#Emmuska Orczy

[beautifulbookishdisaster]

"I am only conscious of one hope, citoyen." "And that is?" "That Satan, your master, will have need of you elsewhere before the sun rises today." "You flatter me, citoyenne."

Emmuska Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel

[junibyrd]

Today is this remarkable lady's birthday.

One year ago I started reading the Scarlet Pimpernel and there was no going back since. I've read 13 of the pimpernel series and 4 individual novels and I can safely say that Emmuska Orczy is one of my fav authors.

I encourage you to read the other pimpernel stories (specially I will repay, Elusive and Eldorado) AND I cannot recommend you enough to take a look at The Tangled Skein! It's a pre pimpernel novel (it was published before the SP) with an entirely different story but as usual filled with love, conspiracy, great characters, nice plot twists, a beautiful scenery aand a bit of magic too!

Without the pimpernel I doubt that I would've survived this past year sane, it gave me such comfort, joy and helped me trough some big events and hardships. I learned a tremendous amount about myself and the way I view life and love. It is also because of this series that I really learned to love reading and to do so in different languages.

So here's to you Emma, and to your dashing superhero, I owe u a lot!

[desdasiwrites]

– Baroness Emmuska Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel

[litandlifequotes]

It is only when we are very happy, that we can bear to gaze merrily upon the vast and limitless expanse of water, rolling on and on with such persistent, irritating monotony, to the accompaniment of our thoughts, whether grave or gay. When they are gay, the waves echo their gaiety; but when they are sad, then every breaker, as it rolls, seems to bring additional sadness, and to speak to us of hopelessness and of the pettiness of all our joys.

The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emmuska Orczy

[oldfashionedbooklove]

—Sir Percy Blakeney to Chauvelin

"You- you aren't going to kill me?"

"You're a rat, but an ecosystem crumbles without vermin. You still have a purpose to fulfill,"

[onaslansside]

PLEASE, if you know The Scarlet Pimpernel, go read my favorite short story in the entire series, it’s so funny. It’s called A Battle of Wits and is available on Project Gutenberg here.

[kaggsy59]

"...my own dear lady's quick, intuitive brain..." @RenardPress #ReadIndies #LadyMolly

I can hardly believe it’s the end of February – and #ReadIndies! Luckily, we’ve had an extra day this year, and to round up the month, Lizzy and I have been buddy reading a book from one of our favourite micro-presses – Renard! It’s a reprint of a fascinating collection of classic crime stories which I’d not come across before; and it turned out to be a real treat. The title is “Lady Molly of…

[hiraethstar]

Chauvelin: *appears in any scene*

Baroness Emmuska Orczy: HE'S SHORT! This man is TINY! You can sling him over your shoulder like a bale of goods, he's so smol!

[siryl]

Illustrated by Montagu Barstow.

Old Hungarian Fairy Tales - Translated by Baroness Orczy

Cthulhu dreams in Balaton

haven’t been able to find any relevant info on this or on the artist

[jadelotusflower]

2024 Roundup - books read

Fiction

Stone Blind: Medusa's Story - Natalie Haynes

Atonement - Ian McKeown (re-read)

A Gentleman in Moscow - Amor Towles

Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries - Heather Fawcett

Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands - Heather Fawcett

Coraline - Neil Gaiman

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - L. Frank Baum (re-read)

The Marvelous Land of Oz - L. Frank Baum

Ozma of Oz - L. Frank Baum

Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz - L. Frank Baum

The Road to Oz - L. Frank Baum

The Emerald City of Oz - L. Frank Baum

Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West - Gregory Maguire (re-read)

Mrs Dalloway - Virginia Woolf

Orlando: A biography- Virginia Woolf

Sappo: Poems & Fragments - Sappo (translated by Josephine Balmer)

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea - Jules Verne (translated by Henry Frith)

The Mysterious Island - Jules Verne (translated by Jordan Stump)

Piranesi - Susanna Clarke

Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy (translated by Louise and Aylmer Maude)

Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë

Frankenstein, or, The Modern Prometheus - Mary Shelley (re-read)

The Scarlet Pimpernel - Baroness Emmuska Orczy (re-read)

Sir Percy Leads the Band - Baroness Emmuska Orczy

The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel - Baroness Emmuska Orczy

The Elusive Pimpernel - Baroness Emmuska Orczy (re-read)

A Court of Thorns and Roses - Sarah J Mass

Best Fairy Tales - Hans Christian Andersen (translated by Jean Hersholt)

A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens (re-read)

Non-Fiction

A year in the life of Ancient Egypt and the real lives of the people who lived there - Donald P Ryan

Persians: The Age of the Great Kings - Lloyd LLewellyn-Jones

American Prometheus: The Tragedy and Triumph of J Robert Oppenheimer- Kai Bird and Martin J Sherwin

Divine Might: Goddesses in Greek Myth - Natalie Haynes

The Splendid and the Vile: Churchill, Family, and Defiance during the bombing of London - Erik Larson

The History of the World: From the Dawn of Humanity to the Modern Age - Frank Welsh

Pagan Britain - Ronald Hutton

Unruly: A History of England’s Kings and Queens - David Mitchell

Burn it Down: Power, Complicity, and a Call for Change in Hollywood - Maureen Ryan

Montaigne: A Very Short Introduction - William H Hamlin

Essays: A Selection - Michel de Montaigne (translated and edited by M.A. Screech)

Hey Honey, I’m Homo: Sitcoms, Specials, and the Queering of American Culture - Matt Baume

Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays the Rent - Judi Dench (with Brendan O’Hea)

What I Ate in One Year (and related thoughts) - Stanley Tucci

What I liked

I enjoyed most of what I read this year, including revisiting some older books with new eyes, finally getting around to some classics from my TBR list (with a few detours), and general mix of history and biography/memoir.

My favourite book of the year, and now up there with my favourite books of all time, is Piranesi, something that has been on the list a while and yet something I have successfully avoided spoilers for. I went in completely blind and so glad I did because the way this story washed over me is one of those very rare things and I loved loved loved reading this book.

I also really enjoyed A Gentleman in Moscow (the tv adaptation was sadly a bit of a disappointment). There’s a fine line between whimsical and twee and while that line likely differs for everyone, for me it successfully kept just on the side of whimsy - or maybe I just love a literary reference and this was full of them. It also inspired me to check out the works of Montaigne which I found interesting in context.

On the non-fiction front, American Prometheus is a good companion to the Oppenheimer film, and Burn it Down was an excellent but rage-inducing peak behind the Hollywood curtain, but The Man Who Pays the Rent was my other favourite read this year. Rather than ghostwritten, this takes the format of question and answer between Judi Dench and actor/director Brendan O’Hea, each chapter focussing on a different Shakespeare play and the characters Dench performed. It’s a beautiful insight into the acting process, theatre history, and Shakespeare’s female characters. Dench is so compelling and charming and the format allows her voice to leap off the page (more memoirs should take this approach tbh). I love Shakespeare but hardly consider myself an expert, so her perspective on the works and the characters was insightful - one of those books you look forward to returning to at the end of the day.

What I didn’t

When I tell people I’m writing a fantasy novel they often ask if I’ve read A Court of Thorns and Roses and I’m kind of sick of seeming uninformed about this faeriecore juggernaut, so finally gave it a go. It’s…not for me, really, despite it being generally keyed into my interests. I just found it…kind of boring? Feyre is dumb as rocks difficult to care about, and Tamlin, despite the cute nod with the name, is stock beast archetype with no other discernible personality.

Most of the book was an absolute slog until it finally got semi-interesting 3/4 in, but we’re stuck in Feyre’s pov and therefore unable to explore anything approaching compelling or nuanced. I’ve been told it actually gets good in the second book (and have been spoiled about the whole Rhysand thing), but I’m not really inspired to give it any more effort.

I also had mixed feelings about Emily Wilde - while of better quality than ACOTAR and I really loved the worldbuilding and some of the fae characters (Poe my beloved!) the central romance fell completely flat for me (maybe I’m just immune to the charms of faerie lords?) and I find the narrative is limited by the epistolary style. However I enjoy the fae plotline enough that I will likely get around to the third book at some stage.

On the point of mixed feelings, it’s interesting how much I enjoy Natalie Haynes’ non-fiction work on Greek myth while finding that her fiction completely misses the mark. Essentially a collection of essays, Divine Might is engaging and thought-provoking on the various depictions of Greek goddesses and their place within the mythos both then and now. On the other side of the coin, Stone Blind is ostensibly Medusa’s story, but mostly told through other perspectives and (much like with her previous effort A Thousand Ships) Haynes is preoccupied with recreating the whole of the myth which ultimately subsumes women, and therefore fails in its premise to showcase the female perspective. It’s just so odd that she can’t bring any of her insights from her compelling analysis to an actual narrative.

[beautifulbookishdisaster]

"It does seem simple, doesn't it?" she said, with a final bitter attempt at flippancy. "When you want to kill a chicken... you take hold of it... then you wring its neck. ... It's only the chicken who does not find it quite so simple. Now you hold a knife at my throat, and a hostage for my obedience. ... You find it simple. ... I don't."

Emmuska Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel

[somebodys-weird-mom]

Goals: less social media (hell site excluded, I actually want to use Tumblr MORE), more actually reading/rereading books.

I wanna get weird about Terry Pratchett and Georgette Heyer and Emmuska Orczy again.

[thelonelybrilliance]

thelonelybrilliance's 2024 Reads

Total Books Read: 132 (Original Goal: 120) Total Pages Read: 35,000 Average Book Length: 255 Pages Longest Book Read: IT, Stephen King Most Books Read in a Month: 16 (October) First-Time Reads: 83

FICTION (new to me)

Favorite Novel: Light Bringer, Pierce Brown

Runners-up: Network Effect, Martha Wells; The Last Unicorn, Peter S. Beagle; Dandelion Wine, Ray Bradbury

Favorite Novella: Small Things Like These, Claire Keegan

Favorite Short Story: So Much Cooking, Naomi Kritzer

Favorite Series: The Murderbot Diaries, Martha Wells

Least Favorite Fiction: Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë; Hope Ablaze, Sarah Mughal Rana; Raffles: The Amateur Cracksman, E.W. Hornung; Mistress Pat, L.M. Montgomery

Least Favorite Series: The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe

NON-FICTION & POETRY (new to me)

Favorite Memoir: A Heart That Works, Rob Delaney

Runners-up: The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion; A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis, Just Kids, Patti Smith; A Natural Woman, Carole King

Favorite Essay Collection: Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions, Valeria Luiselli

Runners-up: Winter Hours, Mary Oliver

Favorite Non-Fiction Investigative/Journalistic/Academic: Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup, John Carreyrou

Runners-up: Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators, Ronan Farrow; Dress Codes: How the Laws of Fashion Made History, Richard Thompson Ford

Least Favorite Non-Fiction: How to Dress: Secret Styling Tips from a Fashion Insider, Alexandra Fullerton

Favorite Poetry: I Know Your Kind: Poems, William Brewer; Enough Rope, Dorothy Parker

Least Favorite Poetry: Woman Without Shame: Poems, Sandra Cisneros

REREADS (by author)

Favorites

J.R.R. Tolkien (The Hobbit: or There and Back Again & The Lord of the Rings)

Jane Austen (Pride and Prejudice, Emma, Persuasion, & Mansfield Park)

Megan Whalen Turner (Queen's Thief series, including Moira's Pen)

Pierce Brown (Morning Star)

Eloise Jarvis McGraw (Mara, Daughter of the Nile)

Constance Savery (Enemy Brothers)

C.S. Lewis (The Voyage of the Dawn Treader)

Elizabeth George Speare (The Witch of Blackbird Pond)

Betty Smith (A Tree Grows in Brooklyn)

Joan Aiken (The Wolves of Willoughby Chase)

Kenneth Grahame (The Wind in the Willows)

Louise Glück (complete works)

Richard Siken (Crush)

Least Favorites

Baronness Emmuska Orczy (Eldorado: More Adventures of the Scarlet Pimpernel)

[lizziethereader]

August 2023 wrapup

I just realized I haven't posted this yet.... Maybe it's because most of this month was fairly mediocre? Or at least not as good as I was expecting... I'm happy with the amount of books I've read, but I was hoping for some of them to wow me, and most of the books didn't manage to do that.

favorite of the month: Packing for Mars by Mary Roach

nonfiction of the month (1): Packing for Mars by Mary Roach

classics (1): Sir Percy Leads the Band by Emmuska Orczy

poetry (1): The Fire of Joy edited by Clive James

graphic novel (1): Salt Magic by Hope Larson and Rebecca Mock

[brookstonalmanac]

Holidays 9.23

Holidays

Al-Yaom Al-Watany (Saudi Arabia)

Asian Corpsetwt Day [Every 23rd]

Asteroid Day

Autumn Stroll Day

Barbara Gordon Day

Batman Day (DC Comics)

Bi Visibility Day (UK)

Bonn Phchum Ben (Ancestors’ Day; Cambodia)

Celebrate Bisexuality Day (a.k.a. Bisexual Pride & Bi Visibility Day)

Checkers Day

Chuuk Liberation Day (Micronesia)

Day of the Genocide of Lithuania's Jews (Lithuania)

Dogs in Politics Day

Education Technology Day

Flashbulb Day

Gray Cat Day

Grito de Lares (Puerto Rico)

Haryana Veer and Shahidi Divas (Haryana, India)

Holocaust Memorial Day (Lithuania)

I Have Not Yet Begun To Fight Day

Innergize Day [Day after Equinox]

International Bi Visibility Day

International Day Against Sexual Exploitation & Trafficking of Women & Children

International Day of Sign Languages

International Hospitality Women’s Day

International Restless Legs Syndrome Day

International Za’atar Day

King’s Birthday (Western Australia)

Kyrgyz Language Day (Kyrgyzstan)

Landscape-Nursery Day

Learn to Code Day

Martyrs Day (Haryana, India)

National AFM Day (a.k.a. Acute Flaccid Myelitis Day)

National Acute Flaccid Myelitis Day

National Checkers Day

National Day of School Failure Prevention

National Day of Women’s Political Rights (Argentina)

National Field Marketer’s Day

National Fitness Day (Ireland)

National Go With Your Gut Day

National Maritime Day

National Property Manager’s Day

National Redhead Appreciation Day

National Singles Day

National Teletext Day (UK)

National Temperature Control Day

National Volleyball Day

Neptune Day

New Year's Day (Constantinople)

Nintendo Day

Pancake Queen Memorial Day

Puffy Shirt Day (Seinfeld)

Restless Legs Awareness Day

Saffron Day (French Republic)

Speed Racer Day

Sügise Algus (a.k.a. Sügisene Pööripäev; Estonia, Finland, Sweden)

Teachers’ Day (Brunei)

Thrue Bab (Blessed Rainy Day; Bhutan)

Teal Talk Day

That'll Be the Day Day

West Nordic Day

World Adopted Dog Day

World Maritime Day (UN)

Food & Drink Celebrations

Chewing Gum Day

Gastronomy Day (France)

Great American Pot Pie Day

Hummerpremiär (Lobster Festival; Sweden)

National Apple Cider Vinegar Day

National Bacon Butty Day (UK)

National Baker Day

National Snack Stick Day

Za’atar Day

Independence & Related Days

Duchy of Prussian Britannia (Declared; 2014) [unrecognized]

Unification Day (Saudi Arabia)

4th Monday in September

American Indian Day (Tennessee) [4th Monday]

Canterbury South Province Day (New Zealand) [4th Monday]

CASAColumbia Family Day [4th Monday]

Dominion Day (New Zealand) [4th Monday]

Family Day — A Day To Eat Dinner With Your Children [4th Monday]

Meditation Monday [Every Monday]

Mellow Monday [4th Monday of Each Month]

Monday Musings [Every Monday]

Motivation Monday [Every Monday]

Mushroom Monday [4th Monday of Each Month]

National Eat Dinner with Your Family Day [4th Monday]

Weekly Holidays beginning September 23 (4th Full Week of September)

Falls Prevention Awareness Week (thru 9.27)

Global Week of Student Prayer (thru 9.27)

International Happiness at Work Week (thru 9.27)

International Week of the Deaf (thru 9.29) [M-Sun including Last Sunday]

Festivals Beginning September 23, 2024

Mayberry Days (Mt. Airy, North Carolina) [thru 9.29]

Feast Days

Adomnán (Christian; Saint)

Augustalia (Ancient Rome)

Bunster Winding (Shamanism)

Carl-Henning Pedersen (Artology)

Cicciolina Day (Church of the SubGenius; Saint)

Cissa of Crowland (or of Northumbria; Christian; Saint)

Citua (Feast to the Moon; Ancient Inca)

Corneille (Positivist; Saint)

Emmuska Orczy (Writerism)

Feast of Chukem (Deity of Footraces; Colombia)

Feast of the Ingathering (a.k.a. Harvest Home, Kirn or Mell-Supper; UK)

Festival of Papa, Wife of Rangi (Maori; New Zealand)

Festival of the Goddess Ninkasi (Sumerian Goddess of Brewing)

František Kupka (Artology)

James Carroll Beckwith (Artology)

Libra zodiac sign begins (Pagan)

Linus, Pope (Christian; Saint)

Louise Nevelson (Artology)

Manolo and Carlo Flamingo (Muppetism)

Matthew Pratt (Artology)

Paul Delvaux (Artology)

Padre Pio (a.k.a. Pio of Pietreclcina; Christian; Saint)

Pekka Halonen (Artology)

Sossius (Christian; Saint)

Stan Lynde (Artolgy)

Suzanne Valadon (Artology)

Thecla (Roman Catholic Church)

Walk the Plank Day (Pastafarian)

Wesley Chu (Writerism)

Xanthippe and Polyxena (Christian; Saint)

Lucky & Unlucky Days

Fortunate Day (Pagan) [39 of 53]

Taian (大安 Japan) [Lucky all day.]

Unlucky Day (Grafton’s Manual of 1565) [45 of 60]

Premieres

Abraxas, by Carlos Santana (Album; 1970)

Aja, by Steely Dan (Album; 1977)

Arsenic and Old Lace (Film; 1944)

Baa Baa Black Sheep (TV Series; 1976)

The Blacklist (TV Series; 2013)

Blonde (Film; 2022)

Brave Little Tailor (Disney Cartoon; 1938)

Bridges to Babylon, by The Rolling Stones (Album; 1997)

Bunker Hill Bunny (WB MM Cartoon; 1950)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (Film; 1969)

Capture the Saint, by Burt Barer (Novel; 1997) [Saint #52]

Corpse Bride (Animated Film; 2005)

The Count of Monte Cristo (Hanna-Barbera Animated TV Special; 1973)

Crazy House (Andy Panda Cartoon; 1940)

Daffy’s in Trouble (WB LT Cartoon; 1961)

Difficult Loves, by Italo Calvino (Novel; 1970)

Dolphin Tale (Film; 2011)

Educating Rita (Film; 1983)

Enola Holmes (Film; 2020)

Girls with Balls (Film; 2018)

The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt (Novel; 2013)

Goofy Gymnastics (Disney Cartoon; 1949)

The Greatest Beer Run Ever (Film; 2022)

Heroes, by David Bowie (Song; 1977)

Highway Hecklers (Chilly WIlly Cartoon; 1968)

I’ve Got to Sing a Torch Song (WB MM Cartoon; 1933)

JAG (TV Series; 1995)

Jeepers Creepers (WB LT Cartoon; 1939)

The Jetsons (Animated TV Series; 1962)

Light of the Midnight Fun (WB MM Cartoon; 1939)

Mad About You (TV Series; 1992)

Moneyball (Film; 2011)

Modern Family (TV Series; 2009)

Mom (TV Series; 2013)

Mutiny Ain’t Nice (Fleischer Popeye Cartoon; 1938)

NCIS (TV Series; 2003)

Night of the Living Duck (WB LT Cartoon; 1988)

North, by Elvis Costello (Album; 2003)

The Nylon Curtain, by Billy Joel (Album; 1982)

One Tree Hill (TV Series; 2003)

Only When I Laugh (Film; 1981)

Oo-oo Birds of a Feather (George of the Jungle Cartoon; 1967) [#3]

Parallel Lines, by Blondie (Album; 1978)

People Are Strange, by The Doors (Song; 1967)

Phantom of the Opera, by Gaston Leroux (Novel; 1909)

Pink Pull (Pink Panther Cartoon; 1978)

Pink Suds (Pink Panther Cartoon; 1978)

The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran (Prose Poetry; 1923)

Rodent to Stardom (WB LT Cartoon; 1967)

Round Trip to Mars (Woody Woodpecker Cartoon; 1957)

Scooby-Doo! And the Goblin King (WB Animated Film; 2008)

The Shawshank Redemption (Film; 1994)

Sicque! Sicque! Sicque! (The Inspector Cartoon; 1966)

Sky Scrapper (Ub Iwerks Disney Cartoon; 1928)

Sledge Hammer! (TV Series; 1987)

Slouching Towards Bethlehem, by Joan Didion (Essays; 1968)

Storks (Animated Film; 2016)

Up a Tree (Disney Cartoon; 1955)

The Veldt, by Ray Bradbury (Short Story; 1950)

When I Was Cruel, by Elvis Costello (Album; 2002)

Whose Line Is It Anyway? (UK Improv Series; 1988)

Wild Ralph Hiccup (Super Chicken Cartoon; 1967) [#3]

The Wolf’s Side of the Story (Terrytoons Cartoon; 1938)

Today’s Name Days

Gerhild, Helene, Linus, Thekla (Austria)

Elizabeta, Lino, Pijo, Tekla, Zaharija (Croatia)

Berta (Czech Republic)

Linus (Denmark)

Diana, Dolores, Tekla (Estonia)

Mielikki, Miisa, Minja (Finland)

Constant, Faustine (France)

Linus, Gerhild, Thekla (Germany)

Iris, Polixeni, Rais, Xanthippe, Xanthippi (Greece)

Tekla (Hungary)

Lino, Pio, Rebecca (Italy)

Ivanda, Omula, Vanda, Veneranda (Latvia)

Galintas, Galintė, Linas, Teklė (Lithuania)

Snefrid, Snorre (Norway)

Boguchwała, Bogusław, Libert, Minodora, Tekla (Poland)

Zdenka (Slovakia)

Constancio, Lino, Pío, Tecla (Spain)

Tea, Tekla (Sweden)

Autumn, Linnet, Linnette, Lynette, Lynn, Lynne (USA)

Today is Also…

Day of Year: Day 267 of 2024; 99 days remaining in the year

ISO: Day 1 of Week 39 of 2024

Celtic Tree Calendar: Muin (Vine) [Day 23 of 28]

Chinese: Month 8 (Guy-You), Day 21 (Geng-Yin)

Chinese Year of the: Dragon 4722 (until January 29, 2025) [Wu-Chen]

Hebrew: 20 Elul 5784

Islamic: 19 Rabi I 1446

J Cal: 27 Gold; Sixday [27 of 30]

Julian: 10 September 2024

Moon: 61%: Waning Gibbous

Positivist: 15 Shakespeare (10th Month) [Almarcon]

Runic Half Month: Gyfu (Gift) [Day 2 of 15]

Season: Autumn or Fall (Day 2 of 90)

Week: 4th Full Week of September

Zodiac: Libra (Day 1 of 30)

Calendar Changes

Libra (Balance) begins [Zodiac Sign 7; thru 10.22]

[cogentranting]

My 2023 Reads

See below for the full list of the books I read and a 1-2 sentence review of each.

Fiction, non-fiction, poetry

Italicized- reread

Cloud Cuckoo Land (Anthony Doerr) - It's like a combination of All the Light We Cannot See, Cloud Atlas and The Book Thief, except not quite as good as any of those. Good, just not as good.

The Stolen Heir (Holly Black) - Highly recommend if YA fantasy romance is your thing

On the Incarnation (Athanasius of Alexander) - one of the foundational works of early Christian theology

Klara and the Sun (Kazuo Ishiguro) - Beautiful, and lovely, and thoughtful and bittersweet

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl and Sir Orfeo (Tolkien translation) - technically this is poetry but its also narrative so I grouped it with fiction. Green Knight is very fun. Pearl is quite boring.

The Case Against the Sexual Revolution (Louise Perry) - I highly recommend this, just be cautious because it has some very frank discussions of some very hard topics so there's a whole bunch of language and trigger warnings attached to this recommendation

Justification Reconsidered: Rethinking a Pauline Theme (Stephen Westerholm) - I'm going to be honest-- I don't remember what I thought of this book. It was for school and I also did a bunch of research on the topic and I don't remember what part of that research this constituted.

A Quest for Godliness: The Puritan Vision of the Christian Life (J.I. Packer) - I read a few chapters of this for a research project last year and liked it enough to buy myself a copy and read the whole thing for fun

The Warden and the Wolf King (Andrew Peterson) - Book 3 of this series (this is 4) remains my favorite but this one is really good and is a beautiful culmination of the themes

The Elements of Eloquence (Mark Forsyth) - About as good as a book that is just explaining various rhetorical figures can be.

The Theology of the Book of Revelation (Richard Bauckham) -THIS book right here I want to read again. This book made me fall in love with Revelation.

King of Scars (Leigh Bardugo) -It's the reason why I'm very upset over the cancellation of the Shadow and Bone tv series (because I won't get to see more of my boy Nikolai) but it's fine

The Secular Creed: Engaging Five Contemporary Claims (Rebecca McLaughlin) - A very useful book, very accessible

Rule of Wolves (Leigh Bardugo) - But seriously I love Nikolai and I mostly really enjoyed this duology.

The Waste Land and Other Early Poems (T.S. Eliot) - So many words saying so many things and maybe I'll know what they mean if I read this another 30 or 40 times.

Notes From Underground (Fyodor Dostoevsky) - Very different from other Dostoevsky but fascinating in its own way

The Scarlet Pimpernel (Emmuska Orczy) - It's a romp

Calvinism: A Southern Baptist Dialogue - genuinely very very helpful to me and just randomly was emailed to me as a pdf by some site that I ended up on the email list for

The Great Hunt (Robert Jordan) - I do not have faith in this series being good over time but at book 2 they're fun

Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen) -It really is that good.

Original Sin: A Cultural History (Alan Jacobs) - a really interesting exploration of the idea

Out of the Silent Planet (C.S. Lewis) - The Space Trilogy is great because it just has such a different feel from most of the other sci fi I've read

Gay Girl, Good God: The Story of Who I Was and Who God Has Always Been (Jackie Hill Perry) - Perry has such a lovely poetic way of telling her story

Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me (Karen Swallow Prior) - This book is really lovely and peaceful and reflective

A Wizard of Earthsea (Ursula K. Le Guin) -honestly was not very impressed by this. It was fine.

Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy) - If you're really into the Russian classics, I would recommend this, but there's like 6 others I would recommend first.

Firefly: Big Damn Hero (James Lovegrove, Nancy Holder) -If you want the book equivalent of a solid but not stand-out filler episode of Firefly

The Hidden Girl and Other Stories (Ken Liu) -I ranked all of the short stories in this on my blog if you search for it. Some are great. Some are not.

All the Light We Cannot See (Anthony Doerr) - It's really really good. A book you just want to sit with.

The Chalice of the Gods (Rick Riordan) - Kinda the same vibe as the Firefly one. It's good to see Percy again, it's a fun time, it's not taking any big swings or doing anything particularly new. But I did really enjoy the thematic linking of which gods were chosen to be a part of the story.

Dracula (Bram Stoker) - It's Tumblr, I don't need to review this here.

Biblical Critical Theory: How The Bible's Unfolding Story Makes Sense of Modern Life and Culture (Christopher Watkin) - This book is really big but it has so much good stuff in it. Well worth the read.

An Experiment in Criticism (C.S. Lewis) - There was quite I while through this one where I was not really jiving with it, but then at the end he pulls it together and I really like where he ends up, as evidenced by quoting half of it on posts here.

Poems (C.S. Lewis) - I'm not good enough at reading poetry to review it. There's a few in here that I quite liked though.

For teaching-

1. The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald)- it's still great. After reading it who knows how many times, it's just so good.

2. The Crucible (Arthur Miller)- The character work in here is fantastic, and I really do like it a lot, but if Miller understood grace a bit better? the ending could be phenomenal.

3. Long Way Gone (Ishmael Beah)- It's not my favorite but it is really powerful and worth reading and the kids were really invested in it