#witch week

[wondereads]

Since it’s Nov 5th, I would just like to say that Diana Wynne Jones wrote a whole book about a world that had fucked up its projected path and had become a hellscape of modern witch trials and when they finally find out what went wrong it’s because Guy Fawkes actually blew up the Parliament instead of failing and it was such a big explosion that it introduced magic to the world and made everyone deathly afraid of it. Anyway

[no-where-new-hero]

Pls tell me your reasons in the tags!

[haveyoureadthisfantasybook]

vote yes if you have finished the entire book.

vote no if you have not finished the entire book.

(faq · submit a book)

[spiritintheinkwell]

My favorite horrible children from Witch Week.

It was a really long time since my last reread of this book, and maaaannn... returning to it after coming out is a totally different experience.

[quietflorilegium]

"Mr Wentworth lifted his harrowed face and stared past Chrestomanci. “How did she do it?” he said. “How does she keep it up? How can Miss Hodge be a teacher and not use witchcraft at all? I use it all the time. How else can I have eyes in the back of my head?” “One of the great mysteries of our time,” Chrestomanci agreed."

Diana Wynne Jones, "Witch Week"

[incomprehensible-ants]

Take: Chrestomanci (chris’s edition) actually just has some kind of dad power because everytime he goes Anywhere he collects like 6 more children.

Magicians of Caprona??? Tonino is literally going to stay in his castle. He knows Angelica by Name and reputation and clearly knows all the kids well enough to make jokes?? Also all of his jokes are terrible and absolutely no one fin them funny. He makes dad jokes.

Witch Week? Man appeared in an alternate timeline and then metaphorically adopted a bunch of orphans apart from Brian. Estelle is obsessed w that man and you can’t tell me that Nirupam, Nan and Charles who collectively have about like half? a parental figure did not see Chrestomanci validate them and their abilities Once and go wow! parent!

Cat and Janet??? Like not Gwendolyn obviously because she’s too busy being evil i guess but he rly went oh no! Children in trouble! I could do literally anything else Or i could adopt them. they’re mine now.

Chrestomanci is gonna be that guy who comes home to 17 children in his kitchen screaming and is like yeah. this is the life. i need more.

[stardustandrockets]

What's a book/series you wish more people knew about and/or posted about on booksta?

The Chronicles of Chrestomanci by Diana Wynne Jones is one of those series for me. I read the first two books (Charmed Life and The Lives of Christopher Chant) in elementary school and have been obsessed ever since. For the longest time it was the only thing I could actually reread and not get bored with.

There are very few other series from my childhood that I'm still super into. But between DWJ's writing and the chaos of Christopher, I'm never not laughing in my rereads. I was also lucky enough to find the whole rainbow edition singles at my local HPB a while back. Which means I can FINALLY read the short stories in Mixed Magics.

Swipe for a surprise!

[fiction-quotes]

“When you grow up to be an author and write books, you'll think you're making the books up, but they'll all really be true, somewhere.”

  —  Witch Week (Diana Wynne Jones)

[ksfoxwald]

If you're wondering how much Diana Wynne Jones has affected me as a person, I sometimes say "My running shoes got buried in cornflakes" when I have a bad day.

[mikimeiko]

They are divided into girls and boys with an invisible line down the middle of the room and people only cross that line when teachers make them. Girls are divided into real girls (Theresa Mullett) and imitations (Estelle Green). And me. Boys are divided into real boys (Simon Silverson), brutes (Daniel Smith), and unreal boys (Nirupam Singh). And Charles Morgan. And Brian Wentworth. What makes you a real girl or boy is that no one laughs at you. If you are imitation or unreal, the rules give you a right to exist provided you do what the real ones or brutes say. What makes you into me or Charles Morgan is that the rules allow all the girls to be better than me and all the boys better than Charles Morgan. They are allowed to cross the invisible line to prove this. Everyone is allowed to cross the invisible line to be nasty to Brian Wentworth. (an excerpt from Nan Pilgrim's journal)

Witch Week - Diana Wynne Jones

[dianawynnejonesfan]

Happy witch week

[randomshenaniganery]

If the twitter sayings are true about us naming Scaramouchie I’m going to name him either Maeglin or Charles

I feel like Scaramouche has Charles Morgan energy

[quietflorilegium]

"Charles liked poetry because the lines were so short. You could think your own thoughts in the spaces around the print."

Diana Wynne Jones, "Witch Week"

[carriagelamp]

I’m legally obligated to try to read at least a few queer lit choices in June, so here’s what I’ve got! Not a lot of Full On Novels because this has been a crazy month, but I got lucky with some really cute ones

Bad Boys Happy Home v1

This was a yaoi that, so far at least, was significantly more domestic than anticipated. Akamatsu has been getting into fights with a man he met on his way home at a local park as a way of blowing off steam, even if he hasn’t managed to beat him once yet. However, eventually Akamatsu learns that the other man, Seven, is homeless and has been living at the park — rather than risk his sparring partner getting displaced, he invites Seven to come stay at his apartment until he gets his feet under him…

Bad Guys v1

Well, they finally put a movie out so I finally bit the bullet and read the first book of this series. I read it in French but there’s hardly enough text to make any difference. I can see why kids enjoy it, it’s fun and silly and the art is very accessible. It really holds zero interest to me though, it’s really more of a picture book like Elephant and Piggie than a graphic novel.

Demon Slayer v1-2

Another book I got talked into reading by children. I thought it looked like agonizingly generic shonen, another Naruto knock off or something similar, so I was surprised by how much I actually enjoyed it so far. The art is really appealing, it reminds me of old-school 90s Inuyasha art? Kinda? It’s about a boy whose family is slaughtered by demons while he’s away, and who returns to find his younger sister, the only survivor, turned into a demon  herself. Together they band together to find a way for her to be cured, as he fights to become a demon slayer who can protect the both of them, and she fights her new, violent nature. I love sibling stories, honestly.

Dragon Girls v1-2

Jeez. I am 90% sure this was Scholastic’s attempt to capitalize on Wings of Fire with a younger audience and a budget of two dimes to get it done. It’s about a group of three girls who find out that they can travel to a magical forest where they’re dragons that are tasked with protecting the forest and the tree queen from an evil shadow. I don’t think anyone can enjoy this unless they’re actively a seven year old girl, and even then I have my doubts. It’s generic to the point of ennui and the art is so bad that even I could have drawn the dragons better.

Earwig and the Witch

The final novella that Diana Wynne Jones ever wrote. After what a botch Ghibli did of the movie version, I’ve been avoiding it, but finally decided to give it a chance. It was actually pretty enjoyable, it very much had a quirky Dahl vibe to it. Earwig, a young orphan who is good at getting her way, is adopted by a witch who intends to use her as labour. Earwig, however, isn’t about to take that lying down and teams up with the witch’s familiar to find a way to once again control this odd situation.

Girl Friends complete collection v1

A cute enough little yuri romance. Not as good as something like Failed Princesses, in my opinion, this one felt much more… tranquil, I suppose? It was sweet but didn’t have a lot of plot happening. Still, if you feel like a very gentle sapphic romance, it’s not a bad one to breeze through.

In Deeper Waters

Gay Little Mermaid! Hell yeah! Pirates! High sea adventures! Magic! This was lots of fun! It took me a little bit to turn my brain off enough to enjoy it at the beginning, but once I realized out this really is meant to just be a queer fairytale I was able to stop overanalysing and just enjoy the ride. Very fun, summer read, scratched an itch I was having after Our Flag Means Death.

Jackass!

This was something. Not as bad as I expected, a childhood friends to unexpected lovers sort of story, and definitely a story that knew its kink and ran with it. Side romance was, simply put, vile though and was rather hard to ignore to get through the rest of the book. Almost enjoyable. There’s better queer manga to read, this made me think more of the trash I read as a desperate teen in the aughts.

Kase-san and Morning Glories v1-3

Now this sapphic romance was absolutely 100% the best thing I’ve read this weekend. It was incredibly cute, and the art is so charming. It’s about “slow pace” Yamada, a quiet girl on the greenery committee, developing a crush on Kase, the school track star, and the very blushy cute romance the two of them fall into.

Lily To The Rescue // Two Little Piggies

Last year I had read A Dog’s Way Home by Cameron and really enjoyed it, so I was excited to see that he had some children’s novels written in a similar style. This is a chapter book series about rescue dog Lily who now lives with her girl and helps at the family’s animal rescue centre. In these books she helps find, protect, play with, and support various animals that are found and brought to the centre. It’s just charming, with some of the loveliest art.

This Wonderful Season With You

Another really cute one, despite the comically generic title that I keep forgetting. This manga is about ex-baseball star Shirataki who ends up being talked into joining the programming club by short, shy, nerdy Enoki. While the other club “nerds” are intimidated by Shirataki, Enoki admires him and the two form an unlikely friendship which grows from there…

Witch Week

Another Diana Wynne Jones book because I was in the mood. This is one of my favourites of hers and I reread it every few years. Witch Week takes place in a world where magic is illegal, at a boarding school for “witch orphans” (the children of witches who have been burnt at the stake) and other “undesirables”. It’s a rather dull, unpleasant life in the school, until one day a note is found in one of the books that a teacher is grade, accusing someone in the class of being a witch. This is a serious accusation, and everyone seems to be trying to get to the bottom of it, as more and more magic seems to be cropping up.

[thelibraryiscool]

ok but what about a Witch Week daily/readalong for oct 28th-nov 5th?