books

The Declaration of Love (c1724) by Jean François de Troy.

The painting depicts an intimate and elegant moment of courtship in an 18th-century refined interior or garden setting. At its centre, a young gentleman kneels before a seated young lady: he extends a small bouquet of flowers with one hand while placing his other hand to his heart.

The lady, dressed in sumptuous silk‐embroidered attire, receives the gesture with composed modesty: she looks somewhat downward and sideways.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Declarationoflove.jpg

https://everybodyslibraries.com/2025/12/10/why-not-both/

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

310d

Why not both?

There is some international overlap. Swiss composer Arthur Honegger (1892-1955) published his first symphony in 1930, a commission for the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

By John Mark Ockerbloom

#books #music #publicDomainDayCountdown

Arthur Honegger (1892-1955), Swiss composer. Picture taken in 1928 : glass negative, restored and cropped print.

Agence de presse Meurisse - This file comes from Gallica Digital Library and is available under the digital ID btv1b9041196z

The formal black and white image shows Honegger in his mid-30s wearing a dark suit with patterned tie, his distinctive wavy hair and intense gaze capturing the serious demeanor of this prominent 20th-century composer. From the Gallica Digital Library collection.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Arthur_Honegger#/media/File:Arthur_Honegger_b_Meurisse_1928.jpg

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books #EOYSale25 #ebook #sale #books2read #indiebooks

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

309d

50% off @ #Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1899894

Amelia and The Book of Newts are in conflict. She wants to explore her feelings. It wants to explore space, taking back the gift for mathematics it gave her. She’s unable to plot a course home, but desperate to see the man she loves, lest she lose him forever…

(Left) The cover of The Next Horizon, by Owen Tyme.

The black silhouette of a man and woman hugging and kissing. The woman has lifted one leg, while the man leans toward her. They stand atop the dark side of a planet or moon in space, which has a slim crescent along the right side. The background in the stars of space, but some have been highlighted with a heat shape that surrounds the kissing couple. Everything is in shades of blue.

(Right) Deep space, displaying the edge of an orange and blue gaseous cloud from a nebula, while most of the stars appear golden in color. Floating in space is a square, red leather book with the image of a newt stamped on the cover. Over the top of everything is the following text:

“You can back down and cooperate, right now, or Marta will hit you so hard, you should reach a tenth the speed of light…”

“No one will ever find you again, but even if someone does, there’s no way they’ll have the capacity to safely slow you down, before you’re gone to them!”

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/TheNextHorizon

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books #itchio #sale

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

346d

Celebrating Sir Tim Berners-Lee, 2025 Internet Archive Hero Award Recipient https://blog.archive.org/2025/11/05/celebrating-sir-tim-berners-lee-2025-internet-archive-hero-award-recipient/

#books

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

347d

Ebook 25% off on Itch.io: https://owentyme.itch.io/legacy-of-newts
Also in other stores: https://books2read.com/LegacyOfNewts

The undead witch that rules the space pirates, known as the Dead Queen, has finally been defeated. That only makes it worse for the witches that pulled it off. She's livid and coming for them, at least once she gets her star ship back under control…

(Left) The cover of Legacy of Newts, by Owen Tyme.

In the background dawn, as seen from space, above a blue world.

In the foreground is a line drawing of a red spotted newt, in white. The lines of the newt are outlined in black, to help it stand out. The interior of the line drawing has been filled with the image of a spiral galaxy in red, orange and yellow, with a blue color that shades to white at the center, which lines up with the newt's head. The galaxy almost looks like fire.

(Right) The background is a blue and orange nebula, with the following text over it:

“You gotta be real strong, real bright, real quick, or real lucky to survive drawing *attention*. Which are you?”

“I’m quick, Amelia is bright, Marta is strong and all three of us have been lucky, after a fashion: if we didn’t have bad luck, then I suppose we wouldn’t have any luck at all.”

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/LegacyOfNewts

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Peterkin

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

2y

"The dusk crept out across the fields wiping out the day's light."
Black April (1927)

American author Julia Peterkin died #OTD in 1961.

In 1929 she won the Pulitzer Prize for Novel/Literature for her novel Scarlet Sister Mary. She wrote several novels about the plantation South, especially the Gullah people of the Lowcountry. She was one of the few white authors who wrote about the African-American experience.

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/72611

Doris Ulmann and Julia Peterkin.

Julia Peterkin, an author who focused on similar themes in her writing, might be seen standing or sitting beside Ulmann, engaged in conversation or simply sharing a moment of quiet reflection. Peterkin might also be dressed in a similar style, with her hair possibly pinned up. The background of the photograph is likely simple, perhaps a natural outdoor setting or a rustic interior, consistent with the subjects of their work.

#Books #Christmas #BookReview #Fantasy #Poetry

Edited 2y ago

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

310d

Blue Are the Hills – a character-driven scifi novel about transhumanism and hope

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

309d

A Review of A Visit From Naughty Claus: https://lydiaschoch.com/a-review-of-a-visit-from-naughty-claus/

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

2y

"He had come on her that morning in a moment of disarray; her face had been pale and altered, and the diminution of her beauty had lent her a poignant charm. That is how she looks when she is alone! had been his first thought; and the second was to note in her the change which his coming produced."
"The House of Mirth" (1905), bk. 1, ch. 6

~Edith Wharton (24 January 1862 – 11 August 1937)

Books by Edith Wharton at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/104

Page from the original manuscript of "The House of Mirth," written by the American author Edith Wharton. Book II, Chapter 9, pp. 35-56. Courtesy of the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Catcher_in_the_Rye

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

2y

#OTD in 1951.

J. D. Salinger publishes his popular yet controversial novel, The Catcher in the Rye.

Between 1961 and 1982, The Catcher in the Rye was the most censored book in high schools and libraries in the United States. According to the American Library Association, The Catcher in the Rye was the 10th most frequently challenged book from 1990 to 1999.

Cover features a drawing of a carousel horse (pole visible entering the neck and exiting below on the chest) with a city skyline visible in the distance under the hindquarters. The cover is two-toned: everything below the horse is whitish while the horse and everything above it is a reddish-orange. The title appears at the top in yellow letters against the reddish-orange background. It is split into two lines after "Catcher". At the bottom in the whitish background are the words "a novel by J. D. Salinger".

Michael Mitchell; the credit "Jacket design by Michael Mitchell" is found on the right jacket flap (the left panel).

https://bookblabla.com/book/all-the-ugly-and-wonderful-things

3 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

347d

[REVIEW] Sohachi Hagimoto - That's My Atypical Girl

cross-posted from: lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/56892944

A Human Made of Words.
This has been one of the best manga I have ever read.
Oftentimes, you hear about how an author “paints with their words” or something to that effect – Hagimoto does something different. It’s not painting, it’s not even sculpting… They do something more akin to Prometheus shaping a Human out of clay. Every page pulls you in and forces you to face the characters in such a realistic way, that you simply can’t help but wholeheartedly believe that they’re real people; Breathing humans of flesh and blood, that just happen to be made of lines and words.
Something that bothers me to no end, when it comes to a lot of manga that deal with bullying and topics of self-harm and suicide, is that they are gratuitously violent. I understand that that sort of representation matters, but it falls flat more often than not, I find. Not in That’s My Atypical Girl – here, everything feels real. It’s a little hard to explain, actually, because I feel like I can’t possibly hope to do justice to the pages, but it simply feels like it happened.
It’s reality; It’s raw and hard to read at times; It’s painful and violent; But it’s true. It speaks to you in such an undeniable way, that it transcends its medium.
This isn’t the sort of manga that transports you into its world; This isn’t an immersive experience that makes you forget reality. No. This is the sort of manga that changes your reality. After reading this, the world of the manga becomes your reality. This has changed the way I think, the way I see other people, and I’m sure it has changed the way I act. It’s the sort of manga that will stay with me, even if I forget it.
Truly, a life-changing experience, and a heartfelt depiction of depression, anxiety, and ASD.
It is a little odd how self-referential it is, though. It’s not bad in any regard, mind you, it’s not even off-putting, but it is just noticeable enough that you begin wondering how much the author wants you to pay attention to it. It is a manga about a mangaka, after all, so I guess it makes sense, in a way. Still.
Morita’s art is good (and actually gets significantly better as the manga goes on, I think, but I would argue that it is by far the weakest point of this work. Occasionally, the characters do look a little off. I suppose this opinion is a consequence of my being spoiled with lots of very high-quality art in other manga, but I can’t let it go unsaid.
I know I didn’t really speak too much about the plot or the characters in this review, but I feel that I shouldn’t. The characters are complex and deep, all of them; However, I can’t bring them to life in a short Lemmy review, so I simply won’t attempt to describe them at all. It would be a disservice to the work. The plot is moving and compelling; However, I can’t make you believe it happened, so I simply won’t attempt to summarize it.
Please, read this.
…and let me know what you think!
Rating: 5/5
Read on Bato.to!

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

346d

Space travel is the lifeblood of the Sol system, connecting colonies scattered across planets, moons, and the far reaches of the Oort Cloud. Find out more! https://www.mpaxauthor.com/worldbuilding-spotlight-space-travel-in-the-sol-system/
#WritingCommunity #books #readers #sciencefiction #worldbuiling

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

347d

📚 All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by: Bryn Greenwood

As the daughter of a drug dealer, Wavy knows not to trust people, not even her own parents. It's safer to keep her mouth shut and stay out of sight. Struggling to raise her little brother, Donal, eight-year-old Wavy is the only responsible adult around. Obsessed with the constellations,...

#books #reading #libraries #fiction #literaryfiction

As the daughter of a drug dealer, Wavy knows not to trust people, not even her own parents. It's safer to keep her mouth shut and stay out of sight. Struggling to raise her little brother, Donal, eight-year-old Wavy is the only responsible adult around. Obsessed with the constellations, she finds peace in the starry night sky above the fields behind her house, until one night her star gazing causes an accident. After witnessing his motorcycle wreck, she forms an unusual friendship with one of her father's thugs, Kellen, a tattooed ex-con with a heart of gold.

By the time Wavy is a teenager, her relationship with Kellen is the only tender thing in a brutal world of addicts and debauchery. When tragedy rips Wavy's family apart, a well-meaning aunt steps in, and what is beautiful to Wavy looks ugly under the scrutiny of the outside world. A powerful novel you won’t soon forget, Bryn Greenwood's All the Ugly and Wonderful Things challenges all we know and believe about love.

- A New York Times and USA Today bestseller
- Book of the Month Club 2016 Book of the Year
- Second Place Goodreads Best Fiction of 2016

A beautiful and provocative love story between two unlikely people and the hard-won relationship that elevates them above the Midwestern meth lab backdrop of their lives.

31 Books Bringing the Heat this Summer —Bustle

Top Ten Hottest Reads of 2016 —New York Daily News

Best Books of 2016 —St. Louis Post Dispatch

https://bookblabla.com/book/vanishing-world

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

310d

📚 Vanishing World by: Sayaka Murata

Amane is ten years old when she discovers she's not like everyone else. Her school friends were all conceived the normal way, by artificial insemination, and raised in the normal way, by parents in 'clean', sexless marriages. But Amane's parents committed the ultimate taboo: they fell...

#books #reading #libraries #fiction #literaryfiction #dystopianfiction #familylife #general

Amane is ten years old when she discovers she's not like everyone else. Her school friends were all conceived the normal way, by artificial insemination, and raised in the normal way, by parents in 'clean', sexless marriages. But Amane's parents committed the ultimate taboo: they fell in love, had sex and procreated. As Amane grows up and enters adulthood, she does her best to fit in and live her life like the rest of society: cultivating intense relationships with anime characters, and limiting herself to extra-marital sex, as is the norm. Still, she can't help questioning what sex and marriage are for.

But when Amane and her husband hear about Eden, an experimental town where residents are selected at random to be artificially inseminated en masse (including men who are fitted with artificial wombs), the family unit does not exist and children are raised collectively and anonymously, they decide to try living there. But can this bold experiment build the brave new world Amane desires, or will it push her to breaking point?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Piaget

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

2y

"We know an object only by acting on it and transforming it."

Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget was born #OTD in 1896.

He is known for his work in developmental psychology and epistemology through what he called genetic epistemology. His work sheds light on "intelligence", understood as a specific form of the adaptation of living organisms to their environment, on the evolutionary stages of intelligence in children, and on his theory of learning.

#books #psychology

Photograph Jean Piaget at the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor.
Unidentified (Ensian published by University of Michigan) - 1968 Michiganensian, p. 91

The photograph of Jean Piaget taken at the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor shows the renowned Swiss psychologist during his visit in 1968.

In this black-and-white image, Piaget appears as an elderly man with a thoughtful expression, wearing glasses and a suit. His hair is white and neatly combed, reflecting his advanced age. The photograph is featured on page 91 of the 1968 edition of the Michiganensian, the yearbook published by the University of Michigan.

#SciFi #Bookstodon #Books @bookstodon #TheEchoWife

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

314d

Finished: The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey.

Wow, that was a ride. I've posted before about having a hard time finding horror or thrillers that don't feel like their twists are predictable.

This is a sci fi thriller that didn't suffer from that problem at all. The twists are very good. I really enjoyed it. It was my book club suggestion so I'm curious what folks will think when we meet next week!

3 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

343d

Ebook and paperback: https://books2read.com/TymeDarkMoon

On a world long thought to have no moon, its sudden appearance inspires wonder and terror. Hasty research links the full moon and catastrophe, revealing the existence of the so-called 'Harbingers of Doom', creatures from the moon that harvest souls. Can everyone survive or will they become part of the dark harvest?

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books

(Left) The cover of dark moon, by Owen Tyme, illustrated by Ryan Johnson.

In the foreground, a redheaded witch and a dark haired wizard fight back to back, holding some rather large pistols. The witch is in a black dress and the wizard is in a black robe with golden decorations. Both looked a bit purple, due to the lighting. The witch's hair blows on the wind and she wears a necklace of bone beads.

Behind them, there's dust, mist and fog lit by twilight as a moon rises, framing their heads. Objects that look like shooting stars fall from the moon and there's a few visible impacts.

(Right) A poem, in two parts, on a background of the stars of space, with a moon between the two parts:

Witch and wizard fight,
The wizard thinks he’s right.
The grudge match ends,
But not quite as friends.
Survive the night they must,
Lest all the world be dust.

Prophesy foretold in stone,
Of the moon no one had known.
‘Harbingers of Doom’ harvest souls,
For the sake of their own goals.
A kingdom dead and long past
Collecting that it might rise at last.

Between the two halves of the poem is Owen Tyme's publishing mark, the yin and yang symbol that has the dots of white and black replaced with hourglasses.

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/TymeDarkMoon

https://bookblabla.com/book/the-match

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

345d

The Paradox Paradox Review - An Unfocused Sci-Fi Time Travel Adventure

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

309d

📚 The Match by: Harlan Coben

After months away, Wilde has returned to the Ramapo Mountains in the wake of a failed bid at domesticity that confirms what he's known all along: He belongs on his own, free from the comforts and constraints of modern life.

Suddenly, a DNA match on an online ancestry database brings Wilde clo...

#books #reading #libraries #fiction #mysterydetective #thrillers #suspensefiction #crimefiction

After months away, Wilde has returned to the Ramapo Mountains in the wake of a failed bid at domesticity that confirms what he's known all along: He belongs on his own, free from the comforts and constraints of modern life.

Suddenly, a DNA match on an online ancestry database brings Wilde closer to his past than he's ever dreamed, and finally gives Wilde the opening he needs to track down his father. But meeting the man brings up more questions than answers. So Wilde reaches out to his last, most desperate lead, a second cousin who disappears as quickly as he resurfaces, having experienced an epic fall from grace that can only be described as a waking nightmare.

Was his cousin's downfall a long time coming? Or was he the victim of a conspiracy as cunning as it is complex? And how does it all connect to the man once known as The Stranger, a treacherous fugitive with a growing following whose mission and methods have only turned more dangerous with time?

Named a Best Book by USA Today - Wall Street Journal - Publishers Weekly

A shocking genetic match exposes a family's darkest secret in this gripping thriller from the creator of the #1 hit Netflix series Stay Close.

#books #reading #HaymarketBooks #ice #politics #USA @books @bookstodon

1 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

215d

Free Ebooks: Abolish ICE, Abolish the Border: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/blogs/525-free-ebooks-abolish-ice-abolish-the-border

'In solidarity with all those standing up for our communities against the brutality of immigrant detention and ICE occupation, we're offering free ebooks of three crucial books about migrant justice and border abolition.'

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

2y

Serbian inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, and futurist Nikola Tesla was born #OTD in 1856.

Some of Tesla´s inventions and innovations: alternating Current (AC) system; induction motor; Tesla coil; wireless transmission of electricity; radio technology; remote control; neon and fluorescent lighting; X-Ray technology; Tesla turbine; oscillators and frequency generators.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla

Books by Nikola Tesla at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/5067

#books #science #technology

Nikola Tesla, with Rudjer Boscovich's book "Theoria Philosophiae Naturalis", in front of the spiral coil of his high-voltage Tesla coil transformer at his East Houston St., New York, laboratory.

Tesla is typically shown standing confidently, either holding the book or with it placed on a nearby table, symbolizing the connection between theoretical knowledge and practical application. He is dressed formally, reflecting his professional demeanor and the serious nature of his work.

https://bookblabla.com/book/against-the-machine

7 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

284d

📚 Against the Machine by: Paul Kingsnorth

How a force that’s hard to name, but which we all feel, is reshaping what it means to be human

In Against the Machine, "furiously gifted" (The Washington Post) novelist, poet, and essayist Paul Kingsnorth presents a wholly original and terrifying account of the technological-cultural ...

#books #reading #libraries #socialscience #essaysphilosophy #technologystudies

How a force that’s hard to name, but which we all feel, is reshaping what it means to be human

In Against the Machine, "furiously gifted" (The Washington Post) novelist, poet, and essayist Paul Kingsnorth presents a wholly original and terrifying account of the technological-cultural matrix enveloping all of us. With masterful insight into the spiritual and economic roots of techno-capitalism, Kingsnorth reveals how the Machine, in the name of progress, has choked Western civilization, is destroying the Earth itself, and is reshaping us in its image. From the First Industrial Revolution to the rise of artificial intelligence, he shows how the hollowing out of humanity has been a long game—and how your very soul is at stake.

It takes effort to remain truly human in the age of the Machine. Writing in the tradition of Wendell Berry, Jacques Ellul and Simone Weil, Kingsnorth reminds us what humanity requires: a healthy suspicion of entrenched power; connection to land, nature and heritage; and a deep attention to matters of the spirit. Prophetic, poetic, and erudite, Against the Machine is the spiritual manual for dissidents in the technological age.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclides_da_Cunha

0 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

2y

“It's not the barbarian who threatens us, it's civilization that frightens us.”

Brazilian sociologist and journalist Euclides da Cunha died #OTD in 1909.

His most important work is Os Sertões (Rebellion in the Backlands), a non-fictional account of the military expeditions promoted by the Brazilian government against the rebellious village of Canudos, known as the War of Canudos.

Brazilian journalist and writer Euclides da Cunha.

Cover of the book “Os Sertões” by Brazilian writer Euclides da Cunha, published in 1902 and therefore in the public domain due to its age.

https://bookblabla.com/book/hole-in-the-sky

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

343d

📚 Hole in the Sky by: Daniel H. Wilson

On the Great Plains of Oklahoma, in the heart of the Cherokee Nation, a strange atmospheric disturbance is noticed by Jim Hardgray, a down-on-his-luck single father trying to reconnect with his teenage daughter, Tawny. At NASA’s headquarters in Houston, Texas, astrophysicist Dr. ...

#books #reading #libraries #fiction #sciencefiction #thrillers #suspensefiction #indigenous

On the Great Plains of Oklahoma, in the heart of the Cherokee Nation, a strange atmospheric disturbance is noticed by Jim Hardgray, a down-on-his-luck single father trying to reconnect with his teenage daughter, Tawny. At NASA’s headquarters in Houston, Texas, astrophysicist Dr. Mikayla Johnson observes an interaction with the Voyager 1 spacecraft on the far side of the solar system, and she concludes that something enormous and unidentified is heading directly for Earth. And in an undisclosed bunker somewhere in the United States, an American threat forecaster known only as the Man Downstairs intercepts a cryptic communication and sends a message directly to the president and highest-ranking military brass: 'First contact imminen't.

A gripping sci-fi thriller—and Native American First Contact story—from the New York Times bestselling author of Robopocalypse, Daniel Wilson, who is a Cherokee Nation citizen and works as a threat forecaster for NASA.

This is where Daniel Wilson's fascinating novel begins. Heliopause is a real place—the very outer edge of our solar system where the sun's solar winds are no longer strong enough to keep debris and intrusions from bombarding our system. It is the farthest edge of our protected boundary (it was recently crossed by Voyager), and the line beyond which space experts look for extraterrestrial presences.

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books

1 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

342d

Ebook and paperback: https://books2read.com/TheInvertedGlass

After encountering the worst life has to offer, including the death of his wife and child, destruction of his home world, an addiction forced on him by the one responsible and a third of the galaxy falling under the heel of that tyrant, Levi Jacobs, a wizard, seeks to unravel the secrets of time and fate.

(Left) The cover of The Inverted Glass, by Owen Tyme.

The Background is a pink and purple nebula in space.

The foreground is largely line art, in white, with a black shadow outline.

At the center is an hourglass. The bottom has black sand, with a white figure standing in it. The top has is an inverted mirror image of the bottom, with a black figure in white sand.

The hourglass serves as the balance point for a set of scales, which hold a heart and a feather. The heart is on the left and the feather on the right. The heart is lower than the feather.

(Right Background) Lying in blue sand is a heart made of the same sand, full of cracks. It glows from the inside in a warm, yellow color.

(Right Foreground) She sacrificed her life,
To save everyone from strife.
Feather against the heart,
Not knowing does really smart.

The necromancer calls,
And it really galls.
Dead, but not forgotten,
She thinks the necromancer’s rotten.

Judgment day delayed,
So she could use her blade.
In agony of soul,
Good or evil is this troll?

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/TheInvertedGlass