#the books i'm talking about in order: guards guards; men at arms; the wee free men; monstrous regiment; the amazing maurice; going postal

[secondhand-sonder]

The back of Discworld novels: wowee terry's whipped another wacky and wild adventure for us this time! there's so many silly shenanigans and witty wordplay in this book that you're sure to have a hilarious time!

Discword novels: a cynical alcoholic navigating and overcoming the pointlessness of his job, a transparent metaphor for racism and gun violence in the police system and in general, an intelligent young girl overcoming the ideas she's been taught by her culture and the media she consumes, just an entire novel made of commentary on war and gender, using talking animals as a way to explore what defines personhood and contrasting stories vs reality, an ex-convict coming to terms with the damage he's caused and fighting monopolies that are trying to do the same thing,

#and then the ex-convict's name is Moist von Lipwig #yes i made them sound more serious than they are but the book descriptions always do the opposite so it balances out #the books i'm talking about in order: guards guards; men at arms; the wee free men; monstrous regiment; the amazing maurice; going postal #discworld #gnu terry pratchett #sam vimes #moist von lipwig #tiffany aching #monstrous regiment

[htonl]

Woah, this is so metaphysical. This is like philosophy, what is and what isn’t, what existed before and what does now, what does existence even mean. Dang. Never thought of it like that. Maybe I’ll leave it to the philosophers and poets to figure this one out, but it’s so cool how complicated and diverse gender stuff is. Very neat. May I ask, how did you come to find all this stuff out? Do you have any books to recommend, or is it just through a lot of life experience? Thanks again!!

haha it sure is a lot to think about, isn't it? i know I'M not qualified to summarize the whole of human experience with gender, although of course i do my best :)

you may ask, but unfortunately i don't know that i have a lot of resources i can give you! i've never had any formal training in queer or gender studies or in philosophy or anything, and i actually..... really don't like reading nonfiction, in general. i've gotten to where i am on gender - and on life in general! - by, essentially, just keeping my eyes and ears wide open, and thinking a lot about the information i'm getting.

of course, it helped that i dove into the queer and neurodivergent communities on tumblr as soon as i discovered them back in high school! i don't know if you've noticed, but people on tumblr really like to talk about their life experiences, and how they relate to queer theory. as long as you fact check (and no, i definitely don't do that enough) and think about what you're reading, tumblr is a very good place to gather information about stuff like this!

if i can recommend one course of action to you, actually, it would be to start reading. read a lot, read good stuff and bad stuff, fiction and nonfiction - i might not read nonfiction for fun, but my formal education in the sciences has given me the logical basis that i use to pick apart both people and life. and the sheer volume of my fiction consumption has allowed me to develop my ability for literary analysis - you would be surprised how well picking apart a character's motivations and actions transfers to understanding the people around you!

on that front, i can recommend a couple books: my favorite author of all time is Terry Pratchett, whose Discworld novels helped me begin to understand human nature and society, and were also instrumental in the development of my sense of humor. There are a lot of them, and if you look up a reading order chart you'll see that it can get complicated, but:

if you want to read his books chronologically, start with The Color of Magic and then The Light Fantastic.

if you want to start with the Witches chronology, which i recommend for learning about stories, start with Equal Rites and then Wyrd Sisters.

if you want to start with the City Watch chronology, which i recommend for learning about society, start with Guards! Guards! and then Men at Arms.

if you want to start with the Death chronology, which i recommend for learning about people, start with Mort and then Reaper Man.

if you want to start with the Tiffany Aching chronology, which i recommend for learning about how to think about your own self, start with The Wee Free Men and then A Hat Full of Sky.

there's a few books outside of these chronologies - the Wizards chronology, for example - and i really do urge you to get around to all of them eventually. especially noteworthy are Pyramids and Small Gods, for musings on religion and faith. also, uh..... his earlier books are definitely less...... polished than his later books, so if you decide to go chronologically or start with Witches or Death, which both started earlier in the series, just..... keep in mind that the first few weren't his best. they're still good! there's just...... better ones.

#gender anon #sorry if that wasn't the kind of recs you were looking for! it's all i got boss #i have very little life experience but i read just. SO much #also i have been known to just sit and zone out and think about philosophical concepts until i come to a conclusion i can accept