#please imagine that we're sitting in the corner of a warm pub - one drink in - while i rant about all of the above

[vagueandominousvibes]

top five books!

Sam. You're asking someone with an MSc literature — someone who turned down a PhD in literature, not because she didn't want to do it, but because her mental health was shattered — about her top five books. Do you realise what you've done? You've enabled me, Sam.

I struggle choosing favourite books even on the best of days, so for the purpose of this I hope you don't mind if I expand it to also include literary series. In no particular order:

The Trials of Apollo, by Rick Riordan. I wrote one of the first 15,000 word research theses on this series. It hasn't been published, but it got me an overall Distinction in my MSc and I would gladly have done my PhD solely on this series. There is so much to talk about — the conversations about trauma, the triumph over childhood abuse (gaslighting), the realisation that sometimes you can't leave your family and have to find ways of living with it. And Apollo. I relate to Apollo, who starts out as The Worst children's novel protagonist, because I too grew up as a spoiled brat and had to work through years of trauma to become a decent human being (something I'm still working on, but that's another story). This series is so well written, so engaging, and touches on so many important issues. And I have a lot of feelings about it.

Smith of Wootton Major, by J. R. R. Tolkien. "But, Kalh," you might say, "why not The Lord of the Rings? Or The Hobbit? Or The Silmarillion? You know, the stuff you've published peer-reviewed research about?" No. Listen. Listen. The Legendarium is amazing and great and fantastic, but SoWM is where it's at. It's Tolkien's writing at its best. It's the epitome of a fairytale. It's short, tells half the story through symbolism and metaphors, and is absolutely gorgeous. It fully and completely embodies his theory of fairy stories, and years of literary research and writing. And it shows.

Howl's Moving Castle, by Diana Wynne Jones. I would have gone with the Chrestomanci series (also by her), but this novel has a decidedly special place in my heart. It was adapted as Studio Ghibli film, and I can absolutely see why. Reading it feels like looking at one of Marie Brožová's illustrations (example below). There's so many seemingly unimportant details that leap out of the background at various points, it's all fantastical, and it feels like a world where everything is possible. We all know Tolkien is renowned for his world-building, but god damn, Jones' is up there. You can tell she loved writing, because HMC practically glows with that love. It's magic incarnate and I'm so sad my copy of it is at my parents' place three flights away, because now I really want to re-read it.

(Source)

Deeplight, by Frances Hardinge. Ok, so I think I have pretty much every children's book Hardinge has ever written, because her world-building, her characters, and her prose is just that good. That said, Deeplight was the first novel by her I read. I was half-way through my MSc and was tired of Ballard, and Beckett, and Smith, and Spiotta, and I had picked this one up some weeks earlier because the cover intrigued me (yes, I judge books by their covers — it's how I've come across over half the books on this list). It's 442 pages long. I read it in one sitting. I still remember the absolute rollercoaster of rage and joy and grief and deep terror I felt reading it. I don't know if it would stand up to a re-reading, but I know that as a one-time read, it's fantastic.

Under the Whispering Doorway, by T. J. Klune. I was going to talk about Ross Montgomery, whose books I like more than Klune's, but UtWD has a special place in my heart due to the circumstances under which I read it. Last winter was rough (to the point where I considered moving six feet down). I had my parents' numbers blocked, refused to visit them alone, and spent the holiday with @foolsbangle (tagging you bc I don't know that I've ever actually expressed how much spending Christmas with you and your family meant to me). I had barely touched a book in several months, and was struggling through a one-year course on the History of Ideas. When I went to An's, I brought some books with me, in the hope that I'd be able to read again. One of these was UtWD. I retrieved it while An was drawing, snuggled up against them, and opened the book. After a while, I became aware An had started reading over my shoulder, and that — the fact that we were both reading the same book at the same time — kept me going. One of my last nights there, we stayed up until 7AM, snuggled up like that to finish the book. UtWD itself is alright. It has fun queer representation and some delightful character, but I've read better prose. Reading it with An like that, however, made it very special to me.

Other honorary mentions that were serious contenders for this list:

The Chime Seekers, by Ross Montgomery

The Midnight Guardians, by Ross Montgomery

The Snow Song, by Sally Gardener

This Is How You Lose the Time War, by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

Six Crimson Cranes, by Elizabeth Lim

Men Without Women, by Haruki Murakami

Footprints: In Search of Future Fossils, by David Farrier

The Land of the Green Man, by Carolyne Larrington

Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett

You may be surprised that the Four Swords manga isn't on this list. This isn't because it's not one of my current favourites, but rather that the list only contains books and series I feel satisfied having read and analysed, without engaging in their respective fan communities. Think of it like the difference between walking through a museum and going to the playground. The above books are artefacts in a museum of literature, exhibited under spotlight, and I walk through the shadows to the curiosities I'm interested in examining. I look at their age and composition, discover their individual contexts, and peruse the research associated with each artefact.

The FS manga is a playground. It's somewhere where I get down on my knees and dig in the dirt, climb the monkey bars, and sit down with others to play with the dolls and action figurines scattered about. It's bright, sunlit, and colourful. It's paint splattered on walls and colourful handprints on thick paper that mum will make you sign in wobbly letters when it's dried. It's a creative endeavour that inspires joy and laughter, rather than the solemn contemplation of artefacts.