Welcome to Litsy!

Long overdue reread of this classic of the grotesque. Swelter, Flay, Steerpike and the rest are some of the most memorable characters in English literature.

Mervyn Peake is a unique figure in modern fantasy. His unfinished Gormenghast trilogy draws upon Charles Dickens and Robert Louis Stevenson as its influences.

#fantasy #comedy #fiction

I have today off (yay 4 day weekend!) and I figured the best way to spend the day is to listen to an audiobook (tagged) and put together some new bookshelves. As a book nerd would. 🤓📚💜

I liked this a lot but it was also v dense and difficult to get through. The world building was incredible and I liked the plot and where it brought us for the rest of the trilogy. I did find the writing verbose and idk if all the words needed to be that long. I definitely want to finish the series but I need a break first

Oh, wow! I just started this one and I am hooked! Titus Groan has just been born into the closed world of the castle— a crumbling pile of rocks with dark, labyrinthine hallways, guttering candles and, scurrying servants. This is a fantasy world built with evocative imagery, intelligent vocabulary, and short, sharp bursts of biting humor. I‘m savoring each chapter, so at around 400 pages, this may take awhile!

#CharactersLikeAlice day 2.
#WhiteRabbit
I present: Nannie Slagg from the Gormenghast books. She is a timid little rabbit of a person, always worried about her poor heart as she tries to get Lady Fuchsia to dress appropriately and show up on time for family events.

Taking notes to write an article about this book next month.

“Like a vast spider suspended by a metal chord, a candelabrum presided over the room nine feet above the floor boards.”

Do you annotate books? Do you take notes on a separate piece of paper? Or do you never take notes?

These seem like a good fall read.

#QuotsyOct18 Day 26: One must #howl indeed when leaves fall from trees like burning tears.

I don‘t listen to many audiobooks -I prefer podcasts while walking the dogs, and don‘t have much opportunity other times- but Simon Vance deserves every Audie and accolade he‘s received. I‘m very impressed. He‘s *almost* as good as Mil Nicholson. Almost. (But her Dickens recordings are free on LibriVox, so she wins.)

Friday night excitement - cracking open the Folio edition of Titus Groan. The Doggo seems a little wary. #folioedition #FolioFreaks #DogsofLitsy

“Their faces, identical to the point of indecency, were quite expressionless, as though they were the preliminary lay-outs for faces and were waiting for sentience to be injected.”

Oh, my. These are officially in the #1 position on my list of Aimee‘s Favorite Folios. Holy cow. I just want to pet them.
#folio #foliofreaks #foliosociety

Here‘s the next two on the chopping block, can‘t decide which to read first. Most likely Titus but Sabriel is calling to me...

Often touted as a challenger to Professor Tolkien‘s LOTR books, this is a challenging read. Rightly classified as a Gothic rather than a fantasy, the book has moments of sheer gobsmacking descriptions and character names & other moments of frustrating minutiae. Steerpike is not a likable or noble protagonist. And yet. After reading some other books since, this book stays with me. While my initial review was not as positive, but book stays w/ me.

Prediction: this book will still be in our bottom 3 after we‘ve read all 1001. Yikes. Enjoy listening to us tear this book apart. #1001books #bookpodcast #applepodcasts #soundcloud #google play

Enjoying some #audiocrochet this evening. It‘s rare that I can enjoy an audiobook, but this narrator really is exceptional. He brings so much life to Peake‘s ingenious characters.

The description in this book is unmatched.

Lunch and a book, sweating on the back patio today. Worth it! This book is toothsome with description & lush with character development. I‘m savoring it slowly and really enjoying it.

Lovely evening, wonderful book, happy family.

And now for something completely different...

Today‘s reading, a Gothic-fantasy delight. #LazySunday

This was not at all what I was expecting, but it was very good. Titus Groan is a wonderfully weird story about a giant castle (so big that some inhabitants are completely forgotten about by others) filled with delightfully weird, eccentric characters blindly following centuries of complicated rituals. Action unfolds slowly as we get to know richly drawn characters in this atmospheric, brilliantly written fantasy.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

#1001books

New audiobook today... I‘m not entirely sure wtf is going on, but I think I like it! 😂

Simon Vance is always wonderful.

A fantasy novel with a dash of derring-do adventurism. We‘ve seen castles and fat cooks and powerful owls, but not like this. A pleasing combination of other-worldliness and straight-up modern social politics. Truly original and every fan of fantasy should read it.

I powered through this #audiobook this weekend for #25infive. When I first read the blurb, I was excited to pick it up, but I was disappointed. The descriptions of characters and the castle were fantastic, but it took forever for me to feel like things were happening. When I did begin to appreciate the events, it seemed almost over and too much of a build toward the next book in the series instead of its own story.

#Hoopla #1001books #Reading1001

Finished Titus Groan this morning and now on to Gormenghast, which needs to be finished in three short weeks for discussion with my #bookclub.

Titus Groan is NOT fast paced, and not much about baby Titus. It‘s a portrait of Gormenghast castle and its various denizens. Each time things start to become a bit tedious, Peake throws in some delicious image or dark turn.

I love castles more than any other kind of building so this was a major treat.

Usually I only listen to one audiobook at a time, but I‘ve set Possession aside for a few days until I can look at the text to where I am so far and because I was intrigued to give one of the April books for #Reading1001 a listen. The blurb sounded great, but I‘m 3 hours in and not impressed yet. Are things going to start happening or is this just a description of the daily life at the castle?

#1001books #audiobook

“Autumn returned to GORMENGHAST like a dark spirit entering its stronghold.”
How does this book NOT have a major fan base?

Reading Titus Groan for BOTM in #Reading1001 book group on Goodreads this month!

#1001books

um duh

...one having at its summit an enormous stone carving of a lion‘s head, which held between its jaws the limp corpse of a man on whose body was chiselled the words: ‘He was an enemy of Groan‘...

#epic

‘...What is the matter with my son‘s eyes?‘
‘They are violet.‘

The eyes that launched a thousand Mary Sues?

So this started a little slow and dreary. But the narrator was good and I kept going. I ended up really liking it and plan to continue the series. Basically it's about the castle and those that live there. There is one servant that will do whatever it takes to be more, to be at the top, and then there is everyone else. A little gothic, a lot strange. A lot of inner monologue. 3 ⭐️ I think. Maybe 4...

Current audiobook.

The Addams Family meets Downton Abbey meets Edward Gorey...meets Monty Python. Simon Vance is a new favorite narrator. #Recommendsday

#192019 update! I have read 9 books to date for my birthday challenge, having finished the ninth last night. Here is how I am doing by decade (this makes 9 look like nothing lol!):
1920s: 2
1930s: 0
1940s: 1
1950s: 0
1960s: 1
1970s: 0
1980s: 1
1990s: 0
2000s: 0
2010s: 4

#192019 read for #1946 and #1001books read 171 or 172 (my app and spreadsheet disagree!). This book is called a fantasy, but I wouldn't call it that at all. The setting is a centuries-old earldom/castle/city sometime in the past, and life in the castle is run by ancient tenets and rules. Very original, and I will be on to book 2 soon!

Finally sinking my teeth into the #gormenghast trilogy!

A customer brought me his personal copy of this book for me to read, and then told me he was envious of my getting to read it for the first time. I had never even heard of it before! I am excited.

We are all imprisoned by the dictionary. We choose out of that vast, paper-walled prison our convicts, the little black printed words, when in truth we need fresh sounds to utter, new enfranchised noises which would produce a new effect.

So I am bowing out of this audiobook. In theory I should love this book, but in reality I struggled to keep listening. Perhaps it was just a bad narrator..perhaps it is one of those books that must be read on the page to enjoy. Perhaps I will try again later with a physical copy.

Needed a new audiobook...heard good things about this one!

Reading TG was an amazing experience. The book feels like it's own self-contained ecosystem, both surreal/exotic and familiar, and Peake's writing makes each page interesting. Ultimately, this book is about how people grapple with change, and I consider it an underrated masterpiece. 🤘🤘🤘