#also if anyone has a goodreads or storygraph and wants to be friends on there hmu i write very bad reviews on there

[blamemma]

in case anyone is interested i read 30 books this year (a low-ish number for me but i wrote my thesis this year and had approximately 7 big mental breakdowns so a good number) 9 of those being non-fiction and the rest fiction/poetry :) these were the 5 books i gave 5 stars (again, a kind of low number but i think i spent a lot of this year reading books that could have been 5 stars at the wrong time of the year so they kinda lost out sorry to them x :/ )

[tryslora]

Support your favorite creative(s) this season!

So, it’s the holiday season (for values of holiday which can be anything you care to celebrate during the winter months) and you would like to support your favorite creative(s). What are some good ways to do that?

Tell the world about them

If someone is a favorite of yours, there’s a good chance that you know someone else who will enjoy their work. Signal boost the creative’s posts. Create your own post with links to their work. Showcase some of your favorite pieces of theirs with a snippet and a link to the original. Talk about why you love the work (trust me, your favorite creative will love to hear this just as much as your friends will appreciate finding out about something new).

Important side note which I know you know but it bears repeating: please reblog and link to your favorite creative’s posts; do not repost their material. Reposting might sound like a great way to show off what the creative does, but it doesn’t help anyone find them. Please be considerate.

Post reviews of their work

Instructions for this depends on what type of creative you are following. If they are a writer, leave a review on Goodreads, Storygraph, Amazon, B&N, whatever platform you choose. Positive reviews are how writers get discovered.

If your creative is an artist and has a platform where they offer commissions, leave a review there if appropriate. Give them five stars. Help your creative climb the ranks from unknown to well-reviewed!

Follow them on social media

If your creative has a list of social media accounts, follow them! This gives you a better chance to help signal boost their cool stuff (as well as hearing about it when they post!). It also gives you a chance to interact, and to see what they’re like when they aren’t creating. If you like their creations, you might have other things in common. 

Does your creative have a newsletter? Subscribe! You can even forward copies to your friends if there’s something really cool you want to share. A Patreon? Check to see if they have free material posted. Many Patreons allow people to follow at a free level, and while there might be paywall-locked material, there might be unlocked material as well.

Social media is wide and varied these days, with everything from Bluesky and Mastodon, to old-school Facebook pages, to even older-school platforms like Dreamwidth. Don’t forget the little known Pillowfort, or the highly fannish Tumblr. Even better, be aware that your creative may present different faces in different spaces. They are just as human as the rest of us!

Talk to them

I’m serious! Being a creative is like shouting into the abyss… if the abyss happens to shout back, that’s emotional food that can sustain a creative for days. Most creatives have several places where they can be found, either for private communication (check to see if they accept messages/DMs/emails first, please) or for public conversation (social media can be wonderful!). 

Create a transformative work

This won’t work for all creatives. BUT. If your creative is a writer, I would place a bet that they would LOVE fanart of their work. Or maybe that’s just me.

Buy their stuff

Yes, this one requires money, and I am well aware that most of us don’t have the budget for monetary support. And that’s fine! As shown above, there are so many other ways to support your creative and help them grow. But if you do have the budget, picking up copies of their work means you can get great gifts for your friends (and help spread the word!). And if you’re up for it, monthly support via Patreon, or random tips are always nice and appreciated things.

Ask them what will help

In the end, every creative has their own list of things that will help them most, and almost every single one would be happy to tell anyone what would help Right Now.

I’m putting this next bit behind a cut/read-more/clicky-link — whatever is appropriate to the platform you’re reading this on. Because this is the personal bit where I add links to the places you can find me. 

And if you are a creative and you are reblogging this on a platform which allows reblogs, please add your own list of helpful information. If it’s a place with comments, please comment! I want to help by giving other creatives a way to get information out.

Where can you find me…?

TrisLawrence.com is my professional website, with blog posts, upcoming appearances, and links to where to find my Stuff.

I post blog entries on Tumblr, Pillowfort, and Dreamwidth (which mirrors on Livejournal and Insanejournal).

I babble randomly on Bluesky and Mastodon. While I exist on Twi-X, I no longer post there.

I have a professional Facebook page. I have an Instagram. I have a TikTok that I am trying to learn how to use.

I am also active in several Discord communities, if you happen to find me there.

Want to support me? -- Patreon | Ko-Fi | Reblog & Comment

Want to hear more from me? — Join my mailing list

[pagesandpothos]

Pansies by Alexis Hall

Official Synopsis:

Alfie Bell is...fine. He's got a six-figure salary, a penthouse in Canary Wharf, the car he swore he'd buy when he was eighteen, and a bunch of fancy London friends. It's rough, though, going back to South Shields now that they all know he's a fully paid-up pansy. It's the last place he's expecting to pull. But Fen's gorgeous, with his pink-tipped hair and hipster glasses, full of the sort of courage Alfie's never had. It should be a one-night thing, but Alfie hasn't met anyone like Fen before. Except he has. At school, when Alfie was everything he was supposed to be, and Fen was the stubborn little gay boy who wouldn't keep his head down. And now it's a proper Fen might have slept with Alfie, but he'll probably never forgive him, and Fen's got all this other stuff going on anyway, with his mam and her flower shop and the life he left down south. Alfie just wants to make it right. But how can he, when all they've got in common is the nowhere town they both ran away from. This dynamic, emotional LGBTQIA+ romance contains never-before-seen content and exclusive bonus material.

My Thoughts:

Pansies is the latest in Alexis Hall's "Spires" series to get a re-release, and I've been really excited to read it. I love everything by Alexis Hall, so it's not surprising that I enjoyed this one, too. 

Alfie and Fen are interesting characters with a complicated history. When they meet again as adults, the two men are immediately attracted to each other, but their past and personal struggles complicate their deepening relationship. 

I found myself rooting for Alfie and Fen pretty quickly. Both of them are funny, complicated, and have satisfying character arcs. Their relationship starts off rocky but grows into something incredibly sweet and healing. 

Like the other books in the "Spires" series, this deals with some heavy topics in a realistic but sensitive way. It's also seriously spicy and very funny!

Pansies is one of my favorites in the "Spires" series. It has great characters (both the two leads and the supporting players), and a relationship that I got seriously invested in. 

I genuinely love this series and can't wait to read Alexis Hall's future additions to it. 

My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Tropes/Tags: queer, Achillean, romance, contemporary

Spice Level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️/5. There are many spicy scenes that are "open door".

Content Warnings: Alexis Hall has full content warnings here. They do contain spoilers!

If you like this I think you will like Pansies: Fans of spicy m/m romances, fans of Alexis Hall, fans of emotional romances with depth

Links: Storygraph | GoodReads | quicunquevult.com

Pansies was released on November 5, 2024, and is available to order!

Thanks to NetGalley, I received an advanced copy of this book for free. The above are my honest feelings about the book provided. I don’t have any affiliate links in this post, and I do not make any money from my reviews. I review books simply because I love to read.

[courfee]

navigation post & faq

ao3 my poetry insta for fanart

Marauders fanart (tumblr)

Marauders microfics (tumblr)

Marauders fanfics (ao3)

ritardando – M | Jegulus | WIP | expected: ~150k words Regulus comforts James through panic attacks, which leads to them fake dating

Operation Walburga's Arbitrary No Kissing Ever Rule – T | Jegulus | 11/11 | wc:91k A 10 Things I Hate About You AU where James fake dates Regulus so Sirius can date Remus again

All My Theory Complete — M | Jegulus | 25/25 | wc: 166k a slow burn Hogwarts fic with a hopeful end.

Watch Me Meet My End — G | Wolfstar | 1/1 | wc: 2.3k Remus finds out about Sirius' escape from Azkaban

On Lies And Spies — M | Peter | 1/1 | wc: 2.7k On Halloween 1981 Peter does not mean to betray his best friend, but somehow everything goes wrong.

blindspot — G | Jegulus | 1/1 | wc: 3k turns out dogs, deer and wolves are red-green colourblind, which has some questionable consequences for the people who can turn into said animals

Something That Tastes Almost Divine — G | Prongsfoot | 1/1 | wc: 2.6k unrequited but very intimate Prongsfoot

If you ask nicely — T | Jegulus | 1/1 | wc: 1.2k James is great at flirting. What he is not great at, he recently had to learn, is being flirted with.

Borrow My Name — E | Jegulus | 10/10 | wc: 30k James is Regulus' new neighbour, who finds many excuses to knock on his door

let's walk the road backwards the way we came — M | Marauders | 4/4 | wc: 5.4k It shouldn’t have come to anyone’s surprise that Remus is the first of the Marauders to die.

high delight — E | Jegulus | 1/1 | wc: 4.7k james is scared of flying on planes, regulus makes for a very good distraction

Les Mis fanart (tumblr)

Les Mis fanfics (ao3)

Now Warm in Love — G | Courf/Jehan | 1/1 | wc: 1.0k Jehan has an awful day and Courfeyrac has an awful sweater

A Piece of Sun — G | Triumvirate | 1/1 | wc: 395 a character study of the triumvirate comparing them to the sun

Nature Assigns the Sun — G | Courf | 1/1 | wc: 2.2k Courfeyrac struggling with not being alright all the time and asking for help

FAQ

Can I translate your fics? you can, as long as it stays on ao3 and is marked as a translation with the ao3 function

Can I post your fics elsewhere? no.

Can I bind your fics? if you do it yourself by hand only for personal use and do not make a profit off of it, go ahead! (and also show me pls i wanna see)

Can I put your fics on Goodreads or Storygraph?  no

Can I use your art as my profile picture/lockscreen/... sure, if it's on the internet credit me properly though

Can I repost your art? don't repost if you have nothing to add to it. if it is merely a compliment or some excitement about my art, reblog/retweet/etc my post instead and add it in the comments/tags/etc. if you do have something new to add (using it as visualisation, art/detail analysis, etc) feel free to repost it as long as you give proper credit (link back to the og post & tag me). however, don't repost my art on social media platforms i am on when i haven't posted it there myself yet

what about fanarts you made for other fics? please do not use the fanart i make for certain fics to relate to other fics. those fanarts are gifts to the authors of the fics they're about and i want them to stay connected to those fics

Can I use your fics/art as training data for AIs/use AI to to expand on your fics/art? absolutely not. I do not endorse the usage of AI in any creative field whatsoever

[vanessaroades-author]

Let’s look at what happened from June 13th to July 13th. (ARCs, Preorders, Sales, Marketing!)

Note: I’m not talking about costs here and likely won’t ever. However, my author buddy JAL Solski has an awesome write-up on the costs, tax considerations, all sorts of numbers, of publishing their sapphic fantasy duology! I’m also very fond of Ros’s write-up on expectations and goals related to post-publication.

Before you start–some disclaimers on my experience

First, expect very little! These numbers will not impress you and honestly there’s a part of me that’s pretty embarrassed, like I'm advertising that I'm a big dummy who can't write. But all in the name of honesty & transparency!

Something I hear a lot from other new authors is, “Am I doing pretty good? Am I doing really badly? I don’t know.” Well, here’s another batch of numbers to consider!

Deep Roots is currently only available as an eBook & through Kindle Unlimited.

I’m not writing anything trendy. By a long shot. I can throw “queer fantasy” on it but that’s kinda the most I got. (When’s the last time you saw a runaway indie hit that didn’t have a ton of romance?)

I’m not popular on social media (260 IG followers with on average <10% engagement and <200 TikTok followers).

I have so many friends in my corner. Someone should stop you at the gate to the Indie Publishing Amusement Park of Hell and tell you, “Listen, if you want any hope of staying sane, make author friends.” Besides helping you navigate tech questions or giving second opinions on your cover, and, you know, understanding and empathizing with you, your friends will be the ones who comment on your posts, repost them, tell their friends, add you in their newsletter, read, and review. That can mean sales…but that also means having people lift you up and celebrate with you.

Advance Reader Copies

I began posting about ARC sign-ups April 4th, sent the first round of eBooks ~May 5th, and closed applications on June 2nd.

I didn’t use a service like Booksprout or Booksirens, just plain old BookFunnel and email (therefore my reach was entirely reliant on my social media efforts). I was most talkative about it on Instagram. I only posted like once or twice on Tumblr and TikTok, but they went really well for my standards.

Sign-Ups: 51

Reviews/Ratings:

By publication day I had 4 ratings/reviews on Goodreads, 1 on Amazon, and 1 on StoryGraph.

After 31 days I had 6 reviews and 10 ratings on Goodreads. 1 extra rating on StoryGraph; Amazon stayed the same.

Note: I was really lax with my ARC team about when reviews should be sent in. I was clear that I didn’t care if they were pre-publication (partly because well…I read ARCs a lot and I know I can’t always get to things on time, and partly because I didn’t decide a publication day until fairly late in the timeline).

However, from what I’ve seen for other authors, a pretty low return on ARC readers isn’t entirely uncommon? Kind of a kick in the confidence regardless.

Preorders

Total of 7. I don’t remember when I opened preorders, but I believe it was around the same time as the ARC application.

Marketing (sort of) from June 13th to July 13th

I ran a small (kinda last-minute) campaign for extra merch & an extra story for anyone who preordered or purchased during release week. I said that I would re-run this campaign for paperbacks.

These are my Tired Girl numbers:

Instagram: 5 posts specifically about DR. 2 non-DR related.

TikTok: 7 videos specifically about DR, most getting ~300 views, though one broke 1k. (Notably, I didn’t post about the release week extras on TikTok at all.). 2 non-DR related.

Tumblr: One post I would send spinning around the block every once in a while. Definitely lowest priority.

Release Week Sales

eBook: 3

KU: 15 pages read

Release Month Sales

eBook: 4

KU: 594 pages read

Future Plans

*Releases one giant sigh* I’M FREEEEEE

Once the book is written and done, cover made and words edited, there’s only one thing left in your control: marketing. Everything else is up to chance (honestly, marketing is up to chance a lot of the time, too).

But I pretty quickly decided to take it easy on social media. A wave of burn-out that had been chasing me since last summer finally caught up, and I don’t think I’m alone in saying that when I saw like no return on investment for my posts or chatter, I was like, “Okay, I’m going to rest, instead of pushing this boulder up this hill, then. I deserve it.”

One plus of having paperbacks come out way after the eBooks? I get release day Part 2! (With fun new props for pics and videos!) I have a good list of video ideas & drafts, but I would always look at them and think, “Wouldn’t this be better to do when the paperbacks are around?” And soon, they will be!

As for blog posts, I want to continue being transparent with things like this. I will (hopefully) catch up on the numbers again near the end of August, as by then I’ll be making the decision to keep Deep Roots in KU for another three months or not.

Until then, lower your expectations! It’ll keep you sane out here. Thanks for reading and hanging out.

[literaticat]

As an agent, how do you recommend authors handle review spaces? Most writers are also readers, but I understand it's probably looked down upon to go around giving 2-3 star reviews to who are essentially your colleagues. I enjoy having the data to look back on of my reads, but as I plan to be published in the future, I'm wondering if I need to make this private and find a private system.

A bit more broadly than your ask: In my personal opinion, writers may be readers, but reviewing spaces such as GoodReads, etc, are not for them. I would strongly suggest that for mental health purposes, authors not only NOT EVER go on GoodReads, but also block it from their computer like it is a naughty website. NSFW BABE. Don't look up your own reviews, don't look up your friend's reviews, for the LOVE OF GOD don't RESPOND to any reviews of your books or your friend's books you happen to see, and unless you have something glowing to say about a book that will uplift the author, for Pete's sake keep it to yourself. If you have potentially snarky things to say about a book or author, journal about it. Text it to the group chat. But don't post it.

As for your more specific ask: I totally understand wanting to keep book-reading data -- I do! I use the Reading List app, which is private. StoryGraph I just got but it feels like a nice interface, I'll be playing around with it, and I'd happily add books I'm reading, my TBR, etc -- but I would either keep my account private to whatever extent is possible, or I just wouldn't rate the books on that. Other people use cool personal spreadsheets, or cool notebooks. This is MY data -- I'm not keeping it to impress or inform anyone else, so why would it need to be public?

When I find books that I particularly adore, I'm delighted to post about them on socials, but I don't need or want to talk smack about books publicly, that would be totally inappropriate coming from me, and since I know and work with SO MANY editors, other agents, authors, etc -- There's pretty much NO WAY I could get away with that without inadvertently insulting somebody. And while you may be "aspiring" now -- the longer you stay in publishing spaces, the more people YOU will know and meet, too.

TRUE STORY from just this week: I was at a Little Free Library and found an old Sweet Valley High book - BEWARE THE WOLFMAN, #106. It has a hilarious jacket and cover copy, I had no idea that the Wakefield twins went through a paranormal "American Werewolf In London" era, I was obviously obsessed and posted about it on Facebook, with a pic of the front and back of the jacket. Now, this is a book that is WELL out of print, it was published when I was in high school thirty years ago, it was a friends only post and I'm not friends with the author, like, literally who would I be insulting if I made fun of this book? Oh -- well potentially my friend Dan, who chimed in immediately to say that he in fact wrote the funny jacket copy. My friend Elise, who is an agent now, but was Dan's boss in 1994 and in charge of these books. OH ALSO, I am friends with the publisher. Ahahahah OK! Yay! Luckily it truly is a bonkers book and they know that so it was all in good fun and haha teehee, but like -- it could have been WAY worse!

ANYwhoo, you asked what I think, that's what I think. This is just how I approach it. "As an agent" I would never tell my authors what they can or can't do with their lives - but this is MY philosophy: we're all here to SELL books, not bash them, so if you don't have anything nice to say, keep it to yourself, because believe me when I say, it's extremely upsetting for all parties when you give a book a shitty review and then are seated next to the author at a publisher dinner later. TRUST ME, I KNOW.

[remnantglow]

Hey, I wanted to ask you about netgalley and how serious they take people being Professionals if they want to make an account. I'd love to make one but after reading through the FAQ I feel quite intimidated since I have no prior experience with reviewing books (would love to start through netgalley) and no review blog etc. to link them. Can I still make an account there or do they need some proof of reviews first on a blog or smth like that?

Hi there! long story short, don't stress about it - Netgalley's big secret is that it seems like it's for Influencers and Professional Reviewers with blogs/youtube channels Only™️, but that is straight up not true, they pretty much just let anyone in there lol

i'm gonna put some more detailed info under the read more!

so - you do need one (1) thing can link on your profile, but that's it, and it can be a Goodreads you just made earlier today (though adding a review or two so it's not completely empty is a good idea). or, alternatively: do you have a Tumblr/Twitter/Insta that you maybe occasionally mention books on? boom. you're a social platform reviewer. i mean, all i've got is this incredibly unprofessional Tumblr, my dead as hell Goodreads (that i made for the sole purpose of linking it to Netgalley), and Storygraph. the friend i found out about Netgalley from said xe literally only has a fake Goodreads account. also, Netgalley was my first experience with "proper" book reviews - so, yeah, no prior experience nor proof of being a reviewer required!

the one tip i'd give is to spend a little time on your Netgalley bio - that's ur chance to sell yourself as a Totally For Sure Professional Reviewer, even if you (or the accounts you linked) aren't. here's my attempt at bullshitting my way through it without technically lying, for example:

and apparently it's good enough to get a 50/50 acceptance/rejection rate on my book requests lol.

basically: don't feel intimidated, set up a Goodreads if you don't have any other social media to link, write a nice bio and you're good to go! sure, your book requests might get rejected more often than if you were a famous booktuber or smth, but no one's gonna stop you from signing up for not being professional or experienced enough :]

[jessread-s]

Thanks to @atriabooks-blog and the author for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review

✩💍🌼Review:

Your honor, I fell in love with Matthew and Josie and I fell hard!

“The Fiancé Dilemma” follows Josie Moore after a big messy misunderstanding results in Matthew Flanagan, her sister’s best friend, playing the role as doting fiancé to resolve a complicated PR issue. Despite the ring on her finger and Matthew not seeming to mind, Josie knows this is only temporary, even if the rest of the small town believes that the fifth times the charm.

This book found me when I needed it most! Having been introduced to Josie in “The Long Game”, I was excited to read from her point-of-view. Armas adds so much depth to her character and unsurprisingly I found myself connecting with Josie on a deep level as a result. I saw so much of myself in the way she prioritized the needs of other people over herself and overextended herself as the mayor of Green Oaks just because it is in her nature to lend a helping hand. Seeing her raw emotions laid out on the page as she grapples with her failed engagements becoming the topic of conversation in the media, her absentee father wanting to be a part of her life, and her mother’s passing is gut-wrenching, but also extremely validating. I think what makes her character so powerful is that she has the ability to make anyone who is struggling feel less alone and I love that about her.  

Matthew truly showed up on Josie’s doorstep when she needed him most. Let me tell you…my heart belongs to this glasses-wearing man!!! He is not shy at all about how attracted he is to Josie (he practically worships the ground that she walks on) and I adore that about him. More than that though, I love how he makes sure Josie comes first. He has her back throughout their stunt, shows up for her in more ways than one, bakes for her, keeps her company, and, most importantly, loves her for who she is. He is perfect for her and watching Josie come to that realization on her own made my heart so full! 

I am not kidding when I say that Matthew and Josie are my new favorite couple and that Green Oaks will always be my happy place.  The array of characters and animals feel like home to me. 

Cross-posted to: Instagram | Amazon | Goodreads | StoryGraph

[aeori-o]

2022 Get Outta Here

Last year I started my post by talking about COVID-19 and it is wild that that thing is still around and people STILL aren’t taking it seriously. I guess if people start off not taking something seriously there’s no reason to then take something seriously later as it has become the dreaded “new normal.” Awful. I’m moving to Pluto.

Let’s talk about the usual stuff, as is tradition.

I know I have that graphic for goodreads (and I now have a secondary goodreads for graphic novels so there’s two now) but worth mentioning is I also have a storygraph account if any of you are on there! Please friend me or however that works.

So far storygraph has some issues (sometimes the website seems to crash and nothing loads or things I do don’t save to my profile) and it looks a little barren (though goodreads doesn’t exactly look good, either) but I really like that there’s the ability to see the community submitted content warnings and that a book is ranked not just by stars but by things like pace, focus, and vibe. Also it’s not owned by amazon (which goodreads is) so that’s a bonus. For now I have both accounts but hopefully storygraph keeps getting better and can eventually replace goodreads for me (I think the main things is adoption—I still like to see what friends and acquaintances are reading and if they’ve read what I’ve read so that’s currently missing for me and the other main thing is a “books by authors you’ve read” section, it is so handy to have that in one place).

I finished 37 novels and 10 graphic novels this year which brings me to 47 total books! I am much preferring 30 minutes of reading a day over an hour, it’s much easier to commit to and much less stressful and I still get a lot read in a year. It also feels really good to be able to fully fill out one of these calendars (I think I’ve managed it for the past few years) which is also nice. I know the calendar is totally arbitrary but there’s something nice feeling about having something that shows how much you’ve done at a glance.

As always I would really recommend doing this, but you can make your goal completely different (it could be ten minutes of reading a day, or a chapter a day, or a certain number of pages a day. Start with something where the bar is on the floor to make it easy to get into!). Doesn’t even need to be reading! Can be exercise or learning something or creative stuff! Sometimes calendars can be hard to find where they’re easy to fill in, I just started making my own in excel (google sheets would work, too) but I’ll put in a blank one at the end jic anyone wants to try. Gotta make the barrier to entry as low as possible! Anyway here’s my reading one:

And then of course I love the little year-recap from goodreads!

Really enjoy that I manage to read a very barely read book on goodreads every year.

Again we’re up! This year my average has gone from 4.1 to 4.2 but still. I think overall I am reading better books. I’ve changed how I rate books on goodreads a little as well. I am in an eternal struggle with how ultimately meaningless rating systems are so I’m trying to rate things more on a scale of if-I-would-recommend-it and how many caveats I have with that. So more books wind up five stars than not. It feels much easier to rate things consistently, as well.

My own personal rating system (in my excel doc) tends to differ a little from how I rate things online (so despite rating Many books five stars this year only one book hit my favourites and most of those other five stars are in my ‘Excellent’, ‘Splendid’, and ‘Good’ categories. And then I have ‘Meh’, ‘Not Worth Reading’, and ‘Why does this exist?’). That’s just for me, and maybe friends, though.

So! Of the 37 books I read this year I’m going to once again recommend a few.

The Green Bone Saga by Fonda Lee

I recommended the first book last year and now that I’ve read the rest of the series I want to reinforce the recommendation: These books are thick, they’re door stoppers, and the first book is a little slow to start but once they get going they are phenomenal. Everything just goes, there are incredible high points in this series. I didn’t think the second book could be outdone but the third book did it. The series goes from conflicts inside a community to global conflicts that that community has to deal with and manipulate.

Basically: The series is about a family of ‘Green Bones’ (who are people who are able to control bioenergetic jade to enhance their strength, resilience, and speed) and how they deal with a territory war with another Green Bone Clan and eventually how they deal with foreign powers trying to extract and study bioenergetic jade for war purposes. Really great series.

Mistakes Were Made (But not by me)

by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson

This one is non-fiction but I found it incredibly interesting. Most of it I feel is things most of us kind of intuitively know just by existing in the world and dealing with people being infuriating (especially in the context of jobs and managers passing the blame) but it’s interesting seeing the research and the various ways it comes into play. I’m not sure if I’m weird but I also found it a very fast, easy read as well? It was just too interesting for me to find boring. So if you’re looking for an interesting non-fiction check it out!

Even Though I Knew The End by C.L. Polk

This is a novella so I can’t say too much without spoiling a lot but if you’re looking for a lesbian noir with magic, demons, and angels then definitely check this one out. The ending is maybe a little rushed but I loved the setting and the characters despite the very short amount of time with them (the curse of novellas).

The Daevabad Trilogy by S.A. Chakraborty

I didn’t actually like the first book at all! There were a lot of things in the first book that bugged me but I felt compelled to read the second anyway. I saw this book all over the place (and heard about it all over the place) and I have a thing for seeing djinn in books and media. Despite my issues there were nuggets of potential in the first book. And then the second book was shockingly good and I devoured the rest. A very fun fantasy romp about family and duty and the things we choose and how hard and disastrous it can be to try and do your own thing.

I especially liked the fourth book though which is a collection of short little scenes with various characters. They weren’t short-stories exactly they were just things that either didn’t fit in the main series or ultimately no longer belonged in it with how things went but I really enjoyed reading it. It felt very nostalgic and I wish more authors would do something similar. I don’t necessarily want plots and entire side stories to see more of characters sometimes I just want to see little things with the characters. I know that’s what a lot of people use fanfiction for but I’d love it from the original author. Really delighted by these and I’m really glad the publisher went for it! This kind of thing could easily have never seen the light of day or, best case in most instances, been relegated to some dusty page on the author’s website.

A lot of the other books I would recommend are parts of a series so I won’t get into them now, but I’m keeping an eye on Iron Widow, Children of Ragnarok, Book of Night, and Not Even Bones. Most of those don’t have sequels out yet, but one of them does so hopefully I can recommend it on next year’s round up.

Additionally some friends and I pass around books and write in them, and so far our library has six books in it! (There’s more on stand-by but they haven’t been written in yet.) It’s such a fun thing to do and makes some truly terrible books fun to read. One of the series we’re reading we’re hoping gets better (as promised by the fans of that series) and we might be adding the series that inspired that series to the list. (I am being intentionally vague.)

Once again I’m going to keep my goal at 30 books, half an hour of reading a day (catch up days allowed). I have enjoyed being much more relaxed about reading.  Unlike last year I currently only have four books out from the library (instead of last year’s thirteen) but that said I think all the books I read last year (including the graphic novels) except for four were from the library. So out of 47 books (total) 43 were from the library. I love the library, but I also need to get a proper start on my owned to-be-read pile. Once I’m through these four books I’m going to try to only take out a library book for every owned book I finish. So hopefully I can at least make it half and half.

But! Here’s the ten graphic novels I read! One of which I own. I really enjoyed all of them and can happily recommend them all. Lore Olympus I finished the second volume and for whatever reason was just hooked and binged the rest online. Heartstopper is also really cute and sweet, I tried a little bit of the show and it wasn’t doing it for me but I am so, so happy it exists I’ve seen that it means a lot to a lot of people (but I’ll stick with the graphic novels).

Film and TV I finished 45 things this year, which so far it seems like I watch a fairly consistent amount of stuff? 2020 my count was 43, last year was 41, this year is 45! Funny how that works out. Some of my highlights from this year are old goodies—we just recently watched the first two Lord of the Rings films (we were trying to marathon but it did not work out), and I re-watch Ghibli films periodically, but of the things I had never watched before? Everything in the image really stands out for me.

Love and Leashes was just incredibly cute, another delightful Korean film. I forgot I had watched that this year so I’m glad I’ve started tracking this stuff because this movie is just really cute. It’s on Netflix and I would wholeheartedly recommend checking it out!

Turning Red made me cry, and then when I walked in on family watching it I almost just cried again just knowing what scene they were on (they did not feel very invested in the movie so it was kind of awkward).

Everything Everywhere All At Once was incredible. I know everyone is saying that and has been saying that but if for whatever reason you haven’t watched it it is really good. It feels really ‘fresh’ in a way? It’s unhinged but also sincere, I really liked it.

Severance was really creepy and tense, and yet somehow very compelling despite the monotony of the environments the characters spend most of their time in. I’m so curious to see where it goes it ended on such a tense note.

Our Flag Means Death was a really heartwarming romp, I think the first few episodes I wasn’t crazy about but it got very good very fast and it also had a very tense ending.

Nope I watched twice back to back (and then a third time some months later to show family). It’s such a fun movie and there’s a lot to interpret and talk about in it, I think this is my favourite Jordan Peele movie yet.

And finally: House of the Dragon though this one is on thin ice. There’s a lot of weird and uncomfortable things in this series, which I guess is to be expected, but overall I found it really interesting and that last episode, hoo boy. I want to see it develop and I am hoping it does not go the way of Game of Thrones but I guess we’ll see.

Video games!

Okay so Nintendo sent me my yearly recap weirdly early this year? And then Steam just sent one. The steam one is very fun.

Unfortunately the Nintendo one this year didn’t have that much info? Last year it gave total games, for how many hours, and even compared the previous year and because the switch doesn’t have the built-in tracker anymore (like the 3DS has) I can’t even check myself. Like I know I played my Switch for at least 130hrs this year in total (compared to 23 total hours last year) but that’s just looking at the games I know came out this year so I could have only played this year (being Arceus, Scarlet, and Splatoon 3) but for games I’ve played in the past like Shield, Pokemon Snap, Okami, Smash Bros, etc. I only can see total time, not time spent this year. I still really miss the tracking the 3DS has. Oh well at least Steam has an in-depth one this year:

I love to see random little facts!! I’m surprised I hit even 20% with controller to be honest, I feel like I almost exclusively used keyboard and mouse this year.

As you can see: I love to play new games.

AND THIS is the kind of thing I like to see! I think that drop of in gaming is more or less universal across all platforms for me.

Okay so here’s everything I started this year and have yet to finish:

And I actually am feeling very optimistic about finishing all of these! Two (Haunting Ground and Fahrenheit Indigo Prophecy) I’m playing for friends and both have been very fun to stream. One is a genuinely good game and one is Fahrenheit Indigo Prophecy (which is very fun to experience with friends but oh it’s not good, it is especially bad on PC because this “remaster” is garbage. I said RE4 on PC last year was bad but it’s an amazing port compared to this one.)

Haunting Ground is still a really delightful game. It makes me miss the days of costumes being fun unlockable bonuses instead of DLC. I’m mostly impressed (so far) by how good the game is at making sure you always know where to go despite how otherwise cryptic the plot is. The only time I’ve gotten lost/stuck was when I unlocked the room, ran into the stalker immediately in that room and ran, and then I guess I got startled so badly that the newly unlocked room just deleted itself from my short term memory. So that’s on me, not the game.

Pokemon Scarlet I’m chugging along steadily in (despite my many, many problems with the game) and Pokemon Legends Arceus I was thoroughly enjoying but the controls were too similar to Horizon Forbidden West so I’ll get back to it once I’m done Horizon. But hoo boy Horizon is taking a while. I know there’s a large group of people who want more game-play-time for their dollar and I largely disagree with that idea in general but this game is wild in that I am enjoying all the time I’m spending in it but also kind of exhausted by how huge it is.

The only one here I might not finish anytime soon is .hack, because I started playing it with Vin and would like to continue showing them it.

I think of all the games in my Unfinished Picture from last year the only one I actually finished was Tell Me Why—Dishonored I still kind of pick at, Pokemon Snap I haven’t gotten back to despite meaning to, Resident Evil Village I want to continue but haven’t gotten to either, same goes for Resident Evil 5. And Prey I officially decided I was done with. So I’m much more optimistic about finishing this year’s batch of unfinished games.

And with Hades 2 being announced I extra want to get back to and finish the first Hades (I got to the credits but I need to do everything).

And then the games I DID finish this year:

All but one of these I played for/with friends! (Steph did most of the playing of Fatal Frame 3, though.) I finished up Tell Me Why on my own but all the rest were friend-experiences! Disco Elysium is unhinged (we would all lay down our lives for Kim). Lighthouse I have thought was “the dark beginning” forever and only right at the end of our play-through did I realize it was “being” not “beginning” and it was also entirely wild. Fatty Bear’s Birthday Surprise was charming and also kind of a lot. And then Pajama Sam in No Need to Hide when it’s Dark Outside was surprisingly well-written and charming? The last two games took almost no time to play all the way through (despite them being huge time sinks when I was a kid) but they hold up really well! Very intuitive, simple puzzles (which makes sense for a kid’s game but is still fluid-feeling as an adult as opposed to escape-room-esq logic puzzles ‘adult’ puzzle games require) and very fun writing that actually got some laughs out of us at points. Good stuff, we’re excited to play more from Humongous Entertainment.

I did start another fill-in-the-squares calendar in June. It mostly came from days feeling like they blur together and I couldn’t really remember what I had done on certain days and wasn’t sure if I had done anything “productive”. I’m really good at warping my own memory to downgrade the things I do so I tried to start marking off when I did anything, at all, that I consider some sort of productive. So that could be cleaning, writing, helping my sister with something, or one of the various little side-projects I take on. I haven’t been super consistent with it, I keep forgetting to fill in days, but overall it has been really helpful for even if I don’t remember what I did I can look back and see all the filled in squares and be sure I did at least something that I consider worthwhile. I just keep a little list under it of kind of ‘ongoing’ things that count or add on things that I finished and that has, in turn, made it easier to remember some neat stuff I did this year!

There’s two major ones but first: I really got into re-shelling controllers last year. Unfortunately I’ve kind of run out of controllers to re-shell. I did get to take apart a friend’s joycon recently to put in a new analogue stick to stop that pesky drift but otherwise I don’t do much shell-stuff these days.

But I did wrap my entire car.

Before and after! Steph helped me with the hardest parts (the bumpers and roof) and my stepmom helped with some bits (which, despite our struggles, she says she’s glad she did because she never would have understood how much work I was putting in otherwise) and my partner helped a little with the doors when they were visiting! I’m especially happy with the headlights. I ground all the UV damaged plastic off, polished them up, and then put a clear, glossy, paint-protective film over top. They look brand-new! I love seeing side-by-sides of the lenses before and after. I used to think the ‘before’ state of the lenses looked good! Wild! Some people have lamented the colour (a lot of people really like bright red cars?) but I love the blue/purple colour shift and my clear-coat was coming off anyway (she’s an old car) so I had to do something to protect it. Bless and curse the co-worker who talked me into this (bless because I love it, curse because it was hard as hell).

I haven’t posted progress shots in one big block anywhere so I’m gonna do that here! And then I realized there were just WAY too many progress shots so here’s just a few:

I mostly like the super wrinkly shots and then seeing it all smoothed out, it’s so satisfying (the work in between those shots is brutal) like these (with a mid-lens-fixing thrown in to see a polished one next to what I had before for funsies):

It was so satisfying to have this come together and I am so happy with how she looks. I am extremely grateful to everyone who helped me along the way, some pieces would have been impossible with just one person (and in the case of the roof that seemed impossible even with two people). Considering it was my first time doing this and I was working in less-than-ideal circumstances (being: outside, where bugs and dust and leaves and weather are an issue) I think it turned out extremely well.

I think when I counted the actual total days this took it was like 11-14? I had work, and then we kept getting rain (the day we did the front bumper it actually rained in the middle of the day so in retrospect I’m amazed that one came together). I also did a little on some other cars. My stepmom’s car is also old so we did some protective stuff where the paint was having a hard time, did the hood of my sister’s car and her lenses as a birthday gift, and then did a co-workers car because its clear coat was having a really rough time. Lots of wrapping! I should redo this one in 4ish years (or that’s what the vinyl manufacturers say, anyway) so we’ll see how it goes.

I also made my dice displays nice this year. At some point I had gotten a shot-glass display to put my dice in, but it wasn’t the nicest looking. Better than having them not on display at all but not by much. For whatever reason I can’t find a proper picture of how it looked before but:

And then once the glass was closed on top of that the ones in their cubes were pretty obscured and the other dice just, didn’t look great in their heaps. So I got some foam core, some washi tape, and a box cutter and spruced it up:

Which I am super happy with! I was so happy with it I got a second one and fitted it the same way. It’s especially nice for my glow in the dark dice, I get to see them glow every time I turn the lights off now.It was a very time consuming little project but I’m really happy (and kind of amazed) at how it came together!

In terms of my more regular creative pursuits I didn’t really write anything creative except to completely re-structure a book series I was reading. It went from me ranting to just completely unhinged going IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN LIKE THIS and then I rewrote a scene from the book based on that premise. That was fun. I still need to touch that up and edit it some but then I fully intend to rip the book open and rebind it with my addition. (It’s one of our pass-around-and-comment-in books.) Still RPing, of course, and it’s a mix of god/furry Anir and Lelia with some modern Lelia and my spirit-folk thrown into the mix. And I didn’t really do much drawing this year but I did do a little to help my sister with some stuff. And that’s better than nothing! I will post none of that here, though.

Once again, though, I have been extremely blessed to receive some wonderful art!

Art by @monsterranchersteph​,@phantomeus​, and @auyamx!

Hopefully 2023 proves to be better than 2022! I’m ending the year with a cold (not COVID, luckily, though I did have that during the summer and it was awful. I can only imagine how much worse it would’ve been if I weren’t vaccinated.) which I’m not sure is a great summary of the year but it’s unusual for me to get sick twice in one year. Having just a regular cold is surreal, though, the last two times I got sick (COVID and then some sort of flu) were both completely terrible, so having just kind of a stuffed up and runny nose, a teeny cough (like, barely), and then just extreme fatigue is more of an annoyance than anything. I am very glad to not be that sick but I also forgot very mild sickness is a thing. (And it’s annoying.)

Anyway, as stated above I’m going to keep my reading goal the same this year as last. 30 books, half an hour reading a day with catch-ups allowed. I’m going to try to get into the habit more of using my other general ‘productivity’ calendar because I have been finding that helpful for my mental health if nothing else. And if anyone else wants to try these calendars here’s the one I’ll be using:

And I think that’s it! Happy new year! If you make any sort of yearly round-up or recap and you’ve made it this far please let me know and I’ll check it out! I am not consistently on tumblr so I miss stuff all the time. I log on, I sigh and block/report the bots that have followed me, I see a little of my dash, I add stuff to my queue, and that’s about it. So please let me know or link me!

[battyaboutbooksreviews]

🦇 With a Little Luck Book Review 🦇

❓ #QOTD Do you believe in luck or fate? ❓

[ Find my review below or Goodreads | Storygraph | Literal ]

🦇 Jude is perfectly okay with sticking backstage or beyond the spotlight while his twin sister and friend take risks. It's easier to work at his parents' vinyl record store, act as the DM at D&D nights, and draw comics out of the limelight. Jude's luck in life changes when he finds a scarlet D20 die. Suddenly, he can do no wrong. He wins a pair of coveted concert tickets, asks out the most popular girl in school (who he's had a crush on forever), and even finds a record signed by Paul McCartney. What happens when his luck takes a turn for the worst? What happens when he realized that blessing could in fact be a curse?

💜 Disclaimer: I've been a long-time, heart-eyed fan of Marissa Meyer. I get weak for any writer who completes a project during NaNoWriMo, but Marissa Meyer's The Lunar Chronicles series (perhaps my most recommended book here) goes above and beyond. That being said, let's talk about Jude. Jude...sweet, sweet baby Jude. You idiot. You adorkable, nerdtastic little idiot. It's obvious where this is going from page one, bub, and you don't see it. I love you all the more for it, truly. Thank you for occasionally breaking the fourth wall and trusting you with your awkward, nerdy self. I loved every bit.

💜 Meyer flawlessly walks the line between magic and realism, making you question if Jude's D20 is controlling his fate or if it's all circumstance. The message ("Is it good luck. Is it bad?" "Perhaps.") behind this story is as complex as a 20-sided die. It's a message of controlling our own fate, of recognizing that our perception of a situation makes it a positive or negative experience. There's so much going on in this story, yet it's all seamlessly intertwined, much as multiple aspects of our lives are part of our vivid stories. Jude processing reality AND his current D&D campaign by creating a comic series (which we get to see!) was precious, but also incredibly realistic of a creative mind. Every member of Jude's found family is realistic, humanly flawed, each processing internal and exterior conflicts many of us have experienced in our teen years. Perhaps one of my favorites was Maya, the girl Jude has a long-time, unrequited crush on (why did I keep picturing Havana Rose Liu's Isabel from Bottoms? Just me???). No secondary character is wasted; they're all a part of Jude's story. Even watching an adult who seems perfectly confident and put together having an unrequited crush sends a message to Jude. It's never too late, so long as you take your shot.

🦇 I'm generally not a fan of love triangles, and it's quite obvious from the beginning that Jude and Ari are meant to be. So it's a little frustrating to watch him (not quite) date Maya. However, it's entirely realistic. Jude has to experience (not quite) dating Maya to realize he doesn't want to (really) date her. The way he processes it all is very mature but also sweet. It also makes his realization that he's been focused on the impossibility of Maya as a distraction from his true feelings all the sweeter.

🦇 Recommended to fans of Nicola Yoon, Rainbow Rowell, Danika Stone, Jenny Han, or the Just My Luck film (with McFly!...and Chris Pine). For all my fellow nerds (anyone who recognizes Firefly gets a cookie).

✨ The Vibes ✨ 🎲 Young Adult Romance 🐉 Tons of Nerdtastic References ⚔️ A Little Magical Realism 💎 Lyrics and Comics 🧚‍♀️ Friends to Lovers 🏰 Found Family 🎲 Part of a Duology

🦇 Major thanks to the author @marissameyerauthor and publisher for providing an ARC of this book via Netgalley. 🥰 This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

💬 Quotes ❝ I’ve got a decent imagination, which is almost as good as epic quests and true love. Imagination surpasses real life… what? Ninety percent of the time? Tell me I’m wrong. You’re the one with your nose in a book right now, so I know you agree with me, at least on some level. ❞

❝ “Luck is all about perspective…” “And what you do with the opportunities you’re given.” ❞

❝ “I want to be with you,” I say. “On whatever quest or adventure we go on. I want to be with you. Always. All the time. And I hate that it took me so long to figure that out.” ❞

[doubtingreality]

Hello Friends!

It's been quite a minute, and I have quite a few updates for you all! First of all, I am in my senior year of college and currently working on MFA applications! (Exciting!) If anyone wants to chat about their experiences with college or grad school, PLEASE feel free to interact!

My first book is coming along, as of this past Tuesday it is officially novel-length and in its second full draft! I am quite excited about this, and I feel like my love of writing has been reinvigorated.

Also, my friends put me on a literature app called Storygraph! It is much like Goodreads but not owned by Amazon, and its algorithm is very user based! If you'd like to add me, my user is simply stormystewart! Let's be friends! :)

[soracities]

hi, m.! how do you discover new books upon removing yourself from the algorithm of goodreads / storygraph? my sister and i are currently evading book socials in an attempt to be more mindful of what we read, minus the ‘feed’ recommending us books. we want to read books because we choose it :) would love to hear your thoughts!

Hi, lovely! This will be a bit late since I've had this question a few times, esp. in regards to quitting social media, so I'm very sorry to anyone else who asked that it's taken me so long to get around to it!

I will be honest, this blog does make up a good part of how I find things -- my mutuals and other lit blogs especially (I also find works through the authors I follow online now and then); most often, though, these will simply put something on my radar so that I always have an ever-shifting web of disparate works circling through my head; titles will crop up when I'm looking for something, but whether or not I get around to reading those books sooner rather than later really depends on a lot of other factors: if it's an author I know or have read and loved before, for example, then I’m more likely to explore it -- the same goes if I spot something on a shelf or in an article that a mutual has mentioned!

Otherwise, the factors that really influence the books I find most often are a lot more personal and down to proximity: things close friends mention or recommend (Dostoevsky was on my list for years, but I bought The Brothers Karamazov without a second thought because of someone I love), the books I find in my local library or favourite bookshops, books mentioned in other books (I pick up a lot of titles through nonfiction / essays, or just stuff the authors I like enjoy), archives like Project Gutenberg, online magazines, journals, book presses, etc. These are the places I go to far more often and are probably what determine the books I actually read most of the time. Admittedly, it’s quite random and there is no set system for me aside from just following my own intuition -- that said, I think the last ones are especially good for discovering new works and authors, so while I don’t know what kind of books or genres you prefer (which means this will all vary of course), if you want to stay away from socials entirely, then I cannot stress enough: mailing lists & newsletters are your friends!! You don’t have to sign up to everything (I’d honestly recommend against it because I think you’d end up with the same situation I found on Goodreads which is far more time spent accumulating titles than actually reading them), but keeping up with sites whose content you enjoy, or signing up to the newsletters of local or independent bookshops is, I think, a really good way of coming across new things without an AI hobbling them together for you.

For me, a lot of what I come across has been assembled from a variety of places, but I have a handful of publishers whose content I love or am always intrigued by (like Tramp Press, Fitzcarraldo, Pushkin Press, or the Dalkey Archive) so I try to keep up with their releases every now and then (I’m also more likely to read random books I stumble across if I know they published them), as well as my favourite online journals, magazines, lit archives etc., As I said, I don’t know what kind of books you like, but for me sites like Electric Lit (because of them, I found out about Norah Lange), The Marginalian (Brainpickings’ new name, and it is an absolute treasure trove), The Paris Review, LitHub, Words Without Borders, or other poem-a-day / poetry archives (Words for the Year and poetry queen @firstfullmoon ig page grieftolight especially!) are wonderful, because they expose you to so many different voices and works. I’m not a huge fan of literary prizes for various reasons, but I do pay attention to the longlist and shortlist of the Dublin Literary Prize and the Booker International because they’re not as narrow or insular as others usually are; I may not always read the titles listed immediately, but they’re filed away in my head, because the most important thing for me is to read, or be aware of in order to read, as wide a selection of books as possible.

All of this means I end up with a very chaotic mental map of the various things I want to read and explore, but the chief thing for me is that if I find something that piques my interest, I follow it -- if I’m reading an author of a particular nationality, for example, I often look up their contemporaries or others writing from the same or a similar tradition. Most of what I read is in translation also, so if a book has really caught me I look up not only the author’s other works, but the translator’s too. Because I read Adonis, I looked up Khaled Mattawa. Because I looked up Khaled Mattawa, I found Saadi Youssef and Maram al-Masri, both of whom I absolutely adored. Non-Fiction helps a lot in this too, at least for me -- as I said, I stumble across a lot of new titles when reading essays by authors I already enjoy, and it’s far more likely that I’ll pick something up if I’ve read about it beforehand. I read Geoff Dyer’s essays because I read Zadie Smith's review of them in her own essay collection; I read Natalia Ginzburg’s Family Lexicon and Enrique Vila Matas’ Dublinesque because I read Zambra; I discovered and fell in love with Stig Dagerman through a Siri Hustvedt essay and I don’t know if I have ever before felt the kind of stunned response I had when I read his writing in Burnt Child; it honestly floors me still. Again, all of this is a very random selection process but it works for me because I’m always looking to explore lots of various things at any given moment. That said, and while I don't know what facilities are like where you are or how easily you have access to them, I do genuinely believe, along with all this, that if you want to be more mindful then the most important thing I can say to you is to really, really, try to cultivate a relationship with your local library and bookstores, whenever and however you can. As I said, I accumulate a lot of titles through a lot of different places, but even through all of these, most of the books I've ended up discovering and loving have been through my local library because they're the ones who have put the book and me in the same room: I had Svetlana Alexievich on my list for a while because I came across excerpts on tumblr, but the only reason I finally got down to reading her is because the Fitzcarraldo edition of Second-hand Time was put on the display shelf. That display shelf is also the only reason I eventually discovered Zambra (also in Fitzcarraldo and so, by now, the only reason I'd discovered Fitzcarraldo). It’s where I found Camilla Gurdova, where I found Nabokov’s letters to his wife and therefore finally got around to reading him; it’s where I picked up Camus’ essays because -- again -- I know how much someone dear to me loves him; it’s how I managed to read Siri Hustvedt and therefore the only reason I found Dagerman to begin with at all. For me, that physical proximity is a vital part of the books I come across because they’re no longer something vague that I “might” read, but a real tangible thing that I can actually pick up and read right there and then; this is what makes the difference for me.

When I first started reading more seriously, I (very naively) collected so many of those ridiculous 100 Best Books of All Time Ever lists; I thought Tolstoy and various other bigwigs were something I needed to accomplish in order to be considered a Real Reader -- naturally, it was a disaster because books then became a massive and daunting chore; I couldn't finish Notes from Underground because, in reality, I wasn't ready for it -- I just wanted to tick it off a list. What I needed, and what my library allowed me to discover, were books that weren’t necessarily on those lists but that stayed with me and influenced the literature I did eventually discover: because of my library I found Helen Simpson, Ali Smith and Jenny Offill which is probably the only reason I gave up those lists and finally allowed myself to read what I wanted, when I wanted; it wasn’t the time for Notes from Underground, but it was the time to read the slim little Turgenev I found wedged on the Classics shelf and fell in love with. The first books that I ended up being challenged by were not the Big Books I always thought I had to tackle but rather things like Books Burn Badly or A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing which I never would have read otherwise. It’s because of my library that I found Mihail Sebastian, Andrés Neuman, and Tomas Tranströmer. It’s why I read Mrs Dalloway as early as I did -- because the book was there. The only reason I ended up finding Adonis (and subsequently, any of his other works as well as Mattawa’s) was because my library had him on their Poetry shelf. I very rarely actually bought books for the longest time because 90% of what I read was through my library, which I know is an insanely lucky position to be in; I lived in a well connected enough area to be able to find most of the books I was looking for (and even if they weren’t in my county, I could order them in from others easily enough).

And I think the exact same kind of unexpected but striking discoveries applies to bookstores (secondhand and independent ones especially, and I love them more for this very reason) -- again, I don’t know what you and your sister have available near you, but if you have the means to visit them then I genuinely can’t overstate how important they are, not only because of what you can find on their shelves but also because of what you can learn by forging a relationship and talking to the staff, or simply the comfort of having an emotional tie to some aspect of the community you live in. I’ve found books because the shops I love posted about a reading or book signing, or because looking up an author on their website led to suggestions I’d never even heard of but was endlessly thankful for. For me, even for all that my brain hops back and forth like a deranged little magpie hoarding new titles, the most important avenues for finding authors or works happens between titles given to me by those I’m closest to, and the places where the books are physically there. I can have a book in my head for months or even years but it’s seeing it in the bargain bin or in the middle of a precarious pile of faded spines in a secondhand bookshop that makes me bring it home, if that makes sense. This is not to detract from any of the other sources above because I understand that this is a somewhat privileged place to speak from and relies a lot, not just financially but also locally on where you are and what you have access to. But if there are local bookshops, or even just ones a short while away from you then I really think you will get so much from visiting them or placing your orders with them when you do discover new titles that have caught you, however that comes about.

In any case, this has gotten a lot lengthier than I intended, but I hope some if it has helped even just a little bit. Happy reading and (hopefully!) happy future discoveries to you and your sister xx