This is a gorgeous photograph by the late Tony Evans, the photographer mentioned by Richard Mabey in the second chapter. I wish there were more of his photographs in the book (there's only one), especially some of those he talked about in depth.
But I found some of his work here: https://www.tonyevans-timelapse.com/landscape
Let me know if you find his photo of the ancient decaying pine with marigolds, I'd love to see it.
#Naturalitsy #photography

To answer my last post:
“Then he went to the moors of Inverness-shire and brought home a photograph of an ancient pine stump (...) heraldically studded with five marsh marigold flowers, kingcups rampant. They were rooted in damp crevices and pits in the rotting wood, portals into the boggy northern past, and Tony had achieved what he always insisted photography was incapable of, showing something that was not there.“
#Naturalitsy

“If photography can stop time, freeze it, representational painting contains it, not just because its making takes time, and therefore incorporates it, but because it can hint at what might have gone before and might come after. Might it be possible for the photograph of a plant to have something of this painterly quality, and record not just an isolated moment but suggest the organism's past and the invisible dynamics of its life? “
#Naturalitsy

The next couple of books for #Naturalitsy just arrived! It feels so nice to have brand new books I can sniff... I mean read... 😅

What a wonderful little story! Can't wait to read the second book.

Written during the pandemic this tiny but hilarious erotic story was a way to spread awareness about the prevention methods available (washing hands, coughing into your arm, self isolation, etc...). Digital copies are available for free on the author's website.

I didn't realise this was an evangelical book when I picked it up at my local free library. It's a short story about "Jiro", a Japanese kid the author taught at the Christian College in Tokyo. It would be "So-so" if there wasn't some judgment passed on Japanese culture. It's mostly a nice story about a boy who becomes disabled and struggles with it throughout his life. Then he gets seriously ill and is saved by God ?
Not my cup of tea.

"After a heavy storm one night the snow had piled into four-foot-high drifts outside the classroom window. So Jiro suggested to the boys in his class in a second-floor room that when the next teacher was busy writing on the blackboard, they should all jump quietly out of the windows onto the snow below. (...) When the surprised teacher finally turned around, there wasn't a boy left in the class!"
Now that's a pretty cool prank!

A beautifully written book that cleverly explores the hidden roots of racism and how they affect both sides. It describes the random acts of violence faced by black people in South Africa and the context that often leads white people to violence.
For those born in this context, racism can be internalised and may come out in small, disparaged and escalating acts before it reaches full violence. 1/3

Not one of her best books but it's a light horror story. Creepy, unsettling and well-written. I'm not a big fan of the petty drama between a group of friends who aren't actually much friends at all, especially when it all boils down to who slept with who, and who's got a crush on who. But that is a personal thing of mine.
It's a light creepy read. If you're also a fan of this genre, I'd definitely give it a try.

"Her hourglass is malfunctioning, someone has put funeral-urn ashes in it instead of sand. There are odd whispers in her icebox door. The ice falls inside the fridge at midnight and sounds like the wrong kind of laughter. The toilet across the hall gargles all night. The termites under her chair are going to gnaw through and drop her to hell. The spiders in the wall are mending her shroud."

"Only the projector and the films in the parlor. Time only works well in one direction. Back. I control the past. I'll be damned if I know what to do with the present, and to hell with the future. I'm not going to be there, don't want to go there, and would hate if you made me. It's a perfect life."

"(...) did strangers lie there, holding on their insides as if they were broken glass?"

"Cal, I thought. Snip away the darkness.
Short in front. So I can see.
Short on the sides. So I can hear.
Short in the back. So I can feel things creeping up on me.
Short!"

"The moon broke through a rift of darkness like a great eye watching me. I walked on mirrors which showed me the same moon and clouds. I walked on the sky beneath (...)"

Hard pick. This book was gifted to me by a dear friend and I thank them immensely for that. There are many valuable words of wisdom and comfort for any lost souls in search of answers. Beautiful, moving and ahead of his time in a way.

"And this more human love (which will fulfill itself with infinite consideration and gentleness, and kindness and clarity in binding and releasing) will resemble what we are now preparing painfully and with great struggle: the love that consists in this: that two solitudes protect and border and greet each other."

"And you should not let yourself be confused in your solitude by the fact that there is something in you that wants to move out of it. (...) everything in Nature grows and defends itself any way it can and is spontaneously itself, tries to be itself at all costs and against all opposition."

"(...)have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms (...). Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer"

"Works of art are of an infinite solitude, and no means of approach is so useless as criticism. Only love can touch and hold them and be fair to them."

"A work of art is good if it has arisen out of necessity. That is the only way one can judge it. (...) go into yourself and see how deep the place is from which life flows; at its source you will find the answer to the question whether you must create."

"In the name of all that is good in this world, Buck Tangle will stand up and fight for the sanctity of a wholesome, decent trot".
As one should! ?

#sundaysmut #weirdsmut

Hard pick! Absolutely hilarious. A must for any fans of British murder stories and avid viewers of shows like “Midsomer Murders“ or “Father Brown“.

Perhaps an open house event for the nearby schools might help?

I'm pretty sure that not only that is indeed a crime but it probably carries a heavier sentence than murder.

Even if he's not obliged to kill you, he will be obliged to solve your murder. Either way, RUN!

Not the children! 😱

"Those ducks didn't get fat on bread" ?

Tradução para português de João Maia, que conseguiu ser bastante confusa às vezes, talvez pela linguagem mais antiga, talvez pelo estilo de tradução adotado (uma mais literal e menos pelo sentido, talvez?). De qualquer forma, foi uma leitura interessa apesar das repetições das ideias. Gostaria de ler outra tradução, desta vez com comentários e/ou contexto, pois parece-me faltar-me informação para poder fazer uma crítica mais justa desta obra.

A short fun read, full of kindness and with an important message, if you care to read between the lines.

Incredibly boring. The author missed so many great opportunities to create something fun and original. It was a great idea and overall well written but leaves a lot to be desired.

#novella #romance #erotica

"Some truths are better whispered. I am (trans non-binary agender genderqueer genderfabulously fucked by stars in the eyes of skies changing in the faces of bees on flowers)". Kitty Lu Bear in "Loving with defiance: breaking a binary, not a b1n0ry"

#trans #disabled #TransandDisabled #NetGalley

“Don‘t cage me just because you locked your own cuffs. The only thing we have to lose is our chains“. Kitty Lu Bear in “Loving with defiance: breaking a binary, not a b1n0ry“

#trans #disabled #TransandDisabled #NetGalley

Soft pick. I don't like the author as a person or his idea of love but he's a wonderful writer and some of the things he writes are not only beautiful but made me think. I disliked the last few chapters, where he becomes more preachy, but overall it's an interesting book. It'll make you think, if nothing else.
I have a lot more to say about this book, both good and bad, but unfortunately Litsy isn't the right place for long reviews.

“Because we believe the surface, we forget that surfaces aren't who we are.“

"I loved opening books to see how they'd begin. Writers create books the way we write lifetimes. A writer can lead any character, to any event, for any purpose, to make any point. What does this writer do, or this one, I wanted to know, with a blank Page One? What do they do to my mind and my spirit, when I read their words?"

"From time to time, I wrote, it's fun to close our eyes, and in that dark say to ourselves, "I am the sorcerer, and when I open my eyes I shall see a world that I have created, and for which I and only I am completely responsible." Slowly then, eyelids open like curtains lifting stage-center. And sure enough, there's our world, just the way we've built it."

““We have to deal in a currency that's meaningful to us,“ she said, “or all the success in the world won't feel good, it won't bring happiness.“

"I leaned back to look and I fell into the stars..."

“He's not a man, he's a compendium of weirdness“, Plautus

So am I, Plautus. So am I... 🤣

This book is hilarious! Definitely recommend it.

"If only we could invent a way, I thought, if only this were a world when unmet people could say you charm me and I'd like to know who you are. With a code: "No thanks," if the charm might not be mutual."

"Chess-players sketch their portraits in the motion of their pieces".

Beautifully put.

#chess

"After searching the thousandth crowd, I'm beginning to doubt that soul mates appear in hayfields."
?

A story filled to the brim with clichés. It's as if the author tried to cram as many horror flicks as possible in one story. The writing is extremely repetitive, and the narrative could be better. Not to mention that the main character is constantly having extreme physical reactions to every little thing (especially in her stomach) to the point that I'd recommend she see a doctor. Not my cup of tea at all.

Poor Conseil 😂
And poor hotel employees who'll have to feed a babirusa haha
(and poor babirusa that has to live in a hotel 🤣)

"In him I had an extremely capable specialist in natural history classification who could scale with the agility of a circus performer the ladder of branches, groups, classes, sub-classes, orders, families, genera, subgenera, species and varieties."

Finally starting this beauty! 😍
#HyggeHourReadathon

Hard pick! I had a lot of trouble putting down this book. It's a political thriller with a lot of very important questions regarding the fate of humanity, our current social and political issues, and social media. The writing is easy and light and, even though the issues can be heavy and emotional, things never get too depressing. It's the perfect combination of a light read with a profound and well-constructed story.
#ArtificialWisdom #NetGalley.

Soft pick because she doesn't mention European bears... Other than that it's a great book, especially for bear lovers.
#Naturalitsy