Letters from the Lighthouse

Merry [they/them], 30s, PhD student, historian, booklover since forever. This is a sideblog.

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Some general blog info

Find me elsewhere:

Instagram: letters.from.the.lighthouse Bluesky: lightletters Wordpress: https://lettersfromthelighthouse.wordpress.com/ Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5097729-merry

I don't currently have a storygraph account because the last time I tried exporting my data, storygraph couldn't handle the number of older and non-English titles in my library; if I finally find the time/energy to try setting one up, I'll add that here.

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What to expect on this blog:

book pictures of my own reads

reviews (when I get round to writing them)

occasional thoughts on my current reads & reading in general

the odd ask game 

What you WON'T find on this blog:

studyblr content and anything academia-adjacent

Dark Academia anything

large amounts of book aesthetics

reading memes and posts of the ‘bookworms will do [x]’ variety

book fandom (this is not a fandom blog, and I don't interact with most books that way anyway. I also do not ship.)

certain genres (YA, romance, crime/thriller, graphic novels/manga & large amounts of SFF)

a regular posting schedule for quotations & reblogged book pictures (I don't have the time to keep those up)

This is a side-blog, by the way.

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Nonfiction - Get Into Merry's Head Edition

Not even close to being all the non-fiction I've read, just a collection of formative titles that will tell you a lot about what goes on...

This isn't even close to being all the non-fiction I've read (and I've excluded almost all research + writing manuals) but it is a fairly good introduction to some of my fave interests & topics. (I've also limited myself to 1-2 works per author, or else the complete works of Olivia Laing, Robert Macfarlane and Rebecca Solnit would have made the list.)

How many have you read?

1-5

6-10

11-15

16-20

21-25

26-30

30+

Voting ended onDec 6, 2025

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

At which point in the year do you admit to yourself (and others) that it is now officially too late to meet your reading goal(s)? Asking for a friend.

[aliteraryprincess]

Nonfiction Aliteraryprincess Has Read - Updated 2025

It's Nonfiction November, so time for my updated list of nonfiction I've read in full (or at least that I can remember). This list goes...

I'm procrastinating paper proposals, so have a list of the nonfiction I've read!

How many have you read?

1-5

6-10

11-15

16-20

21-30

31-40

41-50

51-80

81-120

121-150

150+

Voting ended onDec 3, 2025

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Someone please explain to me why we're trad-publishing Dramione fanfic under the author's actual AO3 username now?!?!

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Read in July: Maggie Nelson - The Red Parts

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Read in July: Han Kang - Greek Lessons

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

I'm tentatively back on this blog (and to reading) btw; I had a very dry spell with both lately and tbh I'm not really sure what happened. I think I can promise some activity soon (I have a couple of quotes and pictures that I want to still post), but it might be slow going. Bear with me, alright?

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Recently finished: F. Scott Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Quarterly Wrapup: April to June 2025

Another very late wrapup post for another very strange quarter. I started it with high hopes: I would continue my reading streak from March, I would participate in the Orilium readathon in April again, and I would finish all the books I’d put on my (not even overly ambitious) spring TBR. Reader, I did none of those things.

What really happened is that I went through a fallow period in my reading for much of April and May and read very slowly and erratically for almost two months. I do not want to call it a slump because that sounds too negative; the reality is probably more that I was just not in the mood and otherwise occupied. [...]

I think, apart from being distracted and not in the mood for reading, I also haven’t had a very good run with books lately. I read a couple of very mid books recently, and while they all came from the library, I think being only mildly engaged instead of completely engrossed also contributed to my feeling rather meh around reading in general. What is more, a lot of my favourite books recently have been non-fiction, and while I like reading enjoyable and interesting non-fiction, I would love to get really immersed and emotionally invested in a fiction book again (instead of just intellectually entertained or educated). Oh well. Better luck next quarter?

View the full post on Wordpress

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were ...

Penniless and homeless, the Winns found fame and fortune with the story of their 630-mile walk to salvation. We can reveal that the truth be

[dauen]

a lovely way to spend a sunny spring day

[freckles-and-books]

Current read

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

My brain feels entirely separate from me. It is empty, but it also cannot take any more in.

~ Katherine May, Enchantment (2023)

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Reread in March: Ali Smith - Spring

[books-are-portals]

Just finished: The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty

[lettersfromthelighthouse]

Enchantment is small wonder magnified through meaning, fascination caught in the web of fable and memory. It relies on small doses of awe, almost homeopathic: those quiet traces of fascination that are found only when we look for them. It is the sense that we are joined together in one continuous thread of existence with the elements constituting the earth, and that there is a potency trapped in this interconnection, a tingle on the border of our perception. It is the forgotten seam in our geology, the elusive particle that binds our unstable matter: the ability to sense magic in the everyday, to channel it through our minds and bodies, to be sustained by it.

~ Katherine May, Enchantment (2023)