Welcome to Litsy!

If you hear the creak of a floorboard behind you… don‘t worry; it‘s just your TBR begging for more gothic drama. 🤫

Dare to keep the chills around with our top gothic book recommendations, which are dying to join your shelf—and maybe haunt you a little. 👻

Level up your TBR with some serious, moody stories that are perfect for reading in candlelight.🕯️👉 https://blog.getbookly.com/best-gothic-books

#gothic #books #bookrecommendation #dark

#gruesome
#wickedwhispers
@Eggs @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

I read this book 20 years ago and I still think about it #ShortButPowerful

#AboutABook… 📖📚📒📘📕📗📙📓

#BookNerd 🤓💙📚

#AboutABook
#FairytaleRetelling
@Eggs
@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

My library holds came in and so my weekend is set. A bit of a contrast between Carter's fairy tales and Betsy-Tacy's small town Minnesota.

#Scarathlon #Littenlisten #TEAMBooklovers #20in4

What a treat!! Thanks Audible/BBC 🖤

@Clwojick @StayCurious @aperfectmjk @Bookwormjillk @Andrew65

Wearing an antique bridal gown, the
beautiful queen of the vampires sits all alone in her dark, high house under the eyes of the portraits of her demented and atrocious ancestors, each one of whom, through her, projects a baleful posthumous existence; she counts out the Tarot cards, ceaselessly construing a constellation of possibilities as if the random fall of the cards on the red plush tablecloth before her could precipitate her from her chill

I want to re-read it already ❤️

So visceral, dark, poetic and I loved the repetition throughout the stories - definitely the most whole set of short stories I‘ve read and a new favourite book of mine. Glad #tbrtarot prompted me to read it as it‘s been on my shelves for ages!

Friday night 🍷 feel like this book would pair better with red wine but this 19 crimes white is lovely! The book is good too - one to read slowly as the writing is quite poetic.

“Now a great howling rose up all around them, near, very near, ...
Who has come to sing us carols, she said.
Those are the voices of my brothers, darling; I love the company of wolves.“

In "The Company of Wolves," a surprisingly festive retelling of Little Red Riding Hood, the wolf and his brothers are born on Christmas Day, when “the door of the solstice stands wide open.“

#winterreadathondailychallenge @andrew_65

I read The Bloody Chamber earlier this month. It had some great stories and some ok stories. There were many retellings of famous stories like Bluebeard and Beauty and the Beast, but told with a more feminist twist. Overall this book was good but not a keeper. However, the Penguin Ink cover (and back cover 💀!) are going to make it hard for me to let go.
🐎🐎🐎
#PenguinInk

Oh how I love this collection!!! Just reread the title story for a class and found even more layers of meaning. Bluebeard meets Dracula meets a bad a** mother, and then there are all the other stories. 💀❤🎼

#skeleton #ominousoctober #scarathlon #teamslaughter #spookoween #pointsathon #bodycountbingo

I‘d read the title story years ago, but this was my first time reading the entire collection. Angela Carter is such a beautiful wordsmith, and the tradition of dark retellings owes her so much! #Scarathlon2022 #TeamMonsterMash @StayCurious #Spookoween2022 @TheSpineView #31by31 @Catsandbooks #PointsAThon @dieareader @GHABI4ROSES #bodycountbingo @PuddleJumper #witchathon @mdm139

custom limited edition very rare cover :)

ripped through this one in a day and a half. The kind of stories you wonder how you‘ve gone this long without knowing. They‘re a part of me now, and I‘ll visit them often from here on out, especially The Erl-King.

Hey @ozma.of.oz look what just showed up.. haha!

#Two4Tuesday @TheSpineView
1.Definitely an accurate reflection of Carter's off kilter writing!
2 . Not really, I love this book so I re-read it anyway! But I do like eye catching book covers!

Quick short story collection to finish on a lazy day. Good writing, but a lot of it was slow and over detailed for me. I liked this one. But I didn‘t love it like I thought I would. Maybe it was the style, but I definitely was expecting more from this one.

I loved this SO much. I want more of them. I get that's an unrealistic desire. But I do plan to read more of her books. I acquired this, I believe, initially because I have a thing for Bluebeard retellings. But all of these stories are fantastic. My favorite might be Puss in Boots.

#DoubleSpin @TheAromaofBooks

Reading my #DoubleSpin book on the train this AM.

@TheAromaofBooks

The Bloody Chamber made it here today! Thanks for a fun round!
@rjsthumbelina @AFrostCauseReads @sprainedbrain
#lmpbc

I'm so late reading this! This was my last read for #LMPBC in our #gothic group, and what an ending! This book was probably my favorite of the round. It is just so perfectly things that I enjoy: gothic, fairytale retellings, and short stories. Some of the stories are dark and disturbing, but honestly, I still wasn't mad at it. @Mynameisacolour it should be in the mail back to you by next week! @AFrostCauseReads @sprainedbrain @suvata

I‘m almost caught up to the end of August with books I read. 😬

This round of #LMPBC, I‘ve been reading gothic with a great group, and I burned through these darkly reimagined fairy tales from Angela Carter. While they were sort of hit-and-miss for me, I definitely enjoyed my time and thought Carter‘s writing rich and sensuous. Loved the title story (a Bluebeard retelling) and The Lady of the House of Love, but The Snow Child had me 🤨.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I finally read this classic for this month‘s #FairyTaleReadingChallenge. There were Red Riding Hood elements in about three of the stories. I love Carter‘s style. It‘s subtle but impactful. It‘s obviously been very influential on more modern fantasy. @Charityann

Wow, I flew through this one. Angela Carter is a master of the writing craft, and I can see how she‘s influenced many popular authors with these fairytale interpretations. More of my opinion later after my group reads it
#lmpbc #groupk @Mynameisacolour @sprainedbrain
@rjsthumbelina this one will be on its way early this month 😊

What are you reading today?

Finally finished my #lmpbc for this month. Packing it up and sending it your way! @sprainedbrain ( I hope you won't mind that I'm reusing an IPSY envelope, they are excellent book mailers ♻️) Holding off on reviewing it on here until the rest of the group has had a chance to read it.😬
#lmpbc

Spending this muggy afternoon indoors with the AC on high, catching up on this month's #lmpbc. Mixed feelings so far!😬

⁠Originally published in 1979, The Bloody Chamber is a collection of fairy tale retellings, such as Bluebeard, Puss in Boots, Beauty and the Beast, Little Red Riding Hood, and Sleeping Beauty. Carter's prose is gruesome but beautifully captivating. In Carter's version of these stories, females are much more than helpless damsels in distress; they are strong, clever, sexual, and in some cases, brutal. I strongly recommend this story collection.⁠⁠

Anyone else have the urge to bust out the pencil crayons and go to town on this gorgeous cover?🖍

A perfect morning catching up on my reading so that I'll be ready to record episode 4 of Of Prurient Interest! I can't wait to talk about Angela Carter's "The Bloody Chamber" with one of my oldest, dearest friends. ??

I have a complicated relationship with this book, but here are two of my favorite quotes, of course both about blood ?

"His wedding gift, clasped around my throat. A choker of rubies, two inches wide, like an extraordinarily precious slit throat." -The Bloody Chamber

"My tear-beslobbered father wants a rose to show that I forgive him. When I break off a stem, I prick my finger and so he gets his rose all smeared with blood." -The Tiger's Bride

Still struggling through this collection. At least it's gorgeous out here and I only have two more stories to slog through, thank heavens. ✌🏻

I admit to bailing on several of the twisted fairytale retellings in here. I was reading it for bookclub. Very much not for me. All the trigger warnings. Bleh.

Happy #creepychristmas opening day! Thank you @Maleficentbookdragon for a great package! I love everything and the coasters are hysterical.🤣
Thank you for hosting @teebe

Not gonna lie, I am not loving this book. CW for rape...There is a story where a man essentially Weird Sciences a girl (yep, specifically a child) into existence, his wife (yep, he is already married) gets angry and murders the girl (rather than directing her anger at the man responsible), and the man proceeds to RAPE THE GIRL'S CORPSE. What is the effing point, Carter?! But I'm trying. So, brandied eggnog...takes the edge off. 😉

I'm not an expert about the histories of stories with Bluebeard, Puss-in-Boots, vampires, or werewolves. I don't think Carter wrote these retellings with scholarly intentions - you just get lost in the stories, almost like you'd never heard of them before. There's a lush strangeness to them all, which might be best captured by my favorite story, The Tiger's Bride. It is a 2nd Beauty & the Beast retelling appearing after a more familiar version 👇

A different take on the Little Red Riding Hood story. That‘s all I can say, or spoilers! 16 points #scarathlon #teamslaughter #screamathon #sbooktober #gothtober #ripreadathon #trickortreadathon #nameinthetitle #ghostathon #gothicreadathon #slaughterthon @Clwojick @4thhouseontheleft

WOW. I‘m only one story in & I‘m hooked! I generally enjoy fairy tale retellings (The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer is one of my favorite series) & I‘m totally burnt out on contemporary texts, so this is hitting the speculative spot right now.

I first heard of this book when I was researching texts for a potential feminist lit class. That‘s on the back burner for now, but I‘m really glad I discovered Angela Carter!

#teachersoflitsy

These were engaging retellings (reimaginings?) of classic fairytales. The narration was good and I liked the way it was split between 2 narrators so it was easy to follow where one story ended and the next began. I particularly enjoyed the way they were set in the middle ground between Grimm's and Disney; happy endings, per se, but not sad endings either.

A good collection, well read by the narrators.
#TBRChallenge #AudioBook #LeastRated

If I had to pick just one book that would demonstrate why I love reading, this would be it. ❤️

The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter.
Such a dark and atmospheric setup.
Creepily amazing.

#currentlyreading
#angelacarter
#bloodychamber
#books #2020

Because so many people I respect love this book, I recommend it. However, I am more ambivalent. I re-read this after ten years, curious to see if my response would be more enthusiastic or appreciative, but still I find it often gratingly verbose and precious. The stories I liked were the longer ones: the decadent “Lady of the House of Love,” both Beauty/Beast retellings, and the title story. Dark, evocative, and compelling.