100% real

The Secret Life of Cows, by Rosamund Young

"Jude?" he asks.

"Go ahead" I say.

I hear the glamour enter his voice, heady and seductive and more powerful than I expected. "Crawl to me", he says with a grin. Embarrassment pinks on my cheeks.

I CAN'TTTTT, THEY'RE SOOO AAHHHHUEKENIEOWNWUWNW 🫶🏻🫶🏻🫶🏻

I hope to be talked about the way Patroclus talks of Achilles.

I’ve felt kind of off about my book recently, I’ve had a lot of rejection and I’ve started to think maybe I should just quit.

But then I think: what if one day it’s real? What if one day there is an actual book in the world, with a real cover and real pages and my name written on the real spine? And what if people read it? Maybe one day there’ll be people who want to keep it perfect, who don’t even want to crack the spines, who will lament over the slightest crease to the pretty pretty cover, who’ll keep their copy on a clean, beautiful shelf so pristine and perfect, who’ll share with the pages their favourite book mark with it’s pattern or it’s quote or it’s ribbon or the thousand other things that could make it special; maybe one day there’ll be people who will fold the pages, who’ll crack the spine, who’ll panic because they accidentally dropped it in the bath, who’ll underline their favourite quotes with their favourite pencil that they always have to tell themselves to stop chewing the end of; maybe one day there’ll be people who’ll put pen against the pages, who’ll draw stars and hearts in the margins, who’ll share their every thought on every page that was worth something enough to them to write on; maybe one day there’ll be people who’ll choose the perfect coloured tabs to match the cover, who’ll create a key, who’ll deem me worthy of their favourite highlighters, who’ll be able to look at the pages of their closed copy, run their fingers over those perfect coloured tabs, and see their thoughts as they read laid out before them; maybe one day there’ll be people who’ll borrow it from libraries, who’ll wipe dust from the cover, even if it’s slightly faded with time beneath the plastic sheath who’ll write their names on a card glued neatly into the front so they are part of it forever.

What if I am lucky enough to one day see a book that is not just my soul, but the souls of readers as well?

Keep writing my loves, keep writing 🖤

Celebrating 40 years of The Colour of Magic! 

The Discworld series of books has been around for what seems like a lifetime, with 41 books in the main series and a huge amount of companions, maps, atlases, colouring books and short stories, Discworld has been in people’s consciousness for almost as long as I have been on this planet. 

It all started, however, with a set of 4 short stories which featured Rincewind the inept wizard and Twoflower, the Discworld’s first tourist which were published by Colin Smythe Publishing as the book we love The Colour of Magic on 24th Nov 1983.

We all fell head over heels in love with the Luggage and marvelled at Rincewind’s amazing ability to stay alive. Twoflower’s constant positivity at all the chaos and potential death inducing moments keeps the stories humourous whilst also giving us, the readers, a firm view of the planet we were going to spend the next 40 years wishing we were living on. 

Terry Pratchett was never going to be a fantasy writer, he wanted to write serious science fiction, how different would things be if he had never written The Colour of Magic. 

Tonight we will raise a glass to the book that started the Discworld swimming, we hope you will too. 

If you don’t own a copy, you can grab one via our Bookshop, https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/40-years-of-the-colour-of-magic-by-terry-pratchett

"instead of flowers, bring her rare books" 🤍♪

- Mahmoud Darwish🤍

Seems legit

Cardan telling Jude that he loves her, is the only thing that made my happy

Another glimpse into my shelves

I want to meet you again in this lifetime and fall in love with you. Again. Get the timing right this time. There's still so much love left in me that was meant for you and i cannot give it to anyone else. It is spilling out of my heart with each tear but I cannot consciously give it to some other person. I must love you right to love anyone else in future. It seems like my mind is hyperfixated on the idea of loving just you. Anyone else in the future must know you to love me right. They say it's not healthy to live in the past but what does it matter to me, I must love you a second time.

-inmybook

Shoutout to the guy at the Waterstones counter one time a year or so ago who looked me up and down then said “I’m gonna assume you have a loyalty card”. Like yeah I was buying 7 books but still

embroidery in a book