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- Reviews: Currents (2026)
- Reviews: Forge (2026)
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- Jincy Willett on “There’s nobody as good as the Ramones, never will be.” — Joey Ramone
- sheila on 2026 Shakespeare Reading Project: Hamlet
- Biff Dorsey on 2026 Shakespeare Reading Project: Hamlet
- sheila on 2026 Shakespeare Reading Project: Hamlet
- Dave on Review: The Chronology of Water (2025)
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Tag Archives: Hopeful Monsters
Ten Books I Couldn’t Live Without
1. Possession – by A.S. Byatt. Like Heather I have read this book probably 4 or 5 times – I just finished it yet again, and every time I come to it – I see different things, I relate to … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged A.S. Byatt, Canada, Catch-22, Dubliners, Emily Climbs, England, Herman Melville, Hopeful Monsters, Ireland, Joseph Heller, L.M. Montgomery, Lives of the Saints, Madeleine L'Engle, Mating, Moby Dick, Nancy Lemann, Nicholas Mosley, Norman Rush, Paul Zindel, Possession, Ring of Endless Light, The Pigman
16 Comments
Cherished Objects
One of my more constant activities in my life is weeding through the stacks of books I own, and getting rid of non-essentials. You may be surprised at how difficult this is. I have to get into a very cold-hearted … Continue reading
The Book Challenge
I got this from Dan – who tagged me “it”. 1. Total Number of Books I’ve Owned: Okay, so the “I’ve Owned” tells me they want to know all in all, as opposed to how many books I currently own. … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged A Wrinkle in Time, Charlotte's Web, Harriet the Spy, Hopeful Monsters, Mating
7 Comments
“Grokking” Stalin And The Murder of Kirov
Update: I just realized that my description of 3 a.m. anxiety may obscure the rest of the post, which would be unfortunate. So if you want to skip over that part to get to the Stalin stuff, feel free. You … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged 1984, George Orwell, Hopeful Monsters, Robert Conquest, Russia, Sergei Kirov, Stalin, The Great Terror
30 Comments
Sheila’s List of Contemporary Must-Read Fiction
1. This is # 1 on the list, forever. 2. If anyone ever really wants to understand, on a cellular level, how I see the world, and humanity’s place in it … I wouldn’t be able to describe it myself … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged A Wrinkle in Time, Birds of America, Cat's Eye, Hopeful Monsters, Mating, The Goldbug Variations
4 Comments
5 Books
You are on a desert island. You can only have 5 books. What books would they be? Mine would be – and these are not necessarily my favorite books – but more like the books I never get tired of: … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged Helter Skelter, Hopeful Monsters, House of Leaves, Jane Eyre, William Shakespeare
18 Comments
The Loneliness of Being a Fan
Do you have books that you love which nobody else appears to have read? As I said in his comments over there: the only other people I know who have read “Hopeful Monsters” by Nicholas Mosley, one of my favorite … Continue reading
Ark
I thought – oh strange and terrible world, you should not be destroyed! There are people whom you can love and who love you – Just let us know, every now and then, what might be an ark. — Nicholas … Continue reading
Nothing
Science takes us to the limit of what we can know about objects: beyond science there is nothing. But this nothing is postulated by science. For how can science be aware of itself except from a standpoint of what is … Continue reading
Cherished Books
I just moved, hired a company to do it for me because … well, because I just have too many damn books to move, and there is nothing heavier than a box of books. My former apartment was a 5th … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged Alice in Wonderland, Canada, Catch-22, children's books, England, fiction, Herman Melville, Hopeful Monsters, Jane Austen, Joseph Heller, L.M. Montgomery, Lewis Carroll, Lives of the Saints, Madeleine L'Engle, Mating, Moby Dick, Nancy Lemann, Nicholas Mosley, Norman Rush, poetry, Sylvia Plath
9 Comments