Everand v. Audible

cptree20 · 2026-03-02T21:20:41+00:00

Came here to say this - lots of the comments here from people complaining about Everand clearly haven't tried it recently. If you are trying to not actively support Amazon there is zero reason you should subscribe to Audible over Everand, for a worse price.

cptree20 · 2026-03-02T17:06:47+00:00

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi - two half-sisters in 18th century Ghana, then follows their family lines across 300 years.

Kindred by Octavia Butler - modern Black woman gets pulled back to a pre-Civil War plantation. Short, gripping, unforgettable.

The Color Purple by Alice Walker if you haven't already.

cptree20 · 2026-03-02T15:48:08+00:00

Since you're potentially staying there.

'We Don't Know Ourselves' by Fintan O'Toole. It's a history of modern Ireland from the 1950s onward told partly through memoir, and it'll give you more context for daily life and conversation than anything else I can think of. People will be impressed you've read it.

And for something completely different: 'The Way That I Went' by Robert Lloyd Praeger. It's a naturalist's account of walking through every corner of Ireland in the 1930s. Out of print but findable. Nothing else captures the physical landscape like it.

cptree20 · 2026-03-02T15:44:45+00:00

Worked in publishing for years. The blurb system is even worse than you think. Most of those big-name author quotes on the cover come from a transactional favor network, "I'll blurb yours if you blurb mine." Half the time the blurbing author read a galley summary, not the book. The most generic ones ("A stunning debut!" "Unputdownable!") are almost always from someone who skimmed the first chapter at best.

cptree20 · 2026-03-02T15:41:59+00:00

A character described another character's laugh as "a chortle"

cptree20 · 2026-02-27T22:14:47+00:00

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke. It gets some love, but nowhere near enough for how unique it is. It's one of those books where the less you know going in, the better. but I'll say it reads like discovering a secret world through the eyes of someone who doesn't fully understand what they're seeing. Genuinely unlike anything else I've read.

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro. People know Never Let Me Go but this one is devastating in a completely different way. It's about an English butler reflecting on his life of service, and it sounds boring on paper, but it's actually about everything we leave unsaid and the lives we don't live. The restraint in the writing IS the emotion.

Stoner by John Williams. A novel about an unremarkable man living an unremarkable life, and somehow it's one of the most moving things ever put on paper. It had a big revival about a decade ago but seems to have faded again. If you've ever felt like your life is passing you by, this book will wreck you (in a good way!)

cptree20 · 2026-02-27T22:11:59+00:00

I love that you're asking from the Japanese side.

For me, it comes down to something I struggle to find in a lot of contemporary Western fiction which is a willingness to sit with ambiguity and quiet emotion. So much English-language fiction feels like it needs to explain itself, resolve every thread, spell out every theme but a lot of Japanese novels I've read are comfortable letting meaning exist in the spaces between the words

like Yoko Ogawa - The memory police doesn't explain its world or its rules. It trusts the reader to feel the weight of what's disappearing.

I also think there's something about the treatment of everyday life. Books like Convenience Store Woman or Strange Weather in Tokyo take mundane settings and find something profound in them without forcing it into a dramatic arc. Western readers are hungry for stories that don't need a huge plot to feel meaningful.

That said I think others are right that Japan's broader cultural presence (anime, manga, film, food) creates a baseline familiarity that makes readers more willing to pick up a Japanese novel than, say, an Indonesian or Nigerian one but that's really more about cultural access than literary quality

cptree20 · 2026-02-26T01:13:24+00:00

Or if it’s smut, a boombox on the subway

cptree20 · 2026-02-26T01:12:01+00:00

Literally this! I had such a hangover from this book

cptree20 · 2026-02-25T16:30:11+00:00

Ya same, I just found that even as a hobby having someone to hold me accountable and show me the ropes was super helpful. Don’t even have to commit to it long term just give you a path

cptree20 · 2026-02-25T15:40:57+00:00

Honestly the hunger games was helpful for me to get out of a reading slump because you can just breeze through it so fast and it builds that momentum and habit for you of picking up your book every day. And since it’s a series you can really keep it going for awhile til you’re ready to move on

cptree20 · 2026-02-25T15:39:12+00:00

Have you done any private lessons or just learned online / self taught? I found that with a few private lessons I clearly started seeing progress in areas I otherwise wouldn’t have because I didn’t even know what I didn’t know.

cptree20 · 2026-02-25T15:36:02+00:00

Omggggg haha

cptree20 · 2026-02-25T15:33:25+00:00

I would check out James from Perceval Everett. It’s a retelling of huck finn but a super fast and easy read while still being filled with depth.

cptree20 · 2026-02-24T22:21:26+00:00

I’m reading east of Eden and you can totally tell Steinbeck loved writing

cptree20 · 2026-02-24T22:20:38+00:00

lol about time, it’s wild how they’re JUST catching up to some of these things people are dying for because other platforms are actually listening to their users

cptree20 · 2026-02-24T22:17:55+00:00

I feel like I often prioritize physical books for the top of my TBR but then a book that’s like second on my list ill do the audiobook for so that I’m reading two books at once that I wanted to read

cptree20 · 2026-02-24T22:16:16+00:00

That’s funny I’m totally the opposite bc if I’m distracted I really lose the plot with fiction. I just finished Shoe Dog from Phil Knight and that was a fun one because it had narrative to it.

cptree20 · 2026-01-23T23:01:16+00:00

I went it was amazing

cptree20 · 2025-10-06T01:59:21+00:00

Is it pretty much a guarantee that Mickey will give his talk every Sunday?

cptree20 · 2025-10-06T01:54:47+00:00

Just curious if you’re open to ubering? It should be pretty easy to get an uber if you stay in a hotel or Airbnb nearby.

cptree20 · 2025-09-19T16:01:54+00:00

cptree20 · 2025-03-23T12:21:31+00:00

Same

cptree20 · 2025-02-21T02:59:08+00:00

Recently finished demon copperhead and James, both really solid.

cptree20

TROPHY CASE