Tag: favorites

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Best of List Memes

Top 10 Zippy Reads

Top 10 zippy reads? I am all for it these days – and that’s the theme for this week’s Top 10 Tuesday. Here are my recs, with equally zippy blurbs!

The Throme of the Erril of Sherill by Patricia A. McKillip
Tropes: Knight quests, Riddles, Puns, Folktales

The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood
Tropes: Snarky, Retelling, The Odyssey, Ulysses hero-not-hero

Six-Gun Snow White by Catherynne Valente
Tropes: Native American, Retelling, Snow White, Wild West

 Once and Forever: The Tales of Kenji Miyazawa
Tropes: Anthology, Japanese folklore, Dark, Compassionate

Jagannath by Karin Tidbeck
Tropes: Anthology, Science-Fiction, Bizarre, Quirky Horror

The Boy The Mole The Horse
#NonFicNov

Shit, Actually: The Definitive, 100% Objective Guide to Modern Cinema by Lindy West 
Tropes: Essays, ROFL Funny, Old blockbuster movies, Punchlines

Edgar Allan Poe’s Tales of Mystery and Terror 
Tropes: Surreal, Otherwordly, Lurid, Anthology, Poetic

How the World Became Quiet by Rachel Swirsky
Tropes: Anthology, Science-Fiction, AI & Identity Crisis, Evolution

The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy
Tropes: Graphic Novel, Poetic, Feel-Good, Found Families

Princess Floralinda & the Forty-Flight Tower by Tamsyn Muir
Tropes: Snarky, 40-floor fall, Coming of Age, Unexpected friends

So, do any of our choices match? Do you have any zippy read recs? Let’s chat!

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Best of List Memes

Eye of Newt: Fictional Food for Thought

A very intriguing prompt for this week’s Wyrd & Wonder: Eye of Newt! Magical ingredients, spell components or fantasy cooking… or any story tropes or character ingredients that make the perfect brew for the reader in us. This got me thinking of some of the interesting fictional cuisine items that I have come across in fantasy books!

Butterbeer | Harry Potter series

Lembas Bread | The Lord of the Rings

Wonka Chocolate Bars | Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Queen of Hearts’ Tarts | Alice in Wonderland

Goblin Fruit | The Goblin Market

Death of Marat | Sunshine

Nobby’s Mum’s Distressed Pudding | Discworld series

Pop Biscuits | The Folk of the Faraway Tree

Groosling Soup | The Hunger Games

Just… some Honey | Winnie-the-Pooh

Any of these be your “eye of newt”? Did you recall any of these dishes? Did you ever try to give them some mundane world recipes? Did this post bring on some hunger pangs? Spill the beans! 😉

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Best of List Memes Music & Poetry

Magic Mayhem Music

(Credits: Portal by Tithi Luadthong)

The wonderful Wyrd & Wonder reading/ blogging marathon is being hosted by Annemieke (A Dance With Books), Ariane (The Book Nook), Jorie (Jorie Loves A Story), Lisa (Dear Geek Place) and Imyril (There’s Always Room For One More).

This Sunday, the prompt is our favorite songs that we associate with the Magical. Some great food for thought – and obviously my chance to conjure up some music for magic and mayhem.

Scenario 1: You are a dark witch, brewing something strong

Yaima – Magician
Continue reading “Magic Mayhem Music”
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Best of List Books Memes Starred Recommendations

Top 10 Underrated Books

This week’s Top 10 Tuesday has us looking at top 10 books that we recommend often to fellow bloggers and friends. Since May is also the month for Wyrd & Wonder, I’m going to stick to some underrated books from fantasy fiction that I do like to clobber people with.

Continue reading “Top 10 Underrated Books”
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Miscellany Recommendations Watchlist

First Quarter Wrap-Up +Movie Recs

Well, it’s been more than a quarter, but it’s just easier to sum up that way! I’m still not getting much reading done, but at least I managed to find some really good movies. Here’s a wrap-up for the first quarter.

Continue reading “First Quarter Wrap-Up +Movie Recs”
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Best of List Books Memes Recommendations

If you like… Mythological Fantasy

This week we have a genre freebie for Top 10 Tuesday, and I am going with Top 10 Mythological Fantasy Books. I really do like a plot where the gods get interested in mortal affairs, leading to much chaos — and great world-building.

1 / The Chalion Series / World of the Five Gods series by Lois McMaster Bujold

2 / Inheritance Trilogy by N. K. Jemisin

3 / Paternus Trilogy by Dyrk Ashton

4 / Malazan Book of the Fallen Series by Steven Erikson

5 / Edda of Burdens trilogy by Elizabeth Bear

6 / The Queen’s Thief Series by Megan Whalen Turner

7 / Tales of the Magatama Series by Noriko Ogiwara

8 / Indulgence Series by Erin Kellison

9 / The Wicked + The Divine saga by Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie

10 / The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins

Have you read or are you interested any of these mythological fantasy books? Please feel free to leave as many recs as possible too!

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Best of List Memes Starred Recommendations

Favorite Books of 2022

How did 2022 fly by so quickly? I barely got any reading done (especially in the second half) and DNF’ed more books than ever (my watchlist fared way better!). For better or for worse, here they are, the few books that stood out as my “favorite books of 2022”.

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Books Memes Recommendations

Top 10 Cozy Reads

This week’s Top 10 Tuesday meme has us looking at books that give us cozy vibes. Here’s a list to to keep us warm!

1/ Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

Everything sounds hopeful and cozy when Anne says it.

2/ James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

Because there’s so much happiness in finding your own tribe.

Continue reading “Top 10 Cozy Reads”
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Best of List Books Memes

Old, Old Favorites

This week’s Top 10 Tuesday prompt asks us to look at “Books I Love That Were Written Over Ten Years Ago“. Well, pretty much all the books I love were written over ten years ago. So this was easy, but I did try my best to mix up the genres as much as I could.

Do we share any favorites from here?

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Books Starred Recommendations

The Throme of the Erril of Sherill

Book: The Throme of the Erril of Sherill by Patricia A. McKillip
Published: 1973
Tropes: Short Story/ Novella, Knight quests, Riddles, Puns, Folktales
Readalikes: Alice in Wonderland, The Girl who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making, Edward Lear

The mad King Magnus sends his knight Caerles on a quest, to look for the Throme of the Erril of Sherill. (A tongue twister, if ever there was one — and it’s not a throne, by the way). If Caerles succeeds, he gets to marry the king’s daughter, who has been locked up in the castle and has never ever laughed. The problem is: the Throme doesn’t exist. Or does it?

“You are cruel and loveless, you and your wanting.”
“I know,” Magnus Thrall whispered. “I know. The Throme is my hope. Find it for me, Caerles.”

It seems like a wild goose chase from the beginning. And poor Caerles seems to be the only sane person in the book. I was chuckling at all his dry witticisms throughout.

“… I do not know what use it is to hurry when I do not know where I am going, and when there will be nothing to find when I get there.”

The whole novella is actually poetry in the form of prose. Does that make sense? Seriously, I’m in awe of McKillip. To pack such a riddle in such lovely words, and to then blend it with humor and pun and brilliant character sketches? This was beautiful. Mesmerizing.

“The house of the King was a tall thing of great, thick stones and high towers and tiny slits of windows that gleamed at night when the King paced his hearth stones longing for the Throme. He had a daughter who sat with him and wept and embroidered pictures of the green world beyond the walls, and listened to her father think aloud to the pale sunlight or the wisps of candle-flame.”

Rating: 10 of 10. Highly recommended.