September 9 – November 4, 2023

September 21 – November 4, 2023

A new wave of celebrity memoirs are raw and personal

In recent months I have been listening to Benjamin Britten’s String Quartet No. 2 (1945) and trying to describe something, anything, about it. Describe seems too weak a word when there exist long formal analyses of the piece: nevertheless, analysis seems easy, and description much more difficult.

It might be a vocabulary and grammar and syntax issue: I’m not sure we have any of those for music like this. Mervyn Cooke says of the first movement: “The overall effect … is highly unusual.” This is the reassuring resignation of a music writer.

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Roland Barthes: “Music, by natural bent, is that which at once receives an adjective.”

Technical areas, do we really need 'em? That’s the question that Marcus, Luke, Pete and Vish are answering ahead of the Jason Tindall vs Mikel Arteta derby this weekend.

Elsewhere, there's fear for the residents of Kenilworth Road as Captain Chaos Darwin Nunez heads to town, and we learn that an unusual friendship (fight?) is on the cards between Peter Reid and Dominic Cummings. Classic Dom.

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Book Riot and EveryLibrary have teamed up to execute a series of surveys exploring parental perceptions of libraries, and our first data sets were released at the end of September. These specifically explore the ways parents perceive public libraries. Looking at the results gives a sense of deep tension — 92% feel their children are safe at the public library, and most parents (66%) report not having their child borrow a book that made them uncomfortable. In the ongoing exploration of this data, let’s take a look at the cross tabs of one specific question that, while concerning, also showcases opportunity. What do the people who do not know how librarians select materials — that’s 53% of the responses — think about other topics related to contemporary book banning? I’ve isolated the respondents to the question in order to look at any potential trends among the rest of their responses. This is the second in a series diving deeper into the data. The first explored what else parents who believed librarians should be prosecuted for the materials in their collections thought.

The demographics of this subset of respondents are close to those of the overall sample. Most are white (70%), followed by Hispanic/Latinx (9%), Black (9%), Asian American (6%), Native (2%), and another race (3%). The vast majority, 85%, were between the ages of 27 and 58. This demographic tended to have less political party affiliation as republican or democrat than the overall sample (18% vs. 14%), and they also tended to choose independent affiliation more frequently (25% vs. 21%). Democrat and republican affiliations in this subset were nearly identical, but the “none” and “independent” affiliations differences are higher. Social media use mirrored the overall survey, with the most frequently used being Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter.

One noteworthy find in the basic information section, given at the end of the survey, was this: those within the subset of being unaware of how librarians selected materials for the collection were more likely than the full group to say book banning was not an issue important to them (45% of the subset vs. 36% of the full survey). In other words, people who don’t know how librarians select books are more likely not to care about book bans. In some ways, this makes sense. It might also be reflective of some overall messaging around book bans and the ways that this issue has been seeded within the democratic and republican parties, especially given that this subset is more likely to consider themselves independent or non-affiliated. We know this is not a partisan issue, but perhaps it is perceived as one.

This subset of users was only slightly less likely to have visited a public library in the last 12 months (91% to 93%), but they visited less frequently (on a scale of 0 to 10, with 10 indicating using the library all the time, the subset ranked a 5.7 and the overall survey a 6.6 — not significant, but noteworthy). They were also less likely to have a library card, with 88% saying they did and the overall survey indicating that 92% had a library card. Again, this data tracks: those who are unfamiliar with how libraries operate are likely those who visit less often and do not have a library card. But again, these differences are not significant ones.

Bigger differences emerged, though, when it came to whether or not these parents had children with library cards. Among the subset of respondents who did not know how librarians select materials for the collection, 52% stated their child had a public library card. In the full survey, 60% of parents said their child had a public library card. This stark difference appeared within another option in this question: 19% of these parents said their child did not have a public library card, while the full survey had this response only 14% of the time.

There’s nothing a good bookworm loves more than a fictional character, be they from a book or a movie or television series, who shares our love of reading. It’s a good 90% of why Gilmore Girls remains as perennially beloved as it is. But as fans of Alice Oseman’s Heartstopper series know, Rory Gilmore simply packing a book with her everywhere she goes cannot even hold a candle to Isaac (Tobie Donovan) on the Netflix adaptation. This boy is seen reading in almost every frame of film he appears in on Heartstopper.

Naturally, our fellow readers got to work on documenting every book that Isaac is seen reading in season 2 of the beloved queer teen romcom. Heartstopper only continues to grow in popularity, especially among young adults, so it might even come to pass that, in time, it will become more influential than Gilmore Girls, at least in terms of literature. Sure, Instagram nostalgia accounts love to get their Rory on by reading their way through her own reading list from that series. But as an equally devoted fan of Gilmore Girls, I can attest that the Rory Gilmore reading challenge can be as boring and pretentious in a way that the series managed not to be.

The premise of Heartstopper revolves around the messiness of growing up, which can get even messier with queer kids. In a nice homage to the message of the series as a whole, Isaac’s books are about as gay as they could possibly be, at least on a show as gay as Heartstopper. As we chronicle each book that Isaac is seen reading throughout season 2, not only do they reflect some of the challenges the characters face in this latest installment but also a clear foreshadow of Isaac’s realization in the season finale that he might be asexual — a criminally underrepresented letter of the LGBTQIA+ alphabet.

Isaac — who, as dedicated fans of the series will know, replaces the character of Aled Last from Oseman’s graphic novel series — was more of a wallflower throughout the first season. He’s still sticking to his comfort zone for the most part in the second season, but we are soon privy to learn that there might be something more to his seemingly antisocial behavior as he repeatedly gazes around the room at romantic couples, appearing apathetic and returning to his book. Things start to get complicated when James (Bradley Riches), another young queer student, starts displaying feelings towards Isaac.

Oseman, who writes the Netflix adaptation of her graphic novels, was clever to start sub-textually suggesting that Isaac might be grappling with queer feelings during the second season by way of the books he’s seen reading. After all, the wallflower characters deserve a storyline of their own as well. One book he’s seen reading in the first episode of season 2 is I Love This Part, Tillie Walden’s YA graphic novel about a budding romance between two teenage girls. It is an obvious ode to Tara and Darcy’s (Corinna Brown and Kizzy Edgell) romance, of course.

With NaNoWriMo starting at the beginning of November, now could be the perfect time to invest in a new app that promises to help you finally finish your novel. tome. was established in 2022 and promises to make writing more accessible to everyone. The program teaches you how to plan and write your novel and gives you the tools to motivate yourself to get it done.

But if you’re interested in trying out tome., you kinda have to go all-in. The app, unlike a lot of other apps in the market, does not offer a free trial. If you buy the app, you get access to it for life, but you do have to throw down around $100 right off the bat. So before you take that leap, you might want to know: Is tome. the kind of app that’s going to suit my needs? Will I really be able to finish writing my novel if I get this product? Will it help me come up with ideas? Spark my creativity?

Let’s take a closer look at the app and what it can and can’t do. Then you can decide if it’ll work out for you and your writing goals!

Whether you already have a draft or you’re just starting out with your writing project, tome. promises to create a custom program designed to help you take your writing to the next level. After you purchase tome., the app guides you through a series of questions to get an idea of where you’re at in your project and what you need the most help doing. Do you need more ideas? Creative prompts? More motivation to just sit down and write? tome. has got you covered.

What do you picture when you hear the term “tentacle manga?” Sure, I can imagine that images of really extreme hentai and the “squid porn” stereotype may come to mind. And while all that certainly does exist, don’t be too quick to judge!

From the very tame to the very spicy, from horror to comedy to erotica, tentacle manga can run the gamut. Unfortunately, our choices do become significantly more limited when just looking at what’s licensed and available in English, but you can certainly get an adequate sampling. As something of a primer, I’ve collected a few tentacle manga picks from various genres here to get you started. Admittedly, your mileage may vary, especially when it comes to the smutty titles, but all I ask is that you don’t jump to conclusions before giving it a test run yourself. So, without further ado, please enjoy this introduction to tentacle manga!

As a quick note before fully diving in, please do be sure to take care when dipping into the more sexually explicit tentacle manga out there, as you may find yourself running into some content that could be questionable based on your personal comfort levels. I’ve included some key content warnings on titles here to hopefully aid readers when getting started.