About stories of all kinds
This book, Beautiful Disaster by Jamie McGuire, repeatedly caught my eye since I first encountered its alluring cover but I never carved out time for it until coming across it again at the library. Walking to the check-out counter, I knew it was going to be trash. But it kept popping up, so I finally… Continue reading The Third Day of Christmas: Beautiful Disaster
I picked this book up, containing two novels by Louisa May Alcott, with the understanding that the first listed story was a sort of first draft of A Long Fatal Love Chase, as its alternate title was A Modern Mephistopheles. However, despite sharing a similar concept, the stories actually diverge wildly enough in their characters… Continue reading The Second Day of Christmas: A Modern Mephistopheles and Taming a Tartar
Though one of the first of the modern fantasy novels, T.H. White’s creations of modern Arthurian myth seem to have been relegated to mere “children’s literature” in a way that even C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia haven’t been. Which designation, aside from being patently inaccurate, does an injustice to the depth and complexity of White’s… Continue reading The First Day of Christmas: The Once and Future King
I don’t know if anyone is aware of this “really old movie,” but The Fellowship of the Ring is a 2001 film adaptation of the 1954 book of the same name by J.R.R. Tolkien. The book is the first volume of the larger work The Lord of the Rings, which helped define an entire genre… Continue reading May the Fellowship Be Unbroken, By and By: A Lord of the Rings Appreciation Post
Kira Navárez dreamed of life on new worlds. Now she's awakened a nightmare. During a routine survey mission on an uncolonized planet, Kira finds an alien relic. At first she's delighted, but elation turns to terror when the ancient dust around her begins to move.As war erupts among the stars, Kira is launched into a galaxy-spanning… Continue reading To Sleep (Perchance to Dream) in a Sea of Stars: Review
The context. In my third year of university, I took a class upon the topic of Middle English romances. We’re taking chivalry, we’re talking Vikings and Bretons, we’re talking lords and ladies and castles and whatnot. We’re talking spoofs, exoticism, and legendary revisionism. The longest piece we read was Sir Gawain and the Green Knight… Continue reading An afternoon with The Green Knight
In The Protestant Ethic, Max Weber opposes the Marxist concept of dialectical materialism and relates the rise of the capitalist economy to the Calvinist belief in the moral value of hard work and the fulfillment of one’s worldly duties. My Review I came into this not knowing any of the dialogue around Weber's philosophy, or… Continue reading A Tangled Weber: The Protestant Ethic and the “Spirit” of Capitalism
Book blurb for City of Dark Magic by Magnus Flyte Once a city of enormous wealth and culture, Prague was home to emperors, alchemists, astronomers, and, as it’s whispered, hell portals. When music student Sarah Weston lands a summer job at Prague Castle cataloging Beethoven’s manuscripts, she has no idea how dangerous her life is… Continue reading City of Dark Magic: Book Review
The "I can't find a blurb because everybody already knows or doesn't care what this book is about" solution: An Encyclopedia Britannica entry on War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy War and Peace, historical novel by Leo Tolstoy, originally published as Voyna i mir in 1865–69. This panoramic study of early 19th-century Russian society, noted for its mastery of realistic… Continue reading It Got Involved: War and Peace Review
Blurb for Return of the Thief by Megan Whelan Turner The thrilling, twenty-years-in-the-making, conclusion to the New York Times–bestselling Queen’s Thief series, by Megan Whalen Turner. This beloved and award-winning series began with the acclaimed novel The Thief. It and four more stand-alone volumes bring to life a world of epics, myths, and legends, and… Continue reading The Long-Awaited Return of the Thief: Book Review
Fictitiously Yours 