Books are Portals

A reading, writing, and editing blog focusing on diverse SFF. Currently Reading: Kindred by Octavia E. Butler

[fictionalaffection]

there’s so much to read , that one life isn’t enough.

[strangequarkbooks]

Wow. It’s been a WHILE. How are you? What a wild time it’s been...”unprecedented” I believe is the word? Anyway, if any of you are still active on here, I have a book IG and TikTok. Follow me @strangequarkbooks on both, and let’s pick up where we left off :) 

[strangequarkbooks]

The Cure for Dreaming by Cat Winters - My Random Thoughts and Summary ***Spoilers Ahead***

I found this in my Google Drive, and I just needed to share. Of course I only did two chapters because I have the attention span of a newborn. 

Chapter 1: A Charmed Individual

Livie, 17. At a show on her bday, 31 Oct, 1900. Portland, OR

Percy, cute boy Livie likes. Son of a judge.

Henry Reverie, hypnotist, stands on Livie’s torso. She’s into his smile. Makes her forget Percy.

Chapter 2: Womanhood Perfected

Livie doesn’t know wtf happened on stage.

Livie feels stoned after the hypnotism. Feelin’ good, girl.

Percy asks Livie if he can drive her home. She’s like, who, me? Oh my.

He has his own buggy ‘cause he’s rich.

Percy reveals to Livie that seeing her under the complete control of some random man on stage gives him a boner.

Percy says Livie was “as beautiful as Sleeping Beauty.” Truly vomitous.

But he’s super vague about whether or not he agrees with his father’s misogyny. More vomit. Mindgames. Men are sociopaths.

Livie’s dad is a ghoulish dentist who smiles as he yanks teeth out of patients’ mouths.

Ensuing convo about the use of leeches in dentistry solidifies source of Livie’s like of horror novels. Parents, they’ll fuck you up.

Percy and Livie bond over having monsters for fathers.

I bond with Percy over our mutual fear of dentists.

Livie’s dad “clomps” out of the fucking shadows.

Percy and Livie talk about Livie like she’s not standing right there. Ladies? Where? Do you mean chairs?

We discover shy little Livie WENT TO A PROTEST ON THE LOW BECAUSE SHE WANTS TO FUCKING VOTE.

As expected, men everywhere lose their fucking minds. Exhibit A: Livie’s dad threatens to pull her out of high school and send her to a fucking convent.

Livie and Percy tell Clomps McGee about Henri Reverie. We can tell Clomps McGee has the beginning of an idea. As we know, men’s ideas are usually awful.

Percy wants to take Livie to a party. Clomps has to think about it. No one fucking asks Livie anything.

Rich client of Clomps saw Livie at the protest and snitched. What a dirty snitch. NEVER TRUST RICH PEOPLE.

Clomps is an asshole to his daughter and all women simultaneously. An injury to one is an injury to all.

Something called the Oregon Association Opposed to the Extension of Suffrage to Women exists. They put the “ass” in “association.”

The first mention of a “bulging blue vein,” and unfortunately not the last.

Why is Livie’s room “cherry-blossom-pink”? Pink was a boy’s color until the 1940’s according to The Smithsonian Magazine because I fact check. 

Foot binding shout out

It’s been mentioned a few times that Livie is really into Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Bram Stoker sounds like the name of  a SoCal tech bro.

[neil-gaiman]

I'm so excited for the good omens tv show, its one of my favorite books! If I had a bookstore I feel lile I would be lile aziraphale and just hoard the books without letting anyone buy them lol. In regards to the show, do they let you have a lot of input, in regards to keeping things true to the spirit of the book, or is it mostly a hands off enterprise for you?

It’s the most hands on enterprise I’ve ever done. I wrote the scripts, and am the showrunner, and I was there from casting and preproduction and will be there until the end of post production.

[strangequarkbooks]

Omg, can't wait.

[hobbit-hole]

if i had to get in a fistfight with any member of the fellowship it would be Frodo because i would easily win

[hobbit-hole]

all i am saying is that he would ostensibly be the easiest one to take on in a fight given that he’s like three feet tall and has led a life of (physical) leisure compared to all of the others due to his standing as a gentlehobbit

legolas, aragorn, and gimli are all used to combat, sam works as a gardener, merry and pippin often gallivant off and get into mischief so they have the advantage of experience in whatever it is they’ve gotten up to/would possibly fight dirty, gandalf is gandalf so while weapons are out of the question i suppose that depends on if magic is involved. i don’t think i could take him without magic even if he IS old because he’s a very large guy, but maybe

it would be my knuckles against Frodo’s baby soft poet hands, plus i’ve got the additional height and fighting experience. i just think that he would be the easiest to win against in hand-to-hand combat out of the rest of them. also he isn’t real so he can’t offer a rebuttal to my claim

[penny-anna]

you’re absolutely correct BUT wanting to fight Frodo makes you a monster D:

[hobbit-hole]

this has nothing to do with WANTING to fight Frodo, i just think he would be easiest for me to beat in a fight with no weapons. unless he utilized his very large feet, but i think he’s too polite to do that because it’s a fist fight and that would be considered playing dirty

[penny-anna]

for someone who doesn’t want to fight Frodo you sure have put a lot of thought into fighting Frodo……….

[animate-mush]

OP is wrong though: you fight Pippin.

First off, Pippin has it coming, so you won’t be fighting your conscience at the same time.

Secondly, Pippin is a spoiled rich kid. He’s no less gentry than Frodo is, but Frodo works out and is shown to have better stamina, at least at the outset. Pippin is also both the stupidest and the slowest of the hobbits. They both nearly beat one (1) troll, so that’s comparable, but Pippin appears not to have got a single hit in against the orcs that captured them while Merry was cutting off hands like a boss. Pippin also straight-up tell Bergil that he’s not a fighter.

Also there’s a nonzero chance that Frodo will just straight up curse you (if the guilt of fighting Frodo isn’t enough if a curse by itself).

And, of course, if you try to fight Frodo, you will 100% end up fighting Sam, and he will wreck you (and you’ll deserve it, you monster)

[penny-anna]

Also: if you fight Frodo you’ll have a very angry Sam & possibly also the entire Fellowship to deal with BUT if you fight Pippin they will probably cheer you on.

[westrons-deactivated20200930]

Bold of you to assume one could attempt to fight Pippin and NOT instantly be killed by Boromir.

[feynites]

So here’s the thing - you absolutely DO NOT want to try and fight Frodo or Pippin because they are going to be protected by the rest of the Fellowship, which basically exists to stop asshole Big People from picking on the hobbits. Folk might talk a big game but when the chips are down, you are not going to lay a single hand on any of the hobbits. Either you’ll find yourself immediately fighting all four of them or else you’ll move to land your first hit and suddenly Aragorn will side-tackle you into the trees. And he probably hits like a freight train tbh.

So here’s what you do:

You fight Legolas.

The thing about fist-fighting Legolas of course is that you will lose. This is not a fight you’re gonna win no matter what. But Legolas has his standing competition with Gimli, so once the challenge is issued, he’s not gonna let anyone else step in and fight you either. No one is liable to volunteer on his behalf, either, so you will only end up fighting the one member of the fellowship. If you are lucky he might also take his shirt off. Bonus!

Anyway.

Legolas will mop the floor with you, but he’s also already convinced you’re weaker than him anyway because you’re not an elf, so he’s gonna go kind of easy on you. And when you lose he will be all snide and superior about it, which means everyone in the fellowship is gonna sympathize with you, and Gimli will probably challenge him on your behalf afterwards, but here’s the key thing:

You will have lost a fist-fight to an immortal warrior prince.

That’s a way better loss to cop to than that time you tried to fistfight a pudgy gentlehobbit and got beaten to the point of unconsciousness by his gardener, yeah?

[strangequarkbooks]

Wow I love this post

[queenhelenblackthorn]

Iconic

[masterofsomething-deactivated20]

I’ve already reblogged this, but if anyone wants a translation:

“Spanish is very difficult. I’m still learning. For example, ‘Donald is three years old’ and ‘Donald has three anuses’. Both are right, but have significant differences.”

[strangequarkbooks]

Lmao

[neil-gaiman]

Have you heard of some of the Coraline theories? Like the theory that Coraline is struggling to cope with the death of her parents and refuses to believe they’re really gone, hence the rotten groceries. There are a few others but I don’t have too many characters to get through them all, if you haven’t checked out the Theorizer on Coraline you should. Pretty interesting. Are you in a position to confirm or deny these theories? Or are we all just looking into it too much?

I wrote the book. Henry Selick wrote the film, and made it with hundreds of people. Since that time millions of people have read the book and enjoyed the film, and some of them have come up with lots of glorious theories and some of them get sent to me, (many of these Coraline theories, if they were true, would preclude other Coraline theories, equally as glorious). 

And there aren’t just glorious theories. There are also barking-mad theories. There are even theories I find on the one hand barking-mad and offensive, but on the other hand sort of sweet, as people obviously put lots of time and effort into deciding that (for example) watching Coraline will brainwash you, or whatever.

And my conclusion is that I don’t think I need to be part of this conversation. It’s fan-fiction, on a large scale, and fan-fiction should, I think, exist apart from the author. So I am glad the theories are out there, even the barking-mad ones. (But watching Coraline will not turn you into an Illuminati mind-slave.)

[lbibliophile]

Just like Slughorn, Albus Dumbledore collects people. Only, instead of focusing on those with influence, he looks to the outcasts.

The expelled half-giant. The young werewolf. The repentant Death Eater.

He protects them and gives them a second chance. All he asks in return is their loyalty.

And, if on occasion he requests that they undertake a certain task, invoking their debt of gratitude - well, that is no more than he is owed.

He once thought to add a certain disowned Black to his collection, but quickly realised his mistake.

Sirius is not an outcast, but a rebel. He knowingly chose his path, and chooses what price he is willing to pay for it. He refuses to be used.

So Albus Dumbledore abandons him.

[wizardtowizard-blog]

Who gave you the RIGHT?

[bonnini]

Dumbledore knows Sirius’s loyalty lies with Harry instead of him, and he has no use for someone who is not willing to follow his orders without question. 

[marauders4evr]

Ooooohoo if there’s ever a post that fits my aesthetic…

[not-a-bit-good]

okay but then where does Harry himself fit into this collection? Is he an outcast because he is “the Boy Who Lived”?

[marauders4evr]

Nooonono, my friend, that’s what makes this post so beautiful. Because it fits the meta I’ve been trying to get people to accept for years. 

Harry was an outcast due to a childhood filled with abuse and neglect. 

Vernon made him an outcast by dismissing his claims of magic, berating him, locking him in a CLOSET and putting bars on his window, and let’s face it, even though her editor made her cut it out, Jo intended for there to be physical abuse. 

Petunia made him an outcast by enabling and contributing to this abuse, as well as making Harry do dozens of chores while doting on Dudley. 

Dudley made him an outcast by bullying him and threatening any students at school who wanted to be his friends. 

And the rest of the wizarding world made him an outcast when they bullied him for being an outsider.

Harry James Potter became an outcast the moment he was placed with The Dursleys.

And who put him there in the first place?

[theotheryongbok]

[my-sun-is-gone-deactivated20180]

I’m here for this Anti-Dumbledore discussion.

[gehayi]

This makes even more sense when you consider why Dumbledore deliberately made Harry an outcast.

Think about it What would Harry have been like if he had grown up in the wizarding world? Or, to put it another way, what would Harry have been like if he had grown up in a world where magic was the norm?

He would have taken magic for granted. He would have been less likely (especially as he got older) to view Dumbledore as a wise mentor and more likely to see him as flawed and capable of bad decisions. He would have seen both the world and Dumbledore as ordinary, with their good points and bad points.

But Dumbledore didn’t need a well-adjusted boy who took magic and the magical world for granted. He needed a child who would love the magical world unstintingly, even irrationally, because it was a haven from neglect and abuse. Even more, he needed a child who feared this world becoming evil and who therefore would not question someone that he saw as the ultimate authority, especially if he believed that obeying that authority would keep the world safe.

Even if obedience meant his own death.

Dumbledore wanted a martyr who would die for the wizarding world, because he believed that Voldemort could not die until Harry did. Which was why he left Harry with the Dursleys and let them neglect and emotionally abuse him for the next ten years.

To get a martyr, he first had to create a victim.

[strangequarkbooks]

Wow. Lots to think about.

[neil-gaiman]

My mum keeps on taking your books off me (my brother buys them for me) because "they are unsuitable for young ladies". And it's annoying cos I love your books!!

The part of me that wants to answer like a Problem Page Person thinks you should talk to your mother and communicate with her about what you like about books and reading and how they improve our horizons and knowledge of the world and suchlike, and that it should all end in hugging and a promise from her to let you make your own mistakes and read what you need to read.

The part of me that loves books just thinks you need to hide your books better, and wonders whether putting respectable book-covers on them covering up the ones they already have would do the trick.

[strangequarkbooks]

💜

[neil-gaiman]

Are you really the real Neil gaiman?

I am merely one of a monstrous horde of Neil Gaimans. We share a life and a home, but have many different pairs of shoes.

[strangequarkbooks]

What a gem. 

[honeybadgertactics]

Me to my brother: Take care of yourself this semester. Eat veggies.

Brother: What are veggies

Me: These edible things that grow out of the ground that are good for you.

Brother: Out of the ground? That sounds kind of gross

Me: It’s mother earth trying to feed you how dare you

Brother: By growing food for me out of its skin, sounds like a trap

Gen Z really is questioning EVERYTHING 😂

[strangequarkbooks]

Not book related, but my brother related. He’s great! 

[dukeofbookingham-deactivated202]

Don’t worry… we passed the sign on our way out

[strangequarkbooks]

U ok?

[honeybadgertactics]

The Most Hilarious Memes About Netflix's Hit Melodrama 'La Casa de la Flores'

Frenzied fans turned 'La casa de las flores' into a social media phenomenon in a matter of days.

If you’re not watching La Casa de las Flores, I ask thee, what are you doing with your life?!?!?!?!?! 

[strangequarkbooks]

This is not book related, but I have a duty to my people to spread this wonderful piece of art far and wide. 

[strangequarkbooks]

The Literary Canon Is Mostly White. Here's an Alternative Latin American Reading List

These books are all great and important, but they hardly include our history.

I am planning on devouring these!

[dukeofbookingham-deactivated202]

@englishmajorhumor I’m dead

[strangequarkbooks]

lmao

[cephalotodd-deactivated20190310]

rick riordan off the shits

[strangequarkbooks]

Nice

[honeybadgertactics]

“A tired girl with a plain face and a distinct lack of fire in her pale brown eyes peered back at me from the glass.” The Cure for Dreaming, Cat Winters.

This is my 30′s aesthetic so far.