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#PostApocolyptic
review
Jari-chan
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Pickpick

On we go with Yu and Chi. Just as lovely as the first volume. Yes, the setting is rather dystopian, but the protagonists are nothing else than cute and innocent. There's a lot of slapstick and the manga made me laugh a lot. But since I'm not that musical, I preferred the anime episode of the rain scene to the one in the manga.

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SqueakyChu
The Pesthouse | Jim Crace
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I‘ve had this book about post-apocalyptic America for a long time, but just started reading it. I guess it‘s a weird time to read such a novel right now, but so be it. My husband read this book a few years ago and then told me it was a little weird. Now he tells me he never finished it. 🤨 😃

BookNAround I really loved his Being Dead even though it is miles outside my wheelhouse. 1mo
SqueakyChu @BookNAround I read Being Dead so many years ago that I remember nothing of it other than liking it (which is why I now happened to have this copy of The Pesthouse here at home!). 🙄 (edited) 1mo
8 likes1 stack add2 comments
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Kenyazero
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Pickpick

My husband found this manga at a used bookstore, so of course it joined our collection. It's a dark, humorous, and adorable short in Sadako's afterlife (long after The Ring) imagining what would happen if she was summoned in a post-apocalyptic landscape. #manga #apocalypse #horror

Kenyazero Used for #OwlHouseReadathon Flapjack: finding a connection with someone for the first time in a while; and #GottaCatchEmAll Mr. Rime: recommended by friends or family. @PuddleJumper (edited) 2mo
16 likes1 comment
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Jari-chan
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Pickpick

After watching the anime, and enjoying one after many, many years without really getting back into anime, I also wanted to read the manga. And it felt so nice being on tour with the girls again. The anime and the manga are about 1 to 1 the same, what a great adaption! The drawing style is special, and just as the anime, there are hidden depths to be found in this mostly very cute series.

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kwmg40
Earth Abides | George Rippey Stewart
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Pickpick

This novel felt different from many other post-apocalyptic novels I've read, where survival is not necessarily characterized by suffering, heroic actions or unwavering optimism. Instead, the protagonist Ish is dismayed with the complacent, relaxed attitudes of his fellow survivors and descendants. Yet, they do survive and Earth abides, as the title suggests.

#ClassicLSFBC @RamsFan1963 @Ruthiella

Ruthiella Glad you finally got to finish it! It was well worth reading, I thought. 3mo
40 likes1 comment
review
Bookwomble
Earth Abides | George R. Stewart
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Pickpick

#ClassicLSFBC
It was good to read a post-apocalyptic novel that didn't dwell on violence & murder (though it acknowledged those things), but rather told of how people went about surviving, preserving family and building community.
The study of the slow decomposition of the body of modern culture was interesting.
Stewart's presentation of xenophobia arising from a hygienic fear of disease & cultural contamination was plausible & sadly relevant. ⬇️

Bookwomble I expected there to be outdated attitudes to race and women, which were there but ameliorated to some degree by the interracial marriage of Ish and Em, and the strength of will and cohesive force shown by Em, and even if this was presented in a stereotypical “Earth Mother“ non-intellectual way, the community would have failed without her.
The outdated attitudes I found most disturbing were ableism and eugenic “purity“, the consequences of which ⬇️
(edited) 3mo
Bookwomble ... might perhaps have been more apparent to Stewart at the time of writing, in the immediate aftermath of the nazi “Final Solution“, though the resurgence of both xenophobia & attempted state control of reproductive rights shows that these abhorrent ideas are tenacious.
Getting off my soap box, this was a slow-paced, thoughtful book that took me a while to get into, but which I found rewarding. The last section about the Last American was an ⬇️
(edited) 3mo
Bookwomble ... especially poignant picture of old age and end of life.
Finally, I'm possibly unduly influenced by having recently read the Elder Edda, but rather than the cliché Adam and Eve, the names of Ish and Em were suggestive to me of Ask and Embla, “Ash and Elm“, the first man and woman of Norse myth, roots of the family tree, the Father and Mother of Nations. I've no idea if this was intended, but I do like the idea. 4.5⭐
(edited) 3mo
See All 9 Comments
TrishB Great review. 3mo
Bookwomble @TrishB Thank you 😊 3mo
quietlycuriouskate Picture looks like Gloucester after a bank holiday has wreaked havoc with the bins collection schedule. 3mo
Bookwomble @quietlycuriouskate Ha, ha! 😆 It's supposed to be post-apocalypse suburban San Francisco, but if Gloucester fits... 3mo
Lesliereadsalot Just read this will be on MGM+ in December. #Classiclsfbc 3mo
Bookwomble @Lesliereadsalot It'll be interesting to see how close they stick to Stewart's quiet, philosophical approach, or where they'll add in more peril and conflict. Hmm 🤔 almost definitely the second option. 3mo
38 likes9 comments
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Bookwomble
Earth Abides | George R. Stewart
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"He had always tried to impress the children with an almost mystical value of books. Still he kept the symbol of the burning of books as one of the worst things that men could do."
??? #UniteAgainstBookBans #ClassicLSFBC

AmyG Make Americans ignorant, fearful and hateful and you will believe anything. 3mo
BarbaraBB @AmyG so true 3mo
See All 14 Comments
dabbe @AmyG Agree 💯. 3mo
GingerAntics 🧡🧡🧡 yes! 3mo
The_Book_Ninja MAGAs: “Must ban books! Must have freedom of speech!…does not compute! Does not compute” 3mo
Bookwomble @The_Book_Ninja This example of cognitive dissonance would suggest that rabid MAGAs actually have any form of critical functioning happening! 3mo
Bookwomble @bibliothecarivs I borrowed your Book Ban hashtag, which I hope is ok. I thought it it more as homage than theft! 😁 3mo
bibliothecarivs It's from UniteAgainstBookBans.org so feel free to use and share! 3mo
CatLass007 Yikes! That is one scary picture and we‘re all too close to it actually happening. 3mo
Bookwomble @bibliothecarivs Then it's a shared resource 😁👍 3mo
Bookwomble @CatLass007 Warnings from history! Hopefully this is not our future! 3mo
CatLass007 @Bookwomble Some days I feel more hopeful than others. 3mo
Bookwomble @CatLass007 We shall overcome ✊♥️ 3mo
36 likes14 comments
review
swynn
Earth Abides | George R. Stewart
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Pickpick

(1949) This was a first read for me, though it's been on my TBR list forever. I'm content to have waited so long because I'm pretty sure its lack of plot and character development and its long expository pages would not have appealed to Younger Me. But Now Me dug it, less as a novel than as an extended meditation on relationships among individuals, civilization, and the planet. Very dated in spots but for what it is it's also surprisingly engaging

Aimeesue Ish! 4mo
34 likes1 comment
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Bookwomble
Earth Abides | George R. Stewart
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Halfway through the August #ClassicLSFBC book, so unlikely to finish before tomorrow, but I'm settling in with a Perry's Puffin-label Somerset cider, classic cheese balls snack, and a bit of John Coltrane to try and make some headway. It's possible I will be too chilled to actually read, but it's a risk I'm prepared to take 🫡

CoffeeNBooks This looks perfect! Coltrane is great! 🎶 4mo
Bookwomble @CoffeeNBooks He was a good choice for my mood 😊😎🎷 4mo
The_Book_Ninja No to cheesy balls✋🏼🛑 4mo
Bookwomble @The_Book_Ninja You strike me as a person with a healthy diet, so I wouldn't be surprised to find you noshing on the Man from Del Monte's plums 🍑 (with apologies to Julian Clarey for blatant joke theft! 😄) 4mo
The_Book_Ninja @Bookwomble 🤣🤣🤣🤣 4mo
41 likes5 comments
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Ruthiella
Earth Abides | George Rippey Stewart
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A few questions if anyone wants to discuss this month‘s #ClassicLSFBC 🦠 pick.

Question 3: I think for any Litten, the loss of literature would have been devastating…could the parents have at least read picture books to their children to keep stories alive? Or would this have been too strange, given that the world depicted in many of the story books would not make sense to the children given their extremely limited society?

MegaWhoppingCosmicBookwyrm Honestly this grated on me SO much. Stories are so inherently part of being human that we‘ve been telling them around campfires pretty much since we came into existence. I cannot fathom just giving up on keeping literature alive and accessible. If Ish had really cared so much, I think he absolutely could have made more of an effort of getting the younger generation interested. 4mo
Lesliereadsalot I never understood why all the members of the tribe didn‘t go to the library every day! What a waste of a resource that undoubtedly could have helped in so many ways. I enjoyed this book even though I would have liked to see all the characters “Do something!” Was nobody else thinking about the future?? #LSFBC (edited) 4mo
Ruthiella @Lesliereadsalot @MegaWhoppingCosmicBookwyrm I knew I‘d find kindred spirits here! My first thought about getting the children interested in reading and writing was to read to them and encourage them to tell and write their own stories. 4mo
See All 8 Comments
Bookwomble I'm late to the discussion, but for what it's worth... books would have been available everywhere the post-disaster people were scavenging, and given Ish's love of books it seems inconceivable that he would have relegated all of them to the 'sacred' space of the university library. A love of reading is passed from parent to child, so this would have happened. I can conceive it dying out, perhaps, over time, but not in the first generation. ⬇️ 3mo
Bookwomble A narrative device, then, to represent the loss/shift in culture. 3mo
Ruthiella @Bookwomble It‘s never too late! I‘m glad I wasn‘t the only one who found the lack of literature odd. You might be right about it being a narrative device to speed up the development. 3mo
kwmg40 This aspect was, to me, the least plausible part of the novel. I\'d expect that the survivors would have sought out books, for entertainment if not for instruction. Maybe it just feels that way to us Littens who, faced with a scary unknown situation, would immediately want to read up on it! 3mo
Ruthiella @kwmg40 Right? It‘s maybe doubly hard for us to understand how this pleasure in life could have been overlooked. I would like to assume there‘s other communities elsewhere that kept literature alive. 3mo
40 likes8 comments