#i bought it at barnes and noble. it was written by a woman. it was a thriller novel

[lordsardine]

[haggishlyhagging]

According to Google Trends, the word "empowerment" hit a high in 2004 and 2005, as it became more deeply entrenched everywhere—feminist discourse, consumer marketing, corporate culture. "Empowering" joined "synergy," "scalable," and "drill-down" in boardroom conferences, vision statements, and business plans, and was eventually called "the most condescending transitive verb ever" by Forbes. It's become the name of a range of businesses, a national fitness event, and an almost mind-boggling number of yoga studios. It's become a company-jargon fave at Microsoft, with former and current CEOs Steve Ballmer and Satya Nadella both using it to impressively vague effect in memos and public talks. (At Microsoft's annual Convergence event in 2015, Nadella told attendees, "We are in the empowering business," and added that the tech giant's goal was "empowering you as individuals and organizations across every vertical and every size of business, and any part of the world, to drive your agenda and do the things you want to do for your business.")

Elsewhere in discourses and debates around sex as both an activity and a commodity, "empowerment" has become a sort of shorthand that might mean "I'm proud of doing this thing," but also might mean "This thing is not the ideal thing, but it's a lot better than some of the alternatives." Feeling empowered by stripping, for instance, was a big theme among moonlighting academics or otherwise privileged young women in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and you can find countless memoirs about what they discovered about themselves in the world of the sexual marketplace; the same is true of prostitution, with blogs like Belle de Jour, College Call Girl, and books like Tracy Quan's Diary of a Manhattan Call Girl. There was a point in the mid-to-late 2000s when you couldn't swing a cat through Barnes & Noble without knocking a slew of sex-work memoirs off the shelves: Lily Burana’s Strip City, Diablo Cody's Candy Girl, Jillian Lauren's Some Girl, Michelle Tea's Rent Girl, Shawna Kenny's I Was a Teenage Dominatrix, Melissa Febos's Whip Smart, and Sarah Katherine Lewis's Indecent among them. The crucial thing these often incredibly absorbing and well-written books had in common? All were written by young, white, and no-longer-hustling sex workers.

I want to be clear that standing with sex workers on the principle that sex work is work is an issue whose importance cannot be overstated, and also clear that my complete lack of expertise on the subject makes it well beyond the scope of this book. But I am interested in the idea that "empowerment" is so often used as a reflexive defense mechanism in discussions of this kind of sex-work experience, but less so in describing the less written-about experiences of people whose time in the industry is less finite and less bookworthy—transgender women, exploited teenagers and trafficked foreigners, men and women forced into sex work by poverty, abuse, or addiction. And I'm fascinated by the fact that we see thousands of pop culture products in which women are empowered by a sex industry that does not have their empowerment in mind, but far fewer in which they are empowered to make sexual choices on their own terms, outside of a status quo in which women's bodies are commodities to be bought and sold. Indecent author Sarah Katherine Lewis has written that, during her time as a stripper, "I felt empowered—as a woman, as a feminist, as a human being by the money I made, not by the work I did"; but hers is just one story. Belle de Jour and other sex workers have written about truly enjoying their work. If the market were just as welcoming of narratives in which young women were empowered by their careers as, say, electricians—if personal memoirs about a youthful, self-determining layover in the electrical trades were a thing publishers clamored for—then a handful of empowered sex workers would be no big thing. Until that's the case, it's worth questioning why the word is so often the first line of defense.

-Andi Zeisler, We Were Feminists Once

[tododeku-or-bust]

How did you get into shipping patrochilles?

Funny story! I read The Song of Achilles when i was in like, the tenth grade, and i didn't know shit about "shipping" til i was 22 🤣 i am one of those people that hadn't read The Iliad (I was an Odyssey kid) so i legit did not know that ol boy was gone die 🤣 i knew about Achilles dragging Hector but that was about it. but the beauty that was TSoA stuck with me for years afterwards, it's so gorgeously written.

So what happened was, i was in Barnes and Noble years later, and I saw the cover! And i was like "oh! I remember this!" And bought it and fell right back in love with it 🤣 so THAT was when i started actively shipping them.

Even when I finally bought The Iliad (translated by a woman, tyvm), I was like "Madeline clearly softened some edges for plot expedience but these boys are still in LOVE love." Especially Achilles. Like i could not let go of this man's heartbreak and the classical tragic beauty of his own hubris destroying what he held dear and the drama and phenomenal action of the response 💋👌🏾💋👌🏾💋👌🏾💋👌🏾 it's why I'll never get why people think Pat is the only simp in that relationship bc NAW.

Also, "Philtatos" has a forever hold on me lmao. I'm pretty sure the man only says it the one time, after Patroclus is dead, but we all saw that shit and said "THAT'S THE ONE!" If it's one thing imma do, imma slip a "Philtatos" into my damn fic.

So....yeah 🤣

[sarah-aliterarylife]

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

Have you ever been on a holiday that was so good you didn’t want to come home? A trip that was so exciting, so filled with fun and new experiences, that you didn’t want it to end? Have you ever visited a place that was so wonderful, that you would be happy to live out the rest of your days there?

In February 2014, we travelled to New York to celebrate my husband’s 30th birthday. We were newly married in June of the previous year, and had recently bought our first home together. New York was bitterly cold, made even more so by the vicious winds that swept through the skyscraper filled streets. There was snow on the ground when we landed at Newark on a cold Friday morning. But we didn’t care one bit. For one week, we lived like New Yorkers (albeit with the perma-smiling faces of two tourists on their first trip to the Big Apple). We took long walks in Central Park. We visited Bloomingdales, Grand Central Station and the Rockefeller Centre. We walked along the High Line and watched a fashion shoot taking place inside one of the nearby buildings. We wandered the winding streets of Greenwich Village and drank hot tea in glasses in a tiny hipster café. We had lunch at a restaurant near Washington Square, surrounded by academics from NYU and Woody Allen types. We got lost looking for the Flatiron Building and ended up in Chelsea. On one particularly chilly afternoon, we took refuge in a church on the Upper East Side and drank hot chocolate, enjoying the stillness, a sanctuary from the bustling streets outside.

I love America. I would visit a different state every year, if the exchange rate didn’t make it so expensive for us Brits. I love its brashness, the boldness and confidence of its people. America to me is like a patchwork quilt of many colours and embroidered images. On every occasion I have visited, no two days are ever the same. No two streets are the same. You can be completely anonymous one moment and told that you are beautiful by a stranger the next. I love American people, American culture, American food, American television. But most of all I love American literature.

I couldn’t visit New York without perusing its many bookshops. I spent at least an hour wandering around Barnes and Noble on Fifth Avenue, until my new husband asked me if we could do something else. I couldn’t leave without making a purchase, so I left with two American classics – The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, and A Farewell To Arms by Ernest Hemingway.

And then I left them on the plane.

It was possibly the joy of some young academic’s life when they boarded the next Virgin Atlantic flight to New York, only to discover some free reading material for their trip, courtesy of me, underneath their seat. Either that, or the cabin crew threw them away. Regardless, I was devastated to discover on arriving home that I had left my double bill of classic American novels on the plane. The first thing I did was repurchase them both. I saved Hemingway for later that year, and read it during a trip to Paris to celebrate my own milestone birthday. But I got stuck into Edith Wharton right away.

Published in 1920, The Age of Innocence was Edith Wharton’s eighth novel, and is widely regarded as her finest work. The first Pulitzer Prize winning book to be written by a woman, it is billed as a slightly satirical novel, a comedy of manners.

The Age of Innocence is centred around Newland Archer, a young New York lawyer who has recently become engaged to May Welland, a young debutante from a prominent New York family. However, his world is thrown into disarray with the arrival of May’s cousin, Countess Ellen Olenska. The Countess has returned to America after separating from her husband, a Polish count, and her arrival causes a sensation. She shocks polite New York society with her glamorous and revealing outfits, unconventional manners, and rumours of adultery. It may not come as a surprise (especially if you have seen Martin Scorsese’s film version, starring Daniel Day Lewis as Newland Archer) to learn that Newland soon becomes attracted to the captivating Ellen. She returns his feelings, but decency and the fear of society’s judgement soon prove too much for Newland, and he moves forward with his wedding to May.

Time and May’s eventual pregnancy conspire to keep the lovers apart, until 25 years later, May dies from pneumonia. Now a father of three children, Newland travels to France with his son, where he arranges to visit the Countess at her Paris apartment. However, at the last moment, he changes his mind, choosing to send his son alone instead. He ultimately decides that he is content to live with his memories of the past.

It would be easy to dismiss The Age of Innocence as a kind of 19th century chick lit (I hate that term). It is also easy to call it a novel about two lovers and very little else. Instead, it is a novel about the struggle between society’s expectations and individual desires – essentially, between the individual and the group. May Welland is characterised as a product of the system, an ideal example of the social code. She is beautiful, innocent, and not intellectual. She appears perfectly subservient, and is the perfect wife for a man in Newland Archer’s position. And yet she is unafraid to manipulate Newland when it is needed, and there is no doubt that she uses her eventual pregnancy as a ruse to be rid of Ellen Olenska forever.

Edith Wharton wrote about a period of American history that took place around 50 years before she was born. She was writing about a time when moral codes and manners strongly dictated how the individual would act. Any deviation from these codes would lead to disgrace and even removal from polite society. Hence Newland ultimately refuses to sacrifice his desires and opinions in order not to upset the established codes of New York society.

The ending of this book initially irritated me. (That is not the first time it has happened – Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier and One Day by David Nichols both made me want to throw the book at the wall) Why bother with a significant time jump and the creation of circumstances that would allow true love to prevail, only to have your leading man conduct a complete about-turn right at the last moment? I imagine that Edith Wharton did this to demonstrate that in real life, because in real life, love between two old lovers rarely prevails. We rarely end up with someone we have loved and lost. Many of us have at one time or another loved someone we could not be with (or someone who was not ours to love) and when those relationships end, it is often final. Very few of us will eventually find a way to be with “the one who got away”. Newland Archer realises, with a depressing finality, that his memories of Ellen Olenska are ultimately more satisfying than any relationship between them could be, and that a renewal of their relationship in mid-life could never be the same. They may discover that they have nothing in common. They may discover that, 25 years on, they are very different people and no longer suited. Their romance may not last, and their memories will be tainted. So he chooses to leave their love in the past.

“It’s more real to me here than if I went up” he says.

The Age of Innocence is an intriguing insight into the New York of the 19th century – The Gilded Age, or Old New York as it is known. Since reading the novel, I have harboured a mild curiosity about that world, and its modern equivalent. I would be interested to learn whether some of those codes and conventions depicted in the book still exist, amongst a certain small proportion of New York’s high society. Watching the cliques of New York housewives at lunch together on Madison Avenue during our trip, and overhearing their conversations, I am sure that it does. Does that segment of society still marry (at least in part) for advantageous purposes, as opposed to simply marrying for love? Does who you know count more than what you know? Are women still expected to a certain extent to be a beautiful, innocent ingenue, as opposed to a free thinking, carefree woman like Ellen Olenska?

In 2023, we can find much to ponder about Old New York and its parallels to modern society in Edith Wharton’s novel.

Like this? Take a look at my website:

A Literary Life – A journey through the books of my life. (whatsarahread7.co.uk)

[scottymcgeesterwrites]

A Guide to the Best Editions and Translations of Some Classic Literature

TWENTY THOUSAND LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA BY JULES VERNE

IMPORTANT: Whatever you do, DO NOT BUY the edition translated by Lewis Mercier. In fact, NEVER buy any translation of ANYTHING by Lewis Mercier. Mercier’s translation is unfortunately the most “standard” and popular translation. This translation is said to have removed about 20-25% of the original novel, and also removes a lot of Verne’s original meaning. In short, it was a botched translation that somehow became very popular and accessible up until the 1970′s, but always still check for before buying. Barnes and Noble still has his translation lying around for sale.

If the name of the translator isn’t on the cover or back cover of the book, you can check the first few pages where they write the publication history. It might be in fine print.  Frankly, any translation that is NOT by Lewis Mercier is good. The pictures I have attached here are of the edition I bought published by The Franklin Library. It was translated by Mendor T. Brunetti. It also includes the original illustrations, which is cool.

THE HOLY BIBLE

Oof. This one can get really dicey. But I’ll explain it the best I can.  There have been dozens of translations of the Bible, if not hundreds. Not everyone uses the same one, especially evangelical groups like Pentecostals and Jehovah’s Witnesses. These more radical groups have willingly altered the Bible to further their views. So, a Bible that a Jehovah’s Witness holds is not the same Bible that a Roman Catholic priest holds.  The King James Bible (KJV, or King James Version) has often been considered the most popular version of The Bible throughout modern history. Many of the Bible’s most memorable quotes are directly taken from the King James Bible. It’s considered dignified, poetic, and beautiful. It’s also wrong. So very, very wrong. It’s quite possibly the worst translation of the Bible ever made. I grew up in Catholic school and even there we never once touched the King James Bible. The problems with the King James Bible include certain “theological biases” (i.e. implying Jesus appeared somewhere when he didn’t) and all-around bad translations (i.e. it says there were unicorns but the real meaning is supposed to say “horned beasts”) (see ReligionForBreakfast). The other annoying thing about the King James Bible is that quotation marks are not used. This can be very confusing for readers as it becomes unclear who is speaking.  If you’re curious to see how an exact literal translation of the Bible into English goes, check out the Interlinear Bible. It has the original Hebrew and Greek text with the English words underneath (or besides). You will quickly realize just how complicated translating the Bible is, as Hebrew does not have many words. The English prose in the Interlinear Bible therefore can read like gibberish.

If you want to read the Bible with as close to the original intent and meaning as possible while also being readable, then go for the New American Standard Bible. It can still be a bit difficult to read though. The current popular edition is the New Revised Standard Version. This newer edition from 1989 is considered the most neutral of all translations, as it does not hold any denominational bias. The translators even placed gender-neutral words, such as “people” instead of “mankind”. 

FRANKENSTEIN BY MARY SHELLEY

The original 1818 text by Mary Shelley has been given more spotlight as of late. The text that we are most commonly familiar with from 1831 had the story toned down because of course it would be scandalous for a woman to write about such things at the time. Mary Shelley had suffered critical outrage and pressure for editorial changes from her husband Percy for her original vision. For the 1831 edition, she was forced to edit the novel so that Dr. Frankenstein would be a more moral character, whereas the original Dr. Frankenstein in the 1818 text did not go through much moralizing. 

Penguin Books recently released an affordable edition of the 1818 text.

THE THREE MUSKETEERS BY ALEXANDRE DUMAS

There are numerous translations but I want to highlight the one I read by Richard Pevear. This made the story very readable while also remaining faithful to the story. Pevear didn’t censor Dumas’s original meanings at all like previous translations did for their time. I thoroughly enjoyed his translation and was lucky enough to get the hardcover of his first edition back in the day. My mom completely surprised me by buying that book for me, and it ended up happening to be the best translation. The best thing about Pevear’s edition is that it includes footnotes for archaic terms. The original hardcover of Pevear’s edition is difficult to find by now, but his translation has been re-released by other publishers. As of a few years ago, a new translation by Lawrence Ellsworth has been released. I have not read that one but have heard good things. The publishers of the Ellsworth translation have also been republishing ALL of the Musketeer stories to provide a series of consistent editions, which has always been rare for the Musketeer saga. 

HOMER’S ODYSSEY, ILIAD, and VIRGIL’S AENEID

First off, read these epics in verse form. I cannot believe there are editions out that written in prose form. I’m sorry but that should be illegal. I grew up reading Robert Fagles’ translation, which is pretty damn good and is the standard in schools. However, also look for Richmond Lattimore’s translation. Lattimore translated The Odyssey and The Iliad in the original rhythm that Homer intended. Fagles wrote in freeform for the sake of being easier to read. Both translations retain the original meaning, so it’s up to you really what you prefer. As for The Aeneid (Lattimore only translated Greek classics), go with Fagles.

DON QUIXOTE BY MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

Read the translation by Edith Grossman. That’s all I can say. I devoured that book in days. Grossman did to Don Quixote what Pevear did to The Three Musketeers. It’s just that good and readable. Ormsby is the second-best, being the most scholarly of all translations. The translation is the most accurate but the humor can be dry and doesn’t pack the same punch as Cervantes probably intended. The translations to avoid like the plague are by Motteux, Smollett, and John Phillips. SHERLOCK HOLMES BY SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE

Surely, most people reading this have a copy of the Sherlock Holmes tales in one form or another. But which is the best?  Every text out there is the same no matter the publication, but I prefer to read the way it was originally formatted with all the illustrations. The automatic assumption people might have is that all the original Sherlock Holmes stories were published in The Strand Magazine. This wasn’t the case. There were several stories published in other magazines at the time, such as A Study in Scarlet and The Sign of Four, to name a few. Therefore, if you find an edition boasting to have “all The Strand illustrations” it probably only has the stories that were published in The Strand Magazine. More confusing yet, some editions do say “All the Strand illustrations” but also include A Study in Scarlet and The Sign of Four.  Keep in mind this magical number: 60 Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a total of 56 short stories and 4 novels with Sherlock Holmes. If the copy you are holding does not add up to 60 stories, don’t bother. You might get a copy that comes in two or three volumes. 

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

I love that we as a fandom have declared the clem comic an noncanon lmao. i'm curious tho, do you believe clem will get a new love interest? do you think it will be amos or someone else?

Yeah, gotta love seeing a fandom come together to agree on something.... even though that something isn't exactly invoking happy feelings, y'know? Like yeah, the comic sucks and at this point I doubt the trilogy will be much better unless Tillie suddenly starts to understand Clementine and makes some impossibly massive improvements..... but it's nice to see all of us mostly getting along?

As for the whole love interest thing, I'm like 98% sure that Clementine's going to get a new girlfriend in the comics. That's my prediction.

During the dumb xpo thing, Tillie talked about how she's excited to explore Clementine as a queer character in the apocalypse and considering Tillie's other works, I will bet literal cash that Clementine gets a new girlfriend. I don't think Amos will be the love interest, and if he does end up being that for Clem or if Clem gets a boyfriend, then I will genuinely be shocked.

.....Y'know what, I need to get this off my chest and this seems relevant enough-

I was talking with my roommate about this the other night actually. I told her all about my predictions for Clem getting a new girlfriend and how annoying this whole comic is, but also how annoying people are being to Tillie over this and like.... everything is a mess.

My roommate, who knows that literally everything is wrong in the 12 page comic and who I told about the xpo where Tillie talked about Clem being queer is important, asked me how I would feel if she ended up getting Clementine's canon bisexuality wrong, and what if she decides to make Clementine a lesbian?

And like...... I actually stopped what I was working on because this wave of dread crashed through me at the thought of that, and I could actually imagine it happening because she already got everything else wrong and if she hasn't actually played the games and is pulling this shit out of her ass.... I can't even describe to you the feeling I felt...

I want to believe that Tillie would at least know and respect the fact that Clementine is a canon bisexual. From what I've gathered, Tillie herself is wlw and I don't believe she would erase a bisexual character. She knows that Clementine is a queer character. Clementine's bisexual.

Like obviously, if I'm right and Clementine gets a girlfriend, she'll still be bisexual. Nothing will ever change that.

But I'm going to tell all of you this right now because just thinking about it upsets me.... if for whatever reason, if Tillie Walden actually erases Clementine's bisexuality and makes her a lesbian in the graphic novel trilogy while "exploring what it means to be queer in the apocalypse," I'm done.

I will have nothing left for Tillie. I will no longer support anything she does. I won't condone harassment towards her because that makes you just as shitty, but I will absolutely call that bullshit out and then never support her again. I will never talk about the comic again because how dare you think you can get away with that and still expect me to waste brain cells on your comic? Hell, I will probably be so fucking livid that I'll drive my ass all the way to barnes and noble just to return the books I bought of hers.

Dramatic? Yeah, but y'know what? I've never really touched on this outside of a few "Clem being bisexual is important representation and we love it" but her being bisexual means so much to me. It truly does, I mean.... after the dumb "btw Javi is bi, we just wrote him straight and threw in a line of flirty dialogue with jesus so we can have our cake and eat it, too-- the straight homophobes will still buy our game and the lgbt+ community will love us, win win," I cannot explain the joy I felt when Clementine was written as a bisexual woman and that she was given two love interests that meant so much to the players.

Like.... I dunno, I never got any real bi rep in games or books or movies, especially bi girls, when I was a teen trying to figure shit out. In jr high and high school, I could never find stories that has bi women as a lead because I was too afraid to look anything up. I didn't wanna be caught reading/watching things that were lgbt+ because I had a shitty boyfriend at the time and our friend group were heavily religious and judgmental. My best friend [who I haven't spoken to for years now] was one of those people who claimed to support lgbt+ people.... but also once told me that she thought lesbians were okay but gay men were lowkey gross and probably only into other dudes because girls wouldn't date them. Oh, and I'll never forget the time she told me that bi people don't actually exist because you either like one or the other.

That's a great thing to here from the best friend you've know since you were an infant after you've realized that you aren't only attracted to boys.

But now I'm out of that environment and I haven't talked to anyone from high school since I graduated, and I've felt more free to intake all the things I wish I could've before...

I just.... Clementine is important to me for a lot of reasons. I've played these games forever, I've gotten to watch her grow for years, and she's just so well-written and amazing in tfs, and the fact that the writers wanted to write her as a bisexual woman means so much, I just.... even though it's not canon, I can't help but take this disaster of a comic personally. Just from those 12 pages, everything about Clementine is destroyed and it sucks. It hurts..... but I'm still not holding anything against Tillie herself. Her comic is bad, but that doesn't mean she's bad..... however, erasing Clem's bisexuality would be the last straw for me.

.....This turned into a rant. Sorry about that. You asked a simple question and I dumped my life story on you but I dunno, I needed to get that off my chest because it's been bothering the back of my mind.

I do wanna add once more that I don't think Tillie's actually going to do that... she should know that both Louis and Violet are canon love interests, plus Clementine canonically had a crush on Gabe in ANF. I think if she's going to get anything right, it'll be the fact that Clem is bi.... I'm just expressing a major fear I have and what it would do to me, and others, if it happened..... y'know?

[oliviermiraarmstrongs]

mid-year book freak out tag

thank you @bloody-wonder for giving me an excuse to share my book thoughts!

1. Best Book You’ve Read So Far in 2021?

It’s gotta be The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood; I hear “feminist period novel about mentally ill woman unable to cope in upper-class society” and I am THERE! It’s like [Stefon voice] This book has EVERYTHING: repressed women, a decaying old house, a complex relationship of two sisters, a pulpy sci-fi story-within-a-story-within-a-story, criticism of capitalism and reactionary attitudes and politics, commentary on how conservative society shuns those it perceives to be “other” and a threat to the social order (poor people, socialists, “unconventional” women). It is EXTREMELY my shit.

2. Best Sequel You’ve Read So Far in 2021?

The only one I've read is Siege and Storm, so Siege and Storm! Shadow and Bone was captivating, if a little simplistic, but the sequel really fleshes out the characters, setting, and themes. It’s great to see Alina take a more active role, and I love the exploration of sainthood. 

3. New Release You Haven’t Read Yet, But Want To?

I’m really curious about Michelle Zauner’s memoir Crying in H Mart. Same with Axiom’s End, which I haven’t really been seeking out, but it’s been resting on my list since I like a lot of Lindsay Ellis’ stuff.

4. Most Anticipated Release For Second Half of 2021?

5. Biggest Disappointment?

The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood. I’ve been getting into Atwood, and I have a soft spot for female-centric retellings of myths, so this was on my list for a long time. It’s not bad; it’s decent as a character study and offers some good perspective on the hanged slave women from The Odyssey, but overall it came off as...bitter? And not in a good way. It’s reasonable to include commentary on how bad things were for women in ancient times, but after a while I’m just like “But there had to be a time when Penelope was happy, right?” But the biggest failing has to be the treatment of Helen. Why a story focused on bringing literary justice to silenced women also characterizes Helen of Troy as a manipulative, arrogant bitch who single-handedly ignited the Trojan War because she enjoys fucking people over, I’ll never know. Ironic that in the opening chapter, Penelope bemoans being used as a yardstick with which to judge other women, and then the book proceeds to do exactly that with her and Helen. Can’t let Penelope have a positive relationship with another woman! There could be some form of unreliable narrator at play, but there’s not much indication that that’s the case here. Even Homer had a more nuanced portrayal of Helen than this!

6. Biggest Surprise?

I suppose The Red Tent. I picked it up at a Goodwill because of my aforementioned interest in female-centric retellings. It’s not amazing, but I wasn’t really expecting it to emotionally affect me like it did. You spend so much time setting up Dinah’s family and this supportive community of woman within a patriarchal society, only to have Dinah abandon it all after getting betrayed by her father and (most of) her brothers. Hearing about how her family fell apart after she left and she never got to see her mothers again really gets to me. The book has flaws for sure - neither of Dinah’s romances are developed very well, and some of its themes can come off as gender essentialist - but I think it’s a nice exploration of female labor and traditions that too often get ignored.

7. Favorite New Author?

The only relatively new author I’ve been reading is Leigh Bardugo, soooooo... honestly I don’t know what I can say that hasn’t already been said, I got into the series pretty late. Great world-building, witty dialogue, a familiar type of story with enough interesting ideas to make it feel fresh. Check out Shadow and Bone if you get the chance. Sound of the summer.

8. Newest Fictional Crush?

You would think it would be Nikolai Lantsov since I just finished reading Siege and Storm and he seems to be the fan favorite... but nah, not yet. He’s fun, but he doesn’t hit me in that way (Though very sexy of him to just casually proposition Alina and Mal for a royal polycule, a la Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot; would love an AU where they accept his offer). However, I would let Zoya murder me. Every time Zoya is not in a scene I am asking “Where’s Zoya?” Also shout out to Alina, just because I would treat her better than all the men in her life! 

9. Newest Favorite Character?

Gonna try to do this without spoiling too much, but Laura Chase in The Blind Assassin really resonated with me. Her personality reminds me a lot of myself, especially as an an autistic person, like the way she has her own way of thinking that makes perfect sense to her, but makes other people see her as odd and naive. I love how she’s set up in-universe as this Sylvia Plath-esque tragic heroine, with Iris spending the rest of the book interrogating and deconstructing, and in a way, reconstructing this image of her. Atwood you’re insane for this. I forgive you for the Helen thing now.

10. Book That Made You Cry?

I never got as far as crying, but the part in The Goldfinch where [spoilers incoming] the art heist goes wrong and Theo is alone in the hotel room and he’s spiraling and considering suicide and finally dreams of his mom… all that was too much for me and I had to put the book down for the night. This guy just can’t catch a fucking break.

11. Book That Made You Happy?

fucidjdjdj I didn’t read any happy books this year. Shadow and Bone and Siege and Storm because I read them really fast unlike my usual months-long reading schedule.

12. Favorite Book Adaptation You Saw?

Predictably, Shadow and Bone. I basically bought and read the book less than a week before the show came out because I thought it looked interesting and wanted in on the hype (mostly because Jessie is cute 🥰). Honestly, the show improves a lot on the first book; the multiple storylines make it more dynamic and complex, the actors really help to make the characters feel more fleshed out, and Alina and Inej interacted for like three scenes, introducing an unexpected but thematically rich ship.

13. Favorite Review You’ve Written This Year?

14. Most Beautiful Book You’ve Bought So Far This Year?

I impulse-bought this book of Romantic poetry at Barnes and Noble just because it was pretty and I had a gift card

15. What Books Do You Need To Read By The End Of The Year?

Besides finishing The Grisha Trilogy/Six of Crows duology/Zoya’s duology that I forgot the name of….I don’t know. I’m not a reader that plans in advance. I acquire books, finish whatever I’m currently reading, look through my stacks deciding what to read next, spend an hour doing so because I can’t decide if I’m in the mood for any of them, and either force myself to read one or buy/borrow a new one.

I’m tagging @betweenironyandsilver, @illuminaticns, @borispavlikovskys, @chdarling, @sctine, @mightyaubs, @excuseforadrink, and @trckstergods, if you wanna! Or anyone who wants to yell about books.

[master-sass-blast]

Gifted.

*tosses escapism fic into the void* yeet.

Summary: You and Piotr go Christmas shopping and enjoy the holiday season. 

That's it. That's all that's happening. You're welcome.

Pairing(s): Piotr Rasputin x Reader and mentioned Illyana Rasputin x Kitty Pryde.

Rating: G.

Word Count: 2k precisely.

Set after “It’s Truly Magical.”

A/N: On the off-chance someone asks or is worried, yes, there are no mentions of masks or social distancing in this fic. That's because, in this fic, there is no COVID (ergo, no need for masks and such). I'm just not dealing with it in my fanfic as well. I won't. You can't make me.

Wear your fucking masks irl pls and thank u.

Taglist:  @marvel-is-perfection, @chromecutie, @girl-obsessed-with-things, @super-darkcloudstudent, @dandyqueen, @leo-writer

“What a bright time, it's the right time/ To rock the night away/ Jingle bell time is a swell time/ To go glidin' in a one-horse sleigh…”

You inhale deeply, then smile. The smells of fresh pretzels and pine –the latter is likely a fake scent that the stores use, but it’s still good—tantalize your nose. You tuck your hat and gloves in your purse, then look over at your husband. “Where all are we going?”

“Ah…” Piotr scans his list –which has notes on which stores to check and what order the stores are laid out in the mall, so as to streamline things. “Kitty said she did not want gifts because she does not celebrate Christmas, so we are just shopping for… my family and Russell. You said you already bought gifts for your dad and Wade?”

“Yup,” you say with a grin. Nate’s easy to shop for –ammo, clothes, and the odd book or two are usually all he want—and for Wade you just find the weirdest stuff listed on Amazon. “And I already sent my uncle a gift from us, so we don’t have to worry about him.”

Piotr nods, ‘hmm-ing’ as he makes a note on his list. “Okay.” He mumbles in Russian under his breath, then says, “Mama had no list this year; I think we start with her first since figuring out gift will take longer.”

“That’s fine. Where should we start?”

“I think bookstore is best bet. From there, we can stop by Hot Topic and candle shop for snezhinka, then Game Stop for Mikhail.”

“Sounds good.” You link your arm through his and smile up at him. “Lead the way, babe.”

 ***

 You glance between the piles of books on the table, then at your husband, who looks like he’s about to pull his hair out. “Do you think that, just maybe, you’re overthinking this? Just a little?”

“This is important,” Piotr insists as he skims through books from various areas of Barnes and Noble –cooking, history, fiction; he’d grabbed at least one book from nearly every section. “She has specific tastes. Cannot be just any old book.”

You purse your lips together. You don’t doubt that Alexandra has particular tastes in reading material –as a woman from her walk in life is bound to have—but you’re also certain that she wouldn’t want her son driving himself insane just to pick a present for her. You sit down next to Piotr and gently put your hand on his arm. “Sweetheart. She’s going to like whatever you get her.”

“Not necessarily. I have seen her toss many books aside with scoff and never pick them up again.”

“Okay, why?”

He shrugs. “Realism. She thinks some authors are ‘too indulgent’ or ‘too unrealistic.’”

“Alright, so maybe we leave out the crime and romance stuff,” you suggest, setting the few books he’d grabbed from those areas aside. “What does she like to do?”

Piotr goes quiet. His expression grows ashen as he contemplates the question. “I… don’t know.”

“Does she like to cook? Or draw? Or watch certain types of shows or movies?”

“I don’t know,” he repeats, more insistent. “She…” He sighs. “She never sits still. I don’t think any shows or movies interest her. When I was child, she always worked. On farm, taking care of animals, helping workers, making food, balancing accounts, translating letters and schoolwork… I never saw her rest. Do something for herself.”

You let out a soft snort. “Maybe a book on meditation.”

Piotr rolls his eyes, grinning. “Perhaps not.”

“Who does she like to be around, then?”

“Otets.” Piotr smiles when the answer comes easily. “She and my father” –he holds up two crossed fingers—“are like this. Aside from siblings and me, I think he is only person she is really close to.”

“Alright, maybe a cookbook, then. That’d give them something to do together.”

Piotr nods, then starts looking through the cookbooks he’d picked. “Question is, which one?”

“Well, we know she likes to stay busy and keep moving. Maybe something that’d challenge their skills? Something they haven’t tried?” You hold up a book boasting ‘rich and authentic Middle Eastern recipes.’ “This could be good. I think they’d have access to most of the ingredients, here in New York.”

He nods again, then sets the aforementioned book aside before checking over the other ones. “I think…” He lifts a hardcover thriller novel off the table. “She likes mysteries. This one has good reviews… maybe…”

You gently take the book from his hands and set it atop the Middle Eastern cookbook. “I think it’s a great choice.”

He smiles, then kisses your cheek. “Spasibo, myshka.”

 ***

 “Bozhe moi.”

You giggle as the two of you step over the threshold of the Yankee Candle store, only for Piotr to recoil and take a step back. “You good there, baby?”

He presses his fingers against the sides of his nose. “Is like… assault of smells.”

“I know.” You inhale deeply, them flash him an impish smile. “Isn’t it great?” 

Piotr groans, still rubbing his sinuses. “Do you mind—”

“I’ll find a candle for Illyana. Wanna meet up in Gamestop?”

“Spasibo, dorogoy.”

You blow him a kiss, then head into the candle store. You take a couple minutes to peruse the holiday display at the front of the store –and grab a couple votives for you and Piotr to enjoy—before heading towards the back of the store, where all the shelves of their regular candles are. You pause to smell your favorites –seriously, the McIntosh apple one never fails to make your mouth water—before taking a step back to survey your options. Alright, what to get for a mildly angsty, queer Russian goth?

It’s not as straightforward as it sounds (har har). Illyana’s an enigma, much like her mother. She’s quiet, keeps to herself, and doesn’t usually bother with convention.

Do I go for aesthetic? You pick up a pitch black candle labeled “Midnight Forest” and give it a cursory sniff. Ugh, smells like ass. No, thank you.

You also have to consider that whatever you get is likely going to be smelled by Kitty, too. As much as Illyana marches to the beat of her own drum, she’s surprisingly conscientious of her bubbly, energetic girlfriend.

Maybe something natural? Like the farm? You try a few options, wrinkling your nose after each sniff. God, what is it with the fresh scents and smelling heinous? You debate texting Piotr and dragging him back in here, if only so you’re certain you’ll get something Illyana would like—

And then it hits you over the head like a brick.

She’s gonna use these for meditation. You head down the rows of shelves, grab a jar labeled “Vanilla,” and give it a smell. Perfect. Not too strong, not too bland. You grab a lavender scented tumbler (for relaxation), then snag a pink one that smells like the perfume Kitty favors on a hunch it’ll be a hit.

By the time you pay for yours and Illyana’s candles, Piotr’s already waiting outside the Gamestop for you, bag in hand.

He eyes your bulging bags, eyebrow raising in trepidation. “Why…”

“Look, it’s your fault for abandoning me,” you say before he can point out your lack of self-control. “You know I’m weak for candles.”

Piotr snorts, then sighs. “Fair enough.” He nods and makes approving noises when you show him the picks you made for Illyana, then shows you what he grabbed for Mikhail.

“‘Mister Mosquito?’” You nearly double over laughing. “What even is this?”

“He wanted ‘weird video game,’” Piotr says, shrugging one shoulder. “I figure this should do.”

“He’s gonna love it,” you reassure your husband. “That’s weird as shit.” You start strolling along the main hall of the mall –and then your stomach rumbles. “Can we get pretzels?”

“Da, myshka,” Piotr chuckles, “we can get pretzels.”

 ***

 “There'll be parties for hosting/ marshmallows for toasting/ and caroling out in the snow/ there'll be scary ghost stories/ and tales of the glories of/ Christmases long, long ago…”

“It’s the most! Wonderful time! Of the year!” you sing along as you rip another chunk off your pretzel. You smile to yourself as you admire the glittering, twinkling decorations decking the food court. “How’s your pretzel?”

“Very tasty.” Piotr dips a bite of his pretzel in some mustard, pops it in his mouth, then swallows before wiping his fingers on a napkin. “I think we only have handful of stops left.”

“Couple of sweaters for your dad… weird socks and-or scarves for Mikhail…” You lean over, reading off the list in his hand (which is written in a mixture of Russian and English). You take another bite of pretzel, then tap on a portion of blended “Russi-nglish” that you can’t decipher. “What’s that?” you ask once your mouth is clear.

“Random gift options,” he translates. “For filling out presents, stockings, that sort of thing.” He touches the tip of his index finger to the page, moving down the list in order. “Chocolate, books, gift cards. Guaranteed hits, essentially.”

“Ooh, I could go for some chocolate.”

Piotr snorts. “You just had pretzel. And this is for others, myshka.”

“If it’s in the car with me, I make no promises.”

He laughs, then makes an extra note on his list. “Safety chocolate… for myshka. Got it.”

 ***

 “Here, dorogoy.”

“Oh, thank you!” You smile as Piotr takes some of the excess bags from your hands, shifting them so he can carry them (which, with his strength and the size of his hands, is no problem at all). You amble along next to him, admiring the various pop-up stands boasting games, calendars, and Christmas-themed treats. “Is there anywhere else we need to stop?”

“I believe we have everything.”

“And I’m guessing we need to head home so we can make dinner?”

“That would be best, da.” Piotr looks down at you, expression curious. “Why? There is somewhere you wish to stop?”

“Eh, not really,” you say with a shrug. “I just like coming to the mall during this time of year. The decorations, the music, the extra stands and seasonal gifts… It just makes me happy.”

“Aah, khorosho. I understand. We can come back later for date, if you like. Take time to walk around and admire stores.”

You grin up at him. “I’d like that.”

The two of you make to head out of the mall, back to the parking lot—

And then Piotr veers towards the right.

“Where are we going?” you ask, giggling as he leads you towards the bookstore. “I thought we already got everything we needed from here?”

He winks at you. “Trip is not complete yet. Not with hot chocolate, anyway.”

You grin and let him guide you over to the café in the bookstore.

Piotr gets you situated at a table near the expanse of windows at the front of the shop. He leaves your bags with you, then leads up at the counter to order your drinks.

You smile, lovestruck as you gaze over at him. How did I get so lucky? You lean back in your seat, taking a moment to admire the snow falling outside before checking out the decorations throughout the store…

Which is when you realize that there’s mistletoe hanging over your table.

You chuckle to yourself. Perfect.

“You are in good mood,” Piotr comments as he returns with two cups of hot chocolate.

“Of course, I am,” you admit with a broad grin. “I’ve got you. And tradition’s on our side.”

Piotr’s smile turns quizzical. He cocks his head to the side, staring at you for a moment, then looks up when you point towards the ceiling. “Ah,” he chuckles, “yes. That is good reason to be happy.”

“I couldn’t agree more.” You hook your finger under the collar of his shirt and gently tug him towards you. “Come here, handsome.”

He lets out a soft, happy giggle and bends down to kiss you.

[aclosetfan]

Aight here’s a 16teen-esque mall au for the ppg that I’ll never write, but enjoy thinking about and have heavily outlined (its long, so most is under the cut):

Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup aren’t related in this one, but you’d figure they were. Bubs/Buttercups are fraternal Twins (Mom/Dad=Keane/Prof)

Blossom’s mom is Ms. Bellum, who is dating Ms. Ima Goodwoman. Sedusa is actually a good woman in this lol, she just doesn’t vibe with blossom very well.

It also doesn’t help that Ima’s son, Butch, is now an even more permanent fixture in Blossom’s life. She had always thought school was enough. 

Later on in the story, Bellum and Ima get married and Butch&Bloss have to come to terms with being step siblings (they break up their parents and end up having to parent trap them back together)

This new relationship between Butch&Bloss works out perfectly for Brick because Brick’s bestfriends with Butch and also has a low-key crush on Bloss. They have English class together and while he very much has a goth persona that he can’t compromise (obviously) by a preppy girl like Bloss, he still enjoys fucking with her. Too bad she has that boyfriend :(

Wait what happened to the mall part?? Here we go: 

So, to preference, Bloss is a very smart young women. A real intellectual. Tons of smart extracurriculars. She’s definitely going places, but an Ivy League school costs money. So, she gets a job at the local mall in the bookstore. Bookstores in malls aren’t doing to hot financially and hers gets bought out. It’s going to be replaced by a more mainstream Barnes and Noble, but applications for employees don’t open up until after construction. She’s out a job and for some reason (maybe it’s her horribly inconsistent schedule) no one’s hiring her!! She’s worried about a gap in her resume, but her Mom ends up having the hookup. Turns out her mom’s boss (the mayor, who’s not the Mayor in this one) actually owns the lone hot dog (& pickle) stand in the mall, and it needs a new person to man it. 

(((This is a call back to when blossom, in the show, had to get a job at that hot dog stand 😂 she has to wear the same uniform with the stupid hat. )))

Her best costumer is actually Mayor, which perplexes Blossom because that can’t be a financially sound business move. His weird wisdom guides her.  

ANYWAY, she takes the job and finds out the stand (and the embarrassing uniform) is unfortunately located in front of. . .

. . .HOT TOPIC. 

Who works there??? Lol obviously Mr. Doom and Gloom himself--Brick!

So, Brick’s pretty much the manager there, right? Wrong, but he is a decent employee. He doesn’t actually need a job, but he’s a counterculture rebel, right?? And rebels go against their parents wishes, right?? And his dads (Mojo and Him) don’t want him working in a filthy mall because they’re rich and there’s better things to do. But he’s pretty anti-them so (🖕) he gets the job (Mojo also does not at all understand goth culture)

And then, because the gods favor him, not only does he end up getting to bug Bloss in English, but ALSO on his work breaks. He ends up eating more hotdogs then he ever thought he would in his life, but also, eventually, ends up becoming her study partner. Another fun and great thing for him is that as the story progresses he gets to watch her relationship with that-Jared-guy crumble right before his very eyes, which just adds fuel to his fantasy fire. 

So tbh this story actually really works out for Brick. He gets to spend time with the girl he secretly likes and has a decent shot at getting her to date him!! Blossom, on the other hand, suffers, but who’s there to help her through this suffering?

Well, obviously, Bubbles (and BC)! Bubbles works at Claire’s. She does well on the floor, but does not at all like piercing ears. She’s not good at it. She messes piercings up too frequently and blood freaks her out. Her coworker Mary often has to step up and do it for her. Still, she likes all the sparkly stuff in the store, so it’s generally a good fit. As of right now, Bubbles really just vibes in this story. Her biggest source of conflict is with Boomer, who works at the Spencer’s across from Claire’s.

Boomer is what Brick calls a shitty scene kid. He isn’t, Brick’s just mean, but Boomer rolls with it. Tbh he just likes dying his hair a shit ton of colors. He isn’t an ideal employee and is often found taking one too many breaks, but he’s charming and doesn’t make too many bad jokes about the dildos on display in the back, so they keep him around. He should honestly be on Claire’s payroll instead, because when Mary’s not available he’s the one who does the piercings (and the right way too, he might add, not with that fucked-up piercing gun) for Bubbles. And while that might make him seem like an overall helpful guy, do not be fooled. Bubbles always pays a price.

Boomer also has a shitty mom (femme fatale; she didn’t want a son), so his at-home life isn’t great, but he puts on a brave face. Brick and Butch essentially share custody of the boy. He has a room at each of their homes, which throws Blossom for a loop because not only does she have to share space with Butch later in the story, but also with Boomer (who she ends up tutoring). 

Speaking of Butch, he was fired from Spencer’s after Boomer got him a job there because he was “immature.” He was also fired from Hot Topic for basically the same reason. Then he landed a job at the Sporting Goods store, but again ended up getting fired (but this time it legitimately wasn’t his fault. His manager was just out to get him, as explained later) Now, he works for the malls arcade arena (they have go-karts and bumper cars; it’s one of those good arcades, ya feel?), so he runs a lot of kid’s bday parties. And to everyone’s surprise, he’s actually really good at it. Apparently, Butch really vibes with kids jacked up on sugar. Parents like him too because he flirts with the moms and pulls the dads into “friendly” but competitive go-kart racing betting pools. 

The person doing the actual hard labor at the arcade is Robin. She gets stuck in the chuck-e-cheese-like costume way too often. She’ a good voice of reason for everyone else, especially Butch. She’s his favorite co-worker.

Going back to the sporting goods store. Buttercup works there. She’s the best sales rep they got. It helps that she’s crazy athletic and is on track to get a pretty decent scholarship with some D1 schools. (What’s she play? Idk? Whatever your heart wants) She can’t say though that she’s the most popular amongst her coworkers. She got in a fight with Mitch, which also meant she got in a fight with the twins that follow Mitch around. She definitely didn't get along with Butch when he worked there. And she thinks her manager’s kind of creepy and he’s only gotten creepier since his partner Snake broke up with him

She doesn’t know why Snake broke up with Ace, but she’s pretty sure it has to do with Butch getting fired

Now, this one’s going to throw y’all for a loop, but the reason she gets in a fight with Mitch is because Mitch was picking on her boyfriend Elmer (THATS RIGHT IM SHAKING IT UP—but don’t worry 😏 I love the greens too much).

Elmer works at the comic/geek shop with Mike. She obviously likes her boyfriend and is big buds with Mike. Elmer’s pretty insecure tho and thinks BC’s going to break up with him all the time. This really bums her out. She doesn’t get why he thinks that (b/c she’s out of his league, but she’s oblivious) because she really likes him. Unfortunately, it gets to the point that she eventually decides she has to break up with him because she can’t convince him to trust her (still their relationship is cutesy side plot for a long bit). It’s her first big heartbreak. A heartbreak that is. . .

. . .ideal for Butch because he’s realized he has more then friendly feeling for her. See they weren’t friends AT ALL beforehand, but his new sibling relationship with Blossom has catapulted BC squarely into his life. Slowly they end up going from workplace enemies to eh to friendly to friends to (😉).

A significant turning point in their relationship happened to involve Ace. Butch was on his smoke break and saw Ace making Buttercup uncomfortable. That same night he sees Buttercup trying to leave and Ace/his gang are trying to pressure her into following them. Butch takes offense to this and ends up walking Buttercup to her car. She argues she doesn’t need him saving her, which he readily agrees to, but explains that any excuse to beat that creep Ace up is a good excuse. Afterward, anytime BC has to work close, Butch walks her to her car.

Eventually, he explains to her that he was the one who inadvertently convinced Snake to get out of their toxic-ass relationship with Ace. Ace found out and that’s why he was fired. So, now, he has real beef with the guy. Him and Ace don’t get along at all. To the point where Butch was banned from the sports store, but he sneaks in to see his friends and mess with BC. 

HAHA does the story ever end???? 

The story ends when Barnes n’ Noble opens. Blossom gets the job, ditches the old boring boyfriend, gets the goth boy, saves her mom’s relationship, and gains a sibling. 

The format of the story would be pretty episodic, with a conflict/resolution in each chapter. But what’s written above highlights the over arching plot lines

and holy shit! how could I forget the cherry on top??? Brick and Princess are cousins, and she does NOT let him forget this. 

((If you want more specific details ya gotta ask. there’s a lot more then just this.)) 

[stormears]

*spends $130 at Barnes and Noble

ANYWAY, my reading list right now!

Reading right now: "The Demon-haunted World" by astrophysicist Carl Sagan. Extremely applicable to the social media world of the 2010s, but written in 1996. A nonfiction book about various examples and reasons for which people more readily believe fantasy and pseudoscience than real science.

TO READ

1) nonfiction book about how American farms are being economically strangled and how this affects the food supply in the country and IS affected by similar circumstances around farms worldwide

2) nonfiction book about Alexander Von Humboldt, one of the first famous zoologists who wrote about how nature and animals do NOT exist for human/"divine" consumption or enjoyment, which was WACK in the mid 1800s

3) Dragon Legacy (I think?) fiction fantasy book about how there's a fantasy world where things are kinda going downhill, there's people that can bond with catlike companions (cool!) and a dragon under the earth that might wake and destroy the whole world, and there's some people who want to wake it up and cause the end of the world for NO reason

4) Book about a woman who lived in the harsh wilderness of Alaska, I think? For about 10 years. Focusing mainly on the beauty of the natural world she learned to appreciate while out there. Honest to god bought this as inspiration for a Haikyuu fanfic I barely started where Iwaizumi is mostly raised in the US and job-hops around the country and likes nature a lot. I want the nature loving perspective.

5) A beautiful looking vegan dessert cookbook which I plan to modify slightly to make keto recipes with. I could have waited a few days and saved $20 to get the book via Amazon but I DIDN'T, and later made chocolate peanut butter brownies based off a recipe from this book. They were pretty good!

This has been a "break time" post to distract me from this JJK fanfic I'm writing about a "custody battle" between Gojo and the Zenins for who gets to raise Megumi and Gojo basically informs them there will be no custody battle or he will kill them, lol.

[asheepbyanyothername]

Mid-Year Book Tag 2020

Tagged by @oblivionsdream This is like half book tag, half call out post, because I’ve only read 26 new books this year. I’ve been slacking. 

Best book you’ve read so far in 2020

“The Good Girl’s Guide to Murder” by Holly Jackson. It’s hard to go wrong with a good true crime novel. The only 5 star rating I’ve given this year, it seems.

Best sequel you’ve read so far in 2020

“The Secret Chapter” by Genevieve Cogman. I love the “Invisible Library” series, and every new book is such a delightful romp, with interesting worlds and colorful characters. Also, I’m a sucker for a good heist, so this was already geared for success in my eyes.

New release you haven’t read yet, but want to

“The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home” by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor. I bought the book already, but haven’t read it because I want to catch up with the “Welcome to Night Vale” podcast first.

Most anticipated release for the second half of the year

Toss-up between “The Devil and the Dark Water” by Stuart Turton (who wrote my favorite book of 2018) and “The Betrayals” by Bridget Collins (who wrote my favorite book of 2019).

Favorite New Author (debut or new to you)

F.C. Yee. I just read both “The Epic Crush of Genie Lo” and “The Iron Will of Genie Lo” this year, and I want more. The books were full of Chinese folklore, and they’re very…Wendy Wu, Homecoming Warrior in all the best ways. The romance didn’t even annoy me like so many YA romances do. I read them both so quickly, they were great. I know F.C. Yee also wrote “Avatar, The Last Airbender: The Rise of Kyoshi”, so I have that on my list for this year.

Biggest Disappointment

I already knew this book wasn’t really my cup of tea based on the summary, but “Loveboat, Taipei” by Abigail Hing Wen. Based on the author’s biography, which is crazy impressive, I thought the book would at least be well written enough for me to overlook the love triangles, high school mean girl antics, “studious daughter leaves strict parental supervision and goes off the rails” trope, and “my parents want me to be a doctor, but I just want to DANCE!”-ness of this book, but it wasn’t particularly well written either. I was disappointed, because it was a Barnes and Noble YA Book Club book (meaning I had to read it), and we’d had a pretty good track record with the recent books, but this was a step back down. These characters, man.

Biggest Surprise

“Stepsister” by Jennifer Donnelly. I had the ARC of this book for so long, and never got around to it until this year, and man, am I glad I grabbed it. It was so good. I’ve come to realize that I’m really into whatever you would call a “modern reworking of fairy tales” genre. 

Book that made you happy:

“The House in the Cerulean Sea”, by TJ Klune. Magical children, found families, cute romance, and a whimsical book that’s aimed at adults. It covers some pretty heavy topics, but never feels like a heavy book. What’s not to like?

Newest Fictional Crush/Newest Favorite Character:

I’m about to embarrass myself, but like. Either Kevin Day (Queen of Exy) from Nora Sakavic’s “All for the Game” series, or Daniel Arlington (gentleman and scholar) from Leigh Bardugo’s “Ninth House”. I will not be taking questions at this time.

Book that made you cry

I don’t really cry over books like that. I guess the book that had the most moving (?) moment for me so far was “Shadow School: Archimancy” by J.A. White.

Favorite book to film adaptation you saw this year:

I have only watched one film adaptation this year, it was Artemis Fowl, and wow, let’s not talk about it.

Most beautiful book you’ve bought or received this year

“The Lost Future of Pepperharrow” by Natasha Pulley. Literally the reason I got into this series at all was because the cover caught my eye.

Book you need to read by the end of the year

“Kafka on the Shore” by Murakami Haruki. I’ve had a copy for years, and never read it, despite Murakami being one of my favorite authors. So that needs to get read this year.

Tagging: @chdmm, because I don’t know who else to tag

[mllemaenad]

'Imagine your children growing up in such a world. If a mage asked it of you, you would have to give him your daughter, not knowing what his plans for her might be. You could not resist him, and neither could she.' - Sorry, this line particularly came to my attention because take away magic and this? Is exactly what happens in the Tabris origin. And to that one Orlesian merchant in Denerim in DA:O. And probably to any number of peasant/elven girls at the hands of nobles every day across Thedas.

No need to be sorry. :)

You’re right. Absolutely.

The thing is – take this in context. This is an answer written by a grand cleric to a nobleman who seems (we don’t have his side of the conversation, obviously, so we can only infer from the substance of the reply) to have been challenging the Chantry’s treatment of mages. If you look at it like that, then what the grand cleric is describing is what happens to almost every mage child in southern Thedas.

Armed men come to your door and take your child away. You have no right to say no. And you have no idea what they’re going to do with them. They may take your child to a Circle across the sea. They may murder them. They may make them Tranquil. They may rape them, beat them, torture them. Maybe you’ll be lucky: maybe your kid is Vivienne or one of the Warden mages. Maybe they’ll do okay.

But you don’t know. And you can’t tell the Templars to go away; that they can’t have your child. They live in a world where this happens to parents every day.

It’s almost too much to imagine. The Circle, the Templars, they’ve shaped my life. I was no more than twelve when they came for me. My mother wept when they fixed the chains to my wrists, but my father was glad to see me gone. He had been afraid, ever since the fire in the barn. Not just afraid of what I could do, but afraid of me, afraid my magic was punishment for whatever petty sins he imagined the Maker sat in judgement upon.

– Anders (short story)

Anders’s mum couldn’t say no. Maybe she wanted to. At bare minimum, it sounds as though she didn’t want to lose her son forever. But that’s what happened. Little Ella is desperate to get back to her parents, because the Templars didn’t even tell them where they were taking her – and when we encounter her, a Templar is threatening her with Tranquillity and strongly implied sexual assault.

Wynne gave birth to a healthy baby boy, whom she was allowed one day with before he was taken into Chantry custody. The child, who was names Rhys, was taken to Lydes and from there transferred to the White Spire in Orlais when it was discovered that he, too, was a mage.

– World of Thedas I

They kidnapped a newborn baby and took him to a different damn country. It took decades, and fighting an archdemon, for Wynne to even get the chance to find him again.

Dulci de Launcet was lucky: she’s a noble, so she at least had letters and some general idea of where her kid was, but she hadn’t laid eyes on her son since he was six.

Yeah. Good fucking job, Chantry. You really solved the problem of powerful people coming to your door to abduct your children.

But while, yes, given the context of the letter I think the irony is best understood in relation to mages, I definitely think it can be expanded upon:

The demon had impersonated the human man who had bought her from the slavers that took her in after her father died. She’d had no idea back then who those kind men really were, only that they offered her food and a warm bed to sleep in. Then an even kinder man came to take her from them, and she found herself in his luxurious home and thought herself the luckiest girl in the entire alienage.

How very naive she had been. Count Dorian, as she learned her new master’s name to be, had been in search of an elven whore he could keep as a pet, something he could put in a pretty dress and bring with him on one of his many trips to the capital, like baggage.

– Dragon Age: The Calling

Ah, look. The exact scenario Grand Cleric Francesca was fear-mongering about. A little girl abducted, enslaved and sold to a nobleman who abused and tortured her. Yes, a mage-child as it happens, but that wasn’t apparent at the time. Fiona was vulnerable because she was an elf – an orphaned elf considered expendable by society.

“What they wish is irrelevant.” Celene turned and stalked away from the window. “I am already fighting a war on two fronts. I cannot be seen to fight a war on three.”

“Then don’t.” Briala rose, putting herself in Celene’s path. “Give them justice.”

“A lord for the death of an elf? I … damn this thing.”

With a quick jerk, Celene tore her mask from her face. Her face was flushed beneath, her eyes red from another night of little sleep. “Shall I declare the elves equal citizens before the Maker and the throne as well, while I’m at it?”

“Why not?” Briala took her own mask off, stealing a quick moment to steady herself. “Unless you don’t believe that, and I’m just a jumped-up kitchen slut you haven’t tired of yet.

– Dragon Age: The Masked Empire

Or here: a revolt that ends in genocide, and that begins because it is unthinkable that they arrest a nobleman for murdering an elf. The victim’s name was Lemet. He was killed shielding an eight-year-old boy who threw a rock at a carriage. And the boy said he did it because his mother had been murdered by Orlesian nobility:

“They killed my mother,” the boy said, pulling against Lemet’s grip.

“Be quiet.” Lemet looked back at the coach and heard its joints creak as the guards jumped down to the street. The driver would want to have that oiled, some part of Lemet’s mind noted.

“They can’t come down this street after what they did to her,” the boy insisted. “They can’t!”

– Dragon Age: The Masked Empire

Or this, where soldiers rob, rape and murder their own citizens in the midst of a civil war:

“Two days ago, Lady Seryl’s men rode in and cur down every man and woman working the fields. Killed our guards, killed everyone in the village square. When they finished killing the other soldiers, they fired arrows out onto the water, killed most of our boys in the boats. They took all the food they could find. They spent the night.” A collective flinch splashed across the crowd. “Said we had been assisting enemies of the throne, that this was a lesson to anyone who’d help Gaspard’s men.” At the last, his voice broke. “My lord, I don’t even know who Gaspard is.”

– Dragon Age: The Masked Empire

Or the serial killer who is repeatedly allowed to walk free because he’s a magistrate’s son, and he targets elven children. Or the elven boys who fled to the Qun because a guard raped their sister – no one would arrest him, so they took matters into their own hands.

And yes, of course, you see the exact same thing in Ferelden in the alienage.

I’m sure everyone feels so much safer now they’ve locked up all the mages.

Orlais’s crimes don’t excuse Tevinter’s. That’s where they went wrong with Dorian’s … painful dialogue on slavery. You can’t point to the horrors of Orlesian society and therefore suggest that the Tevinter slave trade is not that awful. It doesn’t work like that. What you can do, though, is say that Tevinter’s crimes don’t excuse Orlais’s – particularly when they tend to do exactly the same shit:

Slavery still thrives in Thedas, even if the trade has been outlawed. Who hasn’t heard the tales of poverty-stricken elves lured into ships by the prospect of well-paying jobs in Antiva, only to find themselves clapped in leg-irons once at sea? And humans fall prey to this, too.

If they’re lucky, they end up in Orlais, which has only “servants.” Most nobles treat them decently because they are afraid of admitting the truth. Orlesians go to great lengths to maintain the fiction that slavery is illegal.

Of course, the greatest consumer of slave labor is the Tevinter Imperium, which would surely crumble if not for the endless supply of slaves from all over the continent. There, they are meat, chattel. They are beaten, used as fodder in the endless war against the Qunari, and even serve as components in dark magic rituals.

—From Black City, Black Divine: A Study of the Tevinter Imperium, by Sister Petrine, Chantry scholar

– Slavery in the Tevinter Imperium

Fiona is not an anomaly: Orlais kidnaps and sells people into slavery, too.

And this makes sense. Fantasy always draws on the real world, even if they mix and match the cultures and historical periods a bit. So, just like in the real world, you generally have to take anything the wealthy and powerful say with a grain of salt.

The Chantry has a very specific, empire building, agenda. It makes much of problems that aren’t really problems (demons and abominations are not widespread threats, and both are poorly understood); it pins the blame for actual crises on oppressed groups (the Blight is in no way the fault of this random peasant mage from Antiva); it uses racism and religious intolerance to create in- and out-groups (elves [and dwarves, but we haven’t conquered them yet] are degenerate heathens who are preventing the Maker from returning).

As much as I love Dragon Age, what Bioware does sometimes that is … uncomfortable … to use a mild word, is that it lets the powerful rule the narrative. Inquisition is worst at this, because it presents strong voices for people like Cassandra and Cullen, who stick fairly close to the party line. And then it takes characters like Varric and Sera, and distances them from their own cultures … which is fine for individuals but awkward when we’re not letting Briala or Fiona say much either – and where the fuck is Sigrun? No one’s spoken for Orzammar’s casteless since Awakening. But it’s there, to some extent, in all the games.

So the point, always, is that mages and Circles are misdirection. Mages are scapegoats in the Chantry faith who are held responsible for all the bad things, and represent a pretend evil nobility that the Orlesian Chantry is keeping under control.

But the actual problems of this fantasy world are more or less the same as the problems of the real world: powerful nations dominate the continent and force others to bow to their whims and adopt their culture, because empires are just shit; the rich and powerful hoard all the rights to themselves, and can do damn near anything to the poor – particularly where the poor are part of a marginalised group.

What Orlais doesn’t want people to realise is that they are Tevinter. It was never the mages that were the problem, it was the absolute power the Tevinter magisters held over their slaves – a power now held mostly by the Orlesian nobility, who use it in pretty much the same way. Not exclusively, no: of course the nobility of other nations can be, and bloody are, evil fucks. But even there, the Chantry view helps to obscure the truth: you should be scared of empires and those who rule them. Much more scared than you are of a possessed mage.

[otomeshistarlight-blog]

I completely understand the fact that you want your content to be seen by potential readers, and while you aren't targeting minors, your still allowing your nsfw content to be open to them. Yes they can take responsibility and just not go to your blog or even block you but they're minors who don't know any better. You should be more concerned with using a function on this website that was made for creators as yourself to protect minors, than losing maybe a handful of viewers who are not minors.

No, no, no. Thats not how this works. I’m not going to put my content behind three firewalls and hand out passwords only after everyone sends me a picture of their ID to prove their age (which minors can still side step, but I digress) just to ‘protect’ underage people from nsfw content. I use the appropriate tags when I post my work. If you look at my AO3, almost every single fic has an explicit rating for good reason. When I post a link to those fics on Tumblr, I tag them as nsfw. I make it quite clear, every chance I get, that I post/write about sexual content in graphic detail. If a minor chooses to ignore those warnings thats on them. 

Why? 

Let me tell you a story. My mom used to take me shopping with her at thrift stores. I’m a huge nerd so I inevitably found myself in the used book sections every single time. When I was probably 13, I read my first harlequin romance novel. Hell, there was one time I bought a regular old fiction novel (not harlequin) and halfway through it suddenly (and without warning) featured a woman having sex with a dog, much to my absolute horror. Is that poor parenting on my mothers part? Absolutely not because I can walk into a Walmart or a Barnes and Noble and buy that exact same novel, brand new, without getting carded. Trust me. I’ve done it before. The point is, the content is out there and if a minor wants to read it, they’re going to. They’ll find ways to sidestep any sort of precautions you put into place because sexual curiosity and urges are normal - EVEN for a teenager - and they don’t need to be ‘protected’ from the big scary boogeyman that is sexuality. If they’re not ready for it, they wont seek out that sort of content. Period. 

It would be another matter altogether if I were posting my nudes left and right for everyone with a Tumblr account to see but I’m not. I’m posting written fiction with appropriate tags to scare off any minors, but if they happen to read it anyway then that is not my problem. 

If you had told 14 year old me that I needed to be protected from reading sexual fanfiction of all fucking things, I would’ve spit in your face. 

[camcampalooty]

Girls Made of Snow and Glass by Melissa Bashardoust *4/5*

At sixteen, Mina's mother is dead, her magician father is vicious, and her silent heart has never beat with love for anyone—has never beat at all, in fact, but she’d always thought that fact normal. She never guessed that her father cut out her heart and replaced it with one of glass. When she moves to Whitespring Castle and sees its king for the first time, Mina forms a plan: win the king’s heart with her beauty, become queen, and finally know love. The only catch is that she’ll have to become a stepmother. Fifteen-year-old Lynet looks just like her late mother, and one day she discovers why: a magician created her out of snow in the dead queen’s image, at her father’s order. But despite being the dead queen made flesh, Lynet would rather be like her fierce and regal stepmother, Mina. She gets her wish when her father makes Lynet queen of the southern territories, displacing Mina. Now Mina is starting to look at Lynet with something like hatred, and Lynet must decide what to do—and who to be—to win back the only mother she’s ever known…or else defeat her once and for all.

I’ve read more than 100 books and I haven’t come across many filled with as much female power as this. This is a story of love, exploration, femininity, sense of self, and so much more. When I got down to the last 100 pages, I couldn’t put it down, just needing to know how it all turns out.

I went in expecting the traditional story of kings and queens (royalties and kingdoms being a favorite read of mine), but I came out with so much more. Lynet, a young girl living in a world where she is expected to be delicate and obedient, is anxious to scale walls, climb trees, and run freely with her future in her own hands. Mina, a young woman told by her father, “if they love you for anything, it will be for your beauty”, struggles to figure out what love is and whether or not she is capable of it.

“Weak or strong - she didn’t know what they meant anymore. Maybe they didn’t mean the same thing for everyone.” 

Girls Made of Snow and Glass was not only intriguing and inviting, but also therapeutic. It made me think about female roles and my own expectations as a woman. It also pulled me into a world of magic and power and helped me see common issues from a new perspective of strength and perseverance. Melissa Bashardoust tells a very well written narrative that I believe all women should be introduced to early in life. I highly recommend this book for all young women, as well as lovers of the fantasy-fiction genre. It gives you magic, power struggles, friendship, and just a sip of romance. 

I bought my copy of this story from Book Outlet (hardcover) for $6.99

You can also find this book on Amazon and Barnes & Nobles

[annarellix]

The Madness of Mercury by Connie di Marco (Zodiac Mystery #1)

My Review (5*):

I want to start with a confession: I bought this book three years ago and I remember I love it but, being a book hoarder, I usually forgot the titles and thought it was a new one in this series.

I was really happy that a new instalment has been added to this series because I love Julia Bonetti and I love this series.

It was a pleasure to re-read it and this are my thought about the story.

This is a well written, action packed and fast paced cozy mystery that kept me on the edge till the end.

Julia is an unusual heroine for the cozy world: she’s a professional astrologer and quite a kick ass heroine, a strong woman who doesn’t crack under pressure and is able to face the harassment and react.

The cast of characters is well thought and lovely. They are fleshed out and relatable, I would be happy to meet them in real life.

The plot is tightly knitted and full of twists and turns. Even if I supposed that Julia was able to overcome her enemies there’s a big surprise at the end and I didn’t see it coming.

I can’t wait to read a new instalment in this series and I hope it will be out soon. It’s an excellent cozy series and I love the unusual setting and the great cast of characters.

A gripping and highly entertaining story, it’s strongly recommended.

Many thanks to Connie di Marco, Partners in Crime for this ARC, all opinions are mine

Book Description:

San Francisco astrologer Julia Bonatti’s life is turned upside down when she becomes a target of the Reverend Roy of the Prophet’s Tabernacle. 

The Reverend, a recently-arrived cult preacher, is determined to drive sin from the city, but his gospel of love and compassion doesn’t extend to those he considers an “abomination unto the Lord.” Julia’s outspoken advice in her newspaper column, AskZodia, has put her at the top of the Reverend’s list. 

While the powerful Mercury-ruled preacher woos local dignitaries, his Army of the Prophet will stop at nothing to silence not just Julia, but anyone who stands in his way.

Driven out of her apartment in the midst of a disastrous Mercury retrograde period, she takes shelter with a client who’s caring for two elderly aunts. One aunt appears stricken with dementia and the other has fallen under the spell of the Reverend Roy. 

To add to the confusion, a young man claiming to be a long-lost nephew arrives. The longer he stays, the more dangerous things become. One aunt slides deeper into psychosis while the other disappears. Is this young man truly a member of the family? Can astrology confirm that? 

Julia’s not sure, but one thing she does know is that Mercury wasn’t merely the messenger of the gods – he was a trickster and a liar as well.

Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads

The author:

Connie di Marco is the author of the Zodiac Mysteries featuring San Francisco astrologer Julia Bonatti. The Madness of Mercury, the first book in the series will be re-released in October 2020.

Writing as Connie Archer, she is also the author of the national bestselling Soup Lover’s Mysteries from Berkley Prime Crime. You can find her excerpts and recipes in The Cozy Cookbook and The Mystery Writers of America Cookbook. Connie is a member of Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers and Sisters in Crime.

Catch Up With Connie di Marco: ConniediMarco.com, Goodreads, BookBub, Twitter, & Facebook!

Get More Great Reads at Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours

[emilyplumer-blog]

Choosing My Book

Starting my book search, I had no idea what I wanted to read. I’m not very picky on what I like to read as long as it has a good story which most books have, so I didn’t know how to narrow my search. I have liked all the books we have read so far for class, so at first I tried to look up books similar to those titles, however without actually holding the book in my hand, I was stuck on what I would actually like. So I went to Barnes and Noble to check out their books, and I still couldn’t find anything. I went up to customer service desk and I told the woman, “I need a fictional book that was talked a lot about by literary critics and scholars and has a story that I would enjoy. Ohh and I also would prefer it to not have a old white guy as the author” She laughed at that, and directed me around the store and gave me a pile of books. They included: The Color Purple by Alice walker Beloved by Toni Morrison The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison The Joy Luck Club by Amy tan The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros I took the stack and looked up their plots and the literary criticism written on them, and they all had pros and cons. Out of all the books the ones that seemed most interesting and had good criticism was The Bluest Eye and The Color Purple. I couldn’t decide between the two, but both are about African American females being mistreated in the mid 1900’s. I liked both, so I bought both to read, but I don’t know which I will use for my project. My next step in to narrow it down between the two.