Sometimes the book is really good in general but mistakes were made. I'm not reading a full page or chapter of said mistakes in detail, but I'm also not DNFing an otherwise great story if it's just a small part 🤷

I think any fantasy reader can confirm too many authors write armor and battles without doing their research. The romance crowd must be familiar with the bad anatomy sex scenes. And the bookworms binging series know all about copy-paste descriptions and recaps. But I don't think those are bad enough to abandon good plots.

I feel like this is one of those books we should have left in the 1930s maybe. Or we should just remove the friends part from the title.

If the fine is over what you can afford without going hungry or not paying bills, talk to your librarian about options. It's bad that you've lost a book that's hard to replace, it would be worse if you got sick over it or something because it's a thing and you're a person, so libraries often have alternatives, instalments or ways to lower the fine.

Let's not pretend the information in that book is invaluable, it's a picture collection you can likely find a digital equivalent of that's more convenient to use. The invaluable thing is compassion and empathy, your carelessness with your words is what's depriving communities of nice things.

The collection of book related content, creators, and their active audience on TikTok. There's also BookTube (on YouTube), Bookstagram (on Instagram), and every platform has their own version I just don't know the name. It covers reviewers, fans, challenges, charity drives, diy rebinding and book repair, the Regency Romance fanfic community, and basically anything you can think of.

When these are used as adjectives for specific books, it means the book got lots of attention on the platform. Or, more commonly, someone put a sticker or digital label on it for marketing purposes or as criticism because there's a handful of content mentioning the book.

Dramatic reading is fun. There are many books that are so much better read out loud. Plus you're focusing more on tone and the sound of words, you probably have a better grasp on when things are supposed to convey some extra nuance with vowel acoustics or rhythm.

But if it bothers you, you could try a reader app where you only see one word or one line at a time 🤷 Stops you from scanning and skimming stories like they were articles you want information from.

Man I wish the list of things I don't find agreeable was this short. Life would be so much easier.

I'm very anti censorship in general, and I won't be ashamed of not extending that general rule to abuse guides and incitement to harm people when it comes to more nuanced specifics. You may want to defend books that give detailed instructions on how to hit a literal crawling baby so CPS can't prove it because you are more anti censorship than me, but ... I won't want to compete.

Yes it's called an exception. Eg I'm very much against causing blunt force trauma, but I support self defense even if it causes blunt force trauma.

There are books out there about how beating babies with canes is good parenting you just have to make sure you don't leave marks others could see. So those get my full purge vote, let's keep some copies for archival and research purposes but let the rest burn. (I'm not even sure how it's legal to sell these)[edit: Now two people mentioned the same title, but I sadly report it's a whole genre, and I meant every single one of them]

There are books with other blatant misinformation urging people to be abusive. I also won't defend those.

Hate speech and incitement with call to genocide / murder / rape / war crimes etc. (Again, I'm not sure how it's legal)

I'm very against censorship in general, especially when it comes to art. Even books I'd throw on a bonfire with my own hands if it's about a few copies as a symbol or protest, I'd not want them banned. But I just can't find an excuse for some nonfiction works.

I like it. But I never saw the MC as an "annoying little shit" or anything like that, the guy's dream is to save kids from getting traumatized like he was, his coping mechanisms are just really very bad. He's a child himself going through a crisis.

But I fully agree some things aged like milk, and some things were not handled very well to begin with.

That's totally fair. But there's the person who has a book they want to read but needs a digital copy to do so, and then there's the person who seeks out the cheapest damaged copy of a book to exploit the backup copy laws of their country - if they download the same book from the same source for personal use the two of them both participate in redistribution the same way but it's not the same level of ethical.

You could probably use some phone apps to make a digital "backup" pretty fast without even cutting the books. My guess is one payed app for easy high quality results or 2-3 free alternatives with a bit of extra effort. And those apps are important for accessibility until we have better solutions, because it's not however many years ago so we're not just telling disabled people they are SOOL.

Imo it's a very ethically grey area. So my vote is unethical for convenience, acceptable for accessibility if there's no better alternative (eg getting assistive devices like glasses).

Reason: I participated in an academic competition, and the general quality of lyrics translations people submitted annoyed me, so I picked up a huge stack of bilingual poetry collections to study translations.

Level: I think technically just below "Independent user - complex" in English, that's maybe around B1-2. But I had French, Italian, German, Spanish in the mix (some with my native language some with English), and I spoke none of those four languages at that point, I used textbooks to figure out what's going on.

Why bilingual books? To see translations side by side and see what different translators prioritized

Finished? Yes, all

Other: If I had access to them, I'd have picked up novels, too, to learn the language. When my English was way too weak to read whole books I used to sit at the dining table with the original + a translation + dictionaries, it was a nightmare and I'd have preferred a bilingual edition. And in Italian and Spanish I couldn't even find full novels to read, it was sad (I could find them now I guess, at least with English translations, but we didn't have easy internet access back then)

I think it's based on misconceptions. Social media is light and bite sized so you can just put it down any time and scroll while paying attention to the social situation, plus you might be taking care of important things or work messages. When you open a book you get absorbed into hundreds of pages and ignore people without any convenient excuse.

Honestly I also just have some ebooks on my phone and read those, it's not like people can tell the difference between my reader app and reddit unless they stare at it rudely, and I pay the same amount of attention to people around.

No, we have more readers, more of them in it to relax, and more of those voices find you. It's big numbers and biases.

Do you mean Isekai, but novels from the West? I'm pretty sure 3 of those books were on Goodreads Isekai lists, but if you try to look for Isekai it's not what your first hits will be...

It's portal-quest fantasy (hero goes into a fantasy world) or intrusive fantasy (the fantasy world intrudes on the hero's world), but I don't think I've ever seen those just commonly thrown around outside of academic or fantasy nerd circles.

Yeah it's just unlicensed self published books / short stories with all the pros and cons of self published material. And often it's only unlicensed because the original franchise wouldn't accept some part of the content even if they have a history of publishing fanfic of cast members as extended universe books.

I'd like to dispute fanfic authors mastering character development in smut scenes. But the thing is, the tags and comments and notes make it possible to quickly figure out what to expect, and loads of sex educators and intimacy coaches and professionals of various attached fields write fanfic.

I half share your opinion.

Half, because I like smut and erotica from bodice rippers to porn with plot, they are fun reads for me. Even the bad ones when I'm in the mood for "trashreading"

But I do agree. And I think it doesn't just seem unnecessary, it is unnecessary very often because of various forms of bad writing. And it's a literary turnoff for me, too, despite being into a variety of smut.

Very often the story would benefit from a fade to black with aftermath, or poetic two paragraph descriptions of intent and emotional state, because the scene doesn't contribute to the story. And even when it could be a good addition to enrich or move parts of the plot, it's often just something detached thrown in, and I feel like it's only there to get a 🌶️ rating from reviewers. Plus these authors seem to not have good experiences to draw from and it leaves the scenes empty and confusing.

And repetitive. Big problem, too. If it's repetitive it doesn't need to be there no matter the scene. Some people can write 40 smut scenes in a 30 chapter work and make it matter and different, but it's way more often the exact same emotionless scene almost copy-pasted again and again.

Bodybuilders and workout folks will tear me apart, but... You could read in sections instead of timing things. Do a set or two, read ~one journal page's worth of material until it makes sense to pause, do another set. It's very much not ideal if you want to do serious body building, but the best workout is the one you can keep up, so if reading helps you keep it up because it doesn't feel like wasted time, it's worth it. It won't have the full effect you could get from your routine but it's still working out, and you can adjust later for better results.

Or just listen to lectures instead.

I'm pretty sure that's a feature not a bug.

The story is about how we are the real monsters and if you chose the lesser evil you're still just evil, and the villains are ... Patriarchy, colonialization, and all they bring. And everyone is contributing, everyone is part of the problem, even the people who sacrifice their own happiness to make the world better are often compliant.

Women of science have a way harder time getting into their version of university, only the most intelligent are accepted, and mostly only if they are ugly and not important enough to be sold into marriage. And then they still have to use their bodies, it's expected, and after they comply or when they do it for their own fun, they are shamed. It's just how it works for women in certain male dominated fields, except it's not some lead sorceress telling them to bejewel their pubes or something, it's older women in the field telling them to open their legs and close their mouth if they want to get anywhere.

Edit: But I do understand the distaste for it, especially since it was written in the last century by a man, so it's not exactly deeply nuanced about it

Are you alright otherwise? Because sure it can just be your own normal at this age, or getting burnt out on a type of content. But (and sorry if I'm overstepping, but I know I needed people doing just that many times in similar situations) it could also be a symptom of depression or getting near / being in a "down" episode of various mental or neurological things, or a side effect of certain medications.

If you are okay in other aspects of life, pick up more stories rooted in reality or speculating about our future (could become real). Or turn it into a game to research and figure out how the fantasy books are real, all the good ones are full of allegories and meaning, and it's fun to dig them up (warning: don't do HP unless you're ready to deal with some bad stuff)

But if you're not okay... Struggling with other hobbies. Not caring what you eat because it's just fuel when you used to cook or had little treats. Cancelling plans because they aren't worth the effort. Change in cleaning or personal hygiene routines because some parts of it are pointless or you don't have the energy. Doubting friendships, not finding meaning in them or getting paranoid or feeling like everyone hates you. Memory issues, too much or too little sleep, losing time... Reach out for help, do some therapy if you can, get your meds adjusted or changed, etc.

Unnecessary damage that to me just says someone didn't care enough to have a bookmark method that takes seconds (from grabbing an actual bookmark you can often find for free to slips of paper to taking a photo of the page number etc)

If it's your own book I support your freedom to dog-ear, I just still don't think it's cool to crease pages. It's better than butchering perfectly good books for craft purposes, it's not like I'm calling it out unless I'm asked about it in some way, I just feel sad about the tiny breaks in the pages.

Edit: Consider getting a nice book jacket with an attached bookmark ribbon, they are super cute.

May I point out... That's probably when he ran out of drug fueled ideas.