'The great fairy incident of 1822 was depicted in many paintings, the most famous of them being The Seelie Siege of London by an unknown painter with a penchant for alliteration.'
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke is a behemoth of a book.
It's over 1000 pages of alternate history, set in a world where the titular characters are bringing magic back to England, against the backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars.
'If Aziraphale didn’t know better, he might have thought his friend was crying, but it had been centuries since he’d seen Crowley do that.'
This week's fic is from the Good Omens fandom - the Amazon Prime TV series based on the book by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman that I still haven't gotten around to reading (*gasps*!)
And I think what impresses me the most about this fic is the way that it somehow manages to weave the content of the fic almost seamlessly into the canon.
'The massive box of 64 crayons calls to me, every one of them waiting to be picked and pressed to a page. (I could have gone for the box of 120, but that seemed like too much.)'
This week's fic is from a fandom that is super-popular, but also not especially well-known outside its core fanbase.
...which is why I'm going to do a very brief explanation of Carry On aka the Simon Snowverse just so's we're all on the same page.
(I realise that a lot of die-hard fans are probably screaming that how could anyone not know about Simon Snow?! But we do not gatekeep here at Dora Reads, dearest nerdlets.)
(Fandom notes:
gatekeeping - also a non-fandom term, when used in fandom this typically takes the form of 'you're not a real fan of [insert fandom or genre or author, etc.] unless you've [insert arbitrary benchmark]')
It's Thursday, somehow it's only February, let's get some comics-y superhero-y goodness!
Everything is once again in the 'other stuff' category (dammit Loki!)
It's Thursday. Let's get some awesome-sauce comics-y, superhero-y goodness!
Note: For the foreseeable future the only Harry Potter fanfiction I'll be rec'ing will have Trans+/NB+ characters.
I understand if you don't wanna read any posts about Harry Potter whatsoever, and I hope I'll see you when I'm rec'ing from a different fandom.
“Sirius, when is the last time you slept? Or ate a proper meal? Or took a bath? Don’t even bother answering that last one. You smell like something died in your hair..."
To rec this fic, I basically just wanted to go:
AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
...until you read it.
But I realised that's both exhausting and requiring of context. (Dammit!)
(Warning: this post references racism and police brutality)
There are three important reasons for me writing this post:
1. Black Lives still Matter.
2. It's always a good time to highlight diverse books.
and 3. There are so many amazing Black creators out there, who don't always get the recognition they deserve.
So here's a small selection of some of the Young Adult (YA) and Middle Grade (MG) books on my TBR list that were written by Black authors.
For those of you who don't know the book-blog lingo - a TBR is a 'to-be-read' list. Mine is immortal and cannot be stopped. Send help.
For those of you who are British like me, and/or haven't heard the book blogging term, Middle Grade books are those aimed at (roughly) ages 8-12, or 8-14, depending who you ask.
(Quick disclaimer: obviously, I haven't read these books, just their synopses, so I don't know what they're like in terms of content, quality, etc.)
I hope you find something to add to your own TBR, and remember to support Black authors, and other Black creators.
There're so many talented Black authors out there who deserve our attention!
They stand in another stretch of silence before a great screeching sound reverberates throughout the elevator.
'Ginny started to laugh. The Death Eater stopped walking. He was speaking angrily now, growling or snarling something.'
'“Come to my flat for drinks tomorrow?” He forces a casualness to his voice that he does not feel. “I’ve got a bottle of Glenfiddich I’ve had since 1937 and it’s about time you left the bookshop for something other than pastries and feeding ducks.”'
'Loki was left-handed and took a broom that was on the very end. He had plenty of flying practice at home, but he was still nervous. His first day had been going so badly, one more embarrassing moment would just be the cherry on top.'
'"The handwriting on the first spells is far too legible to be Satan's," Aziraphale reasoned, reasonably, like a reasonable person who had just critiqued Satan's penmanship.'
