#i highly recommend reading this book

[tapeworrmart]

"The scars formed a mould waiting for my fingers"

[aroaceleovaldez]

tbh my latest biggest theory for why HoO and onwards is such a dramatic drop in quality and consistency is just. Rick stopped making teaching guides.

Like, the Lightning Thief teacher's guide is SUPER in-depth with even stuff like sources about middle grade child psychology and exact specifications of where he's applying that, explaining what different character's goals/motivations are, their dynamics with each other and their environments, etc etc. Even specifying which specific myths certain plot elements are supposed to reference or be about.

That stuff just doesn't exist for later books. There's activity guides and smaller, significantly more simple teacher guides for later books but they don't go into anywhere NEAR the same level of depth. The TLT one is a full lesson plan that breaks down the book at every level and explains what's going on and more or less why Rick did that. The others are all basically just glossaries of terminology and some simple question guides.

And they didn't even use the TLT teacher's guide for the Disney+ show because they clearly aren't adhering to any of what's discussed in that breakdown of the book.

By creating a teaching guide alongside writing the actual book, that's forcing you to document what you're doing, why, your sources, and information about your characters and the story they're in. It's like an even more in-depth version of a series bible. But that's lacking for later books (and etc) and it shows because that level of thought and depth and attention just isn't there anymore.

[secretlyofthefeywild]

love when i read a book and then i hear/read an interview w the author and they mention being on tumblr, bc it's just like. yea, you wrote a book abt a gay latino trans boy falling in love w a ghost. ofc you're on tumblr

[entropyvoid]

Golden Hour (+ lineart below cut)

I took a picture of the lines for once and did some basic crappy photo editing on my phone, so you could probably print this out and use it as a coloring page or something if you so wish lol. Do with it what you will.

[kat-rose-griffith]

“He smiled. This was a permanent madness. And he couldn’t have been more pleased”

- Colin Bridgerton about how he feels just being in Penelope Featheringtons presence, Romancing Mister Bridgerton pg 282

I am SCREAMING

“She would keep him on his toes, this woman”

- Colin Bridgerton thinking about how hot Penelope Featherington is, Romancing Mister Bridgerton pg 283

The screams that I have scrumpt

“Do I look a mess?” She asked. He nodded. “But you’re my mess,” he whispered. And he was very glad for that.

- Romancing Mister Bridgerton pg 288

And he was very glad for that. And he was very glad for that. And he was very glad for that. I’m on the ground!!!

[deer-watcher]

"For both bonobos and chimpanzees, the bodies of the dead evoke many emotions. Even if the process often begins with trauma and confusion, typically corpses shift to a liminal status; not alive, but equally not a lump of meat. They're more intensively manipulated than hunted animals, and carried for longer. In some – if not all – cases, the eaters must know what and who they're consuming. Cannibalism is very probably a powerful means by which individuals and groups process the impact not only of killings carried out on emotional impulses, but other deaths too. In other words, it's about grieving. [...] "Shift these scenarios to Neanderthals, and add into the mix their far greater cognitive sophistication, and lives that revolved around using lithics. Suddenly it's not difficult to envision how skills in carefully taking apart hunted carcasses might be transposed into a grieving process that involved butchery and cannibalism as acts of intimacy, not violation."

Rebecca Wragg Sykes, Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art

[twig-tea]

Love in the Big City TV Series Episodes 3 & 4: Found Family

[Thank you again to @lurkingshan for organizing and to @bengiyo for the discussion questions in this week's discussion post ]

I talked in my non-book-club post on this section about the t-aras at the hospital after Yeong's suicide attempt moved me. A lot of us have reflected on the t-aras and how their presence in this part of the novel changes the feeling. For me, their presence really complicates my emotions. I love that they are here, and here for Yeong, especially after his suicide, but also through his confusion about Yeong Su. And at the hospital, I love how they function as a foil to his mother in that moment. When people ask about found family vs family, this scene will come to mind in future. Family is who you are raised with who have a legal obligation as well as legal privileges. Found family are those who do not have those legal privileges or obligations but who have chosen to care about and be there for us without them in place. That glass holding the t-aras back, and the t-aras being the ones who make Yeong cry, is what made me cry.

Yeong’s mother in both versions of this story tells him not to be in such a rush to die, which is such an excellent line for her. It accomplishes so much in so little; it could be interpreted as “I'm dying of cancer and fighting so hard to live, and you're trying to die? How dare you” while also saying “I don't want you to die” and even “don't worry, whatever is so hard will not last forever”. But in the adaptation, the impact of the t-aras being there right after she said that line made it so that it also felt like a reminder that he has good things and good people in his life who do love him. And that's why my emotions are so mixed up and complex about their presence, because while the t-aras being here in parts 1 and 2 make Yeong feel less alone than Young felt in the novel, it wrecks me that Yeong still clearly feels that loneliness in spite of their presence. That is so real, and so painful a truth, that the presence of people who love you are not enough to make you not feel so lonely and miserable that you want to die. When I read the novel, the later sections revealing these friendships made me feel the impact of that loneliness later, removed from the moment, but in the series I got it in real-time (even as their presence made seeing the moment play out a little easier to bear; because in the novel we had the benefit of Young's wry hindsight to aid in emotional distance).

I was also thinking about how, in this adaptation of the scene, we see Yeong's mother clock the t-aras in the hospital, and how it feels like they performed the function that Yeong wanted Yeong Su to perform in his attempt to make Yeong Su and his mother meet: they demonstrated that as a gay man, Yeong has people who love him and who are good for him in his life. I would like to think that it's their presence in the series that softens Yeong’s mother to Yeong’s queerness to the point where she kept the polaroid of Yeong and Yeong Su when she found it and let him see it in the binder of her clippings of articles about him; as though it's something she can't engage with or talk to him about but can now tacitly acknowledge. In the book, that polaroid is left out intentionally for Young to find as (at least as he interpreted it) a punishment and a warning. In the series, it felt like the closest thing to acceptance she could offer while saving face: putting that photo of him and Yeong Su in this binder of positive articles about his writing (which is all about his life as a queer man) feels like an acknowledgement that other people can love this part of him that she can't.

I've been dragging my heels on writing this because I'm not ready for Part 3. Holding all of your hands as we all dive in to getting emotionally wrecked this week!

[the-oc-king]

Here have some Dwarf doodles, because they're so damn cute and there's not enough love for them around here

[garlandedspirits]

love it when I read 18th century chinese collections about the supernatural and the author just slaps some of the most timeless and profound sentences ever written in my face

[melisusthewee]

Rafael Federman as Eduardo Strauch in La Sociedad de la Nieve/Society of the Snow (2023)

requested by Anon

[gingermintpepper]

hi, i haven't read the iliad and the odyssey but want to - do u have a specific translation you recommend? the emily wilson one has been going around bc, y'know, first female translator of the iliad and odyssey into english, but i was wondering on if you had Thoughts

Hi anon! Sorry for the somewhat late response and I'm glad you trust me with recommendations! Full, disclosure, I am somewhat of a traditionalist when it comes to translations of the source text of the Iliad + Odyssey combo wombo, which means I tend to prefer closeness in literal verbiage over interpretation of the poetic form of these epics - for that reason, my personal preferred versions of the Odyssey and Iliad both are Robert Fitzgerald's. Because both of these translations (and his Aeneid!) were done some 50+ years ago (63 for his original Odyssey tl, 50 flat for his Iliad and 40 for his Aeneid) the English itself can be a bit difficult to read and the syntax can get confusing in a lot of places, so despite my personal preferences, I wouldn't recommend it for someone who is looking to experience the Iliad + Odyssey for the very first time.

For an absolute beginner, someone who has tried to read one or both of these epics but couldn't get into it or someone who has a lot of difficulty with concentrating on poetry or long, winding bits of prose, I fully and wholeheartedly recommend Wilson's translation! See, the genius of Emily Wilson's Iliad + Odyssey isn't that she's a woman who's translated these classics, it's that she's a poet who's adapted the greek traditional poetic form of dactylic hexameter into the english traditional poetic form of iambic pentameter. That alone goes a very very long way to making these poems feel more digestible and approachable - iambic pentameter is simply extremely comfortable and natural for native english speakers' brains and the general briskness of her verbiage helps a lot in getting through a lot of the problem books that people usually drop the Iliad or Odyssey in like Book 2 of the Iliad or Book 4 of the Odyssey. I think it's a wonderful starting point that allows people to familiarise themselves with the source text before deciding if they want to dig deeper - personally, researching Wilson's translation choices alone is a massive rabbit hole that is worth getting into LOL.

The happy medium between Fitzgerald's somewhat archaic but precise syntax and Wilson's comfortable meter but occasionally less detailled account is Robert Fagles' Iliad + Odyssey. Now, full disclosure, I detest how Fagles handles epithets in both of his versions, I think they're far too subtle which is something he himself has talked at length about in his translation notes, but for everything else - I'd consider his translations the most well rounded of english adaptations of this text in recent memory. They're accurate but written in plain English, they're descriptive and detailled without sacrificing a comfortable meter and, perhaps most importantly, they're very accessible for native english speaking audiences to approach and interact with. I've annotated my Fagles' volumes of these books to heaven and back because I'm deeply interested in a lot of the translation decisions made, but I also have to specifically compliment his ability to capture nuance in the characters' of these poems in a way I don't often see. He managed to adapt the ambivalence of ancient greek morality in a way I scarcely see and that probably has a hand in why I keep coming back to his translations.

Now, I know this wasn't much of a direct recommendation but as I do not know you personally, dear anon, I can't much make a direct recommendation to a version that would best appeal to your style of reading. Ideally, I'd recommend that you read and enjoy all three! But, presuming that you are a normal person, I suggest picking which one is most applicable for you. I hope this helps! 🥰

[sketch-wolf]

day 29 of bat-a-day is brought to you by hey wait, that's not a creature!

that's right! it's Giovanni Potage's Soul Slugger Doom Bat! >:D

[agentnatesewell]

the maiden lane historical romance series was written in 1730s london?? oh my nate and suri historical romance plans are so back!!

[heavenlyyshecomes]

can you recommend me some books? i'm looking for something gentle and hopeful without being saccharine? i just can't bear to read anything dark right now

sure !!

ms ice sandwich, mieko kawakami tr. louise heal kawai

the summer book, tove jansson tr. thomas teal

the order of the pure moon reflected in water, zen cho

concerning the book that is the body of the beloved, gregory orr

tweet cute, emma lord (this is like the one romance novel I've read so adding it)

a month in siena, hisham matar

still life with oysters and lemon, mark doty

goodbye tsugumi, banana yoshimoto tr. michael emmerich

schoolgirl, osamu dazai tr. allison markin powell

the rest are from my tbr:

summer of salt, katrina leno

meet me at the museum, anne youngson

the liar's dictionary, eley williams

also check out my book recs + ref tags for better recs!!

[cheriekos]

reading golden age Batman and I am sharing bits that I simply cannot stop thinking about

first of all he looks like this:

Batmobile looked like THIS:

They constantly refer to him as a “weird” which makes me giggle a bit

got a fiancée that wasn’t mentioned again except for like one issue after this I salute you ms Julie

Batplane’s disguising mechanism………and the fact it works

And like. Don’t know when the don’t kill code came into play but all I know for certain is that it did not exist within the first few issues of his appearance 💀

(Granted that last one is a vampire. Literally like the sixth issue or something had werewolves and vampires in it…..crazy)

and these don’t include all the endings where he leaps from some runaway vehicle or narrowly escapes a confrontation with the villain of the week in which they just happen to fall to their demise or find their death and Batman gets away unscathed. eating every bit of this up. My new favorite bedtime stories thank u for coming to my show and tell

[umbralsong]

I'm rewatching this mainly to study the components adapted by D&D regarding the Meereen plot with the slavers.

Dany was necessarily aged up, they adapted the Dothraki to be somehow more orientalist and racist than the books (no word for "thank you?" gtfo), and completely neglected Dany's own relationship with being enslaved. Even the most crucial aspects of her early abuse are hand-waved, even when there is a literal in-text comparison to Dany and Khal Drogo's enslaved people wearing golden collars.

GRRM famously wondered what made Aragorn a "good" king, and wondered about his tax policy. Here, he adapts it by having Dany's freed advisor, Missandei of Nath, tactically hit the slavers where it hurts - taxes. People can sell themselves into services, but former enslavers can't sell those they used to own, and husbands cannot sell wives. However morally dubious, these policies have a chilling effect on the trade. There are many unhappy components to Dany's compromise with slavers, but it is my opinion that GRRM is demonstrating the limits of compromise with people who don't believe in the humanity of others.

My research means there is a lot I can go into (like the inherent racism of the whole plot), but I feel the most crucial is the fact D&D, Confederate sympathizers that they are, distilled Hizdar's character to Brown Face to pretend that Dany is a white settler colonizer Just As Bad as the slavers for taking away their sacred fighting right of watching poor people butcher each other and laughing as helpless people are eaten by lions :(((