#My friends asks for book recommendations

[rootlings]

Help, I just fell into the Shadowhunter Chronicles trap again bc I heard there was going to be a kitty book and now I've been scrolling the internet for all content for the last few days and I've already begun re-reading the entire TSC again.

[ravewing]

looks at the xmas tree with my neurodivergent eyes (i will actually lose it if i have to wait another day to open presents)

[carygrantsbeard]

French translations of Jane Austen have to be some of the worst ones out there. It’s not something I can pinpoint, but all the joy, wittiness, fun and emotion in her writing disappears and it becomes absolutely BORING!!!!!! I was so shocked when I read her in English for the first time and had the best time ever !!!

[driftingballoons]

Is there any media that's left a lasting impact on you?

So I’m going to give two answers, one the obvious, and another bonus answer for variety’s sake :3

Pmd explorers has possibly had the greatest lasting impact on me that any piece of media ever has. As my introduction to pokemon, I felt like I was playing partly as Hero would’ve experienced it—with absolutely no idea what to expect, and no background knowledge of anything. But the way it quickly changed from “heehee creature adventure :3” to “what does it truly mean to live and how can you shine as brightly as you can, even in the face of oblivion?” caught me quite off guard. It really made me start to think about how I could try to make the most of my life, how people’s actions can be hugely shaped by their situations, and how you really can’t take even the most simple of things for granted. I played this at 12 y/o during an otherwise very disruptive/isolated time in my life, so I’m not sure if that’s partly why my brain latched onto this as much as it did, but I genuinely felt like it helped me get through it. Whenever I felt weak or powerless back then, I found inspiration from how strong hero, partner, and grovyle had to be to get through everything, and it felt like it made coping just a bit easier. Fast forward to a much better time in my life, and it’s helped me find a wonderful, incredibly talented online community and friends, and I have an absolute blast being able to interact with you guys and see your takes on the series!

The other piece of media that had a lasting impact was Allie Brosh’s book Hyperbole and a Half. I hadn’t known before reading it, but she actually had a blog of the same name around the early 2010s, where she’d post her funny comics and stories. The part that had the most impact on me was actually her iconic ‘poorly drawn’ MS paint kind of style. It made me realize that you don’t necessarily have to make professional quality art to make something worth seeing. This inspired me not only to start posting my own doodles and stuff online, but also changed my approach when dealing with a lot of daunting things. Whenever I feel like I’m not good enough/skilled enough to try something, I remember how popular her stuff was, despite looking ‘low quality,’ and it reminds me that doing something low quality is better than not doing it at all! 

[anchorandrope]

.

[roamingbadger]

Books read in 2024 so far:

- Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens

- Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

[rosylamb]

I’d be a good Catholic husband and I have a library I know you’d love. Wish I could message you directly and privately.

🎀 ･*･ ✧ ･*･ 🎀

Dearest anon ⊹ ･ﾟﾟ･｡ 🧸

This was most surprising to see, but I am truly touched you think this ♡

And thank you for these thoughtful and gracious sentiments!

But I’m just here to make friends, and prefer asks — I cannot offer you more than this!

You will meet the most wonderful Catholic wife someday though, I am certain, and I pray your marriage together is a blessed and joyful one ♡

Sending many kind and happy thoughts — I pray you take care, and wish you all the very best ~ ! XO

🎀 ⋆ ⊹ ⋆ 🧸 ˚｡⋆ ✧

✧ ‧₊˚ 🎀 ･ﾟﾟ･｡ 🧁

[fictionadventurer]

imaginary book: “The Ruined Idylls of Calomar”, low fantasy (quite obscure, authorship disputed; philologists suspect the first draft was written in a Celtic or Semitic language in the late 19th or early 20th century.)

The Ruined Idylls of Calomar by A.E. Mann

This haunting work of fantasy claims to be the journals of an unnamed scholar living in exile after the fall of the hidden lands of Calomar. Once a thriving, peaceful, highly civilized culture, its glory was brought low by the pride, greed, and wrath of kings, scholars, explorers and warriors who fought for glory, power, and honor, until its final destruction by a dark, nameless weapon left only a scant handful of survivors to escape and tell the tale. In haunting language, the narrator writes of Calomar's glory and intrigue, its final fall, and his irresistible yet doomed attempts to return to his lost homeland and learn what, if anything, has survived.

[rocketonthemoon]

12, 19, 22 :)

What is the first book you remember reading or being read to you: Being read to me was Fox and Socks or maybe Moo Baa LaLaLa. I used to make my dad read both over and over and over and over to the point where they're still kinda up there somewhere in my head (Luke luck likes lakes Luke Luck Licks Lakes Luke likes lake licks you get the idea) and I'm pretty sure I could front to back recite Moo Baa LaLaLa. First I have memory of reading myself is tricky. I remember reading a bunch as a kid and I remember the feeling of holding books. But at the risk of being TOO on brand I think the first one I really remember reading myself was a Pokemon Chapter book

Top five favorite books: oh jail. Jail for this question. Ok ok ok.

Number One All Time is The Princess Bride by William Goldman. Never has a book so concretely shaped my reading style, sense of humor, and made me want to write something like that book has.

The other four are less and more just general books that hold the dearest place in my heart:

Santa Olivia by Jacqueline Carey The Priory of the Orange Tree by Sammantha Shannon The House on the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

What book never should've been a movie: Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief. Awful movie. Awful awful movies

[queenlucythevaliant]

Hello! 🧡 I'm curious how you balance viewing scripture as infallible while also not taking parts of it (Genesis in particular, to reference your recent post) literally. I've heard some people say that Genesis is meant to be a poetic version of creation and therefore not entirely truthful: sort of like a kids' story, how some details could be fudged without losing The Point. I get why God wouldn't give us all the details, and it's not like this is necessarily a core doctrine issue, but I guess what I'm asking is if scripture is infallible, why would it give an incorrect account?

Hey Anna! I'd love to talk about this! It's one of my favorite issues in the world, actually, so please be prepared for a whole lot of passion from me 😆

So the bottom line, like I said in my previous post, is that I believe that all Scripture is true and infallible, but that it ought not be read literalistically. This is not the same as saying that some Scripture is less true by virtue of using poetic language, nor that I believe that details have been fudged. For me (and others who interpret Scripture as I do), it comes down to analysis of Biblical language, style, and genre.

So okay, let me start by defining my terms:

History = A text detailing true events that actually happened. These accounts may use symbolic, metaphorical, or otherwise figurative language in the service of conveying these events. A history is also not necessarily complete in its detail or exact in its chronology unless the text itself makes those claims (ie it's possible for histories to backtrack and tell events again from another point of view; this is pretty common actually.)

Biblical figurative language can take a variety of forms depending on the genre of the text we're discussing, however in general it is used to express truths that cannot be expressed in other ways. I'm gonna quote Lewis again here, as I think his discussion of Biblical symbolism in Mere Christianity is really great and relevant. This is from book three, chapter 10 (Hope):

There is no need to be worried by facetious people who try to make the Christian hope of "Heaven" ridiculous by saying they do not want "to spend eternity playing harps." The answer to such people is that if they cannot understand books written for grown-ups, they should not talk about them. All the scriptural imagery (harps, crowns, gold, etc.) is, of course, a merely symbolical attempt to express the inexpressible. Musical instruments are mentioned because for many people (not all) music is the thing known in the present life which most strongly suggests ecstasy and infinity.

Crowns are mentioned to suggest the fact that those who are united with God in eternity share His splendour and power and joy. Gold is mentioned to suggest the timelessness of Heaven (gold does not rust) and the preciousness of it. People who take these symbols literally might as well think that when Christ told us to be like doves, He meant that we were to lay eggs.

Figurative language is used throughout the entire Bible. It's in discussions of heaven, like Jack illustrates here, but it's also frequently used in the Epistles ("I have been crucified with Christ") and, in the Gospels ("You must be born again.") It's heavily employed in the prophetic books, Psalms, and the wisdom literature (not even gonna pick an example, it's everywhere). It's used frequently throughout the Pentateuch (God "bore [the Israelites] up on eagle's wings"). It is used in Biblical histories ("[Samson's] soul was vexed to death"), though not to the extent that I believe it's used in Genesis 1-11. Sometimes the text telegraphs that figurative language is about to be used, but certainly not always.

None of these things are any less true than the things described in what we might call "plain" language. Rather, imagery is a tool that helps us understand the deeper truth of a thing; it "expresses the inexpressible" without causing us to doubt that the images are about something real. Sometimes, the language even tells us something that occured spiritually/from God's perspective, but which did not literally happen in the physical world (again, "I have been crucified with Christ.") I think it's clearly a mistake to conclude that the presence of figurative language means that the story is merely figurative or that it's incorrect.

So I read the Genesis 1-2 creation account as a largely figurative account of historical events, and I think it's written that way in order to convey God's perspective of creation. Certainly a human perspective on creation would be (a) theologically un-useful and (b) impossible for an ancient person to understand.

To expound on point (b) a little bit: even a modern person, with all the geological, paleontological, chemical, and genetic evidence that we have, simply cannot comprehend the expanse of what we call "deep time." Modern scientists must communicate these things in metaphors: they use 24-hour clocks in which each minute is thirty thousand years and football fields with geological epochs marked off at the various yard lines in order to try to express that which the human mind is fundamentally not equipped to grasp. The Bible should and must tell the story of creation from God's perspective, and to do that it must use figurative language.

Thus, "Days" are figurative days, but as such they convey greater truths about the way that creation appeared to God: it was gradual and periodic and God was patient, yet it did not seem to take eons to him. It was like a week of diligent work that produced good results.

Likewise, when the text says that God speaks light and land and life into existence, we can read that as a statement of God's incredible, beautiful power over creation. The moon likely formed in the "Big Splat," when another planet collided with proto-Earth and flung debris into space (I'm not even gonna touch the formation of the sun-- waaaaaay outside my wheelhouse). To God, these things were as simple as saying, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night" and then making them. The complex natural processes involved were simple before the Almighty God.

Likewise, the billions of years that are took for life to evolve, from self-replicating auto-catalytic molecules to microbes to multicellular life that arose from endosymbiosis and horizontal gene transfer, and then all the way down the epochs of history: the beautiful Cambrian Explosion, trilobites and the first chordates, then Tiktaalik propping itself up in shallow water and its tetrapod descendants stepping onto land for the first time; those strange, fascinating club-moss forests of the Carboniferous, dinosaurs and archaeopteryx taking to the skies, the K-T extinction event and then mammals picking up the torch and growing larger, whales returning to the seas and their vestigial legs disappearing, life, life life... All of that, to God, was two days of creation in which he spoke and natural processes produced the glorious array of life that existed when Adam and Eve came to be. He had authority over all of it. He said "Let the earth bring forth living creatures," and it did! God made them as surely as if he had sculpted them from clay with his hands, as miraculously as if He had spoken a word and they had existed in a split-second.

It's all true! All truth is God's truth! Every word of Genesis is God's truth, not despite the fact that it's written using figurative language, but because it is. We can understand truths that science alone can't account for - that in all the vastness of protein sequence space, God formed rubisco and ATP synthase: not by random chance, but through loving providence using randomness as a tool. We can see deep time as God sees it, not as a yawning abyss that we can't begin to properly conceptualize, but as a week in the mind of our great God who transcends time.

(My concluding paragraph is going to be somewhat harsh toward YE Creationists, but it cuts to the core of why I feel so strongly about how we read Genesis. I'm going to put it under the cut so that no one has to read it unless they want to; I'm not trying to attack anyone. I hope you know that I say all these things out of a place of deep, deep love.)

Returning to what Jack said: "If [people] cannot understand books written for grown-ups, they should not talk about them." YE Creationists would have us read Genesis without allowing for any figurative language; they would disregard the scientific method in order to do so. To my thinking, if a creation in seven 24-hour days were the intended meaning of the text- if we were, like children, meant to take everything in it entirely literally- then God would be a liar, because then he would have created a world in which the speed of light and geologic strata and the fossil record and even the evidence of our own DNA and physiology are all lying to us about how we were created. I could not love such a God.

But because I, like Jack, like millions of other Christians, can read the text of Scripture and interpret the figurative language it uses, I can instead marvel at the wonder and glory of our Creator-God, to whom epochs are like days, who can speak natural processes into existence. Scripture is history and it's poetry and it's all true. All truth is God's truth.

[dragons-and-yellow-roses]

I was falling asleep because it's 4:30 in the morning but then a friend that I have a mild crush on texted me and asked what horror movies corresponds to which areas at camp, and clearly Climbing Wall is Vertigo, Aquatics is Jaws and Ecology-Conservation is The Birds, (these were her assignments) but she wanted to know whether Blair Witch fit Scoutcraft (basic scouting skills) or Handicraft (arts and crafts) more, and I said Handicraft because of the figurine things, then she asked what Scoutcraft would be, and full disclosure, I like horror movies but I don't watch a lot of them. I'm picky. Because I don't like gore or zombies and I have anxiety so it's difficult. Okay. So I literally Googled "outdoor horror movies" and tried to find one that I recognized, and thankfully Midsommar was on that list and I've seen and enjoyed Midsommar, so that's what I said. The only other horror movies I can remember seeing are Cabin in the Woods (masterpiece but doesn't fit) and one I can't remember the name of but it's about a video game and has Frankie Muniz and the guy that played Mary Lightly in Psych. And tbh, most of my horror movies knowledge comes from parody episodes of Psych. Especially the Hitchcock episode. I only knew Vertigo because of Psych. This post was a whole lot of inconsequential nonsense, but I get a pass because it's 4:30am and I'm talking to a cool girl.

[skitskatdacat63]

I feel like Khachaturian is such an underrated composer :<

Everyone should listen to Gayaneh >:(

[exoticbutterfucker]

I just finished a book for the first time in a few months (and second one in years) and it was super fun and awesome. I always forget that I enjoy reading and then I pick up a book and I’m like “oh wow this is amazing.” Then I finish the book and don’t know what else to start reading.

Anyways if anyone has something good to suggest lemme know.

[asofterepilogue]

I enjoyed glass onion but after knives out it was a little bit jarring in that martha was so compelling a character and so clearly the protagonist that I'd have never thought there would be a sequel about the smart and kindly detective who was ultimately just there to help an audience put together martha's story. I miss my girl, hope she's sipping delicious whatever on her mansion balcony.

[catgirlwarrior]

we are mutuals and weve never talked or anything and im not even super active on here, but today i wished we were friends so i could personally recommend you a really funny book im reading that i think you would like. and then i thought that maybe i should recommend it to you through an ask, but then i felt too embarrassed by the possibility of you not liking the book, or by it being too strange to receive a recommendation from a stranger, or or or. but, i figured youd like to know that strange creatures on the internet think of you

Awww wait anon please feel free to DM me, for book recs or otherwise! Especially if we're mutuals, but even if I'm not mutuals with someone- I LOVE making Internet friends and talking to folks. I'm honored you thought of me and thought I would like your book suggestion. I'd love to be your friend on here if you'd have me, or even if you'd rather just stay mutuals but send the recommendation I'd love to check it out.

[firenati0n]

my friends are so sick of me but the ones who know my Extended Fandom Lore know this is extremely rare lmaoooo