2023 Book List
Unbelievably I read a staggering 70 books in 2023! The most ever! My only disappointment is NOT finishing Dracula Daily, I came so close...
Wolf Brother Michelle Paver
Skin-Walker Michelle Paver
Be the Serpent Seanan McGuire
She Who Became the Sun
Soul-Eater Michelle Paver
Nona the Ninth Tamsyn Muir
The Girl in Red Christina Henry
As yet Unsent Tamsyn Muir
Outcast Michelle Paver
Leonard Cohen: On a wire Philippe Girard
Oath Breaker Michelle Paver
Ghost Hunter Michelle Paver
Baggage: Tales from a Fully Packed Life Alan Cumming
M is for Magic Neil Gaiman
Silverwing Kenneth Opal
Last Violent Call Chloe Gong
Malice: Malice Duology #1 Heather Walter
Pandora Susan Stokes-Chapman
A Lady for a Duke Alexis Hall
Boyfriend Material Alexis Hall
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopedia of Faeries Heather Fawcett
Motorcycles & Sweetgrass Drew Hayden Taylor
Conventionally Yours Annabeth Albert
The Unbalancing R.B Lemberg
Stone Blind Natalie Haynes
The Winter Soldier: Cold Front Mackenzi Lee
Ruby Nina Allan
The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter Theodora Goss
Husband Material Alexis Hall
The Secret Service of Tea and Treason India Holton
My Dear Henry: A Jekyll and Hyde Remix Kalynn Bayron
The Monsters we Defy Leslye Penelope
Travelers Along the Way: A Robin Hood Remix Aminah Mae Safi
Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman Alan Rickman
Morgan Is My Name Sophie Keetch
Threads That Bind Kika Hatzopoulou
European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman Theodora Goss
Feeling Sorry for Celia Jaclyn Moriarty
Daughter of the Pirate King Tricia Levenseller
A Clash of Steel: A Treasure Island Remix C.B. Lee
Harley Quinn: The Animated Series: The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour Tee Franklin
Magic for Liars Sarah Gailey
The Story of Owen Emily Kate Johnston
The Brilliant Death A.R. Capetta
Circle of Magic: Sandy’s Book Tamora Pierce
The Merry Spinster: Tales of Everyday Horror Daniel M. Lavery
Death's Detective- Malykant Mysteries #1-4 Charlotte E. English
The Salt Grows Heavy Cassandra Khaw
A Touch of Darkness- Hades & Persephone #1 Scarlett St. Clair
Mortal Follies Alexis Hall
Witch King Martha Wells
The London Séance Society Sarah Penner
A Life on Our Planet: My Witness Statement and a Vision for the Future David Attenborough, Jonnie Hughes
A Game of Fate- Hades Saga #1 Scarlett St. Clair
Immortal Longings Chloe Gong
Hooked Emily McIntire
Foul Heart Huntsmen Chloe Gong
Signal to Noise Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Daughter of the Siren Queen Tricia Levenseller
Starter Villain John Scalzi
The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl Theodora Goss
Starling House Alix E. Harrow
A Marvellous Light: The Last Binding #1 Freya Marske
A Restless Truth: The Last Binding #2 Freya Marske
Thornhedge T. Kingfisher
What the River Knows Isabel Ibanez
The In-Between: Unforgettable Encounters During Life's Final Moments Hadley Vlahos
Misrule: Malice Duology #2 Heather Walter
The Raven and The Reindeer T. Kingfisher
A Power Unbound: The Last Binding #3 Freya Marske
I started some series, and I finished some series. I found new favourite authors and revisited some old favourites. Please take them as recommendations, or if you have read any of the same books come talk about them with me!
Reminder you can also follow me on The Storygraph to see what I am reading in real time, where I am simply shy_fairy
Previous Years Reading lists can be found here: 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015
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Tumblr: Isn't it funny how Japanese light novels have such improbably long titles? Isn't it weird?
English literature for most of the 17th–19th Centuries:
[Image description – A photograph of a book published in 1810, whose title reads, in full: "A Reviving Cordial for a Sin-Sick Despairing Soul, in the Time of Temptation, Being an Account of the Miraculous Preservation of the Author’s Bodily Life From Many Imminent Dangers; and of the Way in Which the Spirit of God Effected the Deliverance Of His Soul From the State of Nature to the State of Grace. To Which Is Subjoined, the Only Refuge of a Troubled Soul, in the Time of Tribulation and Affliction; or, The Mystery of the Apple-Tree, Explained and Laid Open, in Two Discourses From Cant. ii. 3", by the Rev. James Barry, Minister of the Gospel.]
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the thing is there's like, a point of oversaturation for everything, and it's why so many things get dropped after a few minutes. and we act like millennials or gen z kids "have short attention spans" but... that's not quite it. it's more like - we did like it. you just ruined it.
capitalism sees product A having moderate success, and then everything has to come out with their "own version" of product A (which is often exactly the same). and they dump extreme amounts of money and environmental waste into each horrible simulacrum they trot out each season.
now it's not just tiktokkers making videos; it's that instagram and even fucking tumblr both think you want live feeds and video-first programming. and it helps them, because videos are easier to sneak native ads into. the books coming out all have to have 78 buzzwords in them for SEO, or otherwise they don't get published. they are making a live-action remake of moana. i haven't googled it, but there's probably another marvel or starwars something coming out, no matter when you're reading this post.
and we are like "hi, this clone of project A completely misses the point of the original. it is soulless and colorless and miserable." and the company nods and says "yes totally. here is a different clone, but special." and we look at clone 2 and we say "nope, this one is still flat and bad, y'all" and they're like "no, totally, we hear you," and then they make another clone but this time it's, like, a joyless prequel. and by the time they've successfully rolled out "clone 89", the market is incredibly oversaturated, and the consumer is blamed because the company isn't turning a profit.
and like - take even something digital like the tumblr "live streaming" function i just mentioned. that has to take up server space and some amount of carbon footprint; just so this brokenass blue hellsite can roll out a feature that literally none of its userbase actually wants. the thing that's the kicker here: even something that doesn't have a physical production plant still impacts the environment.
and it all just feels like it's rolling out of control because like, you watch companies pour hundreds of thousands of dollars into a remake of a remake of something nobody wants anymore and you're like, not able to afford eggs anymore. and you tell the company that really what you want is a good story about survival and they say "okay so you mean a YA white protagonist has some kind of 'spicy' love triangle" and you're like - hey man i think you're misunderstanding the point of storytelling but they've already printed 76 versions of "city of blood and magic" and "queen of diamond rule" and spent literally millions of dollars on the movie "Candy Crush Killer: Coming to Eat You".
it's like being stuck in a room with a clown that keeps telling the same joke over and over but it's worse every time. and that would be fine but he keeps fucking charging you 6.99. and you keep being like "no, i know it made me laugh the first time, but that's because it was different and new" and the clown is just aggressively sitting there saying "well! plenty of people like my jokes! the reason you're bored of this is because maybe there's something wrong with you!"
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so. i understand where the sentiment "listening to an audiobook is the same thing as reading the book" is coming from - i mean, yes, the bottom line is you are taking in the same words in what is possibly a more accessible (or maybe just more enjoyable) format for you! and i'm 100% in agreement that "book snobs" who say "no you didn't really read it" if you listened to the audiobook are full of shit. ofc you should engage with stories in whatever way works for you, there is no moral or intellectual superiority to reading words off a page vs. listening to them
but it also is different? an audiobook is a performance. choices a narrator makes about line readings can drastically influence the meaning of the lines. even just different voices, accents, etc. - there are creative choices being made by the person delivering the words to you, and that affects your experience of the story in a different way than if you were making those choices in your own head. it might even change the way you visualize what's going on!
this isn't a bad thing it's just An Actual Thing & i think it's worth talking about. it rubs me the wrong way when people act like accommodations (and for many people audiobooks are an accommodation) always result in a completely identical experience, or even that they should, & if you suggest that people accessing media in different ways are having different experiences it's somehow ableist
anyway on rare occasions i really enjoy audiobooks but mostly they are much less accessible to me than words on a page (i need to be able to reread, flip back and forth, go at my own pace) & i also just really strongly prefer to encounter a text on my own before hearing someone else's performance of it, if possible! again i don't think it's "better" to read a physical book i just think it is a Distinct form of experiencing a story & acting like the two things are entirely the same is sort of doing a disservice to both
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