#the afterlife of holly chase

[lyralit]

books for every song off of reputation

...ready for it? - ☆ All of Us Villains, Amanda Foody & Christine Lynn Herman

end game - ☆ Our Violent Ends, Chloe Gong

i did something bad - ☆ Foul Lady Fortune, Chloe Gong

don't blame me - Six Crimson Cranes, Elizabeth Lim

delicate - Scythe, Neil Schusterman

look what you made me do - ☆ If We Were Villains, M.L. Rio

so it goes... - The Afterlife of Holly Chase, Cynthia Hand

gorgeous - Legendborn / Bloodmarked, Tracy Deonn

getaway car - Six of Crows, Leigh Bardugo

king of my heart - Looking for Alaska, John Green

dancing with our hands tied - Once Upon a Broken Heart, Stephanie Garber

dress - The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid

this is why we can't have nice things - ☆ The Secret History, Donna Tartt

call it what you want - Legend, Marie Lu

new year's day - ☆ These Violent Delights, Chloe Gong

(bonus) i don't wanna live forever - ☆ The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, V.E. Schwab

[immrbrightsideeee]

OK but Spirited (the christmas movie on apple tv) is just the concept/plot of The After Life Of Holly Chase by Cynthia Hand

[inlovewithquotes]

Anything's possible, I suppose. It's a wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.

-The Afterlife Of Holly Chase

[desdasiwrites]

– Cynthia Hand, The Afterlife of Holly Chase

[danielscarcello]

Field of Lucid Dreams

Because I had a hard time getting my novel picked up, I decided to publish my short stories — my collection of coincidences — as a blog, hoping I would gain some traction that way. And before I even wrote a single post, a series of events proved this was the right choice.

At the library where I work, a book came across my desk, called Proof of Heaven, which was about a neurosurgeon who has a near-death experience and describes his vision of the afterlife. It was inside a box full of donated books. I stacked the donations on a cart to shelve them when Sarah, one of my colleagues, stopped me.

“Got one more for you,” she said. She handed me a picture book called Holly, which had a black cat on the cover.

As I filed away the books, I picked up Proof of Heaven and flipped through it. I found a withered prayer card tucked in the book, on page 24; someone must have used as it as a bookmark and forgot about it. I opened the card with one hand, while holding the book open with the other, and one word on the page, from this passage, happened to catch my eye.

Then, out of nowhere, I shouted three words. They were crystal clear, and heard by all the doctors and nurses present, as well as by Holley, who stood a few paces away, just on the other side of the curtain.

“God, help me!”

Holley.

Sarah had just handed me a book called — Holly. I put down Proof of Heaven and picked up Holly, and the first sentence said that last November, we lost our 14-year-old cat named Holly.

That was when Marianne came to mind. Marianne’s birthday was on November 14th. Her father died last year, after a long, grueling illness.

Instead of putting Proof of Heaven on the shelf, I kept it aside for her.

She texted me a few days later: “So I guess I have to read that book now. Last night, this lady at work mentioned that baseball movie, Field of Dreams. Later, I watched this YouTube video, and it mentioned Field of Dreams too. The crazy thing is that the video was about near-death experiences — just like the book.”

“Holy shit!” I wrote.

When I thought about Field of Dreams, I remembered this strange this little episode that took place the night before.

“Here’s another baseball coincidence for you,” I wrote. “Last night I was at Pita Land getting shawarma. I was standing in line, watching TV, and a headline flashed across the screen: ‘Jays sign new infielder Isiah Kiner-Falefa’. But I caught it so quickly that I could have sworn it said infidel, not infielder. I stood by the TV, waiting for the headline to loop back around, so I could see what it actually said. And his name sounded just like what was on the menu — Falafel.”

She sent me a laughing emoji.

“It’s interesting,” she went on. “I never get any signs from my dad, and I want one so badly.”

A few days later, it was New Year’s Eve, and I spent the night at Robb’s place. At one point, he put on the new Dave Chappelle Netflix special: The Dreamer.

Thinking about Field of Dreams, I listened to his monologue, my eyes fixed on the screen.

In your life, at any given moment, the strongest dream in that moment wins that moment. I am a very powerful dreamer. I dreamed tonight as a fourteen-year-old boy, and I’m living it as a fifty-year-old man…

This gave me such a renewed sense of determination to publish my collection of coincidences online. Even if no publisher in the world wanted my book, I would still chase my dream.

And so, the next day, I set out to write my first blog post. I closed my eyes and waited for an idea to come to me. My thoughts went back to Pita Land, and I remembered how on that morning, at work, a bunch of us were talking about obscure horror movies; someone had brought up a documentary about the Donner Party, the group of American pioneers who were trapped in the Sierra Nevada mountains and resorted to cannibalism to survive. Now, just before I saw the headline about Kiner-Falefa, I noticed — for the first time in all the years I’d been eating shawarma — one particular item on the menu: Beef Doner.

With a shudder, I started jotting all this down, wondering how I would string this together into a something worth reading. At first, I couldn’t figure it out, and so I took a break. With obscure horror movies on my mind, I started scrolling through YouTube, looking for something to watch. Then I found a channel called Renegade Films.

At random, I clicked a video called “Who Let Him Make This Movie?”. The movie, which I knew nothing about, was Babylon. As it turned out, much to my delight, Babylon was directed by Damien Chazelle — whose name echoed Dave Chappelle.

When it was over, another video on the channel, right next to the one about Babylon, caught my attention: “The Perfectly Logical Reason This Director Ate His Shoe (inspiring)”.

The director was Werner Herzog. It was about the time Herzog promised Errol Morris he would eat his shoe if he finished a movie about pet cemeteries he was working on. And, as I later read on Wikipedia, “In 1978, when the film Gates of Heaven premiered, Herzog cooked and publicly ate his shoe.”

Pet Cemeteries. Holly. The lost cat. Proof of Heaven. Gates of Heaven.

In other words, the perfectly logical reason this director ate his shoe was so that it would serve as a call to fearlessly chase your dreams. He said:

If I abandon this project, I would be a man without dreams, and I don’t want to live like that. I live my life, or I end my life with this project. All these dreams are yours as well… we have to articulate ourselves otherwise we would be cows in the field.

Field of Dreams.

My head was spinning. Finally, I read the Wikipedia page on Field of Dreams. And the first paragraph absolutely blew me away. Field of Dreams was based on a novel by W.P Kinsella called — Shoeless Joe.

The Perfectly Logical Reason This Director Ate His Shoe.

Frantically, I kept clicking all the links on Wikipedia, writing down all the connections I found — including the fact W.P Kinsella wrote a book called Butterfly Winter, Proof of Heaven had a blue butterfly on its cover, and Werner Herzog directed a movie called Fitzcarraldo, about a man determined to transport a steamship over a hill in the Amazon basin in order to build an opera house.

Field of Dreams gave us the phrase, “If you build it, they will come.”

If you build your website…

– they will come.

Finally, I jumped back to the Wikipedia page for Field of Dreams. In the movie, Ray, who was unable to reconcile with his father before he died, hears the ghost of “Shoeless” Joe Jackson tell him to build a baseball diamond in a cornfield. If you build it, they will come. Throughout the film, Ray sees the ghost of “Shoeless Joe” and other dead baseball players. Then, during a game, when the catcher removes his mask, Ray recognizes him as his father as a young man.

I stopped reading at that point, and I thought about something Dave Chappelle said:

You have to be wise enough to know when you’re living in your dream, and you have to be humble enough to accept when you’re in someone else’s…

All this time, I thought the coincidences were all about my writing, my blog — my dreams. But then I remembered what Marianne said about her father. And I knew I had to be humble enough to accept this wasn’t for me. It was for her.

[hpldreads]

Books inspired by the classic "The Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens.

Marley by Jon Clinch

The Afterlife of Holly Chase by Cynthia Hand

A Vampire Christmas Carol by Sarah Gray

[cupids-chronicles]

Hades X Persephone Saga: A Game of retribution #3

Author: Scarlett St. Clair

Genre: Romance, Fantasy, Mythology

My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐/5.

Spice: 🌶🌶🌶

Goodreads rating: 4/5

Pages: ‎‎‎468 

Published: 31 May 2022

A Game of retribution Review

Note: This book is intended for mature audiences over the age of 18 due to explicit content (steamy chapters).

Well, dear readers, hold on to your mythical chariots because we've been taken on yet another whirlwind ride with the gods of Olympus and the Underworld in "A Game of Retribution". Our old pals Hades and Persephone have returned, along with an entourage of divine drama that could only be rivaled by a soap opera airing directly from Mount Olympus.

Remember that old chestnut of a quote, “Knowledge changes perception”? This statement encapsulates the essence of this third installment perfectly. Hades, our underworld anti-hero, who once saw no issues letting souls meander off into the afterlife, is found in the midst of many a mortal miscommunication. Bless him, he did try to respect Persephone's time with her friend, Lexa, but as they say, the road to the Underworld is paved with good intentions. You'd think after centuries of existence, the dude would’ve mastered the art of timing and empathy.

On a side note, why was Persephone so desperate to keep Lexa alive? If I were to see my friend for eternity in a place like the Underworld (which, let's be honest, is essentially an eternal spa retreat for souls), would I really be so worried about a premature send-off? No, but maybe that's just me.

Meanwhile, Hades is found juggling a narrative equivalent of chasing his own tail. Every time he tries to investigate, interrogate, or perhaps indulge in a much-deserved nap, our dear Persephone, with her seemingly never-ending escapades, interrupts him. And poor Hades is dragged from one scenario to the next, like a divine yo-yo. At times, you almost wish for the guy to just hit the 'mute' button on his celestial phone.

We also delve deeper into Zofie's past. Remember Zofie? Persephone's bodyguard who packs more mystery than Pandora's box? Our glimpse into her history and Hades' hand in her life added depth to an already intricate tapestry of storylines. It’s akin to finding out that your mysterious friend who always wears sunglasses was actually a spy… and also once played in a rock band.

However, let’s address the papyrus in the room: the formatting and editing. Was there a minor deity in charge of this? Maybe the god of typos? The occasional errors, though not tragic, did sometimes feel like Hermes had misdelivered a sentence or two. And as for the formatting - the margins! It felt like reading a scroll that Zeus might have accidentally sat on. Perhaps it's a design choice meant to symbolize the vast emptiness of the void? If that's the case, kudos for thematic consistency. If not, let's hope the next edition will be more space-efficient.

In conclusion, A Game of Retribution scores a celestial 3 out of 5 stars from this humble mortal. For all its highs and lows, it's a must-read for fans of the series. And I, for one, am eagerly donning my toga in anticipation of the upcoming books announced by Scarlett St. Clair on her divinely curated Instagram. Bring on the melodrama, the myths, and maybe a map of Hades’ underworld investigations - because this mortal is here for it all.

Please note that this book is part of a series and can not be read as a stand alone. Lucky for you this can be your little weekend binge as almost all the books in the series has already been released !

Wait a minute boys and girls, check out these trigger warnings first:

Suicide

Death

Violence

Romance Tropes, you ask ?

Miscommunication

Marriage

Who do we meet in this book ?

Hades

Persephone (Perri)

What to read next:

Neon Gods (Dark Olympus) by Katee Robert.

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black.

Drag Me Up (Gods of Hunger) by R.M. Virtues.

Or just like read the next few books of this series.

[random-shit06]

A list of 55 winter books to read this Christmas

(With goodreads ratings)

Mistletoe and murder 4.36

A wish in the dark 4.3

The lion the witch the wardrobe 4.23

Spinning silver 4.21

The girl who saved Christmas 4.2 (matt haigs) 

The nowhere emporium 4.17

The polarbear explorers club 4.16

A boy called Christmas 4.16 (matt haigs)

The girl who sailed the stars 4.15

North child 4.14

The castle of tangled magic 4.1

The bear and the Nightingale 4.1

The Christmas dinner of souls 4.1

The blood spell 4.1

A winters promise 4.08

Winter in paradise 4.08

Frostheart 4.08

Malamander 4.08

The vanderbekkers of 141st street 4.07

Books and crannies 4.06

The Christmas sisters 4.06

Once upon a Christmas 4.04

Snow and rose 4.02 fairytale

10 blind dates 4.02

Greenglass house 4

The snow child 4

The bookshop girl 4.0 (children's book short read) 

Castle in the clouds 3.94

The afterlife of holly chase 3.97

The Christmas bookshop 3.9

One day in Christmas 3.9

A red bird Christmas 3.9

All about us 3.9

The ice palace 3.9

The eye of the North  3.88

Magyk 3.84

The crowns game 3.83

Dash and Lily's book of dares 3.8

Girls made of snow and glass 3.78

The light between worlds 3. 74 

Just like magic 3.7

My true love gave to me 3.7

The hunting party 3.65

A princess for Christmas 3. 65

A merry little meet cute 3.63

The holiday swap 3.61

Twelve dates of Christmas 3.6

The holiday swap 3.6

Snow country 3.6 - short read

The Royal holiday 3.5

Murder for Christmas 3.5

Skipping Christmas 3.5

Blame it on the mistletoe 3.4

25 days till Christmas 3.46

 Real men knit 3.3

Merry Christmas everyone

[ravenstarmedia]

Greetings!

Hey there everyone! You can call me Raven.

I'm a writer, screenwriter, artist, composer, lyricist, and someone who could go on essays talking about what I'm passionate about (for one reason or another) that sites like Twitter just don't allow for properly with their limited amount of characters.

I'll largely be posting about writing, art relating to my current projects, fandoms I'm in (indie animation, games, Disney, animation in general, horror-comedy stories, etc.), and anything else I happen to feel like talking about here.

Recently finished reading The Afterlife of Holly Chase, and currently reading The House in the Cerulean Sea.

Feel free to ask my anything!

Side note: the world needs more afterlife shows.

[erin-bo-berin]

Okay, imagine Steve in an It's A Wonderful Life scenario. Imagine him feeling down and out about his existence and he tries to... Yan now... So divine intervention happens in the form of an angel that takes the form of Dustin.

Here's what I imagine would happen if Steve didn't exist:

1) Nancy and Jonathan never get together and Nancy ends up with some douchebag (probably Billy) who doesn't treat her right.

2) Max never became a part of the Party and she had no one to look out for her whenever Billy or Neil were abusive

3) Dustin left the Party but he has no friends

4) Lucas becomes a douchebag jock, much like Steve did in his "glory days"

5) Robin is made fun of and insulted. Nobody knows she's gay but she's under suspicion and is therefore, bullied.

Happy ending where Steve comes back with new lease on life and more appreciative of himself and what he's built.

Feel free to add more if you like

🌹

How can I add to this perfection? I’m telling you you’re making my eager for Christmas heart so happy right now!

I also have an idea though based off one of my favorite holiday books that I’ve read every year (this year will be my 5th time reading it). It’s a retelling of A Christmas Carol, called The Afterlife of Holly Chase. She’s an awful person and after she dies ends up becoming The Ghost of Christmas Past in a top secret program called Project Scrooge and ends up falling in love with the current years’ Scrooge.

But in my idea, Steve is the one who dies during his King Steve era and becomes a part of Project Scrooge. He’s done this for 4 years now, this Christmas being his 5th and he’s resigned to the fact that this is going to be his afterlife for eternity. Until this year, there’s a new Scrooge; one that isn’t old and wrinkly and Ebenezer like. You’re beautiful and he can’t stop thinking about you. Against all the company policies, while he simultaneously does his Project Scrooge work, sorting through your past for the best pieces to show you on Christmas Eve, to help you change your ways, he goes to see you in real life. He told himself it was just to see you and that’s it. But then he spoke to you and it unravels from there. He falls in love with you and can’t keep himself from you. But as much as you’re changing him, for the better, he realizes it can’t be a real relationship as he has so many secrets for you. Your redemption is in jeopardy from what he’s done and he doesn’t want to be selfish like he had been in his life, so he sacrifices himself and his feelings to help save your soul. After rushing in during the Ghost of Christmas Future’s visit, confessing his feelings for you and what had happened, begging you to listen to the ghosts because your life and soul depends on it, he runs out, emotional. All to get in a car accident, to wake up the day he died, 5 years ago. See, Project Scrooge never gave up on him and his time spent at the company was his “rehab” to making him a better person. This Christmas, he was finally ready. Although sad that he can’t be with you, you’re such a huge part of his heart now and Steve has a new outlook on life and is a completely a different person. From that Christmas on, he’s no longer his King Steve persona. He’s the kind, caring and gentle man we know him to be today.

[myclippings]

The Afterlife of Holly Chase - Cynthia Hand

holiday book early in the year haha :)

[janestewart]

Some Christmas reads I recommend:

There’s Something About Merry by Codi Hall - very cute small town romance with single dad trope. Had me smiling the whole way through. FMC runs a christmas tree farm and there’s a ton of seasonal events. 5/5 perfect christmas read.

Along Came Holly by Codi Hall - same universe as There’s Something About Merry, featuring Merry’s sister Holly. Rivals to lovers romance. Same cute small town holiday vibe. I didn’t relate to the main character as much so it wasn’t quite as perfect for me but still 4.5/5.

The Afterlife of Holly Chase by Cynthia Hand - retelling of A Christmas Carol but with some twists. Very wholesome and fun. Love the story and all the characters. I come back to this one year after year 5/5.

Once Upon a December by Amy E. Reichert - cute, wholesome romance with a magic idea that I haven’t encountered much before. Great friend group as well. This is one I think anyone would love 4.5/5.

A Cat Café Christmas by Codi Gary - opposites attract romance. I’m still in the middle of this one and really liking it so far. If you love cats, you will love this, I promise.

The Key to My Heart by Lia Louis - not as christmas-y as the others but set in winter. This one is a romance but it is also about grief and learning to live again after losing someone you love. I’m still in the middle of this one as well and it’s already my favorite by this author. It is melancholy at times but ultimately hopeful and healing.

Happy reading ☺️

[mirandamckenni1]

Cory Chase: Stepmom Scenes, Ted Cruz’s Twitter & Orgies in the Afterlife Episode 263: Buckle up for a rollercoaster of an interview with America’s Favorite MILF! Cory Chase gets deep quickly when she and Holly swap theories about dying, religion, and the afterlife. Then, they get into all things stepfamily content! She shares her conflicting feelings about filming stepmom scenes, her most creative ways to get stuck, and the emerging “free use” genre. Plus - she dives into the story about the time she became part of a media frenzy when Ted Cruz liked a video of her on Twitter! SHOW NOTES: 1:02 introducing Cory 1:38 how COVID changed her career and the industry 4:49 being back on set 6:25 how she got into the industry 10:21 being in the national guard 12:19 working as a medic 13:32 how she handled seeing death and violence 16:22 thoughts on death and the afterlife 19:38 denying yourself pleasure on earth 23:14 thoughts on the inner conflict of filming stepmom roles 27:01 comment from listener about stepmoms 30:23 what is free use porn? 34:36 getting stuck genre 35:48 weirdest getting stuck scene she’s filmed 37:17 most interesting custom video request 40:10 when Ted Cruz liked her video on Twitter 43:30 why she doesn’t have much sex in her personal life 46:49 how people in porn have relationships 49:22 social shoutouts To support my show: https://ift.tt/kH8GmuT To make a one time donation: https://ift.tt/lKepVi2 Shop my merch store! https://ift.tt/p25KRnN Follow me on Instagram: https://ift.tt/GsqWmDL Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/hollyrandall Follow me on TikTok: https://ift.tt/obWzFDL Visit my Official Podcast site: https://ift.tt/SGmEDNK Fan mail: 26500 Agoura Road, Suite 102-838, Calabasas CA 91302 via YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXnfugukGA8

[inlovewithquotes]

You can try to keep the worst things down inside you. You can shove them away, not think about them, not deal. But they bubble up to the surface. They always do.

-The Afterlife Of Holly Chase

[a-moth-to-the-light]

Books of 2022, So Far!

So, I'm about to leave home for college, which means I need to turn in everything I've been hoarding from the library (yes, I have a problem!). While going through it all, I thought it would be nice to do a little summary of everything I've read this year. It turns out I've read 16 books outside of school so far (not counting all the volumes of Fruits Basket I've read, since I'm in the middle of the series right now), which is unexpected and really cool, especially given that The Karamazov Brothers, one of the books I finished, was an absolutely mammoth read.

The list is vaguely in order of how much I enjoyed each book/series, with the ones I enjoyed most at the top, and I think it really says something about how much I enjoyed my reading experiences this year that Scythe and Thunderhead were my least favorites, because I still had an absolute blast reading them :)

[Image ID: A design featuring the covers of four books on top of a background of images of layered paint that fade into each other. Next to these images are the titles of these books (or the name of the series they are from), their authors, and a small description/review from me.

Lockwood and Co. Series / Jonathan Stroud / Mentally unstable teenagers fighting ghosts in my favorite dystopian society of all time–really, what’s not to love?

2. Believer Columns / Nick Hornby / Warm, sweet, geeky–I get sentimental just thinking about these three volumes.

3. What Could Be Saved / Liese O'Halloran Schwarz / Insightful depictions of art & recovery in the guise of a mystery-thriller.

4. The Karamazov Brothers / Fyodor Dostoevsky / I have no idea what possessed me to read this, but it turned out to be just my type of novel, full of gossip-worthy storylines and diverse explorations of Christianity. /.End ID]

[Image ID: A design featuring the covers of five books on top of a background of images of layered paint that fade into each other. Next to these images are the titles of these books, their authors, and a small description/review from me.

5. The Afterlife of Holly Chase / Cynthia Hand / Well damn, maybe I do like Hallmark movies after all.

6. The Possible World / Liese O'Halloran Schwarz / A novel with the emotional bones and pleasantly meandering storytelling of What Could Be Saved, though lacking its elegance.

7. Robert E. Lee and Me / Ty Seidule / A collection of histories relating to the Civil War & the legacy of anti-Black racism in the American South.

8. The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne / Jonathan Stroud / Albert Browne, who basically has dissociation as a superpower, is the star of the show here, which works just fine for me.

9. Scythe, Thunderhead (the first two books of the Arc of a Scythe trilogy) / Neal Shusterman / A roller-coaster of a plot that had me hook, line, and sinker. /.End ID]

[edanaamah]

I'll always think about him, for the rest of my life and probably beyond it, about those few months that didn't happen for anyone but me. I miss him. I love him. But doesn't always have to be about the happy ending. Love can be about beginnings, too.

The Afterlife of Holly Chase, Cynthia Hand