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there are levels to favorite books 🦢💌🎀

(got this prompt/layout from @thenavidsonrecord /dk who made it) & added the last slide for funzies because i needed to include a few more (am realizing i forgot in memoriam, pls understand that's a fav too, i would put it as "was perfect from beginning to end")

do you see any favs?🤍 taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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11 hours ago

ootd & current read

timing really is everything. i first started reading 'the secret history' in january of this year and just couldn't get into it. i've read dark academia books before and knew the "vibe" so to speak but this one was just filling me with dread and anxiety in a way that i had to just put it to the side 😂 that, and it's such a highly revered piece of literature, and i felt pressured in a way.

i picked it back up a couple days ago after an immense urge for the atmosphere of a dark and cold book, and i can already say that it's much better for me 6 months later. (too bad it's the middle of summer.)

i mean the amount of pages i've underlined and i'm hardly 70 pages in. her writing i didn't appreciate before and now i read these sentences with awe at their simplicity in structure yet complexity in meaning. every word feels carefully placed, every piece a puzzle in which tartt moves masterfully.

i know there isn't much i can say about a book that's already won its awards & accolades, just im so happy to have restarted it & to actually be loving it this time around 💌

like i really do relate.

this was the one quote i highlighted in my kindle in january😂 taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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2 days ago

photos from my favorites folder: a shelfie with my new swan print

reading and writing outside

the cutest/drunkest bee ever

excerpt from 'on the other side is march', a quick story about a mother and daughter who becomes a mother for her mother at the end of her life

trying to work on my gallery wall!

the original painting from the cover of the book im reading, 'the red sacrament'

nyrb forever! ⭐️ taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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4 days ago

memoirs i love and tbr - black cover edition 🖤🩷

(im a dummy i thought i picked just kids but i didnt - i haven't read m train)

happy saturday friends! the air quality is plummeting again and rain is coming, sounds like the perfect rest day for me to stay inside and read and write all day!

i'm almost done with my essay (due tomorrow), fixed a huge kink in my WIP so i'm writing like a monster rn (though it's keeping me from reading tbh) and i just finished rewatching the whole hunger games movies (last week was twilight, what's next???)

i hope you guys have a lovely weekend 💞

what was the last memoir you read?🎀 taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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7 days ago

books of the week ☁️

i just finished 'a very easy death' and it was good??? memoirs are hard to rate. but i'm always searching for how people dealt with a parents death.
'milk fed' was okay, i didn't like it as much as death valley or so sad today. i wouldn't recommend it personally (second slide is from that book tho)
'the summer boy' was a quick but haunting story. it kept me hooked from beginning to end. perfect lil summer book! i never read this author before though i know they have a more popular book than this. their writing was very good too.

im halfway through 'on the other side is march' and really enjoying this one! another sad reflection on one's life at the end of it.
'the count of monte cristo' i fear i jinxed myself by starting it because now i want to read something else but if i put it down i might not ever pick it up. i've finished like 6 books in the time i started this a week ago. i can't 💀

now for my next audiobook im deciding between "odessa", "between two fires" (i've started this like 3 times i don't think im gonna get through it idk why), "a very cold winter" or "dreamland" by olivie blake. let me know if you've read any and i should prioritize them. i'm leaning towards a very cold winter because i want to read more italian historical lit and translation. taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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9 days ago

monday ☁️🕰️🖤

i started probably the longest book i'll ever read and so far im really enjoying it. had a birthday sleepover with my friends. watched north & south (book was better but whewwww he was hot). thrifted antique markets. crying over sam neill. my dads birthday passing for the first time since his passing, almost a year ago now (jul.30). i'm almost done with my summer course despite it being the second week. i hate july. missing fall and cold weather. writing a bunch in my book like it's my journal.

hope you guys had a good weekend 💌 taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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12 days ago

knowing a book will be a favorite and then putting off reading it for a year only to kick yourself for waiting so long to read it is my favorite hobby😍

no for real though, do you ever not read a book for so long because it sounds so perfectly the kind of book you will love and you almost don't want to read it because then you can never read it for the first time again? that's how this book felt.

pain. so much pain and such a gruesome reality and portrayal of war. i wrote a lot of my feelings on my last post too, and so im out of words. it was just perfect, my favorite kind of novel.

5/5 ⭐️ taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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14 days ago

i am a firm believer of reading books at the right time. when i posted this book in my procrastination pile, i had no idea that within it i would find so many references to alfred tennyson, a poet i only studied this past spring, and his many poems, specifically 'in memoriam', eulogizing and memorializing his late friend hallam. had i read this book before taking a victorian poetry course, i would not have gotten any of its references to the great poet laureate of the victorian period. having this knowledge has only enriched my reading experience, which is already fantastic because alice winn is a phenomenal writer, and the story is just fantastic (despite how sad it is). im not even halfway and ive already highlighted so many quotes. im truly savoring this. i dont want to miss a word.

with a title like this, it's not hard to predict where this story will take me. winn, so far, has concisely and painfully captured the pointlessness of war, the grit that it echoes, the needlessness of lives being lost for the sake of your country. "Into the valley of Death / Rode the six hundred" Tennyson wrote, and it is repeated often in the novel as a resounding reminder of what you sacrifice, what exactly a human life is worth in the face of war. to use it as a backdrop for the most intimate love story might simply kill me. but in no way does it feel to be romanticizing anything just for their feelings. and letters!!! ❤️‍🩹 i love letters!!!!

safe to say i'm loving this book!!! i sense a 5 star rating in my future 🔮🔮🔮

what was the last book you rated 5 stars? taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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17 days ago

happy sunday! 💌🖤

guys this weather is killing me 😭😭 this heat wave was way too much and now the humidity is just suffocating ❤️‍🩹 i miss fall & winter so bad!! and i remember saying i missed summer during our really bad snow storm but i take it back! i take it back😭

anyway im almost done with fellowship of the ring, and its always weird going to the book after seeing the movie sm times and having the movie as your only frame of reference, but i love noting the differences and changes made, and now in my next rewatch i will be insufferable!😍

as for pachinko, i haven't gotten much further since i havent been going anywhere; the AC in my gym is broken too, and so i barely spent any time there or walking outside in general 🫩 trying not to feel pressure to read read read because last month had a lot of bad ones i felt were a waste of time, and im trying not to repeat that anymore for the sake of finishing the book. still, pachinko is a long one and not putting any time towards it gives me anxiety lol. and now starting my summer course has me mad because i don't want to do work😭

ANYWAY

what is your current read rn?! taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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20 days ago

hello friends, today i present to you my "procrastination pile" 🫪

so many of these i have owned for literal years (boy parts, the doloriad) and a couple only a year (daughters of shandong), or even bought this year (celestial lights) but most are within that range. and while i really really want to read them i never see myself reaching for them when it's time to pick a new book.

then there are the books i have started but only managed a couple dozen pages (the idiot, the secret history) because they weren't the right time.

if you've read any of these pls influence me harder to start them😭 in memoriam is top priority tbh, but ofc we'll see if that actually happens 😂 taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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24 days ago

what this week 💌

hello friends, firstly, happy sunday! without classes on monday, sundays are sweet knowing i have another day tomorrow. but i start an online course next week and im not excited for it🫠

i have many books to update on! firstly the ones i read this week: i'm finishing up my reread of pride and prejudice right now, and i also read 'love and friendship' by jane austen a couple of days ago, another epistolary novella similar to lady susan that i enjoyed! i also finished água viva as you saw in my review, and yesterday finished near to the wild heart - this one had more substance than the former and i felt like i wasn't going as insane 😂

i started long island girls on audio, thank you to @librofm for the complimentary audiobook and also @youhadmeathea for the arc! i'm really enjoying it. it's NYC set (i love my city), alternative/emo music based (thank the heavens) and Lgbtq which has yet to fully transpire but i'm looking forward to it!!!! also for all my emo girls how are we feeling about bmth's new single?!? i've been listening to count your blessings since. oh it takes me back 💝

hope you all have a lovely day!!!🫶🏻 taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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a month ago

água viva is my second lispector novel. following the apprenticeship/the book of pleasures, which was a 5 star read for me this month, i was hopeful. água viva is a book that demands your full attention for those short 88 pages. described as “at her most philosophically radical”, i wasn’t sure what to expect.

if i’m being really honest, it felt like someone’s thoughts on a reallllly good high lol. random, disjointed, yet so attentive. if it were anybody but lispector, i dare say i might have called it pretentious, since it is just a bunch of ramblings and musings that don’t connect or seem to be fully fledged out. and yet despite how strange of a book it was, i remain enraptured by her mind and writing. because if it was such a random book of musings, anybody could write it, right? but how in the world did she write this? where did it come from? when i read her writing it feels like she has gained access to a part of herself that many of us only dream of unlocking. this is why i keep coming back to her.

i kept highlighting and highlighting despite being like, this is weird, what is even happening, etc. though not nearly as dear to me as the apprenticeship, this was still a wonderful exploration of lispector’s free creativity, though in no way would i recommend this as a first book by this author. with that being said, it was a quick read and i enjoyed my time with it, and now i am onto ‘near to the wild heart’ by her. taken in New York, New York by @swansreads

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a month ago