#John Lewis-stempel

[godzilla-reads]

A sweet surprise from @the-forest-library today. I even poked my head outside in the -19°F weather to get it.

🦊 The Wood in Winter by John Lewis-Stempel

A quick read, this is a simple and thoughtful booklet about our values and traditions in winter. May you go forward with love in your hearts.

[edwardian-girl-next-door]

"There is a kind of life in death. The winds, snows, and floods of winter have scraped the countryside clean, ready for a new start."

~ John Lewis-Stempel, Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field (entry for 18th January)

[bookymcbookface]

Nightwalking, by John Lewis-Stempel

[krautjunker]

Wandern bei Nacht: Was wir in der Dunkelheit erleben können

Buchvorstellung »Ich begann meine Nachtwanderungen aus schierer Notwendigkeit. Der freundliche Pub, der Wadsworth-Bier an Minderjährige ausschenkte, lag leider nicht bei uns im Dorf, sondern erforderte nach der Sperrstunde einen Fünf-Kilometer-Fußmarsch nach Hause. Der Pfad zu meiner heimischen Höhle verlief flussabwärts am Ufer des Wye entlang. Einmal beobachtete ich um Mitternacht…

[teabooksandsweets]

I am a big fan of Iain De Caestecker because of Agents of SHIELD, and I saw he worked in a James Herriot biopic called Young James Herriot. I know you are a great fan of the All Creatures Great and Small saga, so I ask you: is it any good? reviews on IMDB were split.

To be honest, though I have heard of it, I have never seen it. It is based on a book, which I have also never read, by nature writer John Lewis-Stempel, whose work I generally enjoy a great lot. I'm sorry that this isn't a helpful answer.

[llovelymoonn]

webweaving on being nocturnal or feeling more at peace in the night? 🌙

david almond my name is mina \\ van gogh starry night over the rhône (1888) \\ van gogh the starry night \\ van gogh \\ countess of winchelsea anne finch a nocturnal reverie \\ jean-françois millet starry night (c. 1850-1865) \\ patricia mckillip \\ george henry river landscape by moonlight (1888) \\ ?? \\ john lewis-stempel meadowland: the private life of an english field

kofi

[klynnlastname]

Unknown - Unknown / Lucy Frostblade - @caitmayart / Forest Song - Anastasia Serova / Let There Be Light - John Lewis-Stempel / Unknown - Unknown / Light Sketch - Vladimir Motsar / The Archer - Taylor Swift / N/A - Euripides / Inspired by @rrat-king

The Mystery of Lucy Frostblade and Who She Could Have Been

[myheartalivewrites]

25 books for 2025

Thank you for tagging me to the lovely @alasse9 @14carrotghoul @anti-homophobia-cheese @tailsbeth-writes @suseagull5914

and @zwiazdziarka ! I love love love talking about books with you all.

In 2024 I managed 16 out of 25 on my list, though overall I read almost 100 books throughout the year. There was a MAJOR detour through historical romances, and so so many research books I picked up when I decided to write one myself. It’s been busy!

In 2025 I want to try and be more committed to this list, but I’m sure so many more things will pop up as I continue to work on book #2. Let's see if I manage. These are a mixture of research reads and for fun reads, in no particular order:

The Pickwick Papers, Charles Dickens (I'm only like 10% in, so this goes on the list!)

Unmasked by the Marquess, Cat Sebastian

Winter's Orbit, Everina Maxwell

The Prospect, KT Hoffman

The Mill on the Floss, George Eliot

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Anne Brontë

Really Good, Actually, Monica Heisey

The Queer Principles of Kit Webb, Cat Sebastian

Love Marriage, Monica Ali

Wolfsong, T J Klune

Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh

The Marriage Portrait, Maggie O’Farrell

Rodham, Curtis Sittenfeld

Here We Go Again, Alison Cochrun

The Night Watch, Sarah Waters

Sea of Tranquility, Emily St John Mandel

England, A Natural History, John Lewis-Stempel

Machines Like Me, Ian McEwan

The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry, Gabrielle Zevin

Victorious Century, David Cannadine

Lady Chatterley’s Lover, D. H. Lawrence

Something Extraordinary, Alexis Hall

The Nickel Boys, Colson Whitehead

Dr James Barry, Michael du Preez

All Fours, Miranda July

Tagging @caterpills @whimsymanaged @firenati0n @indomitable-love @tintagel-or-cockleshells

@na-dineee @cha-melodius @orchidscript and anyone who might like to play. Happy reading!

[letsbeapoemtogether]

"The month of half summer, half autumn. Half sophistication, half barbarity."

~ John Lewis-Stempel, Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field, "September"

[the-forest-library]

December 2024 Reads

Orbital - Samantha Harvey

I Who Have Never Known Men - Jacqueline Harpman

Ghost Wall - Sarah Moss

Fox 8 - George Saunders

The Muse of Maiden Lane - Mimi Matthews

Finding Mr. Write - Kelley Armstrong

Cole and Laila Are Just Friends - Bethany Turner

P.S. I Hate You - Lauren Connolly

Not in My Book - Katie Holt

The Rules of Royalty - Cale Dietrich

Wrong Answers Only - Tobias Madden

Lily and the Octopus - Steven Rowley

The Mistletoe Mystery - Nita Prose

A Night in the Lonesome October - Roger Zelazny

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow - Washington Irving

A Matter of Execution - Nicolas Atwater and Olivia Atwater

The Scholar and the Last Faerie Door - H.G. Parry

Cursed Cocktails - S.L. Rowland

Games Untold - Jennifer Lynn Barnes

Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats - T.S. Eliot

So Thirsty - Rachel Harrison

Hunting November - Adriana Mather

Two Sides to Every Murder - Danielle Valentine

Demon in the Wood - Leigh Bardugo

Thistlefoot - GennaRose Nethercott

Ghost Squad - Claribel A. Ortega

Heartwood Hotel: A True Home - Kallie George

Understood Betsy - Dorothy Canfield Fisher

The Death and Life of Benny Brooks - Ethan Long

Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Catcher - Bruce Coville

The Boy, the Mole, the Fox, and the Horse - Charlie Mackesy

In a Jar - Deborah Marcero

Frog and Toad Are Friends - Arnold Lobel

Frog and Toad Together - Arnold Lobel

Frog and Toad All Year - Arnold Lobel

Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt - Kate Messner and Christopher Silas Neal

A Little Like Magic - Sarah Kurpiel

Sugar and Spice and Everything Mice - Annie Silvestro and Christee Curran-Bauer

Mr. Santa - Jarvis

I Shall Never Fall in Love - Harri Conner

Bunt! Striking Out on Financial Aid - Ngoni Ukazu

Swamp Thing: Twin Branches - Maggie Stiefvater

Shadow of the Batgirl - Sarah Kuhn

She-Hulk, Vol. 5: All In - Rainbow Rowell

Briony Hatch - Ginny & Penelope Skinner

March: Book One - John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell

Cat People to Judge in Art and Life - Nicole Tersigni

Pen & Ink - Isaac Fitzgerald and Wendy MacNaughton

March Sisters: On Life, Death, and Little Women - Kate Bolick, Jenny Zhang, Carmen Maria Machado, and Jane Smiley

Everybody Needs an Editor - Melissa Harris

We All Shine On: John, Yoko, and Me - Elliot Mintz

Never Play it Safe - Chase Jarvis

Women Living Deliciously - Florence Given

Things to Look Forward To - Sophie Blackall

Real American Girls Tell Their Own Stories - Thomas Hoobler and Dorothy Hoobler

The Wood in Winter - John Lewis-Stempel

50 Ways to Rewire Your Anxious Brain - Catherine M. Pittman and Maha Zayed Hoffman

Democracy or Else - Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, and Tommy Vietor

What I Ate in One Year - Stanley Tucci

Greekish - Georgina Hayden

The Vegetable Eater - Cara Mangini

Bold = Highly Recommend

Italics = Worth It

Crossed Out = Nope

Thoughts: So, uh, I read a lot of books this month. I leaned into beating my total from last year since I was close and read a lot of short reads, graphic novels, and the children's books I was giving for gifts.

There were some good reads this month, including two new canine narrators that I adore: Fox 8 and Snuff from A Night in the Lonesome October (which really should be a big tumblr book as it has Jack the Ripper, Dracula, the Wolf Man, a witch, a clergyman, a druid, Victor Frankenstein, Sherlock Holmes, a Rasputin-coded mad monk, and occultists along with their familiars scheming over the fate of the world).

Goodreads Goal: 476/400 

2017 Reads | 2018 Reads | 2019 Reads | 2020 Reads | 2021 Reads | 2022 Reads | 2023 Reads | 2024 Reads

[nausikaaa]

25 Books For 2025

thanks for tagging me @run-for-chamo-miles! in going through my TBR pile and picking out 25 books to read this coming year i could realise visualise just how many that is, and knowing i read 29 books in 2024, that really boosts my confidence!

everyone's categories seem different, so here are my own of varying sizes:

non fiction:

Six Days In August: The Story Of Stockholm Syndrome by David King

Killing Thatcher: The IRA, The Manhunt And The Long War On The Crown by Rory Carroll

The King In The North: The Life And Times Of Oswald Of Northumbria by Max Adams

Mystery Cults In The Ancient World by Hugh Bowden

Queens Of The Wild: Pagan Goddesses In Christian Europe, An Investigation by Ronald Hutton

England: A Natural History by John Lewis Stempel

classics

Maurice by E M Forster

North And South by Elizabeth Gaskell

anthologies

Eyes, Guts, Throat, Bones by Moira Fowley

Poetry For The Many, collated by Jeremy Corbyn and Len McCluskey

fantasy and historical fiction:

A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske

Autobiography Of Red by Anne Carson

Lucky Red by Claudia Cravens

Lady MacBethad by Isabelle Schuler

Under The Earth, Over The Sky by Emily McCosh

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

The Clan Of The Cave Bear by Jean M Auel

Savage Beasts by Rani Selvarajah

horror fiction

Starve Acre by Andrew Michael Hurley

What Moves The Dead by T Kingfisher

Hell Followed With Us by Andrew Joseph White

Vampires Of El Norte by Isabel Cañas

misc fiction

We'll Prescribe You A Cat by Syou Ishida

Watership Down by Richard Adams

There There by Tommy Orange

this year i'm trying to broaden my horizons and try new things. non fiction and fantasy/historical are still my biggest groups, but i'm hoping to read some classics, more international authors, and explore new genres such as horror.

i tag anyone who wants to do this! seriously, if you want to set out your reading goals for 2025, give it a whirl and say i tagged you. i believe in you!

[godzilla-reads]

❄️January 2025 Reading Wrap Up❄️

🐓 Have You Met the Witch of the Wood? by Annie Dowdell

👗 Fairie-ality: The Fashion Collection from the House of Ellwand by Eugenie Bird, David Downton, and David Ellwand

🐭 Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehmann and Kerascoët (trans. Helge Dascher)

🦌 The Butcher of the Forest by Premee Mohamed

🐰 Four Little Bunnies by Harry Whittier Frees

🌳 The Word for World is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin

❄️ The Wood in Winter by John Lewis-Stempel

❤️ On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder

🐺 White Wolf: Living with an Arctic Legend by Jim Brandenburg

🌖 The Brightest Night by Tui T. Sutherland and Mike Holmes

January Total: 10 books

Top Three: The Butcher of the Forest; The Word for World is Forest; and White Wolf

What did you read this month?

[edwardian-girl-next-door]

"Snow settles its mediaeval quiet on the land."

~ John Lewis-Stempel, Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field (entry for 7th January)

[settledthingsstrange]

The soldier’s instinctive sympathy with the land is no invention of Tolkien’s. The contemporary writer John Lewis-Stempel in Where Poppies Blow has chronicled how common a sentiment it was with those fighting in the Great War, the love of nature and the wildlife-rich English field proving both a motivation to enlist as well as a comfort during the hell of the trenches. The poet Edward Thomas, when asked why he signed up, produced a handful of English soil and said “literally, for this.” The composers of the Great War era, Vaughan-Williams, Holst, and Butterworth (who died at the Somme) were all avid collectors of rural music and folk songs. England, for the men of this generation, was more than a random political unit; it was a place of cultivation, of attachment, intimately tied to the farmed earth and its settled rhythms.

[floralpoeticss]

The month of half summer, half autumn. Half sophistication, half barbarity.

– John Lewis-Stempel, Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field, "September"

[jruthphipps]

Super happy with my latest bookmail from Sherlock & Pages (Frome, UK). I admit I was not prepared for how big Perdido Street Station is. 😂 But I am looking forward to reading all of these.

📚 The Lost Spells by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris

📚 The Year of Sitting Dangerously by Simon Barnes

📚 Nightwalking by John Lewis-Stempel

📚 Perdido Street Station by China Miéville