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—Devotions by Mary Oliver

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Enjoyed a walk among weathered tomes and retro editions on Sunday at the Kanda Furuhon (Used Book) Matsuri, taking place on the streets around Kanda-Jimbocho, Tokyo's "book town."

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Whisper of the Heart, 1995

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Finding treasure in the clutter

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Alright tell me in the tags, what’s Your Poem? That poem you heard once and it has dwelt within you ever since?

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the haunting of hill house by shirley jackson has my heart • ig: honeyedpaperbacks

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Anouk Kruithof   Enclosed Content Chatting Away In The Color Invisibility

books

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The book town of Bredevoort, the Netherlands

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a used bookstore tucked in a quiet narrow alley in paris. 

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Paterson (2016) dir. Jim Jarmusch

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The fantasy library, which would you check out?

Personally, I would really like to read the third Book of Dust novel.. You can buy a copy of this print right here

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Ten to Take Away: Autumnal Reads

Autumn is a season which, to borrow a phrase, contains multitudes. It is a season that marks the end of summer, and thus the oncoming end of the calendar year, and yet it also marks new beginnings in terms of academic environments. It is a time when nature blooms with its last bursts of vivid colour, to contrast sharply with the barren bleakness awaiting by the time the season ends. And above all, it is effectively Hallowe’en season, whether that holds contemplation of death and mortality, or simple costumed fun. Here, I’ve tried to pull together a list of books which capture Autumn in all its shades.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

A quintessential Autumn book, and more or less the birthplace of the modern trend for ‘dark academia’, Tartt’s novel has Californian Richard relocate to a prestigious New England college, and attempt to fall in with a group of mysterious, affected Classics students. Murder, tension, intrigue and college study schedules abound!

Mort by Terry Pratchett

Pratchett’s beloved Discworld deserves its own post, but his Mort, in which the eponymous boy becomes apprentice to Death, scythe, cloak and all, fits in well with the Autumnal months, as one considers the end of all things, and skulls leer around every corner.

The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa

Autumnal in feeling, if not as much in setting, Ogawa’s book presents a strange life on an island where memories can apparently be controlled externally, and evokes that wistful feeling which is so ubiquitous between September and December each year.

A Frog in the Fall by Linnea Sterte

A gentle, wistful book about a small frog undertaking a big journey, Sterte’s accomplished illustration brings the season to life, and showcases an abundant love of the natural world.

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

A great, long book to curl up with as the nights draw in, Clarke’s eponymous characters are two rival magicians who both get in rather over their heads as their powers, and rivalry, grow stronger. A good demonstration that the folly of man can provide more chills than anything offered by the supernatural.

Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff

Ruff evokes the cosmic-horror made famous by HP Lovecraft, but blends it with the all-too-real horror prejudice and racist violence, in a series of creepy connected stories.

Thisby Thestoop and the Black Mountain by Zac Gorman

A grimier twist on some classic fantasy tropes, Gorman’s hero is a keeper of a huge, monster-infested dungeon, who finds herself tasked with ensuring a lost princess doesn’t cross paths with too many of the dungeon’s worst denizens. What could be more in keeping with the spirit of autumn than a book where one of the ‘worst’ monsters is an enormous black cat?

The Upstairs Room by Kate Murray-Browne

Different kinds of ghosts haunt the protagonists, a married couple and their live-in lodger, of Murray-Browne’s debut novel. Regret, mistakes and the permanence of times’ march loom large in our characters’ lives, and as if that wasn’t bad enough, there really is something off about that upstairs bedroom…

Wild’s End by Dan Abnett & INJ Culbard

Across 3 volumes, Abnett & Culbard essentially mix The Wind in the Willows with the War of the Worlds, resulting in a dark and more-than-occasionally frightening journey across the English countryside for a group of disparate villagers.

Salem’s Lot by Stephen King

It would be difficult to ignore the King of the scary story, and while I plan to write a longer post focusing on King’s works in the near future, it would be remiss not to mention his spin on Stoker’s Dracula, which results in one of the definitive vampire stories as a small town falls under the sway of a mysterious newcomer.

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Feeling blue?