Books and Notebooks

This is my booklr blog though I plan on posting journals and stationary too. Posts added to the queue on Fridays.

[theunseelielibrary]

July 2026 Reading Stats

[mdandnoname]

Every time Lord Henry opens his mouth, I want to roll my eyes.

He's like your high school classmate who discovered philosophy, and now even if you just ask him about the weather, he'll turn it into an endless stream of words for the sake of pathos and his elevation above the rest.

[ilovethings27]

Book haul!!

[the-irreverend]

Started re-reading Jurassic Park after hearing about Sam Neill's passing, and it's shocking just how applicable these paragraphs about biotech and genetic engineering are to artificial intelligence:

[rubypomegranates]

“Shame can be sneaky. It tries to tell you that you are not good enough. My personal experience with a chronic illness allows for special empathy and compassion for those who experience chronic illnesses or pain.”

Ilana Jacqueline “Surviving and Thriving with an Invisible Chronic Illness”

[c-oldasice]

project hail mary ⋆｡ﾟ🪐｡⋆｡ ﾟ☾ ﾟ｡⋆

i have started this right after i watched the movie and it’s been a blast! i’m enjoying it so much i don’t want it to end. i’m at around 40% of the book and it’s already better than the movie ( and the movie was a 10/10 ). i have even considered changing my major (ᵕ—ᴗ—)

i would definitely recommend this and even more if it’s your first sci-fi book (as it’s mine).

[susiephone]

still monte cristoposting but one thing i find so compelling is how all 3 of the main antagonists suck in such a normal, banal way. you can totally believe men like this could exist, because they DO exist. their personality flaws are very common and very grounded, and it was by luck that they got the chance to do as much damage as they did.

danglars is a greedy capitalist who values money more than people, and sees everything he wants as his birthright. not only does he jump on the chance to get dantes out of the way, he also treats his wife and daughter like props in order to line his pockets, and steals from the charity he runs. anything for a few extra bucks.

fernand feels entitled to mercedes' affection (and implicitly her body) and gets rid of dantes so he can have what's "rightfully his", taking advantage of mercedes' grief and loneliness after the fact to trap her in a marriage he knows she doesn't want. when they have a son, it gradually becomes clear he only sees that son as an extension of himself - the second albert stops being the perfect, dutiful son, the second he says "no, what you did is wrong and i won't stand for it", he calls him a coward and a disappointment. he sells a woman and her child into slavery and it literally never occurs to him to be ashamed because to him, they weren't real people, at least not people worth mourning. fernand is fundamentally a moral coward; he'll backstab anyone to get what he wants, but folds immediately when faced with the consequences of his actions.

villefort probably displays the most redeeming qualities; we see he loves his children, and unlike the other two, he's eventually able to see what a bastard he is. but he chooses to do something he knows is wrong for the sake of advancing his career, and rather than own up to it, he doubles down for over twenty years, becoming a harsh and calculating judge where he once promised to value mercy and compassion. one of the most fascinating lines in the novel is when villefort admits to another character that he's so merciless to the criminals in his courtroom because seeing other criminals - criminals he thinks of as being "worse" than he is - assures him that, at the very least, he's not the worst humanity has to offer. and while he does love his kids, he fails as a father when he refuses to see how abusive his wife is to his daughter, and his inactive role in his children's upbringing lets his wife wreak havoc on several people's lives. so much could've been avoided if villefort had bothered to notice anything going on with valentine.

the count of monte cristo is high melodrama. it runs on coincidence and disguises and impossibly complex schemes, but the three main antagonists are all very real in the sort of evil they represent.

[nelyaaas]

july 2026 - mood for the first half is buying coffee excessively, reading the secret history (love it!) and the house of leaves with the buddies

[azzandra]

Booktok controversy that's broken containment: a writer told one of her friends the concept for a book, and he took that concept and AI-generated a book based on it and then gifted to her like 'there you go, sweetie, you're welcome ;)'

BRO WHAT.

[azzandra]

OMG, I'm watching a video about this, and it's even weirder. That wasn't even a friend, it was a rando who saw her tiktok talking about the concept and randomly emails her this AI-generated book. That's even weirder.

[cat-she]

And then when she says she doesn't like it, and several NYT BESTSELLING AUTHORS who all happen to be women all explain to him why he's in the wrong, he talks down to them and doubles and triples and quadruples down. But then the moment the woman's husband gets involved, he immediately apologizes to "him and his wife." Just breathtaking levels of misogyny.

[azzandra]

He wanted credit SO HARD for doing basically NOTHING. Worse than nothing! He wanted headpats so hard that when she ignored his email he hounded her to respond publicly.

He's like a microcosm of everything that's wrong with people who use AI to generate stories.

[cat-she]

He was talking about releasing the shit he generated with the idea he STOLE FROM HER for free if she continued not responding to him, and then acted like she was being insane when she clarified that she didn't respond on purpose 😭😭😭 What goes through these people's heads!!!!!!!!!

[azzandra]

Something profoundly wrong with this dude and yet he's incapable of noticing.

[theunseelielibrary]

June 2026 Reading Stats

[the-amazing-wanderer]

“The clever people at CERN are smashing particles together in the hope that Doctor Who will turn up and tell them to stop.”

—

Peter Grant, from Moon over Soho, by Ben Aaronovitch.

[mckitterick]

[rip-quizilla]

[onequoteperday]

“The first rule about a black woman’s hair is you don’t talk about a black woman’s hair. And the second rule is you don’t ever touch a black woman’s hair without getting written permission first.”

— Ben Aaronovitch (from Moon Over Soho)

[a-ramblinrose]

“What’s the biggest thing you’ve zapped with a fireball?’ I asked. ‘That would be a tiger,'said Nightingale. 'Well don’t tell Greenpeace,’ I said. 'They’re an endagered species.’ 'Not that sort of tiger,’ said Nightingale. 'A Panzer-kampfwagen sechs Ausf E.’ I stared at him. 'You knocked out a Tiger tank with a fireball?’ 'Actually I knocked out two,’ said Nightingale. 'I have to admit that the first one took three shots, one to disable the tracks, one through the driver’s eye slot and one down the commander’s hatch - brewed up rather nicely.”

—

Ben Aaronovitch, Moon Over Soho

~~~Thomas “Tiger Tank” Nightingale~~~

[a-ramblinrose]

“You can’t call them black magicians,” I said. “You realize that we’re using black in its metaphorical sense here,” said Nightingale. “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “Words change what they mean, don’t they? Some people would call me a black magician.” “You’re not a magician,” he said. “You’re barely even an apprentice.” “You’re changing the subject,” I said. “What should we call them?” he asked patiently. “Ethically challenged magical practitioners,” I said.”

— Ben Aaronovitch, Moon Over Soho

[rubiscothegeek]

“I’m an old-fashioned copper - I don’t believe in breaking the laws of thermodynamics.”

— Ben Aaronovitch, Moon Over Soho

[onequoteperday]

“If you just warn people, they often simply ignore you. But if you ask them a question, then they have to think about it. And once they start to think about the consequences, they almost always calm down. Unless they’re drunk, of course. Or stoned. Or aged between fourteen and twenty-one. Or Glaswegian.”

— Ben Aaronovitch (from Moon Over Soho)