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yallemagne · 1 year

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So, on a plane yesterday, I skimmed through the rest of P.N. Elrod's book, Quincey Morris, Vampire.

It's not very good. It's poor fanfiction. I do not support attacking fanfic writers or the stereotype of fanfiction being the epitome of bad writing (most of my writing is fanfiction and I'm rather proud of some of it [some bc a good deal of my older work is amateur]), but it's a rather amateur plot where Elrod spends the entire book rewriting the book she's supposed to be building off of, not desecrating.

Now, Elrod has quite a few vampire books, so I think this story is just a self-indulgent take on a neat lil idea she had, but she felt the need to discard all of Bram's vampire lore and all of Bram's plot and squish her own in. I respect Elrod as a fellow fanfic writer, but I don't respect her character assassinations of Jonathan and Renfield and the attempts to justify the assault of Lucy and Mina. Though I guess that Dracula was an unreliable source? Hopefully, the intention was not for the reader to take Dracula's claims seriously.

Since I skimmed, I cannot say that I am the best source. I did read the beginning part up until Dracula starts claiming Jonathan is an insane adulterer. Then I just couldn't take any of it seriously. I mean, I couldn't really take it seriously when Dracula and Quincey were just... having a calm conversation but whatever.

Spoilers of course.

So, in the story, Quincey's body is dragged from the sleeping team's side by wolves and they cannot find him once they wake. Why did the wolves drag him? Because Dracula is apparently alive and has figured out that Quincey is a vampire. Dracula blackmails Quincey into coming with him back to his castle. If he had refused, Dracula would have murdered Quincey's whole team.

And yet after that, the book tries to claim that Dracula was secretly in the right the entire time.

Dracula has green eyes. It has no plot relevance, I don't believe Quincey remarks on the change from red to green, it's just a dumb detail that keeps being shoved down our throats.

Through Dracula's guided questions, Quincey realizes that a woman he had sex with years ago that drank his blood and forced him to drink hers was a vampire (apparently she's also a character from one of Elrod's other books). Why didn't he change into a vampire sooner? Dracula claims there are two different types of vampires, and he's the cooler one while Quincey is the lamesauce one. So Quincey only has to drink animal blood. Quincey worries that his tainted blood may have killed Lucy but Dracula's like "... nah".

Quincey confronts him on everything, but Dracula has a bullshit answer for anything. I feel the only bearable way of reading this is the interpretation that Dracula is gaslighting Quincey. Quincey says "you killed Lucy, you fed on her repeatedly and she died of blood loss". Dracula says "no that was your fault. she would have gotten better if you just left her drained of blood". Dracula claims that Mina's still gonna become a vampire, but bc she wished hard enough I guess she got to not be hated by God anymore. And he claims he broke off his connection with her amicably, and they're totally cool now.

He claims that he was in the right to kill Renfield because Renfield was a madman and would have hurt the team... when he only attacked Dracula in defence of Mina. This is so damn ableist. Dracula, you can't claim self-defence when you are a fucking vampire with the power to hypnotize people. That was a gratuitous use of force against a mentally ill man that was of no great threat to you.

Worst of all, when told of Jonathan's account of the Weird Sisters assaulting him, he's like "oh, I didn't interfere. I watched. they had their way with him several times. and he liked it. I mean, he had an ensuing mental breakdown, but he was totally down with being raped in his sleep every night." He claims that Jonathan was just oversensitive to the paranormal and that everything he wrote in his journal was delusions. He gaslights Jonathan. Apparently, there were servants in the castle. Dracula, you fucking twit, that would be the strangest thing to fucking lie about, and you know it. When questioned why he locked Jonathan in his castle and left him for dead instead of taking him to Whitby with him, Dracula waves his hand like "eh. couldn't. don't ask me to elaborate. I'm still an amazing host."

Quincey later denies Dracula's claims about Lucy's death being all their fault, but he never contradicts the claims about Mina and Jonathan. In fact, he constantly repeats the part about Jonathan being oversensitive. So? He agrees with Dracula that Jonathan and Mina being assaulted was okay? He agrees with the ableist notion that Renfield needed to be "put down". Maybe I just skimmed over a part.

Dracula forces Quincey to drink animal blood and stuff. Shows him the ropes. Quincey goes out and actually finds Arthur and Jack still grieving him. He does not reveal himself. I was glad that Arthur and Jack don't have their characters assassinated. They end up shooting a wolf and Dracula gets mad and Quincey is like "you literally had my body dragged away by wolves, they were acting in retribution, you don't get to kill them for it".

Blah blah I dunno, Quincey moves back to London. He tries out his cool vampire powers to harass some lower-class people. He bites a sex worker (super uncomfortable with this part, he says himself that he felt betrayed by the fact his vampiric paramour forced vampirism onto him without his consent while he was in the throws of passion, and he does it to someone else?) He meets Elrod's OC.

Bertrice Holmwood is a Mary Sue. Okay? She's a manic pixie dream girl, she's a strong independent woman that needs no man (except that she sorta blackmails Quincey into sleeping with her), and she doesn't feel like a real human being.

She's yet another hastily shoved-in plot device. She's Arthur's older sister by exactly one year and her whole deal is that she's the black sheep of the family because she's a girlboss. Ugh. She's less of a character and more of Elrod's vague idea of a cool woman.

"Black sheep", Arthur loves her! They're on good terms and they're very protective of one another. She's not ostracized at all. But here's the thing, if she always existed and she and Arthur had such a close relationship, why was she never mentioned in the original book? Now, I'm not gonna get mad that Bramothy didn't make Elrod's OC canon. I'm gonna get frustrated that Elrod so poorly shoved her in. If Arthur is not an only child, why did all the managing of his father's funeral fall to him? Why was she never present or mentioned in scenes pertaining to Arthur's grief? Because she's not... real. And it doesn't fit the original story for her to be real.

I would have vouched for her role in the story if she had been Jack's secret sister instead. Jack having a sibling that he doesn't really interact with during the course of Dracula is realistic because he has a job and he's not a noble. You could even make her Quincey's sister visiting from Texas upon receiving news of Quincey's death. But. Well. They're not Alabamian so the sex would be out of left field then /j.

She is told the events of the book and is like "I'm gonna kill VH for hurting my baby bro" and like. Fair. Honestly, I appreciate that the book calls out VH's manipulation methods instead of trying to twist it like VH was the secret evil all along and Dracula was the good guy. It seemed like that was how it was gonna play out in the beginning, but Quincey empathizes with VH while still criticizing his methods. It's a human take on VH. Sucks what Elrod did to Renfield, Mina, and Jonathan, though.

Bertrice hangs out with Quincey a lot, but my eyes glazed over for those parts bc of all the written-out lower-class accents. Despite her being rich, she hangs out in exclusively the slums of London apparently. It makes her less likeable honestly. Stop gentrifying the neighbourhood, Bertrice. But one scene I did read was when she took him to a fortune teller that used tarot cards to explain his whole situation. One of them was "you've been lied to" and from Quincey's later insistence that Lucy's death was none of their faults, I think he rightfully took it to mean that Dracula was lying? But he doesn't apply that logic to his interpretation of Mina and Jonathan's story, nor Renfield's death...

Quincey reaches out to Arthur and Arthur is a bit spooked.

Arthur: You're dead! You're a vampire! Begone! Quincey: I'm actually a good vampire. 'Just drink animal blood. Arthur: You're lying! Quincey: I'm not. Arthur: Oh, okay. It's good to have you back.

Quincey tries to talk to Van Helsing, but Van Helsing refuses to believe him. Jack on the other hand...

Jack, on the other side of a door: Quincey, is that you? Quincey: Yeah. Jack: If it is you, open this door. Quincey: Okay, but don't freak out. VH: DON'T LISTEN TO HIM HE'S A MONSTER. Quincey: *opens door* Hey. Jack: Ah, hey bud, good to see you again.

It's funny how easily Jack accepts that Quincey is alive and totally chill, especially with VH screaming at him that it's all lies. You would think that he'd at least be equally as unsure as Arthur. VH storms out I think, and Quincey explains to Jack everything-- that VH is probably just defensive bc if Quincey is a vampire and totally chill, that opens the door to the possibility VH was wrong about Lucy. But he restates numerous times that Lucy was dead, she died of blood loss, the Bloofer Lady was not Lucy because that vampire fed off of children, and there was no part of Lucy left to reason with.

VH apparently kidnapped Arthur and Bertrice. Why? I dunno, because he was paranoid about Quincey. But he cages them and that's just super weird. Quincey tries to remedy this by having Jack reason with VH. When that doesn't work, Quincey tries to reason with him with a *bit* of hypnotism. It doesn't work. VH shoots him several times in the chest and, assuming Quincey is dead, crosses himself and leaves.

Quincey isn't dead, he's fine.

Uh? The End? The Harkers never show up, so they're unable to defend themselves against Dracula's claims against them. It really frustrated me. And of course, Renfield couldn't defend himself, and Quincey only barely argues on his behalf before blindly believing Dracula. VH serving as an antagonist felt okay seeing as he's not vilified, he's just painted as a grieving, irrational old man. That's realistic. Except for his kidnapping of Arthur and Bertrice... which was just... so melodramatic.

Also just... so I mentioned that Bertrice and Quincey have sex and it was kind of coerced. I don't recall when this happened, it's really that pointless to the plot. So Bertrice springs it on Quincey that she knows he's a vampire, and in the high stress of that confrontation, she asks him to have sex with her and bite her. He does. Eh.

All in all, the book kind of reads like a very self-indulgent work of fanfiction. Whatever Elrod wished to put into the story, she put in with disregard to the actual events of the book she was basing her work off of. It honestly wasn't the worst Dracula fanfiction I'd ever read, though the victim-blaming was atrocious. I appreciate that Bertrice was a bit more than just a fuck-buddy for Quincey. Her protectiveness over Arthur is a bit of a character trait. I also like that the Suitors are still bros. The conversations between Jack and Arthur that Quincey listened in on felt like I was reading a better story for a bit, their friendship felt real.

#dracula #dracula daily #quincey morris #quincey p morris #count dracula #arthur holmwood #jack seward #john seward #van helsing #abraham van helsing #book recap #and?? review?#tw sa mention #I would never talk about an unpublished fanfic this way #seeing as I haven't ever mentioned the worst ones I've read so far #but she's a published book author- nothing is sacred

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chanelslibrary · 10 months

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🌙𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰🌙

forget me not by julie soto

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

julie’s debut novel is the perfect balance of fun and witty! ama is an atypical wedding planner who knows how to throw the perfect party but doesn’t believe in marriage herself, while elliot is the grumpy, isolated florist with a soft heart underneath his hard exterior. this wonderfully written book follows how their paths cross both in the present and the past.

i highly recommend reading this book! if you’re like me, all I kept picturing was a tattooed ben solo surrounded by flowers…😍my fantasy! lol elliot and ama have incredible banter, the plot was so great, and the steamy scenes were spicy!!! also the cover art is absolutely beautiful—by @nikitajobson check out this book if you love a cute love story, grumpy/sunshine, dual POV, and angst! i’m grabbing a physical copy right away.

*P.S my podcast @fanficfanaticspod is covering Forget Me Not this month—read along, and listen as we breakdown our favorite scenes!🌺🤍

𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 (+): wonderfully written, LGBTQ+ representation, language of flowers🌸

𝐧𝐞𝐠𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 (-): none

𝐂𝐖/𝐓𝐖: none

#source: @literaturelove #aesthetic #book academia #book aesthetic #bookworm #book blog #bookblr #forget me not #julie soto #book #book review #book rec #book recommendations #book recap #Ama Torres #Elliot bloom #bookstagram #book edit #books

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justapayneaway · 4 months

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2023 Book Recap 📚

This year I decided to do a recap of the books I read in the last year, including some favorite and new authors I met this year. Thank you for all the wonderful books you gave us!

P.S. I couldn't do a top 5 of my favorite books of the year, so I compromised and did a top 10 😅

#books #book club #book community #book lover #book recap #book review #romance

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star-reads-ya · 9 months

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Belle and the Beast's story is not over... Check out my review of Rebel Rose!

#booklr #bookworm #ya book #ya books #book photography #reading #new books #booksbooksbooks #youtube #small youtube #book review #book recap #book worm #book blog #book blogger #review website #website #finished #favorite books

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dovs-dash · 1 year

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youtube

Hey tumblr! Awhile back I made a video discussing famed young-adult author Cassandra Clare's old fanfiction which was responsible for her elevation to 'queen bee' of the harry potter fandom! I thought y'all might be interested! It's got homoeroticism, polyjuice potion, new stupid lore, and several bits of plagarism! I hope y'all enjoy!

#harrypotter #harry potter #harry potter fanfiction #fanfiction #cassandra clare #cassandra claire #young adult #ya books #the mortal instruments #books #reading #recaps #drarry #well kinda drarry its messy #recap #book recap #booktube #Youtube

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libbymonroerandomthings · 1 year

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My Top 5 books that I’ve read this year, 2022!

no one asked for this but whatever! I read 37 out of my goal of 40 books this year. I was so close! Do you think if I read some of my nephew’s little toddler books could I count them towards my goal 🤔!? I’m not really going to give a summary of any of the books, just my general opinion and feelings towards them. Also, Spoiler warning for all books (I think I did really good job at not giving anything away but still just be careful anyway).

So here is my favorite 5 books from this year. ❤️

1) A Memory of Light by Robert Jordan & Brandon Sanderson.

I actually will saying the entire ‘The Wheel of Time’ series is in the number one spot. But I reduced it down to A Memory of Light (AMoL) since it’s the final book of the series. After 14 long books, AMoL wrapped up an incredible series that I’m completely obsessed with. The thing that was talked about since book 1, The Last Battle, was in my book 175 pages long and 6 hours long with audiobook! The Last Battle was epic, traumatizing, emotional, infuriating and so much more! Egwene, Rand, Nynaeve, Mat, Perrin, Faile, Elayne, Min, Aviendha, Siuan, Thom, Lan, Moiraine and all the 200+ characters living my heart and I will forever cherish this series. I can’t wait to re read it over and over again and recommend it to anyone and everyone! If anyone cares The Gathering Storm was my favorite book out all 15 and Egwene is my favorite character!

2) Legendborn by Tracy Deonn

I have another post one here doing a more detail explanation of this book and my love for it (link below)! I seen Legendborn in the book story for two years and alway walked past it. But one day I seen it and it’s sequel, BloodMarked, sitting on a table calling me. I’m glad I finally listened to it because it’s an amazing YA Fantasy book. I felt seen within the main character, Bree. I remember explaining Legendborn to my dad and I must have done a good job because he decided to read it and loved it.

3) Tomorrow and Tomorrow and tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

This was the first book I read by the author Gabrielle Zevin and I like her writing style. This book is beautiful written and it’s great story that goes back and forth in time. I loved and hated Sam and Sadie multiple times throughout the book. I’m not a massive gamer but when I’m in the mood, I can get lost for hours playing, so I loved the gaming and game building aspect of the book. Sam, Sadie, and Marx were written beautifully with depth and empathy and their humanity and emotions really shines throughout the book. It’s a good book that shows the messiness, the ugly and the beautiful and great parts of friendships.

4) Act Your Age, Eve Brown by Talia Hibbert

This was a cute, funny, refreshing and hilarious read. Out of the three Brown Sister books (Get A Life, Chloe Brown and Take A Hint, Dani Brown), I enjoyed Eve Brown the most! I also related to her more then I did with her sister, Dani and Chloe! Plus, that first spicy moment between Eve and Jacob was… 🥵 hot! Chloe and Red’s public spicy part in their book is my second favorite. If you want to read some cute, well written spicy books I recommend Talia Hibbert Brown Sister trilogy. If you read it start with Chloe then Dani and end with Eve.

5) The Jasmine Throne and The Oleander Sword by Tasha Suri

I’ll link my more in-depth review of this series below. Basically these two books fueled my need for good sapphic high fantasy! If you want to read about morally grey characters, a slow burn romance, war and betrayal, a magical system, messy family life and epic world building then this is the book series for you.

If you can tell, I love fantasy books, romance books and even better if their sapphic lol! If you have any good recommendations for those categories or any book in general you really love, feel free to recommend them to me! My goal for 2023 is 55 books!

#top 5 books #book blog #booknerd #wheel of time #legendborn #talia hibbert #the jasmine throne #the oleander sword #tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow #who cares #2022 books #fantasy #book recap #book recommendations #book recs wanted

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nerdyish · 1 year

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Book Review: Outlander - Diana Gabaldon

Published: 1991 Finished Reading: 29.12.2022 Star rating: ☆ ☆

Pffff…. Where to start. This is gunna be a long one.

This is my third attempt in about 7 years to read this book. This time round I finally managed to get through it all. And I’m so disappointed.

Trigger warnings: Rape…. A lot of it. Spoiler warnings: Loads. This is a rant.

Good Bits:

Other than the weird attempt at portraying a Scottish accent I thought the writing was entertaining, I enjoyed the pacing, it captured all the senses and did indeed transport me to another time. Between reading sessions, I found myself imagining a life in a rustic cottage in the Scottish Highlands, baking bread and gathering flowers, meeting a strong kilted man, wearing billowing gowns and wandering the countryside. Any book that can capture my imagination like that, making me see the world a bit softer and distracting me from the daily grind deserves some stars.

However…

Homophobia

In a really painful way. Not only was the main evil character gay in such a negative way, he used his homosexuality as a weapon… and also there was something about his brother… in some way? I think that’s what was happening. I don’t know, the editing/plot in the second half ended up getting me totally lost a few times.

The detail of Jamie’s eventual rape was a really intense difficult read, which was an issue in itself. But the fact that became so perverted and… insanely over the top… made it really unrealistic. I wanted to feel for Jamie when he was talking through it during his recovery, but it became a little bit laughable and awkward and just plain weird. The fact that the rape became more about Randall being gay, and less about him being a monster, felt so so so homophobic. And that was a recurring theme throughout the entire book and I hated it. It was such an awful and damaging perspective to take.

Gay people existed back then, that much was admitted in the book, but in Outlander it was in an evil terrorising way, not in the hidden, difficult, and judged way that it would have been. There was no sympathy for having to live a life like that? It just culminated in evil acts and terror?

This book could have been so much more. It could have actually explored the social differences between Claire’s time and Jamie’s time and talked about Claire’s shock of it? There was so much room to talk about how far things things has come since the 1700s. But the book never addressed any of it, at all. She was shocked by Jamie’s violence towards her for a total of about 5 minutes, then just moved on and accept society as it was.

Can I forgive this opinion because it was published in 1991? No.

Jamie

How can one man go through that much??? Like??? It ended up feeling so over the top and unrealistic. The man would be suffering from some severe PTSD after all the absolutely insane trauma he experienced. His entire personality was that he was a broken, young, strong, and might have been good in bed. A himbo. I need more than that in my romances, I need some complexity. Especially if we’re doing “rough”… there needs to be something morally grey about him. Not just written off as “oh things were different back then”.

It Got Weird In the Second Half

She suddenly found God in a really intense way?

She suddenly knew how to bring about really intense hallucinations using opium? Honestly that entire scene was so uncomfortable to read. I couldn’t really follow what was happening, was it a re-enactment? Somehow it involved her ‘other husband’ and Jamie was kind of making love to what he thought was his mother by the end?!

And why was there so much conversation about wombs and men wanting their mothers by the end? Where did that come from?!

She was absolved of sins – why are we even talking about sins anyway? That was not something she’d ever mentioned, she barely struggled with the decision for the previous 700 pages.

There was a really sexualised breastfeeding scene and a scene where they made love in front of a child and death by cows and a woman killing a wolf with her bare hands???

We were introduced to a new clan in the closing stages of the book? Why? And why were so many people in love with Jamie’s mum?

And is Randall actually dead? Is the reason why we didn’t get a Jamie/Claire/Randall stand off resulting in Randall’s death because he’s actually going to pop up again later? So he just got trampled by cows and is presumed dead so we’ll have a shock reveal and further confrontation later? Because if that’s the case, then I don’t care. I just don’t care.

Uninteresting Romance And Rape As Porn

What connects Claire and Jamie in anyway other than forced marriage, “good” sex, and constantly saving each other from villains? [I say good very lightly because I only actually personally enjoyed the very last sex scene … I’ve enjoyed way better smut by much worse writers.] All of their conversations seemed to be about his traumatic past, neither of them seemed to have a personality outside of that. Claire had more of a personality back when she was in the 1940s. They connect over him saving her, then her saving him through healing, and they have some sex, and then they talk about Jamie’s tortured past, and then that’s kind of it? They don’t talk about life or love or their interests outside of running from the law, it just didn’t feel real and I didn’t fall in love with Jamie at all.

I’m not going to talk too much about the marital rape, almost rape, actual rape, abuse etc, other reviewers have done it to death. I will just add that forced sex can be an interesting kink to explore in romance books, there can be good smut from it, but there has to still be a level of consent. Both from the MC, and from the reader’s perspective. You have to hear the MC want it to be that way, and enjoy it completely. That never happened. Maybe during the “punish you for running away” scene, there could have been a moment where Claire realised that this was actually kind of good, internally, so that the reader was aware that she started to enjoy it and wanted to explore that more? Or maybe when she was saying “no” out loud to Jamie in later scenes, we read internally that she was saying no, but didn’t actually mean no and was saying it because it felt kinda hot to do so? I don’t know, anything else really, just… not this.

The concept of forced sex in Outlander then bled into so many other facets of the book – the villains, the clan, the climax of the book etc – that at no point did it actually feel like a bit of a kink being explored through the female gaze, it simply felt like torture porn and I’m not actually down for that.

Frank Deserved Better

Honestly, while some people may love a sexy Scottish man who’s a bit of a brute and is broken from all his trauma, but very occasionally shows softness, and you may get your kicks from torture porn, I’d rather take the spontaneous but actually soft and kind Frank. Unless you’re all forgetting, he did randomly have sex with her in a field. That’s fun! And it was with… yes you guessed it… consent. He was tentative, and passionate about something other than sex, which in itself is sexy. And I do not doubt at all that if Claire asked for something a bit rougher in the bedroom on occasion, he would have done it, and enjoyed it himself. By making Randall look almost exactly like Frank, we end up not wanting to end up back with Frank. It’s character assassination in order to excuse the cheating that Claire did. And I hate character assassination to justify romance switches – i.e. Jacob/Edward, Tamlin/Rhysand. What’s funny about those examples though is that I actually love Twilight and ACOTAR, so Diana Gabaldon clearly messed something up here.

Claire

She is emotionless. She has next to no reaction to anything that happens to her, even some of the most traumatic moments. There is no internal monologue of any struggle or upset or confusion or hatred or fear, like, at all. Everything she does is so clinical and for the plot, it didn’t even ever feel like we got to understand her deep emotional connection with Jamie, she just decided she loved him and told us so, that was it.

Her decisions and actions also made no sense. She was an academic, with a background in nursing and horticulture, and thoroughly enjoyed her tour of Loch Ness. She was brought up by a travelling archaeologist surrounded by books and artifacts, and met Frank through those adventures. So… why did she hate listening to Frank talk about genealogy and Scottish folklore so much?!?! MAKE IT MAKE SENSE?! She screamed something crazy when she saw the chicken’s (??) blood at the beginning and was so so scared that a murder had taken place, but never once got spooked when out and about with a scottish clan in the 1740s?! MAKE IT MAKE SENSE?! She’d just been through a very traumatic war as a nurse, and then willingly stayed to go through another one? Why? Because Jamie was kind and made her see the world differently?! Can’t be! Because that never happened. I DON’T GET IT?!

The “choice” moment that was built up for so long was not made clear, why did she actually choose Jamie?????? Like???? It was never made clear???? Was it just because she loved him so much more than Frank? And didn’t care at all for her previously life anymore? And wanted to be in the Highlands in the 1700s because it was a better life for her?!? Like??? What was the thing that actually made her stay??? It was never, ever, ever made clear, emotionally, why Claire wanted to be with Jamie or stay, never.

I just don’t get any of it. I loved the Scottish historical vibes, the fairies and folklore and mysterious henge, I enjoyed the Loch Ness monster being real, and the concept of elderly women in post-war Scotland still doing pagan rituals, and never really knowing whether Geilie was actually a witch, but I can get that from other books where the MC’s decisions make sense and where their entire plot isn’t based on how much torture their main characters can go through. And even if it is, is done with actual consequences and urgency and discussion. I do not understand why this book was so popular.

#books #reading #book review #book recap #outlander #diana gabaldon

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shanali2 · 1 year

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Hey! NEW in here,

Gonna publish some aesthetics and the vibe that it's giving me of some books I've read ,and maybe a short comment about what I think under each one...also maybe I'll share with u some of my playlist and songs that I've actually played hundreds of time and I really like.

And remember it's only my pov so I don't want any hate or disrespectful comment against MY or Others opinion.

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rosepehtels · 25 days

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total books read in march: 1

total books read in 2024 so far: 10

average rating in mar: 2.0

average rating in 2024 so far: 3.9

least favorite book of the month:

command me - geneva lee | ★★☆☆☆ | my review

goodreads(18+ only): https://www.goodreads.com/rosepehtels

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witch-of-the-words · 3 months

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My 2023 Reading Wrap-Up

I'm a little late this time with this but that's okay! I read a bit less this year because school is crazy and everything but I still feel like I read plenty. My favorite book I read this year was probably Pride and Prejudice.

Novels: 18

They Both Die at the End by Adam Silvera

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury*

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak*

As You Like It by William Shakespeare*

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd*

Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Infinity Reaper by Adam Silvera

Map of Bones by James Rollins

Blood of Troy by Claire M. Andrews

Radio Silence by Alice Oseman

Loveless by Alice Oseman

I Was Born For This by Alice Oseman

War Storm by Victoria Aveyard

The First to Die at the End by Adam Silvera

The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd*

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne*

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen*

Manga/Light Novels/Other: 9

My Hero Academia: Vigilantes Vol. 1-2 by Furuhashi Hideyuki

Assassination Classroom Vol. 2 by Yusei Matsui

Demon Slayer Vol. 4 by Koyoharu Gotouge

Haikyu! Vol. 31-33 by Haruichi Furudate

My Hero Academia: Ultra Analysis by Kohei Horikoshi

Fullmetal Alchemist: A New Beginning by Makoto Inoue

Plays: 1

Hamlet by William Shakespeare*

Nonfiction Books: 2

12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup

Swimming to Antarctica by Lynne Cox

Total: 30!!

*Asterisks* mean that it was something I read for school.

#2023 books #book recap #pride and prejudice #fullmetal alchemist #mha #alice oseman #they both die at the end

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manicpixiereader · 3 months

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BOOK RECAP

He's Not My Type by Meghan Quinn

January 23, 2024-

Synopsis:

Word to the wise, never become roommates with a girl you’ve been pining over for the better part of a year.

You’re probably wondering why I would do such a thing? Well, I didn’t.

It was my teammates.

The moment they found out Blakely White was single, they took it upon themselves to play cupid and instruct me on how I should win her over.

Don't wear a shirt around her. Make her dinner. Lightly touch her shoulder when you say goodbye.

I'm so flustered, so overwhelmed, so madly in love with this woman who barely notices me, that I lose control of the situation and make one huge mistake: I offer to be her fake date for a wedding so she can make her ex jealous.

That means, for one whole night I get a free pass with her. I get to hold her, dance with her, kiss her…stare at her from across the room like she’s my entire world because she has been for months now.

But when the night comes to an end, I’m faced with two options: bring her back to my bedroom and show her how I really feel, or let her walk away, succumbing to the fact that I very well might not be her type.

My Thoughts:

Oh my goodness OBSESSED. Total rom-com and I think one of my faves by Meghan Quinn with this book 4 of the Vancouver Agitators series. They can all be read as stand alones but they're part of a bigger universe.

The story follows Blakely who works as VIP Guest coordinator (unofficial title) for the Agitators where she meets Halsey Holmes. From their first interaction he is enamored by her and he's about to ask her out when she reveals she has a boyfriend so for the next year he secretly (not so secretly since the rest of the boys know) pines for her. When his teammate Posey finds out she is single they hatch a plan to get him and Blakely together and thus chaos ensues. She ends up staying at Halsey's place since she has some issues with her apartment and they begin to get close. Things don't start too well and Halsey struggles with opening up since he is still processing his grief over his twin brother dying a couple years back, but with time they both see different sides to each other. When he ends up offering to take her to a wedding to avoid awkwardness, their dynamic completely changes.

Meghan has such a good way to interconnect her books' universes and their storylines. What I really enjoy is her ability to balance light hearted and romantic stories with some of life's hardest experiences. She's also so good at bringing in beloved characters from the earlier books in the series without having them overtake the story. Overall I think my favorite thing about this book was the slow and genuine development of this love story. Obviously the humor is great too and there's an incredibly touching scene toward the end of the book between the boys' with such a lovely display of the emotional dynamic they have. I literally almost bawled my eyes out reading it because there was something so special about it.

The spice was 10/10 sooooo good! Meghan's books have a really good balance of smut and plot, where both are just as good as the other. The way that he has pined so long for her and once they finally get together and he expresses how truly feral he is for her omfg DREAM. MAN.

Overall I think we truly get a solid development of their journey together and I would say more so of Halsey's journey through grief. My one critique would be that I think he confronts that grief a little too late into the book (literally the last 2 chapters) and I think it would be nice to have seen a little more of that, it felt like it wrapped up very quickly that it felt a little unrealistic. Loved the introduction of OC into the group and the "Frozen Fellas" was so cute.

Would definitely recommend this book!✨

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