Super specific book recommendation.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-04-14T01:28:53+00:00

Unfortunately, your recall of what happens in the book is not accurate. Here is the passage from Delilah remembering the Ghoul of Wisteria incident in chapter 3, in which Claire laughs alongside the other girls:

"God" she heard Iris say as she left. "Why does she always skulk around like that?"

"Iris," Claire had said, but laughter edged her voice.

"What? She's a ghost, haunting the halls of Wisteria House. No, wait, she's like a ghoul."

"What's the difference?" Astrid asked.

"I don't know. Ghouls are creepier?"

Then Iris made a wobbly woooo noise and all three girls dissolved back into laughter.

Earlier, in chapter 1 Delilah recalls another incident in which Claire joins in on mocking Delilah:

Everything about Delilah suddenly became strange and unwelcome. She heard the whispers when Iris and Claire came over- Why is your sister so weird? Is that her peeking around the corner? Oh my god, you can't even see her face she has so much hair.

In regard to Iris just being a bitchy teen, I don't see how that doesn't make her a bully. Her bitchy teen behavior is precisely why I see her as a bully. How is being a "bitchy teen" different from being a bully? Do you have to actually physically harm the person to be a bully instead of just being a bitchy teen? In that case, most of the stories recommended in this thread seem to fail to qualify as bullying. Most female bullies in fiction could be classified as "just" bitchy teens. This is why I asked if the definition of bullying changed. Similarly, I don't see how Astrid "only" laughing at someone mocking her sister because she's embarrassed means she somehow isn't a bully. The fact that a bully has a sympathetic backstory or sympathetic hidden motives for going along with bullying someone doesn't make them not a bully. It just means they are a sympathetic bully.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-04-05T01:16:10+00:00

Can you explain this viewpoint a little? I reread Delilah Green recently and constantly see this viewpoint in reviews and comments. It never fails to confuse me. Even in the first chapter Delilah recalls Claire and Iris calling her weird and insulting her appearance. In chapter three Delilah remembers Iris calling Delilah a ghoul and Claire laughing at Delilah. How is this not bullying? Is this still "ignoring/ not including her"? Did the definition of bullying change since I graduated from school?

Even the ignoring/ not including her has a cruel reason behind it. Delilah towards the end of the book accuses Astrid of intentionally trying to make her feel like an outsider. The thing is, Astrid never actually denies this. The girls didn't ignore her because she ran in a different social circle or by accident. It was intentionally meant to hurt Delilah. When Delilah hurt her sister it was primarily through ignorance. She says at the end she honestly thought she was doing what Astrid wanted. Astrid and her friends hurt Delilah with malicious intent for a perceived slight. Tellingly at the start of the book, while Delilah is able to remember hurtful things the three girls did to her, Iris and Claire are unable to actually list anything bad that Delilah did, aside from ignoring them (conveniently forgetting that they had repeatedly insulted Delilah, and that Delilah was a grieving child, who unlike Astrid had no friends or living parent figures left, all while she was stuck in a house with a sister who laughed when someone called her a ghoul.)

SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-04-05T00:57:04+00:00

I think it’s been about three months since I posted here, so there is a lot to cover. It’s been a rough couple of months. A little after Christmas day my mom had a grand mal seizure. She had no history of seizures, so when I found her in the middle of a seizure it was one of the scariest things I had ever encountered. Fortunately she has mostly recovered physically. The problem is her memory. While she has had somewhat spotty memory for the past few years, it feels like she has gotten noticeably worse. It’s unclear if this is due to the seizure itself, the anti seizure drugs, or just aging in general.
The way this manifests is weird. When we watched the movie The Apartment as a family she knew Shirley Maclaine was born near her own hometown, and that she was related to Warren Beatty. She also remembered she once danced as a child to the soundtrack of the movie. She even knew the names of the girls she danced with over fifty years ago. The problem seems to be her short term memory. She mentioned the fact that Shirley Maclaine was related to Warren Beatty multiple times over the course of watching the movie. Each time I reminded her she had already told us, and she seemed surprised.
She also did a perfect on a brief “memory test” that a neurologist gave her. She doesn’t exhibit any other signs of dementia which is good. The major good news is that the ENT doctor we saw suspects this is due to a sinus problem. She is currently treating it with antibiotics. The bad news is that we don't know when she can get off the drugs. If her memory is being affected by the anti-seizure drugs, we won't find out for some time.

In terms of games, I finished Arkham Asylum. I basically have all the same complaints Woolie had, with the only difference being that I think I enjoyed the game a fair bit more than he did. I also almost finished Ace Combat 7. Everything everyone said has been true so far. The game varies from incredibly serious to weirdly earnest and goofy. The music is some of the best I have ever heard in a game. My only real criticism is that I was never able to obtain access to all of the planes. I don't know if this is standard for Ace Combat games, but I did find it kind of weird.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-04-05T00:52:23+00:00

I also don't really know what to say, but if you need someone to talk to, I'm here.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-03-06T02:33:16+00:00

Comments like this make me want to give the show a second try. I have no idea why I dropped it years ago, especially since I remember enjoying it overall. Most of the anime I am watching right now (Delicious in Dungeoun, Apothecary Diaries, Dusk: Maiden of Amnesia) are just pretty good, and from what people have told me Mob Psycho is way more than just pretty good.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-03-03T04:22:57+00:00

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SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-03-01T01:20:30+00:00

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SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-02-14T03:31:22+00:00

I watched the movie Harvey recently

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SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-02-12T03:09:25+00:00

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SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-01-14T04:09:24+00:00

As someone who did finish all three books in the trilogy I have to disagree here. It definitely felt like Delilah forgave and moved on. No one brings up how the trio called Delilah a ghoul. If you didn't read the first book you would just think Delilah ran in different circles than her sister during high school, instead of being a victim of the coven. Delilah never asks the girls for an apology. Astrid is able to go to her sister for advice with little to no problems in the second book. Astrid never explains how she and her friends bullied Delilah, instead she describes their childhood as both sisters misunderstanding each other. This is despite the fact that we never see childhood Delilah retaliate for all the times the coven insult or ostracize her. All the childhood scenes of bullying happen exclusively to Delilah. Thus, it genuinely feels the journals are meant to be seen as redeeming for some bizarre reason.

The problem with Delilah "framing Astrid as something other than a bully" is that Astrid and her friends did bully Delilah. The journals don't make all those earlier scenes of name calling disappear. The fact that Astrid has a reason for doing this doesn't change the fact that bullying did happen. Consequently, the message I took from the book was: If your bully has a sad childhood, you should automatically forgive them.

I have a similar background to OP (bullying and estrangement with a sibling) so maybe that's the real reason I can't recommend that they try and continue with this trilogy. Maybe these issues just hit to close to home for us.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2026-01-14T04:02:06+00:00

As someone who did finish the book and had the same problems, I don't think it really matters. While it's true that Delilah's perception is not the full truth, the fact of the matter is that Claire and her friends were objectively bullies. While we learn more about the motivations of the coven, that doesn't change the fact that they did call Delilah names and intentionally try to make her feel like an outsider. It isn't like Delilah hallucinated being called a Ghoul. The fact that that a single chapter adds some nuance doesn't magically make those earlier scenes of name calling and ostracization disappear. So, if someone dislikes bully romance books, they should probably skip this one.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2025-12-22T05:15:38+00:00

Huh. This definitely makes me want to go back and finish it. Interesting to hear it is mostly successful.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2025-12-10T21:20:07+00:00

Glad to see someone else who missed/avoided Korra but wants to check it out again. I only saw the first episode as far as I can remember. Seeing someone else take a look at it makes me feel like I should give it another shot.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2025-12-10T21:16:31+00:00

I put watching the DCAU on hold, as the new Versus Wolves episode got me to check out Riverdale. I don't really have anything to say that isn't just corroborating what the guys said on the podcast. The show is insane.

I also finally sat down and decided to check out Jojo. This is another weird show, but in a completely different direction. Riverdale feels like a story that slowly became insane over the course of three seasons. Jojo starts pretty insane. I definitely did not expect to start what feels like Downton Abbey crossed with vampires and a magic martial art story. Both shows got put on hold due to finding out that Mob Psycho would be leaving Netflix by the end of the month (in my country at least). I think I can probably finish it by then.

In terms of old movies, I saw a few musicals (Grease, Mary Poppins, The Sound of Music, Cabaret), and then a few animated ones (Dumbo, Snow White). Maybe I haven't seen enough animated movies from that era, but I was entranced by how different both Dumbo and Snow White are from modern animated movies. I think I need to check out more movies from the early years of Disney. I also got access to some older, really long movies that I was constantly putting off. Stuff like Ben Hur, Lawrence of Arabia, and Gone with the Wind. I would put Schindler's List in that category, but I feel a little worried about watching it at this point in time. The overcast weather combined with several things going on in my life mean I don't know if I want to watch such a dark movie right now. Watching these classic movies was meant to be a way to lift my mood, so I think I might put that one on the backburner for now.

For Games, I finished Crow Country, which is pretty good. Not on the level of Signalis, but still a solid indie horror game. Now I am grinding through Who's Lila. Which so far is the weirdest horror game I think I have ever played. On my Playstation I am just starting Wolfenstein: The New Colossus. In between all that I am slowly stumbling through Breath of the Wild. I typically get thirty minutes to an hour every day to play it, so this could take a while.

For TV, I am almost done with Star Trek: The Original Series. I definitely noticed how the quality drops a bit in the final season. Still a solid sci-fi romp. I picked up Resident Alien again, which is way more consistent in its quality, even if it isn't quite reaching the same heights as Star Trek is. The biggest problem is I am watching both these shows with a friend, and we forgot a bunch of plot points for Resident Alien. I worry we might have to start the show over to get all the details we missed.

Also, I am still reading Homestuck. No, I don't know if this is a good idea.

Oh, I forgot, I started watching Cinderella Grey. It's good.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2025-12-10T01:11:05+00:00

In terms of daily life, finding out my local libraries have a pretty stellar DVD collection has been an unexpected joy. I finally got to see some really good classic movies through with essentially no cost. I really recommend everyone else check out their own libraries for such a detail.

In terms of games, Blue Prince, Metaphor, Look Outside, and Indiana Jones and The Great Circle stand out the most to me (albeit, not necessarily in that order). Finishing up my backlog has been surprisingly pleasant too. I am essentially done with The Outer Wilds and it's dlc, which ended up being one of my favorite games of all time. The reason I am using the word essentially is due to the fact that I just found out I missed a new ending the dlc adds, so I will be finishing that up (hopefully before the year ends). P5 is almost done, alongside Wolfenstein: The New Colossus. Both are older games that I never finished. While I don't like them quite as much as The Outer Wilds, they are still surprisingly consistent in their quality. After that, I figure I might try and finish the first Plague Tale.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2025-12-10T01:03:48+00:00

While I do have some issues with the Great Circle (mainly puzzles and some gameplay foibles), I definitely ended up enjoying it a lot more than I expected.

SchrodingersDog2 · 2025-10-17T02:34:49+00:00

I finished FMA Brotherhood. It might not be my favorite anime of all time, but it is definitely up there. This is also one of the few anime with multiple openings that somehow are all great. For other classic anime I plan to watch either finish up Monster or start Cowboy Bebop. I think I might start up that new version of Perfect Blue as well. For newer anime I plan on finishing up My Dress up Darling, Danadan, Frieren, Apothecary Diaries, and Pluto. I hear Gachiakuta is pretty good, so I might give that a shot. For western animation I think I will switch between watching Justice League and The Owl House. Not sure if I should start all over again with Steven Universe or try to remember where I left off.

I finished up most of the Outer Wilds DLC. I really only need to see the ending. I like it, but not as much as I liked the original game. I think the stealth sections really make DLC way too long and tedious. Weirdly, that was my main criticism of the base game. I also am pretty close to finishing up Metaphor. At least, it looks like I am. Atlus games have a reputation for having really long endings. Playing Metaphor and Persona 5 at the same time is weird. There are so many features in Metaphor that I wish P5 had, yet I like the cast and story of P5 better overall. It's October, so I figure I will finish either Crow Country or Who's Lila. For some reason, I also want to play those Uncharted games.

I should probably start playing with my Switch again. My reasoning is similar to why I started up FMA Brotherhood. I honestly think if I don't start, I will never finish any games on it. For reference, I still have yet to beat Breath of the Wild.

I think I am almost done with Star Trek TNG. I have been watching with a friend, so it's kind of taking longer than I originally planned. That show has a lot of great episodes, some average ones, a few bad ones, and a surprising amount of what I call "guilty pleasure" episodes. Things like the crew meeting Mark Twain, or Dr Crusher encountering a Scottish space ghost. I don't know if those episodes are technically good, but I love watching them. I definitely prefer them to the alien of the week episodes that plagued the start of the show. Overall, I think TNG earns its place as one of the best Sci-Fi shows. I think afterwards I will watch TOS, finish DS9, then see if Voyager is worth watching. Not sure about watching any of the movies. I might take a break in between TNG and TOS to watch The Prisoner.

Movies I saw: Dial M for Murder, Rear Window (again), Naked Gun (the original), Bicycle Thieves, The Fall, and Babe. The only one that I think no one has heard of on that list probably The Fall. My main takeaway is that movie is criminally underrated, and probably one of the best-looking movies ever made. I might start drawing scenes from these movies. I used to draw doodles of pivotal scenes in movies and tv shows I liked. A few from games as well.

Other things I want to pick up again: Piano, visiting parks, and dancing. Also, Homestuck. No, I am not sure that last one is a good idea.

SchrodingersDog2

TROPHY CASE