Highly recommend the audiobook version read by Andy Serkis. The story is long and complicated with lots of names but worth the work. It‘s powerful & redolent of his source material: the myths & sagas of the ancient world, mostly Norse but also Finnish.

My advice is to let it wash over you rather than try to make sense of it or capture every detail. You can always get the details on the next go around.

Reading about ships wrecking in the harbor where we like to go picnicking adds a certain historic flavor to the experience. I gasped & told the awful details to my partner but had to make sure my son couldn‘t hear. His 6 yr old imagination kicks his empathy into overdrive.

Altogether a fascinating read— caught this pic of the University of Delaware boat heading out into the bay just before we packed it up & called it a day.

Pictures of myself are hard. This book was hard. I wish things could be different for her, for me, for my mother & sister & grandmother & aunts. Until then I‘m going to do what Moss does: send a good, bright wolf back in time to provide exactly what is needed ❤️ I‘m going to start by choosing to love the body that houses me

“he left behind him a trail of debts and broken hearts; one lover was so distraught by their break up that she spent most of the remainder of her life living in a hollowed-out tree.”

I kind of love the idea of being so heartbroken over a breakup that I turn into a literal dryad.

📸 by Rebecca of aclotheshorse

Had a great time at the Taylor Swift Symposium ❤️am I a Swiftie yet? Idk but “I was there/ it was rare”

My bestie on the westie and I presented on Durkheim, the Eras tour, and the TS is a witch conspiracy. It was epic indeed.

Tagged book recommended for anyone looking to have a bit of fun & find TS talking points. I‘m enjoying the conversation 🫶

When I am dead, my dearest,/sing no sad songs for me;/plant thou no roses at my head,/nor shady cypress tree:

be the green grass above me/with showers and dew drop wet;/and if thou wilt, remember,/and if thou wilt, forget.

I shall not see the shadows,/I shall not feel the rain;/I shall not hear the nightingale/sing on, as if in pain:/and dreaming through the twilight/that doth not rise nor set,/haply I may remember,/and haply may forget.

You know that part in Anna Karenina where she‘s crying on the train about leaving her little boy behind and Count Vronsky‘s mom is like “oh that never ends my boy is so big and I still cry” well I just dropped my son off at his grandparents for spring break send chocolate & coffee plz bc I am cry

Elinor helping me read for comps at her brother‘s taekwondo practice ❤️ she liked the sonnets best

Really enjoying this after reading the Letters, the Hobbit, the Trilogy, the Silmarillion, & the Unfinished Tales. Highly recommend!

📸 featuring a rare reddit image of a lost entwife

Book haul (+ one record) from Third Eye in Annapolis 👁️ I had so many zines in my hand but made it home with just these three.

I managed to put three other books back in the shelf too. Incredible self-control, I know. I wager those can be found at the library while these cannot, although the Rousseau was obv. for the gold foil cover I also want to read it again for class.

Finished the LotR trilogy, starting the Silmarillion & v excited for the critical theory I‘ve chosen to pair with it. Also mad about not having all the books I want to read on audiobook ho hum

This book was lovely— a lot of excellent moral readings BUT I wanted more nuance. Still, delightful. Looking for a close reading involving Tolkien‘s other works & specifically an analysis of “the scouring of the shire”

#freeluigi #feanorno

Another cute escape in Dream Harbor. Come for the hot chef, stay for the pancakes 🥞

I have to admit, I kind of sped through this one, but I enjoyed the hard boiled detective, especially since she was an academic adjacent female detective with more backbone than the rest of her department (btw not always a good thing)

I think if thrillers rather than cozy mysteries were more your style, you would like this one better than me

📸 of my desk for real life professor inspired horror

I just love Jenny Colgan books when I‘m having a tough time 💕this one was warm & sweet with just enough difficulty for the characters

I think what I like the most about her books is the way she creates cinematic moments 🫶 & books with characters that like to read, knit, & bake just make me really happy 🥐🧶📚

I love these books 📚 first of all they‘re filthy 🥵 I‘m in love obv. 🌶️ but also I have really enjoyed thinking about how religion intersects with sexuality, the way the Catholic church in particular interprets things like guilt, punishment, & shame, & how much identity overlaps with belief

so I mean, if a book can do all that & contain so much smut I‘m on board 🍆

🧶 Knitting & reading 📖 my two great loves ❤️

This book has been so bonkers. It‘s the strangest on my comps list so far and that‘s really saying something lol

🪲a beetle the size of a cat causes chaos for a character who really doesn‘t need the hassle 🐈‍⬛

A tiny book to have beef (tofu?) with and also a book fan because I am also a book fan 🥁

A much needed day off! Tolkien is the perfect author to spend it with ❤️

A very compelling story blending the genre of sentimental abolitionist novel with slave narrative to question the caste system of race in post civil war America. Iola was almost too good for me. I hated how her story was told through the men in the novel but loved the story, told with grace, although it addressed the darkest and most disgusting part of a deeply American institution, one were still reckoning with today.

📸 by Philip Evergood

I have spent so much on ebooks since bookshop.org started selling them. I even bought a new Boox ereader— not used, new! Reading for school almost requires it.

One of my more recent acquisitions, this book is not the scholarship I hoped. It is still highly readable and has inspired some interesting ideas but they‘re rather more speculative than fact.

📸by abnormalize being on Instagram

These poems truly capture the complexity of love for me. I‘ve always thought it strange how the strength of love can invoke its opposite.

I‘m not saying love is an excuse for a pattern of mistreatment (it‘s not) I‘m saying it‘s complicated & painful sometimes & always scary— your heart walks around outside your body & if you‘re lucky you can trust someone to take care of it. I trust Pablo ❤️

📸of tarts I made my kids & friends for Valentine‘s

Why do I read other books when I‘m supposed to be reading a particular book?

This was so tender, such an unexpected read. I couldn‘t help imagining myself in all their places (kind of the point, I know)

$1.99 on Bookshop.org ebooks

Interesting, but not entirely substantiated scholarship— still, definitely worth the read and fascinating 🧚🍁💀not for the weak-stomached scholar, that‘s for sure

An interesting read! The many contributors have a lot of differences in terms of style and devotion but they‘re all exquisite facets of the same jewel 💎

📸 of my terrarium at work, welcoming spring with a single white flower 💮

What an indictment of colonialism ✨❤️ gorgeous descriptions 🪴 real magic is in the garden

📸 from Longwood Gardens in PA

I calculated my reading time for my comps exams today: https://www.omnicalculator.com/everyday-life/reading-time

Storygraph broke everything down for me: 41, 269 pages total.

This means, in order to be ready to take my exams in early September/late August. I will need to read for ~5 hours a day. This is totally doable and also I'm REALLY excited! I think I might hit 300 books this year 😲

We had a great time reading this. It begs to be read out loud and has very funny jokes for parents. I love Ayoade. Highly recommend!

Really fun playing in the snow today and then cozying up to read with some hot chocolate ☕️

Tolkien is so funny! I laughed out loud at the invention of golf— how had I forgotten about it?!

A perfect love letter to cats 🐈‍⬛ it was wonderful! I especially liked how each story didn‘t dismiss or resolve the person‘s problems, but rather showed how a slight perspective shift and some changes made it easier for them to cope and live with the way they were feeling.

It was also cool to see how the magic worked within the book. I really love these soft, cozy, and reflective Japanese books.

A lovely listen— I admire the cadence of Katherine May‘s prose. It‘s always a pleasure ❤️ this one ruminated beautifully on meaning-making, the personal magic created by nostalgia or encounters with nature. Perfect for walking through the botanical gardens near my home 🎄

She was figuring out her style for the series in this first one but it worked really well. A little trope-y but pas de trop.

Side note: my friend made me four of these mugs with different designs on them. They‘re all the perfect size! One of them can hold half a pot of tea and that‘s ✨perfect✨

this one was v spicy 🌶️ I was here for it, too! The predictability of this one felt more real in some ways— it just made sense to me that they would each have those issues.

I‘m not sure why but I gravitate to these when I‘m going through a stressful or difficult time. This one was my favorite of the three. I really loved how the couple related to each other and brought each other exactly the support they needed. 💕✨

It wasn‘t listed but the REAL book is Scallops and Sorcerers: Vampire Knitting Club: Cornwall by Nancy Warren, the second in the Cornwall spinoffs.

This was the perfect easy read, with some good faith clues and an easily solved (but still just challenging enough to be uncertain) murder.

I did read it super fast though, which is my only complaint with these. Knitting pictured is my Felix Cardigan (Berroco Mercado in Lupine)

What a gorgeous book 📕 started slow but was worth sticking it out. Fully realized tertiary characters, excellent literary references, and a puzzle with plenty of clues so you could suss it out.

This was a brutal holiday and I needed a good read. Thank goodness for these guys, even if they often want me to stop reading at the really good bits.

@wanderinglynn I so love everything from the last #travelingstars package! It‘s been a fabulous year— your gifts have been so gorgeous & thoughtful! I especially loved the tagged book & this glorious mug. Here‘s hoping it is my goddess year. At the moment I feel like the goddess of chaos 😅

 @Chrissyreadit your final gift finally came today! Late as usual, mea maxima culpa 😩 it‘s been a bit of a month so far— more details to come ❤️🙏

Sooo excited to be shelving the used book section at the shop today 🥲❤️🙏

I truly enjoyed 1 & 2 but part 3– still excellent as a metaphor but disappointing as a story.

I‘m still delighted with this book. It‘s likely to be very important to me in terms of literary research.

Still, I‘ll have to figure out why I‘m so reticent to approve the third part.

So pleased to receive such gorgeous gifts from @wanderinglynn for #travelingstars it‘s been so lovely all year & I constantly forget to post just how much they bring to my life ♥️🙏🏻thank you! I‘m beyond grateful 🥹💗I forget my phone exists but I‘m often thinking of my friends here

Excellent book, too btw I‘m excited to read it ✨

I haven‘t seen the movie (& don‘t plan on it tbh) but this was fun— unreliable, framed, epistolary narratives make me happy, as do the illustrations. Recommended for general weirdness & ✨vibes✨

📸featuring my fave new creepy snow globe— is it tiny bats w/ a normal-sized crow or normal-sized bats w/ a giant crow boy? You decide 🪦💀💗

What a great time! This romantasy features an enemy to lovers trope, fabulous queer characters, & a magic that makes sense as both system & metaphor.

The characters transform through their relationships & self-reflection, implicitly arguing love makes us into better, truer selves.

📸 features the most whimsical shelf in my office, simply for vibes/the aesthetic

Mrs. Robinson was fascinating and depressing. Still, it was great hearing all about how suspicious Victorians were of women, sex, diaries, and more, mostly in that order.

I‘m so fascinated by how Victorians saw things and will likely keep reading about them for a very, very long time.

📸by IntoTheForestDark (ElliottBlackwe3)

What a great cover! I didn‘t like this as much as What You‘re Looking For is in the Library but not everything can change your life. This was still a lovely read— an ode to reading, really. Highly relatable 📚

Warning: this book may cause uncontrollable cravings for coffee & baked goods.

Seriously, though, what a great read! I had such a book hangover. Where is the full series?! Surprisingly poignant, this story moves beyond cozy to suggest a whole shifting of values & I‘m here for it.

📸featuring stationary art by Stasia Burrington

A bit late but perhaps better than never? Thanks @Yuki_Onna for the tag! @Eggs #wondrouswednesday

1. BooOoOook!
2. Mop the floor (with Florida Water)
3. Oof this one was tough but reading is faster!
4. Vanilla (but only if it‘s the real deal)
5. Pen (Fountain Pen)
6. Ask ALL the questions
7. Meet myself as an author
8. I like to snuggle chickens best
9. Online if it‘s clothes but in person for books
10. Snow snow SNOW snow snow SNOW snow

This is so much fun to read— great descriptions of nature and totally unrealistic characters but such a fascinating piece to reflect on and, dare I say, rail against? It seems I do.

Also I‘m pretty sure I should be getting ready to teach classes next week but um, there‘s this guy Valancourt who just showed up…so I‘m going to have to finish this chapter first. Close up of my cozy office shelf for the vibes

Enjoying #hyggehour with this excellent micro history of Victorian spiritualism. Delighted it includes small practices to get in touch with the era 🖤💀✨

@TheBookHippie @Chrissyreadit @jenniferw88

My favorite part of the new office I moved into today— everyone should have a cozy blanket and a basket of books in their space.

Rereading Ovid because my friend is (of course) so we can talk about it. I have this v pretty edition right up front next to my Tristram Shandy ♥️✨

Ready to start reading for comps!! These are just the print copies ♥️I would be a professional reader if anyone was hiring

Just read the two newest installments, this one & A Fatal Illusion (books 11 & 12), in the Lady Darby series

this series is descriptive, whimsical, romantic, & thrilling but just a touch anachronistic. Only a purist would complain & I am not ♥️

#hyggehour #withmystery @TheBookHippie @jenniferw88 @AllDebooks @Chrissyreadit