella. I've read a little bit of Russ before so I wasn't surprised by the tone but this would probably strike most as extremely bleak. A handful of people are dropped on a habitable planet to 'colonize' it but things go wrong from the start. The main character immediately determines they should just all kill themselves since there's no way they'll be able to survive long term once their meager supplies run out. Full spoilers but she eventually kills everyone else after they try to basically force her to breed to 'continue the species' and the back half of the book is her reminiscing about her life while she purposefully starves herself to death. An extremely unique read but not one to be taken lightly depending on your state of mind. 65. Khōréō Magazine #1.1 This is a speculative fiction magazine that publishes immigrant and diaspora authors specifically. I actually backed the Kickstarter for it years ago and have been receiving issues the whole time, now but hadn't actually read any yet. Now I have! Another solid collection of stories from a really wide range of cultural viewpoints. Looking forward to working through more of the backlog I have! 66. Countess by Suzan Palumbo A sci-fi novella about a woman from a Caribbean diaspora community (in space) who gets hosed over by the empire she's been trying to make a name for herself in, and then her revenge against it. This ultimately focuses on building community to resist colonization so it's not wholly dependent on a single hero like a lot of these sorts of stories are. 67. Island of the Blue Foxes: Disaster and Triumph on the World's Greatest Scientific Expedition by Stephen R. Brown This is about the 1700s Russian Great Northern Expedition that was lead by Vitus Bering (who didn't survive it, but most people on it didn't). I'd never heard of this expedition before but it was and still is (according to the book at least) the most expensive state-sponsored scientific endeavor to ever happen. A lot of this ends up being about Georg Steller (the naturalist who still has his name attached to a lot of animals) since he was one of only two people who kept a detailed account of what happened. Worth a read if you like exploration/shipwreck disasters! 68. Godhusk - Rebirth by Plastiboo This is basically a walkthrough guide for a video game that doesn't actually exist. Similar in style to Plastiboo's Vermis books, where those are riffing on the Soulslike genre, this is more of a Metroidvania set in a very Giger/Bekskinski-esque bio-horror world. I absolutely love this sort of thing and I'm glad I was able to find a US bookstore with a copy so I didn't have to pay more than the retail price just in shipping since the publisher is in Italy (thanks tariffs lmao). 1. Set a goal for number of books or another personal challenge! 68/52 2. Make sure at least 25% of the books you read this year are not written by men. 36/68~ 3. Make sure a least 25% of the books you read this year are written by writers of colour. 23/68~ 4. Make sure at least 10% of the books you read this year are written by LGBTQ writers. 23/68~ 5. Read something fictional about a real person. -- Little 6. Read two books published in the same month. -- Waste Flowers + Walls of Shira Yulun 7. Read a book by someone known better for making other art (music, sculpture, film, etc). -- Godhusk 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. -- Pride of Chanur 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. -- Dehiscent 10. Read something that recently entered the public domain. -- Red Harvest 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. -- In The Kingdom of Ice 12. Ask someone in this thread for a Wildcard, and read it! -- Three Men In a Boat 13. Participate in the TBB Book Of The Month thread! -- Red Harvest 14. Read something in verse. -- William and the Werewolf 15. Read something with a high body count. -- The Daughters' War 16. Read something with a happy ending. -- The Hellion's Waltz Read at least 10 hardcopies I already own: 16/10
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2025 13:59
|
|
|
Apparently I let the side down by only reading five books. I am actually behind on my goal for 72 books this year so I'd better step it up! 49. The Madhouse at the End of the Earth by Julian Sancton Great book if you want to annoy everyone in your life by telling them facts about the 1897 Belgian Antarctic Expedition. Did you know that it was the first expedition to overwinter in the Antarctic sea ice? Did you know that the captain likely did it on purpose because he knew a more intense survival story would sell better when he got home? Did you know that the crew included Roald Amundsen (better known for being the first man to reach the South Pole), Frederick Cook (better known for lying about being the first man to reach the North Pole and then being jailed for running a Texan oil field ponzi scheme) and Emil Racoviță (who drew rude cartoons of everyone on board and was later the subject of this extremely cool underwater photograph)? Did you know that while they were frozen in the ice, everyone just threw their waste overboard so it froze around the edge of the ship and they later had to break out of drifts of penguin carcasses and their own frozen poo poo by blasting it with explosives? Did you know th– 50. Endurance by Alfred Lansing Read 5 physical books (2/5) All I wanted at this point was to read more about Antarctic expeditions that went wrong. Luckily I already had this one about Shackleton's famous 1914-1917 attempt to make the first land crossing of Antarctica. The crossing did not go according to plan, but the resulting story was even more interesting: the Endurance was trapped in the ice floes, then crushed by them, forcing its crew to camp through the polar winter, haul three small whaling boats for long distances across the ice, and then attempt to sail to safety across some of the most dangerous seas on the planet. The book was written in the 1950s, so the author was able to interview many of the crew members, and having those first-hand accounts really gives it immediacy. I was struck by how completely unbelievable it was that anybody involved survived this, let alone all of them. 51. Swept Away by Beth O'Leary Tragically I didn't have any other Antarctic expedition books on hand, so instead I read a romance where the two leads have a one-night stand on a houseboat and then the houseboat gets swept out to sea, oh no, I guess now they have to deal with their issues etc. This starts out fun but I really soured on it by the end, especially because of a ridiculous third act twist. 52. The Last Murder at the End of the World by Stuart Turton I usually enjoy Turton's high-concept murder mysteries so was looking forward to another one. This one's set in a dystopia where the whole world has been consumed by a deadly fog except for one small island, where the peaceful villagers are watched over by a handful of scientists who clearly know a lot more than they're saying. It moves along at a good pace, but the characters fall a bit flat in service to the mystery. 53. Lady Chatterley's Lover by D. H. Lawrence Rich lady lives out cottagecore sex fantasy by ditching her grindset tech bro husband for a simple-living enthusiast sigma male rear end man. Obviously this is famous for all the dirty bits and the resulting obscenity trials, but the parts about class in 1920s England are more interesting, as are the various ruminations on how human society will be destroyed in 100 years because People These Days are greedy soulless capitalistic automatons (still got four years to go!) Did get a bit tired of Mellors' ranting about how all the women who won't do sex like he wants are wicked lesbians etc etc. Still worth the read though.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2025 19:32
|
|
|
Volcano posted:I was struck by how completely unbelievable it was that anybody involved survived this, let alone all of them. They actually didn't all survive if you include the Ross Sea Party part of the Trans-Antarctic Expedition. The Lost Men by Kelly Tyler-Lewis covers it pretty well and is still in print. (https://verdigristle.com/book/shipwrecks I also have a big list of all the polar and other shipwreck disaster books I've read so far here since it seems like you might find it useful - I think it's mostly up to date).
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2025 20:17
|
|
|
DurianGray posted:They actually didn't all survive if you include the Ross Sea Party part of the Trans-Antarctic Expedition. The Lost Men by Kelly Tyler-Lewis covers it pretty well and is still in print. (https://verdigristle.com/book/shipwrecks I also have a big list of all the polar and other shipwreck disaster books I've read so far here since it seems like you might find it useful - I think it's mostly up to date). Haha yeah I did look up the Ross Sea Party afterwards as the book didn't touch on them at all! Didn't know there was a book about them though. My book also did not mention that Shackleton vetoed several of his men receiving the Polar Medal, including one of the ones who came with him on the James Caird. Which seems incredibly petty but I guess he was just a bit of a dick! That list is amazing though. I will definitely have a more detailed look through and check some of those out.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2025 21:09
|
|
|
5. Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! v8 by Take This is my jam, very charming offbeat comedy romance manga madness. Delightful.
|
|
#
?
Oct 2, 2025 16:24
|
|
|
7: Naked Lunch by William S Burroughs - Interesting, but I had trouble staying engaged with it. A lot of it is delightfully sickening and often extremely funny, and there are some extremely effective dreamlike sequences, where a scene suddenly and surreally pivots around a small detail into an almost entirely new set of circumstances. I loved the feeling of vertigo those gave me, it reminded me of the feeling of reading a garden path sentence and suddenly having to grapple with the obliteration of your understanding. All the sado-masochism is a lot of fun, I particularly loved the recurring theme of someone making GBS threads and pissing in terror as they realize they're about to be murdered via erotic hanging, which feels like a neat analog to the death of the conscience immediately prior to the injection of injectables - what if the petit mort came before, not after? Those sequences also put me in mind of JG Ballard's Crash, where the fear is an integral part of a deadly fetish. What if being afraid is the sexy part? I imagine people who like getting raped have similar feelings. As much as I love the loose and oblique Cronenberg adaptation, I would love to see a straightforward film made of this book that adheres 1:1 to the text. It would be unfilmable and watching it would probably be a crime, but it feels like it's made to be the kind of artwork that just plays on a loop in a museum. Apparently there's a recording of Burroughs reading an abridged version of the text, as well, which I really need to find because I love his voice and, as my friend noted, reading this book feels like being cornered by a toxic barfly. I often found myself hearing Burroughs's voice in my head as I read it, which was very pleasant. Of course it's art. Everything is art, just like everything is obscene.
|
|
#
?
Oct 3, 2025 20:29
|
|
|
A few more books 23) Dodger by Terry Pratchett - All Pratchett books are good though this one was lower on the scale. Understandable considering the time it was written. 24) Shadows of Self by Brandon Sanderson - After the intro of the era in the last one we get more of a glimpse of the overall story of this era in this one. 25) Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton - Picked up vol. 7 on the cheap thinking "I've seen the movie and the show so it doesn't matter that the story is so far in. No apparently the manga is yet another utterly different interpretation of the story so now I need to get the others 26) The Bands of Mourning by Brandon Sanderson - Good character development on this of some of the side characters and nice world development
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2025 07:57
|
|
|
freelop posted:25) Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton - Picked up vol. 7 on the cheap thinking "I've seen the movie and the show so it doesn't matter that the story is so far in. No apparently the manga is yet another utterly different interpretation of the story so now I need to get the others There's a JP manga? Neato, that'd make a fun counterpart to Dinosaur Sanctuary
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2025 08:21
|
|
|
Gertrude Perkins posted:There's a JP manga? Neato, that'd make a fun counterpart to Dinosaur Sanctuary Ah I've outed myself. I forgot to edit my previous post fully after quoting it so that comment applies to escaflowne. Jurassic Park the book is what I read and was an excellent read. In penance I looked it up and there actually is a manga based on the film
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2025 09:30
|
|
|
I've been lagging on updates, but here we are. 47. Wearing the Lion by John Wiswell - Hercules is a bit of a schlubby dude who is incredibly devoted to Hera. Hera is intent on taking out her displeasure at Zeus on Hercules. Herc would rather befriend monsters. He and his motley band tramp around Greece trying to figure out who has cursed him and his family. I enjoyed this,. Wiswell is doing some interesting things, and I'm likely checking out his next book. 48. Isabella Nagg and the Pot of Basil by Oliver Darkshire - Isabella Nagg is in an unhappy marriage. Her husband is fascinated by the goblin fruit that he should absolutely not eat. Isabella stumbles into wizardry, her husband eats a fruit, and suddenly she finds herself fighting for a husband she doesn't want. Enjoyed this. For people with strong opinions on footnotes, there are several here, and often they are funny. 49. The Emperor's Babe by Bernadine Evaristo - A black girl in Roman London, makes a good but unhappy match with a wealthy merchant. Seeking a change, she catches the eye of the visiting emperor. Things change a lot when you've got his favor. A novel in verse that I'd say is good. 50.The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses by Malka Ann Older - #3 in Mossa and Pleiti. Sapphic SF mysteries on Jupiter. I've enjoyed all of these. 51. A Game in Yellow by Hailey Piper - Carmen and Blanca are a kinky couple, but Carmen is starting to lose her spark. As even more dangerous kinks lose their effectiveness, Blanca meets a woman with a solution, reading just a bit of the King in Yellow. The play, which if read will kill you, infects Carmen with a survivors euphoria that makes her want to gently caress like a bunny. But she still wants more. This didn't hit for me. 52. The League of Frightened Men by Rex Stout - A group of men are tormented by the thought that a boy that was injured in a college hazing incident will take revenge. This is a solid one. The earlier Wolfe novels often to me seem to have one story beat too many and this is no exception. I still like it. 53. The Usual Desire to Kill by Camilla Barnes - Miranda visits her aging parents to help out. She also tries to find out the story of a lodger from her youth that left suddenly. All in all this is about a very unhappy marriage and how they all got here. 54. The Grimoire Grammar School Parent Teachers Association by Caitlin Rozakis - This is marketed as a cozy, but I feel it's really more about parents trying to do the right things for their daughter who can no longer go to a regular school. They try to find a place in a very insular community. "Harry Potter meets Gilmore Girls" is the worst blurb I've read, and so far off the mark here. Actually enjoyed it, despite hesitating. 55. Lucky Day by Chuck Tingle - A massive low probability event kills 8 million people. It causes Vera, a statistician, to just check out of her life. She only snaps out of it when a government agent offers her the opportunity to get the people responsible. On the whole, I preferred Camp Damascus and Bury Your Gays, but this was still a pretty good read. 56.Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe - About 2/3rds of this is about life in the village before the arrival of missionaries. Once the missionaries arrive it all goes to hell. 57. Thornhedge by T Kingfisher - A Sleeping Beauty retelling, and a pretty solid one 58. The Burglar in the Library by Lawrence Block - Bernie Rhodenbarr finally in a country cozy mystery, at a faux English country home - This was well done and fun. 59. Written on the Dark by Guy Gavriel Kay - During the not-100 years war, a tavern poet is coerced into investigating a murder. This puts him courtside at the investigation, the trial, the ensuing battles, and eventual civil war. This was good! Ben Nevis posted:1. Catalina by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2025 19:02
|
|
|
6. Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! v9 by Take This is still my jam, very charming offbeat comedy romance manga madness. These couple Uzaki-chan volumes I read lately are the fastest I've read something in quite a while. Helps that picking up right where the anime left off is fun and they really deliver the romcom goods.
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2025 01:00
|
|
|
Gertrude Perkins posted:
I finished eight books in October, and half of them were for grownups! 107 - Welcome To Dorley Hall, by Alyson Greaves. The first volume in the series that half the trans people I follow on BlueSky have been gushing and discoursing about for the last year or so. The premise is a great hook, of course: what if there was a secretive institution that was force-femming dangerous young men? and what if one of those "dangerous young men" was actually a trans girl? And so ensues a novel of interpersonal drama, lies, subterfuge, and a wealth of heartbreakingly rendered trans subjectivity. It's good! The characters are all well-defined, the bizarre circumstances are explained in matter-of-fact creepiness that kept any scene from feeling fully comfortable or cosy. It's a slow-burn psychological thriller, a comedy of manners, and a strange wish-fulfilment fantasy all rolled into one. Good stuff! 6. Read two books published in the same month. - May 2022, same as Setting Fire To Water 108 - If on a winter's night a traveler, by Italo Calvino (trans. by William Weaver). Just as interesting as I remember from studying it at school, though I think this was my first time actually reading through it. I don't think I have anything new or revolutionary to say about it - it's a very famous book, and it deserves its reputation as a postmodern tour de force. Playful, silly, engrossing, heartfelt - a little too arch to keep me from being fully immersed, of course, but I had a lot of fun with it. 5. Read something fictional about a real person. - Calvino is a writer in the world of the book. 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. 109-112 - Wings of Fire: The Lost Heir, The Hidden Kingdom, The Dark Secret & The Brightest Night, by Tui T. Sutherland. The rest of the first arc, and a really fun and satisfying set of books. It's got big revelations about the nature of the world, magic, and the main group's heritage, but also has time to spend with the different characters' relationships. There were some scenes that I found really moving, and the climax was worth the anticipation after Sutherland spent 1400-odd pages setting things up. I can absolutely see why this series got so popular! 15. Read something with a high body count. 16. Read something with a happy ending. 113 - Reamde, by Neal Stephenson. A massive brick of a techno-thriller that starts out being centred around Russian mobsters and a virus distributed through an MMORPG, and then morphs through a series of wild and enjoyable coincidences into a globetrotting, gun-toting counterterror adventure with a dozen different characters to keep track of. This is Stephenson doing a mammoth airport novel, with a high body count and terrible geopolitical stakes that also threaten the foundation of the main characters' big, beautiful, flawed, American family. Is it stupid? Yes. Racist? Often. Self-indulgent? Incessantly. But the momentum is always there, behind the hyperfixation infodumps about computer viruses or hunting gear or Chinese police procedure. And that momentum carried me through the whole drat thing, and will probably get me to the sequel(?!?!) as well. 15. Read something with a high body count. 114 - Lights Out For The Territory, by Iain Sinclair. A series of walks through London spanning from the early-to-mid 1990s, described in furious and poetic terms. A psychogeography that spans organised crime, public art, arcane history, brutal gentrification, notorious politicians, graffiti, and run-down graveyards. Accompanied by a photographer (though only a handful of photographs appear in the book), Sinclair finds beautiful and grisly images of a contemporary London ripe with stagnation and rot. One particularly good chapter sees him following the funeral procession of legendary gangster Ronnie Kray, while another has him profiling strange artists like his friend Brian Catling. A lot of this went over my head - the bibliography necessary to fully grasp it is enormous, I feel - but the parts that worked for me really worked. I lived in London about a decade after this was published, and some elements were very familiar to me, while others seemed almost alien. Good book, though heavy going, as I had to read it in short sessions so as not to be overwhelmed.
|
|
#
?
Oct 30, 2025 21:18
|
|
|
Don't think I'm gonna finish another book this month so here's October. Lots of vaguely Halloween-themed romance this month, because I have to make up the numbers if I'm gonna hit that 72-book goal. Also I was tired and wanted to read something fun. Also oops no physical books again 54. Strange Hotel by Eimear McBride Eimear McBride is a hell of a writer. This is the second book of hers I've read this year and both have been excellent. Each chapter of Strange Hotel finds the nameless narrator in a different hotel around the world, and as time passes, the truth of her life outside these rooms is gradually revealed. There's a puzzle-box quality about this that I really liked, despite it not being a mystery or trying to trick the reader. The way McBride's writing obscures and reveals is really mesmerising. I think this was Book of the Month in TBB a few years back. If you didn't read it then, it's very much worth your time. 55. Fan Service by Rosie Danan I've already enthused about this in the romance book thread, but this was easily the most fun I've had with the genre this year and it's not even close. The washed-up star of a supernatural soap opera thinks he might be actually turning into a werewolf, and the only person able to help him is the embittered fangirl who ran the show's wiki. It's a ridiculous premise, but so much fun, and clearly written by someone with a real love for the LiveJournal/Tumblr era of these kinds of fandoms. 56. The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Daré A Nigerian teenager from a rural village endures a series of horrible events, but never gives up on her dream of becoming a teacher. Unfortunately I did not like this very much. The tone skewed a bit too YA for my liking, and the protagonist's naivety really pushed belief at times. At one point a creepy old man makes a leering comment about her being "not so innocent" and she very earnestly and obliviously responds with "my name is Adunni, not Innocent", and it was like... given level of poo poo the character has been through by this point, including marital rape and modern slavery, I don't understand how something like that would still be flying over her head. Honestly a lot of it just comes off as inspirational poverty porn, especially given the heroic role given to a nice rich lady who has been living in England for years and returns to Nigeria to complain about how backwards everyone else is while rescuing Adunni from her fate. Not for me! 57. The White Boy Shuffle by Paul Beatty Our hero, Gunnar Kaufman, is content being one of the only Black kids in suburban Santa Monica until his mother, concerned by how out of touch her children are with their own identities, decides to relocate the family to inner-city LA. Gunnar spends the rest of the book bouncing between these two worlds, bolstered by his joint talents for poetry and basketball. The satire is sharp, and Beatty manages to keep the tone absurd without it toppling into overt wackiness. I didn't wholly connect with The Sellout when I read it years ago, but I enjoyed this one so much that it made me think I should revisit it. Also, this book is so 90s (complimentary). 58. Do Your Worst by Rosie Danan I was still high on Fan Service so decided to go back to one of Danan's earlier books. This was definitely not on the same level, but still solid. An archaeologist and a professional curse-breaker are both hired to investigate a derelict Scottish castle. Sparks fly etc etc 59. The Testaments by Margaret Atwood The Handmaid's Tale was a formative book for me as a teenager, but I still held off reading this one for years because I just couldn't see how that book needed a sequel. Having finally read it... yeah, it's a solid book, and I enjoyed reading it, but I don't think it really adds anything to the original other than worldbuilding. There were a few moments that really stood out for me (particularly everything with Lydia in the stadium) but it definitely doesn't feel like it will have the same staying power, and I wonder if Atwood would have written it if not for the TV show. So in summary: pretty good, totally unnecessary. 60. All the Lovers in the Night by Mieko Kawakami As with all Kawakami's works, this is a fluffy, optimistic thrillride! jk it's also miserable. The protagonist is a copy-editor and fact-checker who lives an extremely isolated and lonely life, and this loneliness combined with her past demons eventually sends her spiralling into alcoholism. I wrote about this a bit more in the lit thread, but in short, I liked it. 61. The League of Gentlewoman Witches by India Holton One more romance for the road. This is set in a fantastical Victorian England where pirates menace the skies in their flying battlehouses and witches drink tea and rob museums. The two factions don't like each other, but what if they... loved each other? This is the second book in a series, but as I've previously only read the third, I seem to be going in reverse order. The whole thing is written in a very arch mock-Victoriana style which some people might love but I found mildly amusing. If you like gentle adventure and fantasy silliness with your love stories, then you might have a good time with this one. Volcano fucked around with this message at 22:47 on Oct 30, 2025 |
|
#
?
Oct 30, 2025 21:48
|
|
|
I finished 6 books in October, thanks in no small part to my realization that Libro.FM is actually a fully viable non-Amazon alternative for audiobooks. They also donate some of their proceeds to an independent bookstore that you get to choose like Bookshop.org does which is cool. 69. Translunar Travelers Lounge: Issue One This is a speculative fiction magazine that started in 2019 and had a nice mix of stories. Some were a little spookier, some were sort of bittersweet, some were Weird adventures (like train-that's-also-a-squid sort of weird). I might pick up more of these at some point. 70. Ghost Stories of an Antiquary by M.R. James This was the BOTM pick and I'm really glad I dipped in to check it out. I'd never heard of James before but it seems he's pretty well known in the UK (thanks in part to numerous BBC adaptations of his stories I'd guess). These are from the late 1800s-early 1900s so nothing is especially 'scary' by modern standards but you can see the sort of groundwork being laid here that later authors would pick up on with regards to folk horror and "I found an old weird thing, oops it's haunted" stories. 71. A Game in Yellow by Hailey Piper Lesbian BDSM + The King in Yellow. The main couple in the story is drifting apart and they find someone who has a copy of the infamous cursed play and use both of them to try to spice up their relationship. Parts of the book are told in a play format/as part of The King in Yellow which I thought was a neat approach. This was a pretty breezy read and worth checking out at least if the pitch appeals. It's obviously got a lot of sex scenes in it (though they focus way more on character interiority/reactions than like, Tab A-Slot B mechanics). 72. The Other Ancient Civilizations: Decoding Archaeology's Less Celebrated Cultures by Raven Todd Dasilva This focused on, like it says, less well-known ancient civilizations. Each civilization gets a single chapter, so it's pretty brief and high-level but it did introduce me to a good amount of peoples and individuals I'd never heard of before (though you'll likely know at least some of them if you're interested in archaeology at all). I did like the little fictionalized day-in-the-life introductions for each section. 73. The Zorg: A Tale of Greed and Murder That Inspired the Abolition of Slavery by Siddarth Kara The true story of a massacre of enslaved people that happened aboard a British slave ship (more often called the Zong) in 1781 and the court cases and subsequent notoriety about it would eventually contribute to Britain abolishing the slave trade. Other horrors of the British slave trade aren't glossed over at all, and it's especially atrocious to learn just how well prominent slave traders (who knew exactly how terrible things were) managed to convince people that slavery wasn't really all that bad. 74. The Works of Vermin by Hiron Ennes Easily one of my top fantasy books of the year and I'd recommend it to anyone who liked The West Passage or Metal From Heaven. It's got the same sort of lush language and bizarre worldbuilding that doesn't bother over-explaining itself, but it doesn't need to either. It's got a lot of bugs and some really unique body horror. There was also a neat structural thing going on that makes me really excited to re-read it eventually. 1. Set a goal for number of books or another personal challenge! 74/52 2. Make sure at least 25% of the books you read this year are not written by men. 40/74~ 3. Make sure a least 25% of the books you read this year are written by writers of colour. 25/74~ 4. Make sure at least 10% of the books you read this year are written by LGBTQ writers. 26/74~ 5. Read something fictional about a real person. -- Little 6. Read two books published in the same month. -- Waste Flowers + Walls of Shira Yulun 7. Read a book by someone known better for making other art (music, sculpture, film, etc). -- Godhusk 8. Read something told from a non-human point of view. -- Pride of Chanur 9. Read something with a mystery at its centre. -- Dehiscent 10. Read something that recently entered the public domain. -- Red Harvest 11. Read: something with a colon in the title. -- In The Kingdom of Ice 12. Ask someone in this thread for a Wildcard, and read it! -- Three Men In a Boat 13. Participate in the TBB Book Of The Month thread! -- Red Harvest 14. Read something in verse. -- William and the Werewolf 15. Read something with a high body count. -- The Daughters' War 16. Read something with a happy ending. -- The Hellion's Waltz Read at least 10 hardcopies I already own: 16/10
|
|
#
?
Oct 30, 2025 22:42
|
|
|
read a whole bunch of books again. ten, to be precise, which is a monthly record so far. four of those were poetry, one of those ten was Pynchon's latest. top books of the month is probably Kristof's trilogy, Almadhoun's poetry and Rilke 2. Make sure at least 25% of the books you read this year are not written by men. 3. Make sure a least 25% of the books you read this year are written by writers of colour. 4. Make sure at least 10% of the books you read this year are written by LGBTQ writers. 12. Ask someone in this thread for a Wildcard, and read it! 13. Participate in the TBB Book Of The Month thread! 64, 4 tomes (>800pp.) 1. Shëkufe Tadayoni Heiberg (2024): Livets verber: Tilfřjelser til Nudansk ordbog (Life's verbs: additions to the modern danish dictionary) 2. Thomas Hylland Eriksen (2024): Det umistelige - Fra global ensretting til et nytt mangfold (a title that's difficult to translate well. The unlosable, perhaps? a non-fiction book about all the ways modern capitalism homogenizes everything in its path, from culture and language, to biodiversity, our ways of living, etc. and how that loss affects us.) 3. Gunnhild Řyehaug (2024): Her kjem sola (here comes the sun). 4. Johan Harstad (2024): Under brosteinen, stranden! (971 pages. the title is taken from a slogan of the 1968 protests in France, which was "Sous les pavés, la plage!") 5. Miroslav Krleža (1932): The return of Philip Latinowicz 6. Nils Bjelland Grřnvold (2024): Den grřnne boka 7. Eva Vezhnavets (2023): What are you looking for, wolf? 8. Stig Dagerman (1945): Ormen 9. Christian Kracht (2012): Imperium 10. Ovid (8): Metamorphoses, translated by professor Thea Selliaas Thorsen (the translation is just about 800 pages, with a long introduction, translator's notes, and a whole host of appendices) 11. Jon Fosse (2004): Det er Ales (Aliss at the fire) 12. Hanne Řrstavik (2020): Ti amo 13. Max Porter (2019): Lanny 14. Antonio Scurati (2020): M. L'uomo della provvidenza 15. W.G. Sebald (1995): Rings of Saturn 16. Řyvind Rimbereid (2023): Hvorfor hjerte nummer to 17. Lea Ypi (2021): Free: Coming of age at the end of history 18. Alfred Döblin (1929): Berlin Alexanderplatz 19. Patrick McCabe (2022): Poguemahone 20. Alberto Moravia (1951): Il conformista 21. Annie Ernaux (2000): L'événement 22. Charlotte Brontë (1847): Jane Eyre 23. Edith Södergran (1949): Samlade dikter 24. Burhan Sönmez (2020): Stone and shadow 25. Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (2020*): Murder in the age of enlightenment and other stories - *I know all his stories were written in the 1910s and 1920s, the year is for this translated collection 26. Wisława Szymborska (2009): Here 27. Alice Oswald (2011): Memorial: An excavation of The Iliad 28. Witold Gombrowicz (1939): The possessed 29. Percival Everett (2024): James 30. Kathrine Nedrejord (2024): Sameproblemet (the sami problem) 31. José Donoso (1970): The obscene bird of night 32. Osamu Dazai (1947): The setting sun 33. Eimear McBride (2025): The city changes its face 34. Mathias Énard (2020): The annual banquet of the gravediggers' guild 35. Flann O'Brien (1939): At swim-two-birds 36. Ida Hove Solberg (2024): Var det grřnt 37. Marguerite Young (1965): Miss Macintosh, my darling (1321 glorious, ethereal, hallucinatory pages) 38. Luka Holmegaard (2023): Havet i munden (digte) 39. Caro de Robertis (2021): The president and the frog 40. Alfred Döblin (1925): Reise in Polen 41. Georgi Gospodinov (2020): Time shelter 42. Alain Robbe-Grillet (1960): Jealousy 43. Thomas Mann (1901): Buddenbrooks 44. Anne Carson (1998): Autobiography of red 45. Han Kang (2021): We do not part 46. Virginia Woolf (1922): Jacob's room 47. Lars elling (2025): Nei, dette husker vi 48. Olga Tokarczuk (2014): Books of Jacob (912 pages) 49. Jon Fosse (2025): Vaim 50. Solvej Balle (2025): Om udregning af rumfang VI 51. Alice Oswald (2016): Falling awake 52. Jon Fosse (1989): Naustet 53. Curzio Malaparte (1944): Kaputt 54. Elsa Morante (1974): La Storia 55. Walid Nabhan (2013): Exodus of the storks 56. Edith Wharton (1920): The age of innocence 57. Thomas Pynchon (2025): Shadow ticket 58. Haile Bizen (2023): La oss si at jeg er (poetry with parallel tigrinja and norwegian text) 59. Nikola Madzriov (2010): Remnants of another age 60. Christian Kracht (2025): Air 61. Ghayath Almadhoun (2024): I have brought you a severed hand 62. Ágota Kristóf (1991): The notebook, the proof, the third lie 63. Rainer Maria Rilke (2011): Selected poems: with parallel german text (poetry from accross his oeuvre plus unpublished poems) 64. Lyudmila Ulitskaya (2011): The big green tent ulvir fucked around with this message at 17:09 on Oct 31, 2025 |
|
#
?
Oct 31, 2025 16:16
|
|
|
45+/45 BOOKS Really losing steam as the year goes on, so I don't think i'll be able to hit the BOOKLORD targets for author diversity. Alas. 49) The Warren by Brian Evenson - A fun, post-apoc, post-human novella that gets by on vibes to hide its very bare bones (lack of) storytelling chops. 50) Alien: Infiltrator by Weston Ochse - garbage! one of the worst of these ancillary series tie-in ones and that's saying a lot. Reads like fan fic. 51) Walking to Aldebaran by Adrian Tchaikovsky - super-garbage! this is filled to the brim with a smirking, wisecracking Weir- or Scalze-esue Jerkass Protag. Contains the words "captain obvious" several times. Honestly it is written like a GBS post from 2003 with how many little catchprases and internet-speak is packed in. Just loving horrid. 52) Things We Lost in the Fire by Mariana Enriquez - a very interesting short story collection by an Argentinian (iirc). A few stories that lean into the urban legend-spooky or paranormal-spookiness arena. Presented as a series of such. Oozes charm, and (at least in translation) the prose is really lyrical and playful.
|
|
#
?
Nov 3, 2025 03:06
|
|
|
|
| # ? Nov 10, 2025 01:04 |
|
|
November has arrived, and then some. Doing well, just need to finish a couple of challenges. I do need a book from a non-human perspective. 60. How to Become Dark Lord and Die Trying by Django Wexler - Groundhog Day meets edgy fantasy written by a horny teenage boy. The choice to make the main character insufferable was an odd one. Reportedly the second is less good, so count this series as unfinished. 61. The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and his Mother) by Rabih Alameddine - Raja is a gay teacher in Lebanon. After some family falling out his mother lives with him. He tells about his life through the civil war, the war with Israel, and his fights with his father and brother. Generally, felt a little aimless, but came together really well and I wound up liking it. 62. The King in Yellow by Robert Chambers and INJ Culbard - A graphic novel of some of the stories from Chambers' The King in Yellow. It's OK. I'm not sure how much the illustration adds, it's possible it even detracts at times. 63. The Society of Unknowable Objects by Gareth Brown - The society is a group founded in London after WW2 to find and put away magical objects, to keep them from being abused. Magda inherits her membership from her mother, and her first recovery mission goes horribly wrong. Can the group fend off a trained killer coming after their hidden trove? Is everything what it seems? All in all solid. Reviews make it seem like it's the second in this "world." Embarrassingly, I have the first as well, but haven't read it. 64. The Beasts of Carnaval by Rosalia Rodrigo - On not-Puerto Rico, Sofia a mestizo former slave seeks her lost brother at the fantastical Isle of Beasts. It's a luxury resort that plantation owners often visit with the slaves, and they often don't return. Can she uncover the secret and find her brother? Honestly this was mostly OK. A lot of it is dreamlike, but occasionally more modern phraseology slips in and pulls the reader out of it. And the dream-likeness sometimes makes it hard to follow the plot payoffs. 65. The Library at Hellebore by Cassandra Khaw - At a magic school, one that works almost as a containment facility for Antichrists and others with world destroying magic, a handful of students are trapped in the library, trying to figure out who dies and who remains. Khaw has their distinctive style on full display, with all the effluvia and viscera you can hope for. All in all a solid read. Ben Nevis posted:
|
|
#
?
Nov 7, 2025 16:20
|
|