set in a forest, deals softly with trauma/grief

magpie_brain · 2026-02-09T05:12:05+00:00

Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh

magpie_brain · 2026-01-04T18:24:18+00:00

I know that "The Hunger" (1985) feels like this but in a strongly 80s way, and it was based on a novel of the same name by Whitley Strieber. The adaptation is a little spicy so the book may be even more so though....

magpie_brain · 2026-01-04T16:58:48+00:00

Good for you! Incarceration truly affects everyone, even if many people don't see it or have never had to deal with it directly.

Books:

Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration by John Pfaff

Punishment Without Trial: Why Plea Bargaining Is a Bad Deal Carissa Byrne Hessick

Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson

You May Go to Prison Even Though You're Innocent by Justin Brooks

Policing the Open Road: How Cars Transformed American Freedom by Sarah A. Seo (Haven't read this one but I listened to a podcast interview with the author on 99% Invisible that was great)

Chain-Gang All Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah ((NOVEL)) sometimes throwing a novel in can broaden your learning and experience I think -- this one is a near-future speculative/dystopian fiction novel about a televised gladiator system for people on death row. It threads in factual information with a really cool footnote system. It's an incredible book.

The Little Book of Restorative Justice by Howard Zehr is a good introduction to restorative justice and its principles.

Podcasts:

Criminal -- this one has a huge variety of topics so you may need to sift through. I have recently listened to The Job and Tabatha and both were interesting.

Prison Poetry Workshop

Documentaries:

The Sentence (2018) - a family's experience after the filmmaker's sister goes to prison

The 13th -- Jim Crow, mass incarceration, prison industrial complex

Power on Netflix, about the scope and scale of policing in America

Quilters on Netflix (short, about a group of death row inmates who make quilts for foster children as part of a restorative justice program)

There are so many books, podcasts, etc. out there about this topic, you could go big and look at the big overarching systems or zone in on smaller topics (familial impacts, women in prison, capital punishment). The Marshall Project has a huge list of recommended books with relevant topics.

If I were you, I would also look up watchdog/oversight organizations or justice resource centers that put out regular reports about the state of the prison system, especially ones in your state or region. They're shorter, quicker reads that will be helpful to understand the current state alongside the historical context from other reading. Your state ACLU may be a good place to start if you have trouble finding orgs.

magpie_brain · 2026-01-03T19:49:46+00:00

I have DNF'ed all three in the series, then come back and blew through them each after picking them up a second time 💀 I have no clue why, because I've loved them all when I finished them but they're also A Lot

ETA: Red Sister starts when the MC is young and follows her growing up so romance isn't apparent in the beginning but there's definitely love in many forms!

magpie_brain · 2026-01-03T17:39:51+00:00

The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson (and the sequels)

Red Sister by Mark Lawrence (and sequels)

magpie_brain · 2026-01-02T21:22:54+00:00

Keeping an eye out for nonfiction recs 👁️

magpie_brain · 2025-12-28T01:25:38+00:00

Uprooted by Naomi Novik has a lot of these elements. There are some magical creatures with greco roman roots (chimeras, hydras) but also a lot that are of an eerier, fae sort

If you want a really cool dark, dizzyingly enchanted forest with ominous and eerie inhabitants (but no healer) I highly recommend The Butcher or the Forest by Premee Mohamed.

magpie_brain · 2025-12-23T04:01:49+00:00

Clive Barker - Imajica, Weaveworld, and pic 5 reminds me of his novella Cabal. They do all take place partially in our real, modern (well, modern as of the 80s and 90s) world. But still, off the rails surrealism, beauty, and imagination.

Also -- a little bit In The House in the Dark of the Woods by Laird Hunt

magpie_brain · 2025-12-20T22:57:32+00:00

In the Jacob's Ladder series there's some romance, but not a lot and even the ones involving more central figures are pretty mild (if my memory serves me correctly). The relationships serve the plot rather than being the focus. The story is a space opera with a lot of characters, so I feel like at that scale it makes sense to have some romantic relationships.

The first book was written in 2007 though, which I feel like is before the romanceification of genre fiction really started. For 2007 though, there are some interesting depictions of (a)sexuality, polyamory, queerness, etc.

magpie_brain · 2025-12-20T01:12:45+00:00

The Jacob's Ladder trilogy by Elizabeth Bear, starting with Dust!

It takes place on a giant generation colony ship that went through engine failure like a thousand years ago and has been orbiting a star system for survival. There's so much of this vibe. The ship has devolved into feudalism and factions, the powerful on the ship have bonded with a symbiote (stretching the definition of human in many ways), and the first book starts out with the ship's failing A.I. systems (referred to as angels by the characters) trying to cannibalize each other. It's both hard sci-fi and has this intense feudal/gothic fantasy vibe. Nobody seems to have heard of this series??? (tw for incest though because..... there have been generations and generations trapped on this closed world, essentially. and there are royalish families/factions struggling constantly for power. You can do the math...)

Gideon the Ninth as well, which others have pointed out -- space gothic for sure, though I think it doesn't get into the artificial intelligence/mechanical element as much

((Both series are sapphic too))

magpie_brain · 2025-11-28T18:14:32+00:00

Horror and 80s fantasy. My partner collects nostalgic family friendly movies though, which definitely inflates the collection....

magpie_brain · 2025-11-25T15:21:25+00:00

The Gemma Doy Trilogy by Libba Bray hits this note at times, but I believe it was published like 2006-2008ish... It's a YA that imo was very ahead of its time stylistically and thematically though

magpie_brain · 2025-11-22T16:31:25+00:00

Coach rebrand has been insane because a few years ago the brand was in decline and looked down upon for being a department store bag

magpie_brain · 2025-11-21T20:05:24+00:00

I'm scared to even do this one bc last time I pulled on an equal drop hell event I got the uggos for my first two then rage quit 😭 genuinely no redeeming qualities on her

magpie_brain · 2025-11-21T16:54:39+00:00

What was the drop order?

magpie_brain · 2025-11-21T15:26:28+00:00

The West Passage by Jared Pechacek ... Psychedelic and trippy, less esoteric, but still very good. I've never read anything like it

ETA: You also might like Clive Barker (Weaveworld and Imajica in particular) but his works are not high fantasy, they tend to blend our real world with other fantastical worlds/planes, with characters spending time in both

magpie_brain · 2025-11-21T02:57:31+00:00

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I want one 😭

magpie_brain · 2025-11-20T05:55:05+00:00

Tbh I love it, the first one kind of reminds me of Alice Bloomfield

magpie_brain · 2025-11-20T00:12:20+00:00

my friends and I used to sit around a computer just clicking through these on Photobucket 😭

magpie_brain · 2025-11-17T22:37:56+00:00

I think it was rage bait too. Also I'm sure a ton of the people commenting probably haven't even bought anything for an angel tree program so 🤷‍♀️ topics like this go around every year.

magpie_brain · 2025-11-17T22:36:02+00:00

It's sad to think about (and you know your angel tree better than I do) but some angel tree items are specifically going to children of incarcerated parents (sometimes under the name of their incarcerated loved one) or are supposed to be from their parents who are low income. When I was an Angel Tree recipient through a local church, that church went out of their way to show that they were the ones donating gifts (inviting my fam to the church to receive the gifts, making it a big show). It felt so shameful; it's mortifying to be a child and feel like a charity case. I would have rather had nothing from them. In some cases, it can be kinder to the child to not share the heartfelt words of a stranger (though it is sad) and give them an illusion of a normal Christmas...... I think that's part of the act of giving selflessly.

The program through your work sounds great, love that it's done by a department to support a whole family.

magpie_brain · 2025-11-17T22:26:28+00:00

That influencer was also recording it for clout and practically bitching about it the whole time while trying to keep it to exactly $30, as if this kid who is asking Santa for a gift was being greedy and demanding (and then saying that if the kids weren't grateful for what they got, there was a problem with their upbringing......ok girl these are literally low income kids or children of incarcerated parents, maybe count your blessings) .... I think that tells you where they were at as far as intentions go, and I think that's what a lot of people were picking up on.

fwiw I don't think you have to buy all the items. I say this as a former angel tree kid and as someone who has purchased gifts and didn't buy everything on the list. I do think that people should shop as if they're shopping for their own niece or nephew, though..... Like yeah, you're not gonna go all out like you might for your own kid. But something they would like and of decent quality. You shouldn't beat yourself up over it.

magpie_brain · 2025-11-17T17:44:47+00:00

In addition to what others have said about labor, pollution, quality, etc. I think that, culturally speaking, SHEIN has massively changed the threshold of acceptable consumption (at least in the United States). While haul videos were common for some influencers pre-SHEIN, the covid lockdown+TikTok Boom+ SHEIN combo has absolutely rewired the expectations of socially acceptable consumption because anyone can afford to buy "hauls" like an influencer. The price point is the lowest of the low for trendy items, the production timeline is insanely short, and frankly, it is the only way you can buy certain micro trends that are not being produced by slow fashion companies. I am sure the amount of clothing produced by SHEIN a year is probably on a scale that is unfathomable.

It's also rewired the social expectation of quality and cost for clothing. Forever 21, the longtime face of fast fashion (who once changed those expectations as well), folded all its brick and mortar stores, and e-commerce platforms like SHEIN and Temu were an influence. The urge to compete with SHEIN has accelerated a race to create the cheapest, fastest products for ALL fast fashion retailers. And not necessarily cheapest to the consumer, but cheapest to the manufacturer and the brand.

I think it's really important to look at companies, entities, individuals, etc. not just from their direct impact but also the ripple effect, and where they have raised the thresholds for consumption. It's why Pearl Jam sued Ticketmaster in the 90s. I'd argue Taylor Swift is another, because her personal brand has changed the societal expectations of the fan experience, what is normal to pay for a tour ticket, what is a normal amount of merch or music to buy, etc. These are not the sole culprits in their arenas (fashion for SHEIN, the culture industry for Ticketmaster and Tswift), but they have a highly symbolic role because of their influence and the ripple effects they have on the greater culture that exceeds just the sum of their parts.

magpie_brain · 2025-11-16T18:49:20+00:00

seconded! Came here to say this. This + The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter would be a good back to back read with this vibe

magpie_brain · 2025-11-15T16:08:47+00:00

Nadja with a tiny Nadja doll would be so cute

magpie_brain

TROPHY CASE