#Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law

[rachel-sylvan-author]

"Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law" by Mary Roach

Hey everybody, my phone broke, so this is from my laptop, so if I'm not answering Comments the way I usually do, please know I'm fighting technology, but I still love you all!😅😂🥰

[nevinslibrary]

Totally Random Non-Fiction Tuesday

This is another fun Mary Roach non-fiction book. This time about the places (and times) that humans and wildlife collide. Roach goes all over the world, from indoor elephants, to bears, to terrifying leopards. And, I’m not sure that it’s a spoiler, but, a lot of the time, these issues that humans are having with animals, it’s not the animals fault, but ours.

Just like her other books, it has a good balance of information (oh so much information) and humor throughout the book. It was a fun read. Also, laser scarecrows??

You may like this book If you Liked: Are We Smart Enough To Know How Smart Animals Are? by F.B.M. de Waal, Poached by Rachel Nuwer, or Animals Strike Curious Poses by Elena Passarello

Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law by Mary Roach

[book-ish-ly]

Review: ★★★★★

Very funny, very educational. Love the variety of topics chosen to write about.

Notes:

WHART - animal attack/wild crime scene investigation classes (look into)

Delhi wealth holders use langur monkeys as bodyguards/guard dogs (practice used to be more common, but has since been made illegal)

New Delhi residents hate and adore the local macaque monkey menaces

Rangers and investigators can DNA test animals’ mouths/claws to verify if that animal was present during or after an attack on a person

Indian elephants steal alcohol (haaria) from brewing villagers and get hella drunk

Persistent albatross are part of the reason the military abandoned Midway Atoll

Deer freeze in front of cars because

The headlights and the cars themselves are not necessarily connected in their brains

Animals are only evolutionarily “trained” to respond to something approaching up to a certain speed - most animals don’t go 60 mph

When moose are hit by cars, they are so tall they often crush the roof by rolling over it, often killing the person inside - not to mention damaged caused by moose antlers

Researchers scare off turkey vultures by hanging a dead vulture “effigy” upside down - something about it perturbs the vultures

Carrion eating birds rip rubber bits off cars because of an off gas that smells like carrion

Seagulls have a love-hate relationship with the Vatican - They love the Vatican, the Vatican hates them

New Zealand is trying to learn how to “nicely” cull invasive species

[airplanes924]

Books I've Read in 2023

Number 58

Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law by Mary Roach

[random-bookquotes]

Everyone wants to eat a mouse. Hawks want to, coyotes want to, skunks, foxes, rats. A mouse is a nutritious morsel with no anatomical defenses: no venom or noxious exudations, no spines, no shell. A mouse’s best hope is to get itself someplace safe, and do it fast. At that, the mouse excels. It can squeeze through a hole no bigger than its head. A motivated mouse can jump straight up to a height four times its body length. If I were a mouse, I could leap a wall twenty feet high with no running start. I could pass through the opening of my own mailbox.

Mary Roach, Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law

[dfortrafalgar]

Watching You In The Morning

Inspired by “Watching You In The Morning” by Waltzin

Law x Fem Reader

Warnings: fluff, kinda poetic? more narrative study than plot, more fluff

Also posted on AO3

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

The rise and fall of your chest was a perfect metronome, as if you were dancing along to the patter of raindrops as they fell against the submersible’s porthole.  In your deep, whimsical slumber, you would never even know of the romantic waltz your very presence exuded upon the man in the bed next to you.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

Slow, methodical.  His tattooed fingers dusted fleetingly across the skin of your neck, reaching out to you with reserve, with apprehension, with want.  He felt himself smile, chapped lips tugging ever so slightly at his cheeks at the sight of your serenity, lost in the haze of your dreams.  You were truly beautiful.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

He could watch your breathing forever.  He could die at the crevice of your chest, just to know that you were still inhaling and exhaling, inhaling and exhaling.  To know that you were alive, that your flesh was warm with your blood, that your nerves could feel his hands against your skin, was plenty for him.  He forever worshiped the ground you walked on, relishing in your every moment.  Every word you spoke, every blink of your eyes, curve of your smile, every time your perfect hand fit snugly into his like a statue carved from the finest marble.

His calloused fingers traced invisible lines up your neck, towards your jaw, barely touching you enough to feel the slight fuzz of your natural facial hair.  He ghosted across your dimpled skin, absorbing the heat you radiated, memorizing every cell he could touch.  His eyes darted toward your lips, parted ever so slightly to breathe.

In.

Out.

When his slate-gray eyes looked back up toward yours, you were also looking back at him.  You blinked in slow motion, eyes heavy with the waning of your slumber.  You grinned at him, a sight that made the cold man’s heart do pierrouets, fluttering below his ribcage.  Any more unbridled affection towards him would make his chest rip open in a flood of snow-white doves.

With exhaustion on your tongue, voice crackling without being used, you spoke.  “Were you watching me?”

His fingers retraced their steps along your skin, landing at your collarbones where he mimicked the line of your bone.  “How could I not?”

You laughed.  A sound so bright, so warm, almost too warm.  A sound that made his body lighter, his hair stand on end.  A sound that filled his senses with yellow and violet hues, that smelled like peaches and lavender, that engulfed him in a sweet embrace of a hearth’s heat.  Your laugh made the walls he had spent a decade building up crumble with vigor, chips of glass falling to the ground and shattering into irreparable pieces.

Pieces that he was starting to think did not need to be repaired.

He adjusted his body with the motion of you shuffling closer to him, nestling yourself perfectly in the crevice of his shoulder, his arms around your body, secure and safe.  He smelled of cedar and ethanol, a faint tinge of gasoline and the essence of sugar.  You melted like butter in his hold, paralyzed in his arms, a willing prisoner of his presence.  You felt his chest rise and fall with his shallow breaths.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

Your own air tickled the skin of his breast, tiny, gentle feathers in a spring breeze.  Your fingers crawled along his side before looping your arm under his and pulling your body ever closer.  Oh how you wished you could break the universe for just one moment, to part his atoms and truly become one with him.  Even just a zeptosecond would be enough.

“If you keep thinking this hard, you might blow a fuse.”  His low voice rumbled against your head.

“How did you know?” you responded, voice light and airy, lovestruck and dumb.

He released a chuckle from his throat.  “I just had a feeling.”

Silence once again fell over the two of you.  Save for the continuous rain that fell, a faded noise in the backdrop of the aura he surrounded you with.  Washing away all worries, all fears.

“Can we stay like this forever?”

The question surprised you.  It wasn’t like him to ask such silly, menial queries.  Ever the pessimist, ever the analytical scientist.  He lived for the truth of the world and the facts of life.  He had you for the optimism and the joy for life that he lacked, a perfect balance.  The Yang to his Yin.

You simply hummed.  Tilting your head up to meet his eyes, you felt your blood rush to your face like a flame.  “Forever.”

His arms squeezed you once, then twice.  He sighed, melancholy.  The rain continued to fall, the vessel continued to sway monotonously on the surface of the vast, open ocean, but you stayed anchored to his bed, to his sheets, in his unmoving arms.

He smiled again.  “Thank you.”

No response was followed, and no response was needed.  Your breaths fanning against his skin were more than enough.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

[goodluckclove]

WRITERS - Read More Nonfiction! (With Recs)

Okay so before I start I'm making it very clear that I don't say this as some generalized statement about how All Online People Aren't Reading Right. I doubt that's true! But based on some of the threads and discourse I see on my corner on Writeblr, it definitely seems like a lot of you would greatly benefit from expanding the scope of what you read.

I think there's probably a big stigma against nonfiction for a lot of people - there was for me for the longest time. Maybe six years ago, though, I stumbled into the genre and found that it can actually be rad as shit. It's been an invaluable form of research from people who definitely know what they're talking about, as well as a way to open myself up to new ideas.

You have chronic writers block? It could potentially be because you're consuming exclusively one genre of media. If that's the case, this will definitely get the gears turning!

Below are a collection of my favorite nonfiction books from my own shelf. The funny thing I immediately learned about suggesting more than like three nonfiction books at a time is that it does paint a kind of intimate picture of who I am. Feel free to tell me if these recommendations surprise you based on who you view me to be.

Clove's Favorite Nonfiction Books!

The Mystery of the Exploding Teeth by Thomas Morris - a collection of historical medical cases back when someone would see a doctor for a gunshot wound and the doctor would treat it with a laxative. WILD stuff.

American Monsters by Linda S. Godfrey - US cryptids! Lots of first person accounts.

Cursed Objects by J. W. Ocker - Famous cursed shit. Quick read but very fun.

The Cloudspotter's Guide by Gavin Prector-Pinney - this was written by the founder of the Cloud Appreciation Society, a real organization. It tells you everything you need to know about clouds. Fascinating.

Gory Details by Erika Englehaupt - stories and studies of more morbid and "gross" aspects of science, like the guys who stung themselves with instincts to measure the pain or that beach that feet kept washing up on for a while. Cool interviews with science people.

Fuzz by Mary Roach - wild animals break the law a lot actually and we still as a species don't really know what to do about that.

Spook by Mary Roach - an account of Ghost Believing from all sides of the argument. There was a guy who measured dying bodies to see if he could see them get lighter as their soul escaped.

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimberly - an indigenous-influenced look at our relationship as a species to nature around us. Really beautiful prose from someone who I believe is primarily a botanist and activist?

All the Living and the Dead by Hayley Campbell - stories and analysis from different aspects of the death industry! Embalmers to crime scene cleaners! Super interesting!

American Afterlives by Shannon Lee Dawdy - I have. A lot of death culture books. A lot. This one talks about all the neat things people in America do with their bodies after they die in the modern age. It's fun!

Dark Archives by Megan Rosenbloom - so this IS a book on the history of Anthropodermic bibliopegy, or books bound in human skin. I'm actually midway through this now and it's super fascinating and cool. Also my wife refuses to talk to me about this so I'd love someone else to talk to.

The Secret Lives of Color by Cassia St. Clair - I read like four books on color theory and pigment for a novel I wrote a few years ago and this was my favorite. It's a look into a ton of major hues and pigments throughout history as well as a peek into the timeline of color making. Did you know making green fabrics used to be illegal?

Atlas Obscura - a fucking cool look into weird and unique spots across the globe. Every artist who works with places should have access to this. It's awesome.

Every Caitlin Doughty book they're all great. She's a modern mortician and founder of the Order of the Good Death. Just an incredible human being and a super engaging and informative writer.

If someone wants to reblog with their favorite nonfiction books and what they got from them, be my guest! Maybe someone could use a new read to get their next idea or refine what they're currently working on!

[baudleaires]

I was tagged by @fullmetalscullyy to post four of my favourite books I've read this year, and I REFUSE TO APOLOGIZE FOR BEING CRINGE. EVERYONE LISTEN. I CAN EXPLAIN.

1. Fourth Wing - is this, like, objectively a good book? No. Was it the most fun I've had reading anything all year? Yes. Dragons fight evil wizards I don't know what else to say.

2. Jade City - I turned around so quickly on this one about midway through, and then inhaled it all in one afternoon. Brain worms. It's a political mafia type thing in a fantasy world and the sibling dynamics are 👏

3. Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law - I love you Mary Roach your brain is so big please teach me more cool animal facts

4. Happy Place - I got very into romance audio books this year, oops. This one has my favourite thing in all genres which is "some friends go stay somewhere beachy for the summer". Hell yeah.

Emma already tagged internet pals so I'm just gonna go for my IRL buddy read friends: @r3ally-bad-url and @i--think-im-lost

[reddy-reads]

state of the bookshelf 11.4.24

reading Mary Roach's Fuzz: When nature breaks the law. It's good! She's a very witty and engaging writing. However, her books feel like "daytime books" to me, and I think I want to pick up a stupider book for before I go to bed... If the book is too interesting it wakes me up, and I want to do more reading before I fall asleep. I have a book-themed cozy mystery and something called Finn Fancy Necromancy on the shelf so I hope something will work out

[ashleybenlove]

I read a lot of books in April lol.

Rereads marked in ** and dates are dated completed.

The Dos and Donuts of Love by Adiba Jaigirdar – Apr 2

How to Find Love in a Bookshop by Veronica Henry – Apr 4

The Big Four by Agatha Christie – Apr 4

How Not to Date a Dragon by Lana Kole – Apr 6

Yes Please by Amy Poehler – Apr 7

Evil Under the Sun by Agatha Christie – Apr 7

ORC: Monster Erotica by Layla Fae – Apr 7

The Seven Dials Mystery by Agatha Christie – Apr 10

None of This Is True by Lisa Jewell – Apr 11

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque** – Apr 13

Spaceman of Bohemia by Jaroslav Kalfař – Apr 13

Kristy and the Snobs by Ann M. Martin** – Apr 14

Claudia and the New Girl by Ann M. Martin** – Apr 15

People We Meet On Vacation by Emily Henry – Apr 16

Good-bye Stacey, Good-bye by Ann M. Martin** – Apr 17

Hello, Mallory by Ann M. Martin** – Apr 18

Little Miss Stoneybrook ... and Dawn by Ann M. Martin** – Apr 20

Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law by Mary Roach – Apr 20

Anxious People by Fredrik Backman – Apr 20

Snowed In & Snuggle Weather by Elise Kennedy – Apr 21

Everyone Here Is Lying by Shari Lapena – Apr 23

Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo – Apr 25

Hoarded by the Dragon by Lillian Lark – Apr 26

The Icepick Surgeon: Murder, Fraud, Sabotage, Piracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetrated in the Name of Science by Sam Kean – Apr 28

An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us by Ed Yong – Apr 29

Black Girls Must Be Magic by Jayne Allen – April 29

[sheepnebula]

A Book Review for Down from the Mountain by Bryce Andrews

When I got done with this book, I checked goodreads for what people were saying about it, and things seemed pretty divided. On one end there were four star reviews saying the book was a beautifully written stories about humans and nature, and on the other end there were one star reviews saying this was sold as the life story of a bear but was actually a boring book about a man building a fence. Personally I agree with both reviews, this is a beautiful book about a man building a fence and how that fence impacted the life and death of a bear named Millie.

(Spoilers) I read this right after listening to Fuzz by Mary Roach which is a book about animals, often bears, interacting with the law, so I was very much steeped in bear high jinx. Part of that book details how bears in a vacation town for billionaires will break into homes to steal food with the interesting wrinkle that the bears had grown a preference for certain brands and would not touch others. I was reminded of this fussiness when reading that the bears in Schock’s field would first pick out the sweet corn before bothering with the feed corn. This is a delightful glimpse into the minds of these animals and I think is the heart of what makes an animal charismatic and sympathetic. I feel like some people have a hard time believing that animals have any interior thought process at all or perhaps prefer to think of them that way so they’re easier to kill or eat, but the more you observe an animal, the more you can see the cogs turn behind their eyes. I think Bryce Andrews does a great job depicting those mental gears in the heads of the grizzly bears in Schock’s corn. I don’t think I’ll be able to forget Millie and her cubs for quite some time.

That brings us to the corn and the fence. I think one reason why I wasn’t bored by the fence building like other readers is that the care and professionalism that went into that solution felt very Star Trek to me. It would be easy to imagine an angry farmer complaining and fighting this environmentalist over these horrible bear pests ruining his livelihood, but instead Schock had a very measured attitude towards the bears and allowed Andrews to try a new type of solution to fix his problem. None of the drama came from butting heads between over the top personalities, it instead came from the central problems of humans trying to live in bear’s habitat, and that problem brings more than enough drama. The research that went into the short fence design and the financing to get it built were surprisingly fascinating, but much of the book is dedicated to Andrews actually building the fence which was hard and insightful work. Getting the work done over the course of the summer led to a surprising amount of tension as the growing corn paralleled the growing threat of the bears, but come harvest time, when Millie is killed, the corn is cut down because as relentless as the bears are ultimately humans have control over what happens to the corn and the bears.

In the end the tragedy is simple math. Human habitation and agriculture offers an insane amount of calories that no bear could reasonably be expected to resist. Sprawling land use by a ton of small farms creates an invisible minefield for an animal that is too clever not to take the bait. It’s impossible to expect an animal that desperate for food to scrape and scrounge for bugs when fields of unprotected corn selectively bred to provide more calories than any normal plant is sitting right down the mountain in abundance. Millie is ultimately boxed in and mortally wounded by forces she could never be expected to understand. As a reader I fully felt Andrews obsession with her and her cubs.

This makes the ending of the book slightly awkward. If I were to take one lesson from this book it would be, do not start a farm in grizzly bear habitat, yet that is what Andrews proudly sets out to do in the end. I joke here, but I do think it illustrates a tension running through this book between a romanticization of rural life surrounded by nature including bears with the real risk and destruction that kind of life can present to these animals. Every new person living out there weather it’s a generational farmer like Schock, a new organic farmer flaunting bear safety rules, or a very bear conscious farmer like Andrews represents more land area going to people instead of bears and another point of contact and potential conflict. Still, following the bear rules makes a huge difference, and if any human is going to be living out there I’m glad there’s someone with a deep appreciation for these animals and a desire to coexist with them. Also, it doesn’t hurt to get a good bear book out of it once in a while.

[quoththemaven]

2023 Favoritest Book Reads

Vineland - Pynchon, Thomas

Prophet - Blaché, Sin & Helen Macdonald

And the Ass Saw the Angel - Cave, Nick

Lou Reed: The King of New York - Hermes, Will 

The Color of Magic (Discworld, #1; Rincewind, #1) - Pratchett, Terry

Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative - Kleon, Austin 

Sonic Life: A Memoir - Moore, Thurston

The Fifth Season (The Broken Earth, #1) - Jemisin, N.K. 

Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law - Roach, Mary

Everyone's a Aliebn When Ur a Aliebn Too - Sun, Jonny

The Night Masquerade (Binti, #3) - Okorafor, Nnedi 

Home (Binti, #2) - Okorafor, Nnedi 

Binti: Sacred Fire (Binti, #1.5) - Okorafor, Nnedi 

Binti (Binti, #1) - Okorafor, Nnedi 

Black Paradox - Ito, Junji

David Bowie's Low (33 1/3) - Wilcken, Hugo

Faith, Hope and Carnage - Cave, Nick

The Sirens of Titan - Vonnegut Jr., Kurt

Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth - Aslan, Reza

Smashed - Ito, Junji

Time Shelter - Gospodinov, Georgi

Brian Eno's Another Green World (33 1/3) - Dayal, Geeta

Armageddon in Retrospect - Vonnegut Jr., Kurt

Neverwhere (London Below, #1) - Gaiman, Neil 

The Committed (The Sympathizer #2) - Nguyen, Viet Thanh 

Into the Great Wide Open - Canty, Kevin 

Mongrels - Jones, Stephen Graham 

DisneyWar - Stewart, James B.

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex - Roach, Mary

The Left Hand of Darkness - Le Guin, Ursula K.

My Bloody Valentine's Loveless (33 1/3) - McGonigal, Mike 

Suttree - McCarthy, Cormac

Life's Work: A Memoir - Milch, David

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue - Schwab, V.E.

Against the Day - Pynchon, Thomas

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

Bruce Springsteen's Born in the USA (33 1/3) - Himes, Geoffrey

La Moustache - Carrère, Emmanuel

Janelle Monáe’s The ArchAndroid (33 1/3) - Favreau, Alyssa 

Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea - Pinsker, Sarah 

The Man Without a Shadow - Oates, Joyce Carol

The City & the City - Miéville, China 

Mem - Morrow, Bethany C. 

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind - Harari, Yuval Noah

Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs (33 1/3) - Eidelstein, Eric

Gutshot - Gray, Amelia 

The Price of Time (Watch What You Wish For #1) - Tigner, Tim 

The Revolution Was Televised: The Cops, Crooks, Slingers and Slayers Who Changed TV Drama Forever - Sepinwall, Alan 

Just Kids - Smith, Patti 

Sounds Like Titanic: A Memoir - Hindman, Jessica Chiccehitto 

Flicker - Roszak, Theodore

Tinderbox: HBO's Ruthless Pursuit of New Frontiers - Miller, James Andrew 

Flashback - Simmons, Dan

Flaming Lips' Zaireeka (33 1/3) - Richardson, Mark 

The Sympathizer (The Sympathizer #1) - Nguyen, Viet Thanh 

Pavement's Wowee Zowee (33 1/3) - Charles, Bryan

Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1) - Gibson, William

Invisible Cities - Calvino, Italo

Don't Fear the Reaper (The Indian Lake Trilogy, #2) - Jones, Stephen Graham 

The Wes Anderson Collection - Seitz, Matt Zoller

Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said - Dick, Philip K.

Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly (33 1/3) - Maner, Sequoia

The Nineties - Klosterman, Chuck

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow - Zevin, Gabrielle 

Wanderlust: An Eccentric Explorer, an Epic Journey, a Lost Age - Mitenbuler, Reid

A Heart That Works - Delaney, Rob 

Imago (Xenogenesis, #3) - Butler, Octavia E.

Cryptonomicon (Crypto, #1) - Stephenson, Neal 

Blacktop Wasteland - Cosby, S.A. 

Pearl Jam's Vs. (33 1/3) - Brownlee, Clint

Tracy Flick Can't Win - Perrotta, Tom

Devil House - Darnielle, John 

Adulthood Rites (Xenogenesis, #2) - Butler, Octavia E.

Heat 2 - Mann, Michael & Meg Gardiner

Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures (33 1/3) - Ott, Chris

Dawn (Xenogenesis, #1) - Butler, Octavia E.

The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer - Stephenson, Neal 

The Republic of Thieves (Gentleman Bastard, #3) - Lynch, Scott 

The Year of the Flood (MaddAddam, #2) - Atwood, Margaret 

[mongrelmutt]

My books read list for 2023! For the first time I met my goal of at least one book a week!! 😁

1. "A Conspiracy of Kings" -- Megan Whalen Turner

2. "Thick as Thieves" -- Megan Whalen Turner

3. "Return of the Thief" -- Megan Whalen Turner

4. "Vatican II" -- John O'Malley

5. "The Catholic Church: A Short History" -- Hans Küng, translated by John Bowden

6. "Confessions" and "Letter to Coroticus" -- St. Patrick

7. "Through the Brazilian Wilderness" -- Theodore Roosevelt

8. "The Wind in the Willows" -- Kenneth Grahame

9. "Period: The Real Story of Menstruation" -- Kate Clancy

10. "Star Wars: Padawan" -- Kiersten White

11. "Star Wars: Master and Apprentice" -- Claudia Gray

12. "Deep Down Dark" -- Héctor Tobar

13. "The Lost World" -- Michael Crichton

14. "Provida Mater Ecclesia: Apostolic Constitution of Pope Pius XII Concerning Secular Institutes" (English translation) -- Pope Pius XII

15. "Frankenstein" -- Mary Shelley

16. "Kenobi" -- John Jackson Miller

17. "Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law" -- Mary Roach

18. "Trigun" and "Trigun Maximum" -- Yasuhiro Nightow

19. "Contagion of Liberty: The Politics of Smallpox in the American Revolution" -- Andrew M. Wehrman

20. "Gay and Catholic: Accepting My Sexuality, Finding Community, Living My Faith" -- Eve Tushnet

21. "The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth" -- Beth Allison Bar

22. "Turtles All The Way Down" -- John Green

23. "All Systems Red (Murderbot Diaries #1)" -- Martha Wells

24. "Artificial Condition (Murderbot Diaries #2)" -- Martha Wells

25. "Rogue Protocol (Murderbot Diaries #3)" -- Martha Wells

26. "Exit Strategy (Murderbot Diaries #4) -- Martha Wells

27. "Network Effect (Murderbot Diaries #5) -- Martha Wells

28. "Fugitive Telemetry (Murderbot Diaries #6) -- Martha Wells

29. "Isaac's Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History" -- Erik Larson

30. "The Johnstown Flood" -- David McCullough

31. "The Last Days of the Dinosaurs: An Asteroid, Extinction, and the Beginning of Our World" -- Riley Black

32. "Beastly Brains: Exploring How Animals Think, Talk, and Feel" -- Nancy F. Castaldo

33. "The Rise and Reign of Mammals: A New History from the Shadows of the Dinosaurs to Us" -- Steve Brusatte

34. "Dog Sense: How the New Science of Dog Behavior Can Make You a Better Friend to Your Dog" -- John Bradshaw

35. "Evolution Gone Wrong: The Curious Reasons Why Our Bodies Work (or Don't)" -- Alex Bezzerides

36. "Immune: A Journey Into the Mysterious System that Keeps You Alive" -- Philipp Dettmer

37. "Catholicism and ADHD: Finding Holiness Despite Distractions" -- Alex R. Hey, PCAC

38. "The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons: The History of the Human Brain as Revealed by True Stories of Trauma, Madness, and Recovery" -- Sam Kean

39. "An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us" -- Ed Yong

40. "Lesser Beasts: A Snout-to-Tail History of the Humble Pig" -- Mark Essig

41. "The Mind's Eye" -- Oliver Sacks

42. "Loveless" -- Alice Oseman

43. "The Monkey Trial: John Scopes and the Battle Over Teaching Evolution" -- Anita Sanchez

44. "The Great Quake: How the Biggest Earthquake in North America Changed Our Understanding of the Planet" -- Henry Fountain

45. "Kiki's Delivery Service" -- Eiko Kadono (translated by Emily Balistrieri)

46. "Origin: A Genetic History of the Americas" -- Jennifer Raff

47. "Ancillary Justice" -- Ann Leckie

48. "An Elegant Defense: The Extraordinary New Science of the Immune System: A Tale in Four Lives" -- Matt Richtel

49. "System Collapse (Murderbot Diaries #7)" -- Martha Wells

50. "Spying on Whales: The Past, Present, and Future of Earth's Most Awesome Creatures" -- Nick Pyeson

51. "Howl's Moving Castle" -- Diana Wynne Jones

52. "We Have Always Lived in the Castle" -- Shirley Jackson

53. "Sarah, Plain and Tall" and "Skylark" -- Patricia MacLachlan

54. "The Haunting of Hill House" -- Shirley Jackson

55. "All Creation Waits: The Advent Mystery of New Beginnings" -- Gayle Boss (illustrated by David G. Klein)

[snowberry-crostata]

Summer Reading/Writing/Arting Tag

Tagged by the wonderful @thequeenofthewinter and @late-nite-scholar, thank you both!

1) Describe one creative WIP project you’re planning to work on over the summer:

I’m going to cheat and say two things. The first is Sundered, Kingless, Bleeding, my ongoing Dragonborn quest line novelization (chapter three is almost there - if I can make it through my in-laws’ visit this weekend I’ll have it up next week). I’m hoping to get at least one new chapter up in both June and July, and then start spending more time with it after my dissertation defense is over. I’ve also got a couple of miniatures busts (this one and this one) that I’ve been itching to paint but haven’t had time for, so I’d love to be able to carve out some time to work on those.

2) Rec a book:

I’ll always recommend Mary Roach’s books for anyone looking for hilarious, irreverent, and informative science nonfiction. Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers was my first, but a lot of people like Packing for Mars too. I’m working my way through Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law right now, and I’ve had to stop reading it in public because I keep cracking up every few pages.

3) Rec a fic:

There are lot of amazing stories out there, but I've been particularly into in microfics recently. Jiubilant's stories are so evocative; this one with Lydia and Viarmo sticks in my brain, and I love this series of vignettes about an East Empire Company clerk who becomes archmage.

4) Rec music:

A while ago I put together instrumental writing playlists for each of the Skyrim holds and I listen to those a lot while writing, but this week I’ve been catching up on Eurovision and have been playing Lord of the Lost’s (they were robbed, their song was so good) cover of the runner-up song on repeat.

5) Share one piece of advice:

This is as much a reminder for myself as it is advice for other people: if you’re feeling frustrated or stuck with your writing, walk away for a few days (or weeks…) and re-read it later. It’ll be better than you think, and with some time away you’ll be able to catch and fix the things you didn’t see when you were deep in the trenches. Also, read your drafts out loud, not just in your head! It’s a really good way to catch typos, skipped words, repeated words, awkward phrases, etc.

@stormbeyondreality and @sylvienerevarine, if you haven’t been tagged already I would love to see what y’all have planned (no pressure though!).

[inklingofadream]

"At breeding colonies, herring gulls will sometimes peck to death another gull's chick should it blunder into their territory. And then they, or another gull, may eat is. I read all about this in 'Cannibalism in Herring Gulls,' an article by Jasper Parsons, who watched a lot of it go down on Scotland's Isle of May. I showed off my new vocabulary word: kronism, the eating of one's offspring. They also do that.... "While 20 to 30 percent of herring gull chicks that wander away from their nest are attacked, a similar number, one study showed, are adopted by a neighbor who feeds and protects them. As with humans, as with bears, a few individuals are responsible for the bulk of the species' churlish (to us) behavior. Of the 329 herring gull chicks cannibalized during the 1968 Isle of May breeding season, 167 were eaten by just four cannibals. According to Parsons, one out of 250 herring gull pairs practices cannibalism. It has nothing to do with food shortages, he found. It just seemed to be what they liked to eat best."

-- Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law, Mary Roach

[embossross]

2022 in Books: Non-Fiction Edition

memoirs

in the dream house by carmen maria machado (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

priestdaddy by patricia lockwood (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

night by elie wiesel (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

negroland by margo jefferson (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

fun home: a family tragicomic by alison bechdel (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

black box by shiori ito (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

waste: one woman's fight against america's dirty secret by catherine coleman flowers (⭐⭐⭐)

a history of my brief body by billy-ray belcourt (⭐⭐⭐)

essays

the best american essays 2021 (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

how to slowly kill yourself and others by kiese laymon (not the new edition unfortunately 😭) (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

coventry: essays by rachel cusk (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

trick mirror: reflections on self-delusion by jia tolentino (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

the curtain: an essay in seven parts by milan kundera (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

upstream: selected essays by mary oliver (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

the best american essays 2019 (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

languages of truth: essays 2003-2020 by salman rushdie (⭐⭐⭐)

tacky: love letters to the worst culture we have to offer by rax king (⭐⭐⭐)

the 2000s made me gay: essays on pop culture by grace perry (⭐)

poetry - no ratings because i am a poetry novice lol

an american sunrise by joy harjo

golden ax by rio cortez

time is a mother by ocean vuong

other

being mortal: medicine and what matters in the end by atul gawande (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

red famine: stalin's war on ukraine, 1921-1933 by anne applebaum (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐)

dopesick: dealers, doctors, and the drug company that addicted america by beth macy (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

fuzz: when nature breaks the law by mary roach (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

a beginner's guide to japan: observations and provocations by pico iyer (⭐⭐⭐⭐)

the best american science and nature writing 2021 (⭐⭐⭐)

how the irish saved civilization: the untold story of ireland's heroic role from the fall of rome to the rise of medieval europe by thomas cahill (⭐⭐⭐)

the neanderthals rediscovered: how modern science is rewriting their story by dimitra papagianni (⭐⭐⭐)