#this is why I haven’t read Mexican Gothic yet

[marzipanandminutiae]

southern gothic crimson peak. that’s it.

The thing about Southern Gothic is that, if you do it with any kind of conscientiousness, you’re going to run into slavery. sooner or later. Having grown up in the south, I can attest that if there’s a big gorgeous house from anytime before the Civil War, the original owners almost certainly enslaved people there. And while that can be a fascinating thematic throughline for deep literary southern Gothic – it’s certainly a horrible family history – it’s not as good for Fun Gothic With BlorbosTM.

(slavery also happened in the northern US, to be clear. For fiction purposes, though, you can go further back in history without encountering it than you can in the south.)

Like. If there’s a big old crumbling house in the south, even if it’s a modern story, there’s a 99% chance that the looming specter of slavery is going to overshadow the characters’ interpersonal interactions. And this is one story where I prefer focusing on the interpersonal interactions

I guess you could have Allerdale built after the war if it’s a modern version? So then you don’t feel as bad focusing on smushing the characters together like dolls while whispering “now kiss?”

[oingomyboingos]

Tag 9 people you’d like to know better. I was tagged by the lovely @icannotreadcursive

Last song: spotify tells me it is Honeymoon (Forever) by Hellogoodbye, which is off of my ineffable husbands playlist. I have good omens brain rot rn 😅 accepting fic recs if u have any

Currently reading: I have been slowly churning my way thru Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia. 1950s Mexicana socialite must go investigate her cousin’s mysterious illness. the cousin lives in a spooky manor after she has married into the once-rich family of a British aristocrat, whose failed mining enterprise hangs over the town like a spectre. ALSO Tombs by Junji Ito—I very much enjoyed the title story and the one about the deep sea creature.

Currently watching: Recently finished Kingdom, and I can’t recommend it highly enough. It’s a korean period drama with zombies. The king dies while the queen is waiting to give birth, and the current heir starts a coup. What do you do if you’re from the queen’s clan and desperately want to stay in power? Why, infecting the king’s corpse and turning him into a zombie sounds like a great way to buy time until you have a new heir. The costuming is excellent (THE!!!!! HATS!!!!!!) and the characters are genuinely so likeable.

also going apeshit for star trek lower decks

Current obsession: I blame david tenant’s wonderful acting because after bingeing good omens 3 times in the past few weeks I have now returned to doctor who and am attempting to watch the 13th doctor. it’s fine. not the best quality writing. Im curious to see where this “lone cyberman” plot goes. the evil microplastics episode was silly. i want to know more about “ruth.” i liked the mary shelley bits, but I am slightly put off by the writers not letting thirteen think on the fly. ten always used to come up with these crazy schemes in the moment. meanwhile, in the mary shelley episode, they keep asking thirteen for help and she goes “yeah my brain isn’t working right now check back later.” like, hm. I don’t like the written in incompetence. or perhaps it’s the phrasing/set up of it that’s getting to me? it’s not that there weren’t challenges that were tough for ten, but the writers’ hand wasn’t so….evident? it always felt like big time lord brain working on the problem. now it’s as if they’re telling us “hush we haven’t gotten there yet so just deal with her being dumb no we will not give you more info yet or a satisfying reason for her to act this way.” i’m also not the biggest fan of the whole “oh look at me i’m talking to myself” jokes. I know they’re trying to make the character quirky and likeable, but the joke wasn’t funny the first time and now i’ve heard it like 8 times. save me. I have heard that her final season is better, so hopefully that’s true. I think I will be taking a break for now though so that I can watch more star trek lol

alrighty I’m supposed to tag 9 people i want to get to know better so! let’s go: @kayliflower @dolly-macabre @cosmosredshift7 @godofsickdreams @idylls-in-juniper @minecraftgender @transathenacykes @lezbfrenz @great-exhibition-of-1851

(only if u want to!)

[artofapeach]

What other fandom are you into

*slides in* hi

Oh boy SO many

Critical Role and anything Dungeons and Dragons. Like, before Vivzie, that was my major obsession and personality, which is why I often bring it up when no one asks djnajdnsjdjd

Homestuck and Hiveswap. Yeah, I know

Undertale and Deltarune 😭

MUSICALS! Beetlejuice, Be More Chill, Hamilton, Hadestown, all that jazz!

Dead End Paranormal Park. I haven’t seen the second season yet though! Gonna binge it this weekend with my sister :3c

not really a fandom but HORROR I LOVE HORROR SO MUCH I WOULD KILL FOR MORE HORROR ASKS AND REQUESTS OHMIGOD

Life sims! Like Sims, Rimworld, Dwarf Fortress

Eldritch shit!!! Like Lovecrafy stuff (tho Lovecraft himself sucks stupid racist sexist bastard)

Paranatural!! It’s so good, please read it if you haven’t, it’s a webcomic and it is the best

Also books! Six of Crows, Mexican Gothic, Dracula, Sherlock, all that shit! I’m have an English degree, so I basically have to read for the rest of my life

Object shows! Like Battle for Dream Island and Inanimate Insanity! Just…look them up. It’s weird but great I swear

This YouTuber, GabSmolders. She’s so chill I often have her on in the background while I’m drawing. Been meaning to actually draw her for a while

Komi Can’t Communicate! I love her so much oh my god

Uuuuuuu I know I’m probably forgetting a BUNCH, but I guess this list is long enough. Basically anything cartoony, chill, and/or dark wwww

[richincolor]

Celebrating Adult Hispanic Literature

Inspired by Zoraida Cordova's adult debut, "Inheritance of Orquidea Divinia" and the start of Hispanic Heritage Month, I thought I would highlight Hispanic authors writing adult literature of all genres that you should be reading (if you haven't already).

The Inheritance of Orquidea Divina by Zoraida Cordova Atria Books

The Montoyas are used to a life without explanations. They know better than to ask why the pantry never seems to run low or empty, or why their matriarch won’t ever leave their home in Four Rivers—even for graduations, weddings, or baptisms. But when Orquídea Divina invites them to her funeral and to collect their inheritance, they hope to learn the secrets that she has held onto so tightly their whole lives. Instead, Orquídea is transformed, leaving them with more questions than answers.

Seven years later, her gifts have manifested in different ways for Marimar, Rey, and Tatinelly’s daughter, Rhiannon, granting them unexpected blessings. But soon, a hidden figure begins to tear through their family tree, picking them off one by one as it seeks to destroy Orquídea’s line. Determined to save what’s left of their family and uncover the truth behind their inheritance, the four descendants travel to Ecuador—to the place where Orquídea buried her secrets and broken promises and never looked back.

Mexican Gothic by by Silvia Moreno-Garcia Del Rey

After receiving a frantic letter from her newly-wed cousin begging for someone to save her from a mysterious doom, Noemí Taboada heads to High Place, a distant house in the Mexican countryside. She’s not sure what she will find—her cousin’s husband, a handsome Englishman, is a stranger, and Noemí knows little about the region.

Noemí is also an unlikely rescuer: She’s a glamorous debutante, and her chic gowns and perfect red lipstick are more suited for cocktail parties than amateur sleuthing. But she’s also tough and smart, with an indomitable will, and she is not afraid: Not of her cousin’s new husband, who is both menacing and alluring; not of his father, the ancient patriarch who seems to be fascinated by Noemí; and not even of the house itself, which begins to invade Noemí’s dreams with visions of blood and doom.

Her only ally in this inhospitable abode is the family’s youngest son. Shy and gentle, he seems to want to help Noemí, but might also be hiding dark knowledge of his family’s past. For there are many secrets behind the walls of High Place. The family’s once colossal wealth and faded mining empire kept them from prying eyes, but as Noemí digs deeper she unearths stories of violence and madness.

And Noemí, mesmerized by the terrifying yet seductive world of High Place, may soon find it impossible to ever leave this enigmatic house behind.

Dominicana by Angie Cruz Flatiron Books

Fifteen-year-old Ana Cancion never dreamed of moving to America, the way the girls she grew up with in the Dominican countryside did. But when Juan Ruiz proposes and promises to take her to New York City, she has to say yes. It doesn’t matter that he is twice her age, that there is no love between them. Their marriage is an opportunity for her entire close-knit family to eventually immigrate. So on New Year’s Day, 1965, Ana leaves behind everything she knows and becomes Ana Ruiz, a wife confined to a cold six-floor walk-up in Washington Heights. Lonely and miserable, Ana hatches a reckless plan to escape. But at the bus terminal, she is stopped by Cesar, Juan’s free-spirited younger brother, who convinces her to stay.

As the Dominican Republic slides into political turmoil, Juan returns to protect his family’s assets, leaving Cesar to take care of Ana. Suddenly, Ana is free to take English lessons at a local church, lie on the beach at Coney Island, see a movie at Radio City Music Hall, go dancing with Cesar, and imagine the possibility of a different kind of life in America. When Juan returns, Ana must decide once again between her heart and her duty to her family.

You Had Me at Hola by Alexis Daria Avon

Leading Ladies do not end up on tabloid covers.

After a messy public breakup, soap opera darling Jasmine Lin Rodriguez finds her face splashed across the tabloids. When she returns to her hometown of New York City to film the starring role in a bilingual romantic comedy for the number one streaming service in the country, Jasmine figures her new “Leading Lady Plan” should be easy enough to follow—until a casting shake-up pairs her with telenovela hunk Ashton Suárez.

Leading Ladies don’t need a man to be happy.

After his last telenovela character was killed off, Ashton is worried his career is dead as well. Joining this new cast as a last-minute addition will give him the chance to show off his acting chops to American audiences and ping the radar of Hollywood casting agents. To make it work, he’ll need to generate smoking-hot on-screen chemistry with Jasmine. Easier said than done, especially when a disastrous first impression smothers the embers of whatever sexual heat they might have had.

Leading Ladies do not rebound with their new costars.

With their careers on the line, Jasmine and Ashton agree to rehearse in private. But rehearsal leads to kissing, and kissing leads to a behind-the-scenes romance worthy of a soap opera. While their on-screen performance improves, the media spotlight on Jasmine soon threatens to destroy her new image and expose Ashton’s most closely guarded secret.

Sabrina & Corina: Stories by Kali Fajardo-Anstine One World

Kali Fajardo-Anstine’s magnetic story collection breathes life into her Latina characters of indigenous ancestry and the land they inhabit. Set against the remarkable backdrop of Denver, Colorado–a place that is as fierce as it is exquisite–these women navigate the land the way they navigate their lives: with caution, grace, and quiet force.

In “Sugar Babies,” ancestry and heritage are hidden inside the earth but tend to rise during land disputes. “Any Further West” follows a sex worker and her daughter as they leave their ancestral home in southern Colorado only to find a foreign and hostile land in California. In “Tomi,” a woman leaves prison and finds herself in a gentrified city that is a shadow of the one she remembers from her childhood. And in the title story, “Sabrina & Corina,” a Denver family falls into a cycle of violence against women, coming together only through ritual.

Sabrina & Corina is a moving narrative of unrelenting feminine power and an exploration of the universal experiences of abandonment, heritage, and an eternal sense of home.

Postcolonial Love Poem by Natalie Diaz Graywolf Press

Postcolonial Love Poem is an anthem of desire against erasure. Natalie Diaz’s brilliant second collection demands that every body carried in its pages—bodies of language, land, rivers, suffering brothers, enemies, and lovers—be touched and held as beloveds. Through these poems, the wounds inflicted by America onto an indigenous people are allowed to bloom pleasure and tenderness: “Let me call my anxiety, desire, then. / Let me call it, a garden.” In this new lyrical landscape, the bodies of indigenous, Latinx, black, and brown women are simultaneously the body politic and the body ecstatic. In claiming this autonomy of desire, language is pushed to its dark edges, the astonishing dunefields and forests where pleasure and love are both grief and joy, violence and sensuality.

Diaz defies the conditions from which she writes, a nation whose creation predicated the diminishment and ultimate erasure of bodies like hers and the people she loves: “I am doing my best to not become a museum / of myself. I am doing my best to breathe in and out. // I am begging: Let me be lonely but not invisible.” Postcolonial Love Poem unravels notions of American goodness and creates something more powerful than hope—a future is built, future being a matrix of the choices we make now, and in these poems, Diaz chooses love.

[ace-trainer-risu]

oh here! i’ll come ask you for book recs lol. do you have any spooky and/or autumn-y book recs? or just your fave books :)

First of all, I'm sorry this took me SO long to answer. I want to say I've been busy but it's just been general [waves hand vaguely] life.

ANYWAY thank you for asking! I actually don't read scary stuff a lot b/c I'm a wimp, but I have a few spooky/autumnal books up my sleeves! Let's see what we've got!!

1) The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters

Let me just start by saying that Sarah Waters is one of my absolute favorite authors ever! All her novels are suspenseful, twisty historical novels with great female and queer characters. Although, fair warning, actually The Little Stranger is like her one novel that isn't queer, but it is VERY good. If you read The Little Stranger and like it, please read Fingersmith and/or The Paying Guests.

The Little Stranger is set in the countryside of post-WWII England and follows a mild-mannered doctor as he becomes increasingly involved in the lives of the family living in the local, increasingly decrepit, possibly haunted mansion. Think Downton Abbey but creepy. Strange things keep happening inside the house, from dog bites to mysterious sounds to creepy black spots. Literally just typing that gave me goosebumps. It seems like someone may be out to get the family, but who...or what? Is it simply the ghosts of their own painful memories, or is something more? Sarah Waters is excellent at lush, intricate historical detail, and she leans into that here to create an atmosphere of slowly building dread and horror and mystery.

That being said, as a person who isn't normally a fan of horror, I don't think this book is too scary. It's more of an atmospheric, psychological horror than a jump-scare, bloody horror. It's not a book that will give you nightmares (probably), but you might lie awake thinking about it.

Also. Pro-tip. As a haunted(?) house story, the house is obviously fairly central to the story. Dear fellow Americans, keep in mind that the British refer to the floors of a building differently than us. For Americans, the ground-level floor is called the first floor, the floor above that the second floor, etc. For the British, the ground-level floor is the ground floor, and the floor above that is the first floor, etc. There's all sorts of creepy references to characters hearing noises above them on the first floor, but I was just like, Why are they always in the basement?

2) Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno Garcia

This and the above are two very different books, and yet they are both set in the mid-1900s and both are about weird, creepy, maybe-haunted houses. What can I say, I like gothic fiction.

After our heroine, Noemi, receives a bizarre, borderline incoherent letter from her beloved cousin, she sets out to visit her in the literally decaying mansion she resides in with her husband and his new family deep in the countryside of Mexico. All Noemi wants to do is persuade her cousin to come back home with her, but her cousin's new in-laws are very determined not to let that happen...or to let Noemi leave either. Secrets abound in the bizarre house and even creepier nearby cemetery, and soon Noemi finds that she too is suffering from bizarre dreams and visions...although, are they just dreams?

This book is so weird, but in such a good way? I read it for a book club and every week we had increasingly bizarre theories about what was going on, we were googling alchemy and fungi and St George, and some of our theories were even right. Although definitely not all. Another very twisty one that keeps you guessing.

In terms of scariness, interestingly I think there's more overtly creepy and horrifying moments in this novel than The Little Stranger, but I found TLS more overall scary? But that may be because I read it quickly, which I think is the ideal setting for suspenseful stuff, and I read Mexican Gothic over a longer amount of time since it was for a book club. This one does have some more typical horror elements to it, but I don't think it's more creepy than terrifying.

3) The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey

I listened to this one as an audiobook and the audiobook is excellent so would recommend that, but have no doubt it would also be great to physically read.

Oh my god this book...it's more thriller than horror, but I think it fits the brief. There were multiple moments listening to this book that I literally gasped or said "OH MY GOD!" out loud, and there are moments which are very creepy and horrifying. There's a particular scene in the backyard... Again, incredibly suspenseful and twisty. And the character development and character psychology is just! really really good! There's also really interesting and knotty feminist stuff which is a lot more complicated and nasty than some of the "girlboss" stuff which is popular right now.

Super minimal summary: All you really need to know is that it is a sci fi novel about a scientific researcher trying to pick up her life after her marriage has imploded, only for everything to go BATSHIT WRONG. Trust me, that's all you need to know, it's better to go into this not knowing what's going to happen or what to expect. I had no clue what this novel was about when I started it, and holy shit. Very good book, absolutely recommend this if you want some super suspenseful, creepy sci fi that will make you say "oh my GOD" repeatedly.

Okay, shifting gears a little now b/c autumn isn't just spooky, it's also cozy and restful and daydreamy!

4) The Thinking Woman's Guide to Real Magic by Emily Croy Barker

This isn't maybe a cozy book per se, but it's a great book to cuddle down with on a dreary day and lose yourself in. If you've ever asked yourself, "What would it be like if you crossed Pride and Prejudice with Howl's Moving Castle except the wizard was way worse but somehow still sexy" - then you should read this book! I actually came across this book b/c I was like, I wanna read a book that's a portal fantasy but for adults, and this book was like OH here's everything you wanted.

It's about a grad student, Nora, who has totally stalled out on her dissertation and is at a shitty wedding when she accidentally wanders through a portal into a beautiful, fantastical fairy world. At first, everything is amazing and literally perfect...but surprise surprise, not all as is it seems, and soon everything goes to, how should I put it, shit. Nora escapes, but rather than returning home, she finds herself trapped in a far more dreary realm. But not one without it's own charms and it's own magic, and Nora finds herself the student-slash-sorta-captive of the crochety, sexy, maybe-killed-his-wife magician Aruendiel* and she begins to learn magic herself.

Unlike the above books, this is not a fast-paced, twisty book, and I think if you go into this expecting high fantasy along the lines of Game of Thrones, you may be disappointed. It's not really a typical high-fantasy novel, it's more of a cross of an 18th/19th century realist novel, a fairy tale, and a fantasy novel. But if you want that, then it's REALLY good! I loved this book! And the magic in it is so cool, something about the way its described feels so visceral and real and like you could really do it if you just tried hard enough. There is a romance and it's totally, intentionally hashtag problematic, but it's very laid back, very slow burn, so I think even if you aren't a person who digs romance you can still enjoy this. If you're looking for a feminist-leaning fantasy novel that you can just sink into and lose yourself in, this is the perfect book. You will long to magically fix broken plates.

5) The Ruthless Lady's Guide to Wizardry by C.M. Waggoner

Honestly I can't even justify why I think this one is an autumn book. It simply is. It's autumn colored in my head. It is the coziest book I have ever read about necromancy and crime. Also I just want to recommend it. This is another one that I listened to as an audiobook and it's also a good audiobook, for those who are interested. But it also means I will not be able to spell absolutely any of the character's names.

This novel follows Delly, an enterprising young scoundrel of a fire witch with a teeny tiny gin habit as she attempts to support herself and her hot-mess of a mom in the roughest neighborhoods of Fantasy-City-That-I-Can't-Remember-The-Name-Of. Lice...gate? When Delly comes across an advertisement for a bodyguarding job for young women for a hefty fee, it seems like the answer to definitely not all but at least some of her problems. She accepts, along with an interesting assortment of other sorcerous young ladies, including a wonderfully bitchy Absentia (my love), a young woman who can turn into a boar, boar girl's necromancer mother, and the very sexy part-troll Winn, who in my imagination looks like Gwendoline Christie and talks like Miranda Hart. Which. Perfect woman. Winn being a fine, wealthy young lady, Delly can't help but think to herself that it wouldn't be such a bad thing if Winn happened to fall in love with her and carried her off to be rich and spoiled the rest of her life.

Of course, things quickly don't go to plan, and soon Delly and her companions find herself caught up in wicked schemes of murder, drugs, and an undead mouse named Buttons who says BONG. I love Buttons SO MUCH.

This book is just a silly romp of a novel which worms into your heart and your brain. It's fun and cute and gay, and also it made me cry. I haven't stopped thinking, "Not quite regulation hammerball" since I listened to it like half a year ago.

Also, while I'm here, this novel is set in the same world as and features a few of the same characters as Unnatural Magic. Which is also a hell of a book. Literally the best bisexual relationship I have ever fuckin read. It's a winter book tho, so I simply can't go into it here.

Aaaaand...that it's! Happy autumnal reading :)

[horrificallyelisbaaron]

Podcast Recs: The White Vault and Beyond

Anyone listened to The White Vault podcast? I’m on the last season and it’s beginning to feel formulaic. I still find it funny that ever episode begins with “travel is not advised” and want to solve the mystery, but I hope it’s not a repeat of the past seasons.

Also: has anyone listened to other podcasts on that network (Fool and Scholar Productions), like The Liberty Podcast

VAST Horizon

or Dark Dice?

Are any of these good follow-ups to The White Vault?

And if not, what would you recommend listening to next? Podcasts in my library include:

Somewhere in the Skies

Haunted Places

The Horror Virgin

Psychoanalysis: A Horror Therapy Podcast

Astonishing Legends

Parkdale Haunt

Ghost Tape

From Now

Tower 4

Creepy: A Horror Podcast

TANIS

RABBITS

The Black Tapes

Blackout

Dark Air

Strange and Unexplained

Red Collar

Full Body Chills

Tales

Soft Voice

Right now, I’m very interested in:

The psychology of sociopathy and serial killers and why they don’t always overlap

How non-cis-men who kill do so in far different ways than cis-men do

How detectives approach crimes nowadays (I’ve been reading a lot of John Douglas and want to see how his methods of profiling and capturing a criminal have evolved)

Gothic fiction at any time period in any place (think Catherine House to Mexican Gothic to The Masque of the Red Death” to Interview with the Vampire to Hell House to Salem’s Lot and so on

Stories where someone’s trauma is solved by going through a horror story

Something with “Cocaine and Rhinestone” vibes

The craft of writing horror

Also, if anything on this list (I haven’t listened to them yet) isn’t that great, I’d love to know that too!

Not interested in:

True Crime Podcasts, especially MFM (tried it, tried to like it, it isn’t for me 🤷) or Serial or anything that blows up to a point where there’s no relationship between the podcasters and the listeners. I prefer more independent artists.

0% McElroy

Podcasts that value personality over facts/storytelling. I have my chatty, witty podcasts already. I want a new collection of podcasts that teach me, inspire me, and scare me.

[fandomsandfeminism]

Hello! I left SPN back in s7, but my fave time was seasons 1 & 2 when it was creepy backroads mysteries and southern/american gothic themes. I'll take any recs in that theme you have, (bonus points for witchy mains!) And I'll give one of my faves: the Eden Moore book trilogy by Cherie Preist. Its about a mixed race girl who grows up able to see ghosts, fast book follows her growing up & trying to solve an old family history. It can be iffy on handling the race of the protag and with mental illness, but I've definitely seen it done WORSE and some of possible the iffiness is making a point about how its handled in the real world. More spooky and atmospheric than real horror, tho there are a couple of murders.

Oooo, thanks for the rec! 

The first rec that springs to mind is “Welcome to Nightvale”- both the Podcast AND the books. It’s very American Paranomal, but with a lot of humor in there. Both the podcast and the books are great. 

For something spooky/paranormal, try the Netflix movie “The Haunting of Bly Manor.” Not really American gothic, but....it’s a ghost story. 

Ok, let’s talk books. 

I’m going to put Cemetery Boys top of this list. I’d classify it as Urban Fantasy, it pulls from a lot of latinix / Mexican folklore, and it’s cute as hell. 

I want to rec Trail of Lightning  but understand that I haven’t actually read this book yet. I LOVE Roanhorse’s other book (Black Sun, BIG rec there, though super different vibe from SPN.)  Trail of Lightning has LGBT characters in it, and the genre is a good fit. Buuuuuut I’m kind of recing it blind here. 

Keeping with the theme, I’m going to rec The City We Became. I’ve read other books (very very very good books) by NK Jemison, so I trust her. This is an urban fantasy set in New York, so I think it would tick the right boxes (but I haven’t read it yet myself.) 

I also want to rec Love in the Time of Global Warming, and I’m having a hard time explaining why. It’s a future post-apocalyptic fantasy-ish retelling of the Odyssey? But there’s something about the almost episodic nature of that story structure and the mythology-inspired conflicts that just...feels right. I dunno. 

I’m going to put Tithe on this list. The queerness isn’t as prominent as some of these other books (it’s the gay best friend trope.) BUT it’s an Urban fantasy and I really really liked it when I read it back in middle school, so its worth a shot if that’s your thing.  (There’s actually a lot of YA Urban Fantasy with secondary LGBT characters that I loved in Middle School I could put on this list. So if that’s actually what you’re into, maybe also try “Wicked Lovely”) 

I’m also just going top pop this list of LGBT Witch books right here, since, hey, witchy.

[notbecauseofvictories]

Hi Sarah! My friend and I are starting a bookclub (as much as you can with two people who aren't pressed for deadlines) and I was wondering if you have any recommendations? (That is if you have time to rec anything!) We're starting off with Deathless and have Fitzgerald next in line somewhere but I def want to try to expand the genres we read and tbh from years of following you, I trust your judgement

I don’t...like giving recommendations? At least not directly, it seems like too much opportunity for getting it wrong. Everybody has their own tastes, after all, and even the best of friends don’t necessarily vibe with what you vibe with. (I’ve experienced this with multiple friends, so I know what I’m talking about.) Truly, one of the reasons that my whole “I’m going to get back into reading for pleasure!” push has been so successful is that I only bother with books that interest me, and stop reading when they fail to catch my attention.

But I’ve now read at least 60 books in 2020, which is approximately 60 more than I’ve read in the years prior, so I’m happy to share that. Below is my list of recent reads, beginning to end, along with a very short review---I keep this list in the notes app on my phone, so they have to be. Where I’ve talked about a book in a post, I’ve tried to link to it. 

Peruse, and if something catches your interest I hope you enjoy!

2020 Reading List

Crazy Rich Asians series, Kevin Kwan (here)

Blackwater, Michael McDowell (here;��pulpy horror and southern gothic in one novel; come for the monster but stay for the family drama.)

Fire and Hemlock, Diane Wynne Jones (here; weird and thoughtful, in ways I’m still thinking about)

The Secret History, Donna Tartt

Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn (here; loved it! I can see why people glommed onto it)

Swamplandia!, Karen Russell (unfinished, I could not get past the first paragraph; just....no.)

Rules of Scoundrels series, Sarah MacLean (an enjoyable romp through classic romancelandia, though if you read through 4 back to back you realize that MacLean really only writes 1 type of relationship and 1 type of sexual encounter, though I do appreciate insisting that the hero go down first.)

The Bear and the Nightingale, Katherine Arden (here)

Dread Nation, Justine Ireland (great, put it with Stealing Thunder in terms of fun YA fantasy that makes everything less white and Eurocentric)

The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson (VERY good. haunting good.)

Tell My Horse, Zora Neale Hurston (I read an interesting critique of Hurston that said she stripped a lot of the radicalism out of black stories - these might be an example, or counterexample. I haven't decided yet.)

The Rose MacGregor Drinking and Admiration Society, T. Kingfisher (fun!)

St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves, Karen Russell (some of these short stories are wonderful; however, Swamplandia's inspiration is still unreadable, which is wild.)

17776, Jon Bois (made me cry. deeply human. A triumph of internet storytelling)

The Girl with All the Gifts, M. R. Carey (deeply enjoyable. the ending is a bittersweet kick in the teeth, and I really enjoyed the adults' relationships)

The Door in the Hedge and Other Stories, Robin McKinley (enjoyable, but never really resolved into anything.)

The Hero and the Crown, Robin McKinley (fun, but feels very early fantasy - or maybe I've just read too many of the subsequent knock-offs.)

Mrs. Caliban, Rachel Ingalls (weird little pulp novel.)

All Systems Red, Martha Wells (enjoyable, but I don't get the hype. won't be looking into the series unless opportunity arises.)

A People's History of Chicago, Kevin Coval (made me cry. bought a copy. am still thinking about it.)

The Sol Majestic, Ferrett Steinmetz (charming, a sf novel mostly about fine dining)

House in the Cerulean Sea, TJ Klune (immensely enjoyable read, for all it feels like fic with the serial numbers filed off)

The Au Pair, Emma Rous (not bad, but felt like it wanted to be more than it is)

The Night Tiger, Yangsze Choo (preferred this to Ghost Bride; I enjoy a well-crafted mystery novel and this delivered)

The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula Le Guin (unfinished, I cannot fucking get into Le Guin and should really stop trying)

The Ghost Bride, Yangsze Choo (enjoyable, but not nearly as fun as Ghost Bride - the romance felt very disjointed, and could have used another round of editing)

Temptation's Darling, Johanna Lindsey (pure, unadulterated id in a romance novel, complete with a girl dressing as a boy to avoid detection)

Social Creature, Tara Isabella Burton (a strange, dark psychological portrait; really made a mark even though I can't quite put my finger on why)

The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins (slow at first, but picks up halfway through and builds nicely; a whiff of Gone Girl with the staggered perspectives building together)

Stealing Thunder, Alina Boyden (fun Tortall vibes, but set in Mughal India)

The Traitor Baru Cormorant; The Monster Baru Commorant, The Tyrant Baru Cormorant, Seth Dickinson (LOVE this, so much misery, terrible, ecstatic; more here)

This Is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone (epistolary love poetry, vicious and lovely; more here)

The Elementals, Michael McDowell

Gideon the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir (didn't like this one as much as I thought I would; narrator's contemporary voice was so jarring against the stylized world and action sequences read like the novelization for a video game; more here)

Finna, Nino Cipri (a fun little romp through interdimensional Ikea, if on the lighter side)

Magic for Liars, Sarah Gailey (engrossing, even if I could see every plot twist coming from a mile away)

Desdemona and the Deep, C. S. E. Cooney (enjoyed the weirdness & the fae bits, but very light fare)

A Blink of the Screen, Terry Pratchett (admittedly just read this for the Discworld bits)

A Memory Called Empire, Arkady Martine (not as good about politics and colonialism as Baru, but still a powerful book about The Empire, and EXTREMELY cool worldbuilding that manages to be wholly alien and yet never heavily expositional)

Blackfish City, Sam J. Miller (see my post)

Last Werewolf, Glen Duncan (didn't finish, got to to first explicit sex scene and couldn't get any further)

Prosper's Demon, KJ Parker (didn't work for me...felt like a short story that wanted to be fleshed out into a novel)

The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett

His Majesty's Dragon, Naomi Novik (extremely fun, even for a reader who doesn't much like Napoleonic stories)

Three Parts Dead, Max Gladstone (fun romp - hard to believe that this is the same author as Time War though you can see glimmers of it in the imagery here)

A Scot in the Dark, Sarah MacLean (palette cleanser, she does write a good romance novel even it's basically the same romance novel over and over)

The Resurrectionist, E. B. Hudspeth (borrowed it on a whim one night, kept feeling like there was something I was supposed to /get/ about it, but never did - though I liked the Mutter Museum parallels)

Stories of Your Life and Others, Ted Chiang (he's a better ideas guy than a writer, though Hell Is The Absence of God made my skin prickle all over)

Gods of Jade and Shadow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia (fun, very much a throwback to my YA days of fairytale retellings, though obviously less European)

Four Roads Cross, Max Gladstone (it turns out I was a LOT more fond of Tara than I initially realized - plus this book had a good Pratchett-esque pacing and reliance on characterization)

Get in Trouble, Kelly Link (reading this after the Chiang was instructive - Link is such a better storyteller, better at prioritizing the human over the concept)

Gods Behaving Badly, Marie Phillips

Soulless; Changeless; Blameless, all by Gail Carriger (this series is basically a romance novel with some fantasy plot thrown in for fun; extremely charming and funny)

Black Leopard, Red Wolf, Marlon James (got about 1/3 of the way through and had to wave the white flag; will try again because I like the plot and the worldbuilding; the tone is just so hard to get through)

Pew, Catherine Lacey (a strange book, I'm still thinking about it; a good Southern book, though)

Nuremberg Diary, GM Gilbert (it took me two months to finish, and was worth it)

River of Teeth, Sarah Gailey (I wanted to like this one a lot more than I actually did; would have made a terrific movie but ultimately was not a great novel. Preferred Magic for Liars.)

Mexican Gothic, Silvia Moreno-Garcia (extremely fun, though more trippy than Gods and the plot didn't work as well for me - though it was very original)

The New Voices of Fantasy, Peter S. Beagle (collected anthology, with some favorites I've read before Ursula Vernon's "Jackalope Wives", "Hungry Daughters of Starving Mothers" "The Husband Stitch"; others that were great new finds "Selkie Stories are for Losers" from Sofia Satamar and "A Kiss With Teeth" from Max Gladstone and "The Philosophers" from Adam Ehrlich Sachs)

[kolbisneat]

MONTHLY MEDIA: June 2021

We in Ontario are still mostly locked down and my area is the MOST locked down (not being dramatic, it’s genuinely the only region that isn’t opening up at the start of July). What this means is there’s still lots of time for safe, distanced, indoor activities! Here’s how I spent June.

……….FILM……….

Groundhog Day (1993) Despite liking practically every time loop movie I’ve watched, I’d never seen Groundhog Day. It was great! I was surprised by how much of a journey Bill Murray’s character went on. Just when I thought he’d gotten to the point where he would break the cycle, the movie says “nope!” and digs deeper. Now I understand why it gets referenced in all the other time loop movies.

Cruella (2021) It’s a fairly bonkers premise and it’s just campy enough to work. The scenes where it slows down for drama feel...unnecessary, but maybe overall it was still a good time at the (at home) movies! It takes some swings and I’ll never complain about that.

……….TELEVISION……….

Loki (Episode 1.01 to 1.03) I tend to prefer my Marvel stuff a little more fantastic so this is...right up my alley. Time travel, strange planets, it’s all great. Very Doctor Who. Keen to see how this shapes up.

The Bachelorette (Episode 17.01 to 17.04) Katie gives off such a good “I’m not supposed to be here” energy that I can’t help but enjoy this season. That and the change from Chris Harrison to Tayshia Adams and Kaitlyn Bristowe is the breath of fresh air I need.

Neon Genesis Evangelion (Episode 1.12 to 1.17) Still a very slow burn and a slow watch for me but I’m digging it! It seems to be in an exposition/bigger plot phase right now so not as much giant robot v monster battles but hey, I’m all for variety.

Superstore (Episode 4.12 to 5.08) The series has really transitioned from Jonah and Amy to the full cast and that’s great! Also hitting some surprisingly topical story beats.

……….READING……….

Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Complete) I have a rather limited exposure to the gothic genre (Dracula, Frankenstein, and Crimson Peak are pretty much it) but this felt right at home. Turns out I really dig contemporary gothic novels! If you liked Crimson Peak then check this novel out. If you haven’t seen Crimson Peak, watch that and read this.

DC: The New Frontier by Darwyn Cooke (Complete) Still one of my absolute favourite comics. I’d pitch this as Mad Men meets the Justice League. It deftly weaves fun superheroics into real-world events around the late 50s (including the overt racism and misogyny of the time). The pacing and artwork are cinematic, the narrative feels big enough for a full-team threat, and everyone feels like they’re a piece in a bigger puzzle. Just love it.

Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlmann and Kerascoët (Complete) One of my favourite graphic novels to reread every so often. It’s so dark and sad yet beautiful to look at. I admit I less enjoyed the...meanness of the tiny fairy-like characters on the latest reading, but I think that’s byproduct fo the general climate in which I’m reading the book. Still highly recommend.

Head Lopper Volume 2 & Head Lopper Volume 3 by Andrew Maclean with Jordie Bellaire (Complete) Volume 2 is still my fave of the trio. The plot and pacing are ace and the style feels a lot more pulpy. Volume 3 is a really fun story that expands the world but it all feels...rushed in a way that the previous volumes didn’t. Maybe it’s the larger cast and the bigger story, but there were a number of times where I felt like panels were missing. The evolving art style is a lot more loose and I like it overall, but I think the art would be better complimented by more breathing room. As critical as this is sounding, I still have a blast every time I read this series and I’ve preordered volume 4, so know that I criticize because I love it all so so much.

……….AUDIO……….

The Adventure Zone: Ethersea (Podcast) I fell off of The Adventure Zone a while back but I’m digging this new premise! I know the worldbuilding episodes may not be loved by some but I really dig seeing how the sausage is made and getting a glimpse at another gaming format. Good stuff.

Love to See It (Podcast) With all the Bachelorette stuff going on this summer, I’m glad this podcast is back (albeit with a different name).

……….GAMING……….

Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting (Andrews McMeel Publishing) The adventurers have made some MAJOR waves on the island! Or at least with one faction. I won’t spoil anything so there’s a more thorough breakdown over on Reddit!

Super Mario 3D All Stars (Nintendo) I wrapped up Super Mario Galaxy and I’m reminded that I always enjoy the 3D Mario games for about 60% of the time it takes to complete it. It just doesn’t feel as satisfying or challenging (in a good way, you know?) than the 2D platformers. It’s just not for me, an old.

And that’s it! As always, let me know if you have anything to recommend and happy Wednesday!

[a-skirmish-of-wit-and-lit]

Ashlee Bree’s Top Reads of 2020

 Rules: Share your top books of 2020 and tag other Booklrs!

Tagged by the lovely @crowflybookclub. Thanks sweets! These are in no particular order.  xx

-Murder on the Orient Express, Agatha Christie

*I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, I’ve been sleeping on Agatha Christie for  far too long and this book convinced me. How she manages to tell a whole ass murder mystery through dialogue-heavy scenes still amazes me?? TEACH ME YOUR SKILLS, YODA.

-Beach Read, Emily Henry

*My favorite chick lit romance of the year! I have pawned it off in recommendation to everyone I know and will continue to do so. January and Gus are a book/writing lover’s dream team! (A reread is in my imminent future--obviously.)

-To Love and to Loathe, Martha Waters

*Coming in April 2021. When I say I screamed when I got this ARC, I mean I broke the sound barrier. There’s an “affair of convenience” with “no strings attached” and everything! Diana and Jeremy certainly know how to do steamy. Whew!

PUT IT ON YOUR TO READ LISTS.

-A Rogue of One’s Own, Evie Dunmore

*Book two of A League of Extraordinary Women series and also the roguish delight of my dreams!!! You’re not gonna want to miss all the fireworks between Lucie and Tristan! (Also, Dunmore could write the back of a cereal box at this point and I’d fangirl over it.)

-Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams, Matthew Walker

*Nonfiction/science. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about this one since I read it back in February. FEBRUARY. Sleep is integral to our health, in ways I didn’t even realize, and I have Walker to thank for opening my eyes. (And also for getting my ass to bed to catch the zzz’s I need.) 

-Recursion, Blake Crouch

*Crouch absolutely BLEW MY SCI-FI-LOVING MIND with both this and Dark Matter this year. If you’re at all interested in string theory or the idea of alternate realities, you need to check his books out. They’re a heart-pumping, reality bending, trip!

-Rage, Bob Woodward

*There’s a reason why Woodward has such journalistic acclaim. He’s meticulous in his questions, in his corroboration of sources; he goes into the trenches to get at the center of how a president ticks. This account of Trump is no different. 

-My Dark Vanessa, Kate Elizabeth Russel

*Not for the faint of heart by any means. It’s haunting prose, coming from the point of view of a victim who’s straddling the line between dark romance and abuse. It leaves a shadow, a specter. You can’t escape its clutches fast enough yet it won’t let you go, either. 

It’s one of those “I hate this, ABORT! ABORT! but I can’t stop reading” books, for sure.

-Mexican Gothic, Silvia Moreno-Garcia

*LISTEN, this is a big deal because horror’s not really my thing. Distortion and gothic horrors abound. It’s delightful!

-Kiss the Fae, Natalia Jaster

*Jaster’s gorgeous lyricism is on full display here in this tale about a human (Lark) and her Fae captor-of-sorts (Cerulean). The setting, the characters, the romance--all of it is whimsically delicious. And it’s only the first in the series...😏

Tagging @accidental-rambler​, @lynyrdwrites​, @frommybookbook​, @thedoctorknits​, @aussyangel​, @renee561​, @commonxcrimminals​ + anyone else who wants to give it a go! 

[starlightcleric]

Book recs #3, 9, 23, 38, 43, 55, 68, 69, 92?

3. a stand-alone that you wish was part of a series

I’m having a really hard time with this because most of my favorite books either are part of series (Watership Down has a way less popular spin off, did you know?), or are self contained so I feel no need for there to be a sequel. There are a lot of unanswered questions at the end of Mexican Gothicby Silvia Moreno-Garcia, but, like, there are supposedto be? So while I want to know what happens to the characters, I don’t actually want a sequel because the narrative is done.

9. your favourite book of 2020

I actually read multiple books in 2020 that made it onto my favorites list, but I’m going to pick Daisy Jones & The Sixby Taylor Jenkins Reid. It’s basically a band interview/biopic of a fictional rock band from the seventies as told in book form, which sounds really niche but it’s really well done and moving. I’ve heard the audio book is amazing; I think they cast different people as each of the different characters giving interviews, so you actually get the full interview feel.

23. a book that is currently on your TBR

Lol, my to-read shelf on Goodreads has 71 books on it. One (out of eleven) of the books I currently have on hold from the library is All Systems Red by Martha Wells which is the first in the Murderbot series, which has been highly recommended to me. I am #188 in line on 31 copies of the e-book. It’s going to be a while.

38. your favourite series

I mean, Discworld, but if I’m trying to rec something I haven’t talked about yet, I really enjoy the October Daye series by Seannan McGuire. It’s an urban fantasy series about a half-fey private detective.

43. a book that you have read more than three times

Lol, I’ve read Watership Downover twenty times, it was my favorite book as a child. If I’m trying to talk about books I haven’t talked about already, I read Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fireabout that many times as well. I obsessively reread books as a child, so really any book that I liked got read more than three times.

55. a book with a satisfying ending

That’s… open ended. And honestly I often greatly enjoy endings where not everything is tied up neatly. Let’s go with Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones. I feel like YA books tend to have neater endings than adult. Not a bad thing.

68. your favourite piece of classic literature

But I have so many classic literature loves. Going to go a bit obscure and recommend The Kalevala, which is the national epic of Finland. I specifically have the translation by Keith Baker. Does the plot make any sense? No. Is the poetry absolutely beautiful? Yes.

69. your favourite mythological retelling

I really enjoy The Legend of Sigurd & Gudrunby (posthumously) JRR Tolkien. I love the Poetic Eddafor its language, but there’s not a consistent narrative. And The Volsung Saga has a (semi) direct narrative, but the prose is dry and the narrative is inconsistent. This book makes an internally consistent story in verse. (Incidentally this is why I prefer The Nibelungenliedto the Norse versions of the story-- it’s internally consistent).

92. a book about a redeemable villain

I… am actually having a difficult time with this, because most of my favorite villains are femme fatales that absolutely wreck shit (Milady from The Three Musketeers, arguably Kriemhild from The Nibelungneliedbut she’s a lot more sympathetic). Maybe Lucy Audley from Lady Audley’s Secret? She’s not the protagonist, and she doesn’t win or get necessarily redeemed, but my entire Victorian Literature class was on her side.

book recs ask game

[snoopysfriendwoodstock]

This isn't really niche but do you have any book recs for fantasy/sci fi not written by white men? Thanks!

yes! (fair warning: i don’t read as much fantasy/sci-fi as i did a few years ago so these are a bit older and gear a bit younger, so i’m also going to rec a couple i’ve heard GREAT things abt in addition!)

ones i have read and would recommend: 

1. tristan strong punches a hole in the sky by kwame mbalia (middle grade): SO FUN! it’s a percy jackson style book about a kid who finds the world of west african + african american mythology through his dead friend’s journal and it is just the BEST so funny and so enjoyable especially if you have pjo nostalgia

2. passenger by alexandra bracken (young adult): okay idk why this one lives in my brain so much but i LOVE it. it’s about a teenage girl named etta who finds out that she’s able to time travel and after learning her mother is being held hostage somewhere in time she becomes partners with nicholas, a Black pirate from the 1700′s, to find her. this is the only time travel book or media i’ve seen that actually explores the idea of time travel not only with a Black protagonist but with a Black man and a white woman being companions in different periods in history? but also it’s written by a white woman so i’m not going to say it’s like Extremely Profound or Correct or anything i just like it!

3. mexican gothic by silvia moreno-garcia (adult): okay this one is more thriller than fantasy/sci-fi but some really fantastical elements are introduced in the latter half and it’s tagged as fantasy on goodreads and i just think everyone should read this bc i loved it <3

ones that are on my list that i either haven’t gotten to yet or that were out of stock so long on bookshop . org that my order was cancelled:

1. pet by akwaeke emezi (young adult): a book with a young transgender girl mc who teams up with a monster to kill p*dophiles! my order was cancelled for this one and i want it so bad. (also there is more than this book than that description but this is how my fav professor described it to us and it hooked me <3)

2. a blade so black by l.l. mckinney (young adult): a retelling of alice in wonderland that is also crossed w buffy and set in atlanta! have heard nothing but good things about this. also if you read it leave it a good review, racists have tried to ruin this authors goodreads score.

[crazygirlsworldofbooks]

Review: Mexican Gothic

“One could construct a hundred different narratives, it didn’t make them true.”

Book: Mexican Gothic

Author: Silvia Moreno-Garcia

My Rating: ✯ ✯ ✯ ✯ (4 Stars)

Read: December 10, 2020

Synopsis: After receiving a frantic letter from her newly-wed cousin begging for someone to save her from a mysterious doom, Noemí Taboada heads to High Place, a distant house in the Mexican countryside. She’s not sure what she will find—her cousin’s husband, a handsome Englishman, is a stranger, and Noemí knows little about the region. Noemí is also an unlikely rescuer: She’s a glamorous debutante, and her chic gowns and perfect red lipstick are more suited for cocktail parties than amateur sleuthing. But she’s also tough and smart, with an indomitable will, and she is not afraid: Not of her cousin’s new husband, who is both menacing and alluring; not of his father, the ancient patriarch who seems to be fascinated by Noemí; and not even of the house itself, which begins to invade Noemi’s dreams with visions of blood and doom. Her only ally in this inhospitable abode is the family’s youngest son. Shy and gentle, he seems to want to help Noemí, but might also be hiding dark knowledge of his family’s past. For there are many secrets behind the walls of High Place. The family’s once colossal wealth and faded mining empire kept them from prying eyes, but as Noemí digs deeper she unearths stories of violence and madness. And Noemí, mesmerized by the terrifying yet seductive world of High Place, may soon find it impossible to ever leave this enigmatic house behind.

My Review:

I was confused by this book to say the least. I didn’t even know what rating I was going to give it until I was almost all the way through the book because I had such mixed emotions about it. I am just starting to figure myself out as a reader and have definitely come to the conclusion that horror really isn’t the genre for me, however, I did enjoy this book. After initially picking it up because many booktubers were raving about it and also the cover is absolutely beautiful and one of my favorites, I was taken by surprise after discovering just how gruesome and terrifying it was in some places but I did end up enjoying it ultimately.

The story is about a girl, Noemi, who is forced to go investigate her cousin’s new husband and their estate after she receives a frantic letter with her cousin swearing that her new husband is poisoning her and that something wrong is going on at the manor of her new husband’s family. The plot is something that really caught my attention and I thought it was interesting enough so I gave it a shot. I haven’t read much horror whatsoever, so it definitely appealed to me. Not my usual thriller mystery but there seemed to be some aspects of it in this novel. I did struggle a little through through the first half of the book since most of the action and excitement takes place is the last part of it.

Further on, the characterization is superb. I got into the mind of many of the characters and I learned to love Noemi for her quick wit and refusal to be anyone but herself. Even the bad characters, though I was not able to feel much sympathy for them, I felt there was a very good amount of background and it was explained very well why they were the way that they were. It definitely made them more real in my eyes, not just the “villains” anymore because it gave them a flawed, human side and I was there for it. The story was very character driven and I loved seeing into all their minds, even if I got the chills all throughout this book because the characters were unsettling to say the least.

Finally, the writing style is mesmerizing. It painted vividly for me, the High Place manor with its creepy atmosphere and unknown things lurking at every corner. I think that’s probably my favorite part of this book, that the writing was just a joy to read and I felt myself transferred to High Place as I read the book. It was just on the precipice of being too much with the details and the descriptions without reaching it. Beautiful writing, through and through. 

In conclusion, I enjoyed this book immensely even if horror as a genre is really not my cup of tea and I prefer to stick to my thrillers. I would recommend this book to anyone who is not put off my some horrifying imagery and fans of twisty, horrory things. It will keep you on the edge of your seat, that’s for sure. Not my absolute favorite but I can see how it would be for someone who is more into all the horrific things and likes the horror genre more than I do.

[casual-lip-bites]

Prologue and Chapter 1

To Everyone in the Whole World. Every small thought or action or choice every single person has ever made has warped the universe into what it is now, and for that I thank you.

Prologue I bet you thought that this was going to be an insightful book or something. Well, you were wrong. This book really sucks. No one thought it would ever get published, much less finished. Not even my mom believed in me. But as I kept writing it, I thought of all the stupid teen romance books I’ve read and thought, hey, if those could get published, why can’t I publish a book too? So I’m really sorry if you decided to buy this or something. I hope you kept the receipt, because in truth, my book probably isn’t worth the five dollars or however much it cost you. Not in this economy. Unless, of course, you borrowed it or got it from the library or illegally downloaded it online or something. I hate writing. My vocabulary is passible at best. I never thought that I would write a book, like, ever, but look at me now. Just to let you know, I did not write this whole thing. I had help from my best friend and a Mexican kid who has told me multiple times that he wishes I was dead. These are literally the only people I ever talk to. I’m warning you right now: I don’t know what they’re going to write. Personally, I’m going to try to be PG-13, but I’ve been told that have a swearing problem, so that’s not always going to be possible. You know it’s bad when you have to Google “what does it take for a book to be banned”. It’s right there in my search history. Right above “why are teenagers so smug” and “when can I legally drop-out of high school”. Nothing really matters to me anymore. I’m just here to exist for as long as possible. I don’t like putting effort into anything, really. College is out of the question. I mean, someone has to wipe down gas station toilets. I only agreed to write this novel because there’s not too many realistic YA novels out there. Not everyone can have their dream relationship. (I’m going to marry a trashcan.) Not everything ends happily, and sometimes things don’t end at all. (My story begins at the end.) I never really have any deep thoughts. (At least, not in the way that it’s shown in teen books.) And most teenagers have boring-as-hell lives. (Either that, or I just assume that everyone else does too.) Really though, the deepest thought that I’ve had in a week happened when I dropped a bowl of soup and thought “oh shit son” and then wondered if soup has the ability to understand the concept of gender identity and family relations. Truly deep thoughts come and go. It’s usually only the stupid things that I remember long enough to write down. I’m just going to go ahead and warn you, some of the insightful stuff I try to write comes out like it’s supposed to, and other times it will just look like: boop boop boop Are trees vegetables? Exact words are not my forte. I’m lucky that I came up with “forte” right then. I’m really not sure how this will turn out at all. I haven’t even read most of this. I’m not allowed to read what Lily and Ethan write, and they’re not allowed to read what I write. We’re basically publishing it without proofreading each other’s work. It’s supposed to “encourage honesty” or something. So we’ll see how that turns out. Yeah. There’s probably a reason why books like this don’t exist. Again, sorry. Anyway, I wrote this for you because I care a lot about you as a person.  I needed this book to exist because I need you to know something. I don’t care if it’s cheesy. You need to hear it. Things can and will get better. Do not kill yourself. I wrote this for you, so you’d better learn something from it. I have bled and suffered and bled some more to get this book out. If you kill yourself, I will murder you. Someone is always ready to listen. Sometimes we forget about people we can count on. There’s always that one person that you forget about. Like siblings. No matter how much you hate each other, no matter how horrible to you they are, no matter how shitty the personality, your sibling(s) will listen to you if you seriously need someone to talk to. Another thing I didn’t consider, until just recently, is talking to someone who has a crush on you. If they like you, chances are they probably don’t want you to hurt yourself. However, if he/she is one of those freaks that crawl in your window at night or design you-inspired sex dolls, you should probably think of another option. Like a guidance counselor. They’re legally obligated to care about your feelings. Don’t forget those people. Someone will listen. There’s always someone. I know this because I was forgotten. Wait, what was I writing about again? I have a really untraditional writing system. I first write out a bunch of BS that I really can’t use and then scan over it the next day. I delete little sentences that don’t make sense here and there until I’ve deleted the whole chapter. Then I re-write it and then ignore it all for a month or two if I’m getting behind on schoolwork or something. Sometimes in the middle of the night I take it out, read it, and type little scraggly messages on it to daytime me. They look like they were typed out by a toddler. I can’t even tell what most of them are supposed to mean, so I spend a lot of time trying to decode things like “bread water” instead of writing the actual story. My favorites are: “com on grill u cans rite better than that” and “higher than meth”. Oh yeah. I also hate it when authors get you attached to a character and kill them off right at the end like they’re actually trying to ruin your emotions forever, so I’m going to go ahead and warn you now so you hate me less for making you read this book. My sister dies in the first chapter. No amount of character deaths in YA books could have prepared me for what had happened. That’s another reason why I needed this book to exist. The suddenness and finality of death is unreal. It’s kind of like a text message ding going off and then the sound cutting out right in the middle of it. And then a random electrical wire snapping and burning and suddenly everything’s on fire and you’re on fire and your pets are on fire and it’s painful and even though you embrace death and dying and enjoy pain this is too much. Another thing: You’re probably wondering what gender I am. Even if it wasn’t at, like, the fore-front of your mild, you were probably subconsciously trying to figure it out. I won’t make you play “Guess That Gender” until my name appears in dialogue or something. This isn’t Walmart. My name is Kirsten Bloom. I also hate it when authors write shit like “his dark, leaf green eyes looked at me, comforting me and giving me memories of summery afternoon walks in the woods with my father” to describe how people look. Like, no. My face isn’t the type of face that could be described in poetry anyway. So here’s what I look like most of the time: I have brown hair. I would have black hair, but my mom won’t let me dye it. I have washed-out green eyes. I’m pale. I dress kind of gothic. (Eyeliner, 90’s choker, black leather boots, black lipstick, black/purple shirt, black skinny-jeans, black jacket with a skull on it.) My style is basically “economically disadvantaged girl trying to act cool and gothic but failing hard”. Just so you know, I’m not exactly sure how I’m going to write this just yet, but I’m sure that it will be really horrible for at least the first two or three chapters. I’m sorry about that, but believe me; it will be so worth it. If you’re anything like me at all, I guarantee that this book will save you from some shit. I have one hell of a story to tell you. And so it begins.

Chapter 1 Katherine Bloom is dead. She killed herself. I can’t believe that she’s never coming back. She was alive just a week ago. She can’t be gone. But she is. Her death is one thing that I have accepted. Once a person is pronounced dead by medical professionals, there’s no way around it. But my heart feels like it’s been ripped to pieces. She was my other half. I never fully comprehended how awful deaths are until I saw my sister on a cold, metallic operating table, her lifeless eyes staring at the ceiling. Seeing nurses in lab coats covering her thin frame in a sheet, gone forever. Watching my mother choke and sob in front of me. Not being completely sure if the screaming sound I heard was coming from my vocal cords or if it was just the sound of my brain collapsing in on itself. After three days of pure depression sprinkled with rage and denial, I know that my little sister is never coming back. Death is permanent. Death is unshifting. Death is cold. And I don’t love. [I warned you it would be like this. Just roll with it.] It’s as if she never existed, except she’s more here than ever. I can actually feel her absence. It’s heavy and empty at the same time, especially in her room.  All of the Christmas lights that she always kept in there have been packed away into a little box, just like all of her other things. Mom said earlier that we could donate it to charity, but she hasn’t followed through on that. I have a feeling that her things will stay here forever. My little sister will always have a place in our house. But right now her room is mine. I’ve been sleeping here since I basically smashed everything in my room into a trillion pieces. It has a depressive presence in it, though. This place is so empty without her. I spend most of my time in here drawing invisible circles on her bed that’s been stripped bare, and think. She slept on rosy red sheets, which are now packed away in a box. It was her favorite color. Now her ashes rest in a rosy red urn. It was originally for grandma. We were hoping that she would die. I really wonder about what my sister was thinking about during the afternoons that she spent locked away in here, wasting away. A lump grows in my throat, but I can’t even cry anymore. I’m just done with it all. I still haven’t figured out why she would kill herself. No matter how many things I try to decode from days I can barely remember, I’m no further along than the previous hour. She wasn’t a depressing person. She smiled a lot. She had lots of friends. The only thing that was different about her attitude was that she stayed in her room for extremely long periods of time, listening to music. I didn’t find that alarming, because that was one of her favorite pastimes. Only she usually did it for less than five hours at a time in a locked room. I thought that she was just becoming one of those teenaged girls who like to keep to themselves. Like me. I guess it was more than that. And now she’s dead. I put my head down on the flat bedspread. I am determined to find out the truth. I need to know the truth more than I need oxygen. Someone rings the doorbell. What the hell do they want? I force myself out of bed and trudge over to the front door and open it. My heart starts fluttering and I just can’t believe my eyes. It’s Katherine. She smiles at me and I hug her so tightly that I just might kill her. I’m shaking so hard right now. “I missed you so much. Please don’t hurt yourself. Ever,” I say. When I stop hugging her, I see that she too is tearing up. There’s a bright glow around her. She starts to say something, when- And then I wake up. My sister is dead. And I’m still lying on her bed. I just dreamed it all. I’m ashamed to say that that was not the first time that I had done that. There’s nothing I want more than for my sister to come back. But she’s gone. All that’s left are bittersweet memories. Ashes can’t dance. Ashes can’t sing. Ashes can’t ride bikes. Ashes can’t feed birds in the park. Ashes can’t sit under the stars and watch them twinkle all night. Ashes can’t smile or love. They can’t do any of the things that my sister loved to do. I know for a fact that she didn’t just randomly decide to kill herself. No sane kid just looks in the mirror and goes: Hey. Today was a fun day, but I think that I should just hang myself now. She is, was, a very cheerful person. I secretly envied her for that reason. She was great. We had near perfect childhoods, but for some reason she was the only decent one out of us. The only conclusion that I can come up with is that she was bullied. And once I find out who caused this, I will kill them. All of those bastards are going to die tonight. I’ll stab them over and over and over and over and over and over and over again with the pocket knife she harmed herself with, after I make absolute sure that they feel guilty for their actions. Blood will be spilt tonight. And I hope those faggots rot in hell. I found her pocket knife in her bedroom closet yesterday, when mom and I were cleaning out her room. We were deciding what of hers we should keep and what we should ‘’give away”. We were just expecting to find old toys and stuff like that. Then I found that thing. Actually, it really wasn’t that hard to find. It stabbed me in the kneecap. I gave mom the knife. I didn’t give any explanation at all. The knife said more than any words could say. Apparently, that was a bad idea, because she didn’t say anything after that. She just got in the car and left me there, holding out the bloody knife. Now, that said more than words could say. For a wild moment I thought that she had abandoned me to start a new life. Wouldn’t be the first time someone did that. Apparently, mom went to the liquor store to drown her feelings in alcoholism. But she might as well leave, with all the support she’s given me. It’s like her soul was sucked out of her eyes. I hid the blade in my jacket pocket the minute she left Katherine’s room, assuming that she would take it from me eventually. But she never intended to, for reasons that I already covered. Katherine was just a kid. What did she do to deserve this? What did I do? There’s no way that she hung herself. But she did. She left mom and me. She didn’t leave a note or anything. There was no warning. It just happened. Everything reminds me of her. I’ll have to get used to it, considering the fact that I live here. I shut my eyes. I hate everything in this house, especially the mirror, which I can’t stand to look into. My face isn’t my face anymore. It’s Katherine’s: the same Katherine who was hanging by her neck in the bathroom, staring at me blankly. My make-up probably looks really runny and shitty. I decide to brave looking in the mirror. I look for only half a second, and then shut my eyes. My chest feels heavy. I lose my breath. When I say I can’t stand how I look, I mean it literally. Anyway, my eyeliner looks how I thought it would look. I look like a raccoon going through a gothic phase. I’m never going to heal if I stay here. Sometimes I just think about getting in the truck and leaving home forever. Like in every non-supernatural YA novel ever. But then my mom would have no one, except her liquor. Sometimes I think if I got drunk maybe I could experience whatever magical delusional feeling she’s experiencing, but I come from a long line of people who ruined their lives with alcohol, so I’m not going to take that chance. I am the generation that finally gets it right. I smoke instead. I strip off my jacket (aka security blanket) for the first time all day and walk right out the back door. The night air feels warm and cool at the same time. Crickets are chirping. The wind feels amazing. I’ve always preferred night-time. Usually in the summer I change up my sleep schedule where I wake up at 3:00pm and go to sleep at 5:00am so I can mostly stay up at night, but still do stuff with friends in the afternoon. Plus, going out and doing whatever at night means that there’s zero chance of getting sunburned, and everyone’s asleep, so it’s like I live in my own little world. It’s just me and the sky. I’ve decided to not do that this year, because I need as much stability as I can get. I get out my lighter and cup my hand around it. The flickering flame illuminates the cigarette just before I light it.  Contrary to popular belief, smoking is actually a great way to cope. First of all, it’s fun. Second, I can get a nice buzz going without losing my mental facilities, and not just because I lost it all beforehand. Third, you get to light things on fire. That’s always fun. And fourth, you can slowly kill yourself by doing it. Then I’ll die slightly after my mom so she won’t have to outlive both kids. Drag. Hold it in. Hold it in. Hold it in. Hold it in. Exhale. Repeat. Drag. Hold it in. Hold it in. Hold it in. Hold it in. Exhale. Repeat. Drag. Hold it in. Hold it in. Hold it in. Hold it in. Exhale. Repeat. I got these from a place some of my friends call “the tube”. I found it by accident a couple months ago. It’s where all the drug-addicted teens at my school hide their drugs and alcohol. They’ve apparently created their own complex mini-black market. I used to be friends with some of them, but now they’ve turned into bitches. Not from drugs; just from being themselves. I would tell you where the tube is, but I promised not to tell. We made a deal. If it was stuff like meth I would report it, but why ruin my joy of having all those people owe me? When I wanted some of their cigarettes, the deal got that much more complicated. I had to make a little trade. You see, in the tube, there’s something they always need. It’s worth its weight in gold, and it’s the same color. It’s pee. They love pee. They have to like it, if they still want to keep their drugs. Each person that trades there keeps a small plastic bag of clean pee on them at all times in case of random drug testing at school. Clean pee is hard to come by for them, though, because mostly everyone who knows about the tube is high as fuck on all the drugs, and therefore do not have clean pee. I am their source of security. I agreed to trade with them. One gallon of pee buys two packs of cigarettes. I think it’s a fair trade. What would I do with all my pee anyway? A car zips down the road. The wind and dust hit my face a few seconds later. I gag and spit out the dust. Smoking by the road really isn’t safe, but at this point in the game, I really don’t care if I die. Actually, I care just enough to live just so I don’t inconvenience others. I wish I could end it all sooner. Ever since the suicide I sometimes notice my breathing and go: why? Why did she die instead of me? I’m not going to rush anything, but if I got hit by a school bus tomorrow, I don’t think that I would really care at all. My stomach jolts in a funny sort of way. Tomorrow is the last day of school. I hate school, but I always miss it when it’s gone. Sure, it’s shitty and stuff, but it does provide stability. I need to go back, even if it only is one last day. School will hopefully bring something normal back into my life. It will also give me a chance to spend time with my friends before summer break, if you can even call them friends. They’re basically just the people I hang out with at lunch so I don’t look stupid sitting alone. They seem to like me enough to tolerate me, which is nice, I guess. Those people are very, um, interesting. First of all, there’s Molly. She’s the smartest person at our school. Everyone wants to be her friend. She helps people she likes with their homework and stuff. After spending so much time around people who are brown-nosing her, I forgot the stereotype about nerds having no friends. I honestly have no idea where that came from, because at my school, we treat the smart people like royalty because we depend on them for, like, not failing. There’s this kid named Jacob who also sits at my table. His stupid hairstyle has not changed in sixteen years. He’s strange and vaguely fucked-up, but I guess we all are to some degree. He gives off a weird sexual vibe, but not really a rapist/child molester one. It’s softer and seems more obscure, like maybe he’s sexually attracted to goats. I really should stop his description here. And then there’s Lily. She has the weirdest stories. I read one of them and my eyes nearly bled. It was a Twilight fanfiction in which the characters were all gangsters. Her face is always really flushed and she laughs at everything. Except when she’s on her period, which in that case she turns into the nastiest, loudest, bitchiest person you’ve ever met. A lot of weird shit happens at that table. My favorite was when we created a match.com profile for a burrito someone dropped on the ground. It was the most amazing thing in the world. “Burrito1230345 looking for a one-night stand. Bring candles, incense, and lots of lube.” Lily tried to reposition it so it would look as sexually suggestive as a burrito could possibly be, but she failed horribly. Jacob took over and did the job right in less than a minute. How he managed, no one knows. It all started when Jacob’s crush dropped the burrito on the ground as she walked to her table. Jacob started staring at it because, of course, he’s a freak. We started to joke with him about him wanting the burrito, because Jacob just has the kind of pervy face that makes him look like he wants to screw everything. He said that he didn’t want it. We felt bad for this little burrito, because not even Jacob would make love to it. Somehow, ten minutes later, we created a full profile for our burrito. Those were good times. I’ve laughed a lot a that table. I miss those little fuckers. I haven’t seen another human being besides the local news and the pee collectors in a week. The news people did a story on my sister’s suicide. I remember watching it. Our story was the second to last thing on there. The day before the news report, they interviewed Mom. That did not go over well. When they tried to talk to me, I turned away and walked into the house. I don’t need their sensationalistic crap in my life. I thought I was through with them, but then they entered my house WITHOUT PERMISSION and asked me “WHAT MY MOOD WAS”. Take a fucking hint. What did they think? Did they consider it a possibility that I was elated that my sister committed suicide? Did I look like I was jumping over rainbows and skipping through meadows or something? You know, this is why I am no longer considering journalism as my career. I now hate the media. This whole thing has really opened my eyes. They didn’t show either of the failed interviews, thank God. I will give them that. Even so, the newscasters had blank, empty faces when they were giving the report about the suicide. Then, not a moment later, they were smiling and talking about a baby animal that was born in the local zoo. It’s clear that they don’t really give a damn about anyone’s feelings. About a second before I fall asleep (I collapsed on the rocking chair we have outside), my mom pulls up into the driveway, back from her midnight run to the liquor store. She ran into our trashcan pretty hard. That’s just wonderful. She’s driving drunk. Actually, she’s probably not even drunk, but depressed slap-happy. It’s a good thing that I have my own car so I can drive to school without chicken bones flying off the hood. I got mom’s old one about three months ago after I got my driver’s license. I always hated the school bus. I’ve seen some shit there. Mom got a new Honda a year ago. She was supposed to get a used one. To be fair, Hondas aren’t the most expensive cars, but still. She’s going to run that thing in the ground if she keeps that up. I hope that the car insurance will cover the damage. But I have a really bad feeling that the car insurance is actually my college fund. Bye, college. Mom gets out of the car, kicking out some wine bottles in the process. I don’t really want to witness this. I snuff out my last cigarette and go inside. My lungs were starting to struggle anyway. I crash on the couch and quickly fall asleep, praying that my brain won’t force me to relive my sister’s death again like it usually does. I wake up at what feels like seconds later, but it is pitch black outside, and the sound of thousands of horny cicadas chirping is louder. I’m thirsty and covered in sweat. My dead sister didn’t revisit me again, so that’s a plus. Forcing myself off the couch, I get a glass of milk and put it in the microwave. My head spins, due to either the smoke, the alcohol smell coming from mom’s bedroom, or how fast I moved in a short amount of time, or all three. It takes me a minute notice Mom, in her room, passed out. I suddenly wish that microwaves had a “silent” option. Mom would never hurt me intentionally, but you know. After the infernal beeping sound ends, I quietly get the milk out and slowly trudge over to the table. I sit down, taking quiet sips from my glass. Mom herself said that it was unhealthy to have addictions. But here she is, passed out, wine running through her veins instead of life. I wish mom was happy again. I wish that she would go to work and pay attention to the last daughter she has left. But wishes are empty. We are not happy. It’s like we all died that awful night. In some ways, I did die. My dreams are rotting away. My sanity is hanging by a single string of skin. The better half of me is gone. I’m ripping apart at the seams. Emotional pain is probably the worst abstract concept ever. I would burn off my right hand to see my sister for one more day. I would walk across hell if it would give her one year on earth. I would die a thousand painful deaths to make her happy. If only I cared enough about her before the suicide. Forget walking across hell. I couldn’t even walk to her room. A lump grows in my throat. What sort of things did my sister experience? Does she still remember it? Whatever it was, I hope that she’s stopped suffering. I really hope she didn’t go to hell. She couldn’t have, though. She’s too pure. Everything is temporary. That’s just one harsh fact of life and the workings of the universe. However, it would have been nice if the universe was kind enough to allow my sister to be a little less temporary. I look at the pictures on the table. You know what’s funny? Family photos are funny. They’re like little windows into the past. It takes me back to when I dressed normally, Katherine was little and not dead, Dad was here and still loved my mom, we lived in this big house by a river, and life was generally just, like, better and stuff. It sickens me, the fact that the happy people in those pictures have no idea about what the future holds. I chug the rest of my milk, accidentally spilling half of it on the table and my chest. I’m not cleaning that shit up. Stretching, I quietly go back to my sister’s room and fall onto her bed. I stare at the ceiling fan and watch it spin around and round. Just like my brain. I shut my eyes. Rain lightly taps on our metal roof. How long was it raining? I tilt my head to look out Katherine’s window. Water falls gently upon the water-starved ground. It runs and runs until it finds a low area to rest in. Then the soil draws it in like a slow breath. My eyelids close once more and I focus on the rain and nothing else. A boom of thunder wakes me. Unfortunately, I’m the type that stays awake all night if I wake up. Now I’m alone with my thoughts. I’m just tired enough to not be able to grab my phone. I wish I could play some music to drown out my thoughts. My brain won’t shut the hell up. I’m being reminded of everything I’ve ever said or did with her. I miss my sister so much it actually physically hurts. I wish I killed myself instead of her. I really have no idea why she killed herself at all. I can’t think of any conversation or anything that could even slightly read as “suicidal”. She’s not even that good at keeping secrets. What am I missing here? Is it just really obvious or something? I’m so frustrated. She didn’t even leave a suicide note. I really wish she had. I mean, isn’t that something that you just do when you kill yourself? I mean, I guess there’s not really a rulebook or a protocol for that sort of thing, but yeah. I have to go to school tomorrow. Maybe that would help me sort out my thoughts. Maybe I can consult with Jacob and Lily and Molly and see if they might know anyone who can help me. I need to find out what happened to my sister. It just doesn’t make any sense at all. I wish I could just find something that would answer all of my questions just like that. It’s probably going to take a while to know the whole truth, but I will do everything it takes. Mark my words.