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TikTok’s book club will be open to all as the rest of the site is, but will offer more structure for discussion. The first book chosen for the club is Persuasion by Jane Austen, which has been adapted by Netflix recently. The Austen classic follows Anne Elliot—a young, privileged women living in the early 1800s— as she revisits a past love. There will be a hub specifically for the book club so that users can easily find the book of the month and share their reviews, as well as any aesthetics they favor....

There is something unusual about Sapience University. It is a dark, isolated castle that has stood empty for years. It is surrounded by undead creatures left behind from a magical war. And when everyone returns to Sapience for the winter semester, some students seem eerily different. Students continue their magical studies unaware that enemies walk among them. However, it won’t be long until the enemy strikes and sends the school back into chaos....

I can’t stop thinking about Kelly Jensen’s thought-provoking article on post-2016 election trends in YA that ran in Book Riot recently. In the segment on young adult thrillers, Jensen asks: “With readers voracious for crime stories and thrillers, what does it say when there are so many dead and dying girls or so many girls who are at the center of victimhood?” I’m an avid reader of YA thrillers, a fascinated consumer of true crime media, and of course the author of one of the books mentioned in the article, I Killed Zoe Spanos (June 2, 2020)....

CBS: Pride and Prejudice FBI. Eliza whips off her glasses and announces “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a tired agent must be in want of a MURDERER”. via GIPHY Fox: Canceled when Lydia runs off with Wickham. HBO: There is so much hate-sex between Elizabeth and Darcy, but it’s like, art, you know? Winnie the Pooh Freeform: Winnie comes to the new 100 Acre High School as an outcast, and the show is about his past and making a new rag-tag group of friends....

It was the blessed school librarian who led me to my first story. She let my 3rd grade class browse the shelves quietly for 15 minutes during language arts period. I brought home Island of the Blue Dolphins and read the entire book in one sitting the next day. I remember being astonished that Saturday afternoon when I finished the last page and closed the book, awestruck. What time was it?...

This is a polarizing story. People either love it or hate it. But whether positive or negative, this book is almost guaranteed to engender a strong emotional response in those who read it. The one thing it won’t cause is indifference. I’ve never heard of anyone who thought Wuthering Heights was simply okay, or not very good but also not the worst. Come hell or high water, Emily Brontë’s single novel will make you feel something....

What if it isn’t the kids? What if the horror really lies in the depths parents will go to for their little ones? Parents are largely wired to protect their progeny. What happens to that ingrained need to see these tiny creatures survive when we add a supernatural element to the mix? Suffer the Children by Craig DiLouie is a prime example of what happens when the children of loving parents are put in an extreme situation....

1. Le Grand Meaulnes by Alain-Fournier The proto-Gatsby. It may gall the most patriotic of American readers but possibly the origins of the greatest of the Great American novels is rooted in France. Alain-Fournier wrote Le Grand Meaulnes, his only novel, in 1913 before dying in the First World War aged 27. Its influence, however, wafts through 20th century literature like a modern fairy tale. It tells the tale of an idealistic adolescent, the titular Meaulnes who discovers a strange house in the woods, meets and falls in love with a young woman within, leaves two days later only to forget the way back....

I first read A Wrinkle in Time in 2003. Reading and books had always been staples in my life, but this particular title did something really special and it was my first real look at meaningful literary analysis. We read it as part of the advanced English curriculum for “gifted” 5th graders, and I loved that class. Everything about it was special for me—being selected, of course, but also the opportunity to read on a deeper level and the excitement that came with walking to a different part of the school building and sitting in another classroom for a piece of the day....

I was one of the above. Coming from a culture where outsourcing one’s search for compatibility to parents, relatives, and sometimes outsiders is norm, I approached this series with trepidation. But as I started watching the show, I unclenched. Really, who is anyone to comment on how someone finds someone to care about, as long as it’s consensual and not breaking any rules? It wouldn’t be me, though, if I was not compiling book lists in my head while watching TV....

This is a question fans have been asking themselves since Julia Quinn first published the first book in the beloved Bridgerton series, The Duke & I. And since Bridgerton has now been adapted into a Netflix series with not one but two successful seasons (and two more on the way), viewers are just dying to know! If you were a character on Bridgerton, which one would you be? Well, thankfully, you can all breathe a sigh of relief, dear members of the Ton, because we finally have your answer right here in this quiz....

The story is set in the year 1984, when the world is in a perpetual state of war. Big Brother, a dictator, runs the totalitarian nation Airstrip One, formally known as Great Britain. Big Brother gains supporters based on a cult of personality that the Thought Police, an arm of the Party, design and enforce. Our hero is Winston Smith, a dutiful mid-level government employee at the Ministry of Truth....

To me, female comic book representation is something that creators have been slowly inching towards, giving us diverse women something to look up to. Take for example one of my favorites, La Borinqueña, created by Edgardo Miranda-Rodríguez, whose Puerto Rican background inspired him to create a story with a strong female superhero at the helm. La Borinqueña tells the story of Marisol Rios De La Luz, a Columbia University Earth and Environmental Sciences undergraduate student living with her parents in Williamsburg, Brooklyn....

A study published in Frontiers focuses on the cognitive and affective processes involved in reading. They found that ToM regions of the brain are closely associated with reading stories that bring out negative emotions. Theory of mind (ToM) is the ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others, and to know that others have beliefs that are different from one’s own. When we read, we essentially do this very thing....

My anticipation waned significantly after the first teaser showed up online. It was a lot of flashing lights, leather, and heels. Which isn’t a bad thing in and of itself but it suggested to me, at least to some extent, this proud, powerful team was already very much down the road to being fetish dolls. After the Batgirl of Burnside, in her most excellent suit and her practical, yellow Doc Martens, alternative routes to costuming were literally right there....

After I graduated from college, I found myself wanting to be more connected to the world and decided to subscribe to various news outlets. (In hindsight, I was basically turning into my father.) The 2016 election was fast approaching, and I figured that it was time to become more aware of the world around me, especially since there had been so much dialogue about “fake news,” which made me determined to do my own research....

Something to keep in mind, though, when talking about BL manga is its audience. The genre, as we know it today, originated as a sub-genre in the shōjo category in the 1970s. This means it is a sub-genre written, in large part, for an audience of young women by women. And a big question that may emerge from that is: why? If you peruse the internet, you may come across discussions like this reddit post where female readers themselves explain what draws them personally to BL....

How The Emergency Book Did Its Thing Emergency books could exist solo or in packs, depending on the circumstances. It was a fine idea to always keep a loner in your day bag, purse, or coat pocket, especially if that work was particularly hefty or grueling. Philosophy was a good pick, as was ancient literature. The trick to a solo emergency book was its size to substance ratio. You really wanted something you’d need to sink your teeth into, but which wouldn’t weigh you down too much....

Last year, I wrote about how I think I’ve outgrown young adult novels, because as much as there are YA books that I will always hold dear to my heart, I can’t escape the fact that I don’t hold the same mindset that I held when I read YA. Similarly, I’ve come to realize that outgrowing books isn’t limited to a specific genre aimed at a specific age group. Sometimes we grow out of books merely because we aren’t the same people we were when we read them....

This week, the district took even more draconian censorship measures. In response to a couple of complaints from parents about books available in the digital library app Epic!, the district removed access to the app for review. Epic! is used at elementary schools throughout the US and provides over 40,000 age-appropriate titles to readers. Williamson County schools serve 42,000 households. A small number of complaints from right-wing affiliated individuals removed an entire library of material for the school to “review....