#or How We Found the Bishop’s Bird Stump at Last

[reloha]

There is something like this in the Oxford Time Travel series by Connie Willis.

tv shows with time travel organizations/bureaus/police/agencies/whatever should have a department with instead of a tech genius eating candy, it’s a harried seamstress or fashion designer who is like

“1450 italy? does it look like I have the time to dye you wool? nO. YOU’RE GOING TO THE 1980s”

and throws shoulder pads at the hapless time agent

[bookgeekgrrl]

My media this week (3-9 Jul 2022)

📚 STUFF I READ 📚

🥰 The Way I Feel For You (Becassine) - 77K, Stucky, omegaverse fake-dating - reread, forever fave, has every yummy thing I love about these tropes

😊 Cards On The Table (Agatha Christie, author; Hugh Fraser, narrator) - would genuinely love to know if the line in ABC Murders sparked this or if AC already had it planned and slipped that line in as a clever easter egg; love this one for bringing so many of her 'slueuths' together, just like I loved it when HP worked with Mr. Satterthwaite

😊 The Company You Keep (orbingarrow) - post-WS canon divergent, background stucky but really very Bruce focused, really enjoyed these characterizations and seeing Bruce front & center

🥰 Paradise Lost & Found (Jennifer Knightley) - delightful contemp romance set in a tropical wedding resort with a jilted groom & a rebound fling that (obvs) develops feelings.

🥰 To Say Nothing of the Dog: Or How We Found the Bishop's Bird Stump at Last (Oxford Time Travel #2) (Connie Willis, author; Stephen Crossley, narrator) - it's been 20 yrs since I read this; a mash up of the vibes of Victorian comic literature, '30s golden age detective fiction and PG Wodehouse into a delightful time travel adventure romp. It does feel a little dated in some of the characterizations, but sadly kotowing to the narcissistic, abusive, imperious, unreasonable, reality-denying billionaire on the off chance she might donate some money and everyone pretending her behavior is 'whimsical' and 'hilarious' and not absolutely toxic feels unfortunately super fucking contemporary (but shout out to naming her Lady Shrapnell - absolute *chef's kiss* to that Wilde allusion)

🥰 Read, White & Blue (JJK) - 99K, shrunkyclunks - canon divergent newly defrosted Steve and librarian Bucky; loved it!

💖💖 +69K of shorter fic so shout out to these I really loved 💖💖

two more in the fantastic Differently Okay Local Idiots series by One-EyedBossman (desert000rose) & SecretFandomStories, which has no-powers vets Steve & Bucky figuring out how their jagged edges fit together in a D/s relationship: Part 6: Charlie Foxtrot (16K) and Part 7: De Oppresso Liber (12K)

put out this fire (burning in my soul) (liloau, thatsmysecret) - MCU: Stucky, 19K - reunited childhood friends with firefighter Steve, a cat up a tree and a DELIGHTFUL Winnifred Barnes (the audio prompt for this was fucking hilarious and the fic absolutely did it justice)

Lesson One: La Petite Mort (AidaRonan) - OFMD: BlackBonnet, 3K - after an offscreen reunion & reconciliation, Stede and Ed come together

Take Your Time Coming Home (odetteandodile) - MCU: Stucky, 13K - reread, love this prewar 'hot rack' flatshare sorta epistolary romance

📺 STUFF I WATCHED 📺

Olivia Colman reads a letter responding to an unsolicited penis photograph

Benedict Cumberbatch reads Nick Cave's letter about grief

Armistead Maupin reads a letter to his 16-year-old self

Shirley Manson reads a powerful feminist letter to her niece

Legends of Tomorrow - s6, e14-15

Our Flag Means Death - s1, e6-7

Murder In Provence - s1, e1

Bringing Up Baby

The Brokenwood Mysteries - s8, e1-2

What's Up, Doc?

🎧 PODCASTS 🎧

Sidedoor - Get Off My Lawn

🎶 MUSIC 🎶

Classic Tropical Hits

Evening In Havana

Presenting MCR

The Hits: '70s

[herwitchinesss]

“To Say Nothing of the Dog: or ‘How We Found The Bishop’s Bird Stump At Last’“ by Connie Willis is so hilarious y’all. i keep cackling. slightly sad i only have the 2hrs i had put off for a day because... i’m really having fun with this story! and yes, it is the second book to the Accidental Bubonic Plague Time Travel series I had started- but w no plagues, just romance & comedic shenanigans w time travel. tbh you don’t really need to read the first book to enjoy the series. 

[cheshirelibrary]

  5 Books To Read If You Loved “Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy”

[via #AmReading]

The cult classic The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy picked up fans from all over the universe. If you already read all five books in the “trilogy”, consider trying some of these books:

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams

The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett

Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

To Say Nothing of the Dog, Or How We Found the Bishop’s Bird Stump at Last by Connie Willis

The Secret of Platform 13 by Eva Ibbotson

[stumblingoverchaos]

Another hilarious Connie Willis novel is Bellwether - it’s about predicting fads and I managed to get my then book club to read it. Every single tangent people went on re their lives outside of book club could be related back to the book.

Also, To Say Nothing of the Dog: or, How We Found the Bishop's Bird Stump at Last is loosely based on Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) by Jerome K Jerome (1889).

Things to read if you like Good Omens

I've excluded other books by Neil and Terry here, since that's a fairly self-evident starting point. Here are various works that share some similarities with Good Omens (book and show and fandom).

If you want Pratchett-esque writing and a similarly irreverent attitude to the creation, maintenance, and disposal of the Universe, check out The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. Not an obscure pick by any means, but highly recommended if you haven't got to it yet for any reason. The humor and especially the attitude to matters of cosmic import are very reminiscent of Good Omens.

If you want star-crossed queer lovers on opposite sides of an existential battle, check out This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone. It's sweeping epistolary science fiction about agents from two factions fighting for control of reality. Not a personal favorite of mine but I think I'm an outlier, so highly recommend giving it a shot!

If you want historical shenanigans, hilarity, and a plot involving two people ineptly attempting to avert the apocalypse, check out To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis. One of those admirably genre-defying books, its conceit revolves around time travel as a means to study the past and some unexpected calamities. Bonus similarities: the Victorian era, put-upon employees, and clumsy matchmaking. This IS a personal favorite.

If you want something with worldbuilding akin to, uh, Good Omens E-rated fanfic (and you're okay with E-rated art), check out the graphic novel Fine Print by Stjepan Sejic. Deals with demons gone hornily awry!

If you want a humorous adventure from the perspective of an outsider charged with a mission it doesn't entirely like, check out the Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells. The protagonist is a socially awkward security android who gets embroiled in a mystery when a mission runs into catastrophe.

Happy reading!

[yanmazu]

🌻

Connie Willis’ “To say nothing of the dog” is a very good book.

[From Wikipedia: To Say Nothing of the Dog: or, How We Found the Bishop's Bird Stump at Last is a 1997 comic science fiction novel by Connie Willis. It used the same setting which includes time-traveling historians she explored in her story Fire Watch and novels Doomsday Book (1992) and Blackout/All Clear (2010).]

[avrelia]

great list that I want to add some of my favorites that never fail to warm my heart (and there is no war involved)

Castle Hangnail by Ursula Vernon. Technically it is a children's book about a twelve year old Wicked Witch who took residence in the Castle Hangnail, but so what if we are not twelve anymore? This book makes all crops grows nicely and all gargoyles sniff in deep satisfaction.

Summon the Keeper by Tanya Huff. I think this book is unjustly forgotten, but if you are in a mood for a perfectly Canadian fantasy, with a small Ontario town, a small bed and breakfast place, a cat, a hole in the basement that leads to hell, and weird hijinks, it will do you good.

To Say Nothing of the Dog: or, How We Found the Bishop's Bird Stump at Last by Connie Willis. Oxford historians, time travel, mysteries, silly humor, Victorian nonsense, future, ugly vase, cats, to say nothing of the dog.

someone recommend me some good fantasy books that aren’t centred on a war, please, my crops are dying