Marissa's bookshelf: all en-US Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:29:03 -0700 60 Marissa's bookshelf: all 144 41 https://www.goodreads.com/images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined]]> 11107244 Selected by The New York Times Book Review as a Notable Book of the Year. The author of The New York Times bestseller The Stuff of Thought offers a controversial history of violence.

Faced with the ceaseless stream of news about war, crime, and terrorism, one could easily think we live in the most violent age ever seen. Yet as New York Times bestselling author Steven Pinker shows in this startling and engaging new work, just the opposite is true: violence has been diminishing for millennia and we may be living in the most peaceful time in our species' existence. For most of history, war, slavery, infanticide, child abuse, assassinations, pogroms, gruesome punishments, deadly quarrels, and genocide were ordinary features of life. But today, Pinker shows (with the help of more than a hundred graphs and maps) all these forms of violence have dwindled and are widely condemned. How has this happened?

This groundbreaking book continues Pinker's exploration of the essence of human nature, mixing psychology and history to provide a remarkable picture of an increasingly nonviolent world. The key, he explains, is to understand our intrinsic motives- the inner demons that incline us toward violence and the better angels that steer us away-and how changing circumstances have allowed our better angels to prevail. Exploding fatalist myths about humankind's inherent violence and the curse of modernity, this ambitious and provocative book is sure to be hotly debated in living rooms and the Pentagon alike, and will challenge and change the way we think about our society.]]> 802 Steven Pinker 0670022950 Marissa 0 to-read 4.16 2010 The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined
author: Steven Pinker
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/04/04
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]]> <![CDATA[Female Husbands: A Trans History]]> 51771013 Female Husbands offers a dynamic, varied, and complex history of the LGBTQ past.]]> 350 Jen Manion 1108483801 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.03 2020 Female Husbands: A Trans History
author: Jen Manion
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> <![CDATA[A Court This Cruel & Lovely (Kingdom of Lies, #1)]]> 122779502
The day I meet him, the ruthless mercenary leaves me for dead.

Just hours after humans are born, the gods take what little power we have. In return, they protect our borders from the vicious, merciless fae.

The humans who manage to keep their power are known as the corrupt.
And they are burned.

When my forbidden power is discovered, I’m forced to flee my tiny village and the life I adore.

To survive, I make a desperate bargain with the mercenary who abandoned me at my weakest.

Our deal is simple: I’ll help him and his mysterious friends sneak into the city. And he’ll help me learn to wield the strange, dark power I’ve always kept hidden. The power that may just be the key to my survival.

But the ruthless mercenary is hiding secrets of his own. Secrets that threaten the safety of everyone I love. Secrets that could tear this kingdom—and perhaps even this world—apart.

Please note: A Court This Cruel and Lovely is an NA/adult romantasy book with steam. While this series is slow burn, the chili pepper rating will increase for each book.]]> 562 Stacia Stark Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.09 2023 A Court This Cruel & Lovely (Kingdom of Lies, #1)
author: Stacia Stark
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> <![CDATA[Candle & Crow (Ink & Sigil, #3)]]> 204640536 From the New York Times bestselling author of The Iron Druid Chronicles comes the final book in the Ink & Sigil series, as an ink-slinging wizard pursues the answer to a very personal mystery: Who cast a pair of curses on his head?

Al MacBharrais has a most unusual job: He’s a practitioner of ink-and-sigil magic, tasked with keeping order among the gods and monsters that dwell hidden in the human world. But there’s one supernatural mystery he’s never been able to solve: Years ago, someone cast twin curses on him that killed off his apprentices and drove away loved ones who heard him speak, leaving him bereft and isolated.

But he’s not quite alone: As Al works to solve this mystery, his friends draw him into their own eccentric dramas. Buck Foi the hobgoblin has been pondering his own legacy—and has a plan for a daring shenanigan that will make him the most celebrated hobgoblin of all. Nadia, goth queen and battle seer, is creating her own cult around a god who loves whisky and cheese.

And the Morrigan, a former Irish death goddess, has decided she wants not only to live as an ordinary woman but also to face the most perilous challenge of the mortal world: online dating.

Meanwhile, Al crosses paths with old friends and new—including some beloved Druids and their very good dogs—in his globe-trotting quest to solve the mystery of his curses. But he’s pulled in so many different directions by his colleagues, a suspicious detective, and the whims of destructive gods that Al begins to wonder: Will he ever find time to write his own happy ending?]]> 352 Kevin Hearne 1984821318 Marissa 4 4.23 2024 Candle & Crow (Ink & Sigil, #3)
author: Kevin Hearne
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/27
date added: 2025/03/27
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]]> The Pairing 199440249 definitely not.

Theo and Kit have been a lot of things: childhood best friends, crushes, in love, and now estranged exes. After a brutal breakup on the transatlantic flight to their dream European food and wine tour, they exited each other's lives once and for all.

Time apart has done them good. Theo has found confidence as a hustling bartender by night and aspiring sommelier by day, with a long roster of casual lovers. Kit, who never returned to America, graduated as the reigning sex god of his pastry school class and now bakes at one of the finest restaurants in Paris. Sure, nothing really compares to what they had, and life stretches out long and lonely ahead of them, but—yeah. It's in the past.

All that remains is the unused voucher for the European tour that never happened, good for 48 months after its original date and about to expire. Four years later, it seems like a great idea to finally take the trip. Solo. Separately.

It's not until they board the tour bus that they discover they've both accidentally had the exact same idea, and now they're trapped with each other for three weeks of stunning views, luscious flavors, and the most romantic cities of France, Spain, and Italy. It's fine. There's nothing left between them. So much nothing that, when Theo suggests a friendly wager to see who can sleep with their hot Italian tour guide first, Kit is totally game. And why stop there? Why not a full-on European hookup competition?

But sometimes a taste of everything only makes you crave what you can't have.]]> 407 Casey McQuiston 1250862744 Marissa 0 to-read 3.65 2024 The Pairing
author: Casey McQuiston
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/22
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]]> <![CDATA[Chronic Pain, BDSM and Crip Time (Interdisciplinary Disability Studies)]]> 78260354 118 Emma Sheppard 0367438828 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.33 Chronic Pain, BDSM and Crip Time (Interdisciplinary Disability Studies)
author: Emma Sheppard
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.33
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/03
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]]> <![CDATA[Mating in Captivity: Reconciling the Erotic and the Domestic]]> 27485
In her 20 years of clinical experience, Perel has treated hundreds of couples whose home lives are empty of passion. They describe relationships that are open and loving, yet sexually dull. What is going on?

In this explosively original book, Perel explains that our cultural penchant for equality, togetherness, and absolute candor is antithetical to erotic desire for both men and women. Sexual excitement doesn't always play by the rules of good citizenship. It is politically incorrect. It thrives on power plays, unfair advantages, and the space between self and other. More exciting, playful, even poetic sex is possible, but first we must kick egalitarian ideals and emotional housekeeping out of our bedrooms.

While Mating in Captivity shows why the domestic realm can feel like a cage, Perel's take on bedroom dynamics promises to liberate, enchant, and provoke. Flinging the doors open on erotic life and domesticity, she invites us to put the "X" back in sex.

©2006 Esther Perel (P)2006 HarperCollins Publishers]]> 220 Esther Perel 0060753633 Marissa 3 4.16 2006 Mating in Captivity: Reconciling the Erotic and the Domestic
author: Esther Perel
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2006
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/03
date added: 2025/02/03
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]]> <![CDATA[The Book of Life (All Souls, #3)]]> 16054217 The #1 New York Times bestselling series finale and sequel to A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night

Bringing the magic and suspense of the All Souls Trilogy to a deeply satisfying conclusion, this highly anticipated finale went straight to #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. In The Book of Life, Diana and Matthew time-travel back from Elizabethan London to make a dramatic return to the present—facing new crises and old enemies. At Matthew’s ancestral home, Sept-Tours, they reunite with the beloved cast of characters from A Discovery of Witches—with one significant exception. But the real threat to their future has yet to be revealed, and when it is, the search for Ashmole 782 and its missing pages takes on even more urgency.]]> 561 Deborah Harkness 0670025593 Marissa 0 to-read 4.15 2014 The Book of Life (All Souls, #3)
author: Deborah Harkness
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/17
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Cruel Prince (The Folk of the Air, #1)]]> 26032825 Of course I want to be like them. They’re beautiful as blades forged in some divine fire. They will live forever.

And Cardan is even more beautiful than the rest. I hate him more than all the others. I hate him so much that sometimes when I look at him, I can hardly breathe.

Jude was seven when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King.

To win a place at the Court, she must defy him–and face the consequences.

As Jude becomes more deeply embroiled in palace intrigues and deceptions, she discovers her own capacity for trickery and bloodshed. But as betrayal threatens to drown the Courts of Faerie in violence, Jude will need to risk her life in a dangerous alliance to save her sisters, and Faerie itself.]]> 384 Holly Black 0316310271 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.00 2018 The Cruel Prince (The Folk of the Air, #1)
author: Holly Black
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/14
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> <![CDATA[Death's Master (Flat Earth, #2)]]> 669027 Death's Master, winner of the August Derleth Award for Fantasy, is the second book of the stunning arabesque high fantasy series Tales from the Flat Earth, which, in the manner of the One Thousand and One Nights, portrays an ancient world in mythic grandeur via connected tales.

Long time ago when the Earth was Flat, beautiful indifferent Gods lived in the airy Upperearth realm above, curious passionate demons lived in the exotic Underearth realm below, and mortals were relegated to exist in the middle.

Uhlume, Lord of Death, second of the Lords of Darkness, King of Shadow and Pallor, makes an unusual bargain which sets in motion an intricate sequence of events that entangle men and gods, queens and kings, sorcerers and witches, and lowly wanderers. When the secret to immortality falls into human hands, dark magic and wickedness are unleashed, testing the bounds of mortal love and sanity, and questioning the nature and purpose of life itself.

Come within this ancient world of brilliant darkness and beauty, of glittering palaces and wondrous elegant beings, of cruel passions and undying love.

Rediscover the exotic wonder that is the Flat Earth.

]]> 348 Tanith Lee 0879974419 Marissa 0 to-read 4.23 1979 Death's Master (Flat Earth, #2)
author: Tanith Lee
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1979
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/14
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]]> <![CDATA[Night's Master (Tales from the Flat Earth #1)]]> 882258 208 Tanith Lee 0886771315 Marissa 0 to-read 4.07 1978 Night's Master (Tales from the Flat Earth #1)
author: Tanith Lee
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1978
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/14
shelves: to-read
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]]> Snakes and Ladders 358863 48 Alan Moore 0957789653 Marissa 0 to-read 3.87 2001 Snakes and Ladders
author: Alan Moore
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/14
shelves: to-read
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]]> Promethea, Vol. 1 821800
Sophie Bangs was a just an ordinary college student in a weirdly futuristic New York when a simple assignment changed her life forever. While researching Promethea, a mythical warrior woman, Sophie receives a cryptic warning to cease her investigations. Ignoring the cautionary notice, she continues her studies and is almost killed by a shadowy creature when she learns the secret of Promethea. Surviving the encounter, Sophie soon finds herself transformed into Promethea, the living embodiment of the imagination. Her trials have only begun as she must master the secrets of her predecessors before she is destroyed by Promethea's ancient enemy.]]> 178 Alan Moore 1563896672 Marissa 0 to-read 3.91 2000 Promethea, Vol. 1
author: Alan Moore
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/14
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]]> <![CDATA[The God of Lost Words (Hell's Library, #3)]]> 56982188
Claire, the rakish Hero, the angel Rami, and the muse turned librarian Brevity have accomplished the impossible by discovering the true nature of unwritten books. But now that the secret is out, Hell will be coming for every wing of the library in its quest for power.]]> 353 A.J. Hackwith 1984806416 Marissa 3 4.13 2021 The God of Lost Words (Hell's Library, #3)
author: A.J. Hackwith
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2025/01/11
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]]> <![CDATA[House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City, #1)]]> 44778083
Hunt Athalar is a notorious Fallen angel, now enslaved to the Archangels he once attempted to overthrow. His brutal skills and incredible strength have been set to one purpose-to assassinate his boss's enemies, no questions asked. But with a demon wreaking havoc in the city, he's offered an irresistible deal: help Bryce find the murderer, and his freedom will be within reach.

As Bryce and Hunt dig deep into Crescent City's underbelly, they discover a dark power that threatens everything and everyone they hold dear, and they find, in each other, a blazing passion-one that could set them both free, if they'd only let it.

With unforgettable characters, sizzling romance, and page-turning suspense, this richly inventive new fantasy series delves into the heartache of loss, the price of freedom-and the power of love.]]> 803 Sarah J. Maas 1635574048 Marissa 3 4.43 2020 House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City, #1)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2025/01/11
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]]> <![CDATA[Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong]]> 296662 Lies My Teacher Told Me won the American Book Award and the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship.

James W. Loewen, a sociology professor and distinguished critic of history education, puts 12 popular textbooks under the microscope-and what he discovers will surprise you. In his opinion, every one of these texts fails to make its subject interesting or memorable. Worse still is the proliferation of blind patriotism, mindless optimism and misinformation filling the pages.

From the truth about Christopher Columbus to the harsh reality of the Vietnam War, Loewen picks apart the lies we've been told. This audiobook, narrated by Brian Keeler (The Hurricane, "All My Children") will forever change your view of the past.]]> 383 James W. Loewen 0684818868 Marissa 4 3.96 1995 Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong
author: James W. Loewen
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1995
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2025/01/11
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]]> <![CDATA[What Did You Do? (Infatuated Fae, #2)]]> 199204540
As she prepares for the event, Caly finds herself haunted by the memory of Malum Mendax, the Unseelie Prince, always feeling eyes are on her when she's alone; shadowy silhouettes in her room and even touching him in her dreams.

What Caly doesn't know, is that it's more than just the memory of him that haunts her.

Malum Mendax has returned to punish his pet and those that took her away from him.]]> 354 Jeneane O'Riley 1962719006 Marissa 3 3.70 2024 What Did You Do? (Infatuated Fae, #2)
author: Jeneane O'Riley
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/07/18
date added: 2025/01/11
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Tending Grief: Embodied Rituals for Holding Our Sorrow and Growing Cultures of Care in Community]]> 194477915
We live in a culture that suppresses our ability to truly feel our grief—deeply, safely, and on our own terms. But each person’s experience is as unique as the grief itself. Here, Camille Sapara Barton’s take on grief speaks directly to the ways that BIPOC and queer readers disproportionately experience unique constellations of loss.

Deeply practical and easy to use in times of confusion, trauma, and pain, Tending Grief includes rituals, reflection prompts, and exercises that help us process and metabolize our grief—without bypassing or pushing aside what comes to the fore. Sapara Barton includes exercises that can be done both alone and in community,


Sapara Barton honors each and every The loss of displacement from homelands, from severed lineages and ancestral ways of knowing. The grief of colonization and theft. The deep heaviness that burrows into our bodies when society tells us our bodies are wrong. Practical tools and rituals help readers feel into their grief, honor what comes up, and move forward in healing.

Written specifically to center and hold the grief of BIPOC readers, Tending Grief is an invitation to reconnect to what we’ve lost, to find community in our grief, and to tend to our own suffering for our individual and collective wellbeing.]]> 176 Camille Sapara Barton 1623179947 Marissa 5 4.22 Tending Grief: Embodied Rituals for Holding Our Sorrow and Growing Cultures of Care in Community
author: Camille Sapara Barton
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.22
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/09
date added: 2025/01/11
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]]> The Song of Achilles 13623848 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780062060624.

Achilles, "the best of all the Greeks," son of the cruel sea goddess Thetis and the legendary king Peleus, is strong, swift, and beautiful, irresistible to all who meet him. Patroclus is an awkward young prince, exiled from his homeland after an act of shocking violence. Brought together by chance, they forge an inseparable bond, despite risking the gods' wrath.

They are trained by the centaur Chiron in the arts of war and medicine, but when word comes that Helen of Sparta has been kidnapped, all the heroes of Greece are called upon to lay siege to Troy in her name. Seduced by the promise of a glorious destiny, Achilles joins their cause, and torn between love and fear for his friend, Patroclus follows. Little do they know that the cruel Fates will test them both as never before and demand a terrible sacrifice.]]> 408 Madeline Miller Marissa 5 4.28 2011 The Song of Achilles
author: Madeline Miller
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2011
rating: 5
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date added: 2025/01/11
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]]> Ninth House (Alex Stern, #1) 43301737 The mesmerizing adult debut from #1 New York Times bestselling author Leigh Bardugo

Galaxy “Alex” Stern is the most unlikely member of Yale’s freshman class. Raised in the Los Angeles hinterlands by a hippie mom, Alex dropped out of school early and into a world of shady drug dealer boyfriends, dead-end jobs, and much, much worse. By age twenty, in fact, she is the sole survivor of a horrific, unsolved multiple homicide. Some might say she’s thrown her life away. But at her hospital bed, Alex is offered a second chance to attend one of the world’s most elite universities on a full ride. What’s the catch, and why her?

Still searching for answers to this herself, Alex arrives in New Haven tasked by her mysterious benefactors with monitoring the activities of Yale’s secret societies. These eight windowless “tombs” are well-known to be haunts of the future rich and powerful, from high-ranking politicos to Wall Street and Hollywood’s biggest players. But their occult activities are revealed to be more sinister and more extraordinary than any paranoid imagination might conceive.]]> 476 Leigh Bardugo 1250313082 Marissa 4 4.13 2019 Ninth House (Alex Stern, #1)
author: Leigh Bardugo
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2025/01/11
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]]> Blood Over Bright Haven 208430658
"The best fantasy novel of the year" The Guardian

“The easiest 5 star I have ever given” ***** Reader Review

-------------------------------------------------------------

For twenty years, Sciona has devoted every waking moment to the study of magic.

When she finally achieves her ambition to become the first woman admitted to the High Magistry at the University of Magics and Industry, she finds herself undermined at every turn. Instead of a lab assistant, she’s paired with a janitor, putting her crucial research at risk.

But Thomil wasn’t always a janitor. Once a nomadic hunter from the wild plains outside the city, he now sees a chance to understand the forces that decimated his tribe and drove him from his homeland.

Together they will uncover an ancient secret that could change the course of magic forever – if it doesn’t get them killed first.


Praise for Blood Over Bright Haven:

“This is the new god-tier fantasy author” Reader Review

“I couldn't put it down” Reader Review

“My favourite fantasy of all time” Reader Review

“I will never emotionally recover” Reader Review

“The best book – bar none – I've read all year” Evan Winter, author of The Rage of Dragons

"This book is a merciless reckoning that leaves you reeling long after the last page is turned." Sara Hashem, Sunday Times bestselling author of The Jasad Heir

"A scathing but truthful look at the world we live in… A stunningly powerful story." Terry Brooks, author of the epic fantasy Shannara series

"Innovative and brilliantly written, this is a glorious jewel added to the crown of dark academia." Seanan McGuire, author of the Wayward Children series

"A storytelling masterclass." Mark Lawrence, author of The Book that Wouldn't Burn

"A fantastic page-turner – clever, emotional, and thematically rich. I was completely engaged the whole way through. Highly recommended!" James Islington, author of The Will of the Many]]> 428 M.L. Wang 0593873351 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.29 2023 Blood Over Bright Haven
author: M.L. Wang
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/10
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> The Lost Apothecary 53288434 A female apothecary secretly dispenses poisons to liberate women from the men who have wronged them - setting three lives across centuries on a dangerous collision course.

Rule #1: The poison must never be used to harm another woman.
Rule #2: The names of the murderer and her victim must be recorded in the apothecary’s register.

One cold February evening in 1791, at the back of a dark London alley in a hidden apothecary shop, Nella awaits her newest customer. Once a respected healer, Nella now uses her knowledge for a darker purpose - selling well-disguised poisons to desperate women who would kill to be free of the men in their lives. But when her new patron turns out to be a precocious twelve-year-old named Eliza Fanning, an unexpected friendship sets in motion a string of events that jeopardizes Nella’s world and threatens to expose the many women whose names are written in her register.

In present-day London, aspiring historian Caroline Parcewell spends her tenth wedding anniversary alone, reeling from the discovery of her husband’s infidelity. When she finds an old apothecary vial near the river Thames, she can’t resist investigating, only to realize she’s found a link to the unsolved “apothecary murders” that haunted London over two centuries ago. As she deepens her search, Caroline’s life collides with Nella’s and Eliza’s in a stunning twist of fate - and not everyone will survive.]]> 301 Sarah Penner 0778311015 Marissa 3 3.72 2021 The Lost Apothecary
author: Sarah Penner
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/10
date added: 2024/12/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames]]> 95734 227 Thich Nhat Hanh 1573229377 Marissa 0 to-read 4.07 2001 Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames
author: Thich Nhat Hanh
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/11/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Awakening to the Spirit World: The Shamanic Path of Direct Revelation]]> 7571339
- How the original practice of shamanism shaped the world's spiritual traditions and why it is still relevant today

- The art of the shamanic journey--a time-tested meditative method for experiencing important spiritual lessons and truths

- Guidance for avoiding common pitfalls of shamanic practice

- Instruction for working with your dreams, connecting to your spirit guides, healing yourself and your environment

- A CD of drumming to facilitate your shamanic journeys]]> 360 Hank Wesselman PhD 1591797500 Marissa 0 to-read 4.26 Awakening to the Spirit World: The Shamanic Path of Direct Revelation
author: Hank Wesselman PhD
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.26
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/10/15
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Somacultural Liberation: An Indigenous, Two-Spirit Somatic Guide to Integrating Cultural Experiences Toward Freedom]]> 150065149
Experience somacultural A revolutionary ideology to explore how our bodies offer portals to personal and collective freedom.

What role does dominant culture play in how we experience the sensations, thoughts, feelings, and deeper existential mysteries of our bodies?

Dr. Roger Kuhn, a Poarch Creek Two-Spirit Indigequeer activist, artist, sex therapist, and somacultural theorist, believes that Two-Spirit people hold a unique perspective—and that viewing our bodies through a somacultural lens can help us better understand how dominant culture informs and, all too often, misinforms our relationship to it.

Somacultural liberation is an embodied practice that helps people connect with the intersections of their identity. Kuhn’s revolutionary mode of inquiry illuminates the full impact of our cultural reality in shaping both our individual and shared sense of self.

The history and experiences of Native American peoples and those who identify as Two-Spirit offer the reader a path to access the full brilliance of their body. Including growth work activities, cultural assessment exercises, mindfulness practices, and nervous system regulation techniques, Somacultural Liberation provides readers with the tools and skills needed to transcend any challenges they may face in their lives.

Straddling colonial imposition and tribal significance, Two-Spirit identity offers a powerful decolonizing framework to achieve freedom and navigate the toxic systems of domination that impose upon the precious truth of who we are.]]> 208 Roger Kuhn 1623178827 Marissa 5 4.21 Somacultural Liberation: An Indigenous, Two-Spirit Somatic Guide to Integrating Cultural Experiences Toward Freedom
author: Roger Kuhn
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.21
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/09/17
date added: 2024/09/17
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]]> <![CDATA[House of Flame and Shadow (Crescent City, #3)]]> 52857700
Hunt Athalar has found himself in some deep holes in his life, but this one might be the deepest of all. After a few brief months with everything he ever wanted, he's in the Asteri's dungeons again, stripped of his freedom and without a clue as to Bryce's fate. He's desperate to help her, but until he can escape the Asteri's leash, his hands are quite literally tied.

In this sexy, breathtaking sequel to the #1 bestsellers House of Earth and Blood and House of Sky and Breath, Sarah J. Maas's Crescent City series reaches new heights as Bryce and Hunt's world is brought to the brink of collapse-with its future resting on their shoulders.]]> 835 Sarah J. Maas 1681193094 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.21 2024 House of Flame and Shadow (Crescent City, #3)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/08/29
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Game of Gods (Hades Saga, #3)]]> 56587784
Hades, God of the Dead, has finally made Persephone his in every way possible. With their wedding on the horizon, the couple should be ecstatic. But Demeter is wreaking havoc on their bliss by battering the whole of New Greece with erratic and dangerous weather. At the same time, Theseus continues with his agenda against the Gods, allying with the hate-group Triad in an effort to bring down all of Olympus.

Hades refuses to allow anything to stop him from securing Persephone as his bride, but he must play a deep strategic game with the Gods of Olympus to safeguard their future. And it is not entirely clear which Gods are truly on his side.]]> 592 Scarlett St. Clair Marissa 3 3.96 2023 A Game of Gods (Hades Saga, #3)
author: Scarlett St. Clair
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2024/08/29
date added: 2024/08/29
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]]> <![CDATA[White Feminism: From the Suffragettes to Influencers and Who They Leave Behind]]> 54238294 JOURNALIST KOA BECK’S AMBITIOUS HARVARD RESEARCH-BASED DEEP DIVE INTI HOW FEMINISM HAS BEEN COMMODIFIED AND RACIALIZED—AND THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OF THINKING THAT COULD DRIVE A NEW MOVEMENT

Fourth-wave feminism preaches empowerment for women, centering an intersectionality that has been missing from the start. Long before the Lean In phenomenon and branded empowerment conferences, women have been encouraged to “find their power” and to “know their value” when combatting institutional sexism. But we’ve also funded patriarchal institutions that have cashed in on “feminism” without actually making a real difference in the lives of the women they supposedly uplift.

From the formation of the suffragette movement over a century ago to the Women’s March in 2017, mainstream feminism has been defined by parameters dictated and sanctioned by the white women they most benefit. In White Feminism, Koa Beck details the conventions that marginalized genders have needed to adopt in order to be recognized and exposes how Indigenous, Black, brown, transgender, disabled, and undocumented women, among other disenfranchised peoples, have been overlooked in order to champion a different feminist narrative. With insights spanning from the rise of girl bosses to widespread civil unrest during a global pandemic, Beck illuminates how white feminism adheres to a political strategy that commercializes struggle and reinforces white Western supremacy.

Combining her quick-witted, cutting commentary with methodical historical research, Beck pulls from years of experience in the media industry to highlight the extent of racial prejudice, elitism, and privilege that fuels the dominant feminist discourse. She delivers a call to action that urges readers to reinvent the narrow feminist ideas that have become staples in modern gender politics, asking readers to join her in scrutinizing the capitalist, individualist, and heteronormative paradigms under which white feminism operates. In this wide-ranging analysis of the dangers of homogenizing the global feminist experience, Beck advocates for a new landscape that accounts for visibility and inclusivity.]]> 300 Koa Beck 1982134410 Marissa 5 4.25 2021 White Feminism: From the Suffragettes to Influencers and Who They Leave Behind
author: Koa Beck
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2024/08/24
date added: 2024/08/24
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Why Are People Into That?: A Cultural Investigation of Kink]]> 199464033 From a #1 Apple podcast host, Lambda Literary fellow, and former dominatrix, a sex-positive, judgement-free cultural deep-dive into the world of kink. When BDSM educator and former dominatrix Tina Horn first launched Why Are People Into That?!, publications from Esquire and Guardian to Vice, Bustle, Buzzfeed, and beyond heralded the undertaking as one of the best podcasts about sex. Each episode centered around a different aspect of kink, erotic fantasy, and human sexuality, thoughtfully and non-judgmentally examining why, exactly, different strokes work for different folks. From sex workers and scientists to artists, writers, and porn stars, Tina’s wide range of guests helped educate fascinated listeners across the world on the wide spectrum of humanity’s sexual appetite. But for every episode she released, with every guest expert she interviewed, she found her listeners more and more insatiable--and she soon realized that the only way to really address the titular question with all the depth and nuance it deserved was to turn that idea into a book. From spanking, bondage, and financial domination, to the most taboo fantasies involving cake, chains, and cannibalism, WHY ARE PEOPLE INTO THAT? explores the universal human drives that shape even the most specific erotic tastes, and the cultural context that molds and is molded by the way we conceptualize sex, pleasure, gender, fantasy, and power. Along the way, Tina invites us to reconsider everything we thought we knew about sex and sexuality. How, for example, should we think about "consensual nonconsent" in a post-#MeToo era? How does cross-dressing, as a sexual fantasy, fit in with our evolving cultural understanding of gender performance and identity? And what do foot fetishists, furries, and “femdoms” have in common? Blending insightful cultural criticism, investigative journalism, psychology, and spicy anecdotes from Tina’s 15+ years of hard-earned expertise in the sex industry and beyond, WHY ARE PEOPLE INTO THAT? is a philosophical-but-fun exploration of the prismatic spectrum of human desire and the expansive possibilities of pleasure. For readers of books like Kink and Sex at Dawn, this raunchy and rousing book is perfect for anyone who is interested not only in the intricacies of what we desire, but in how desire itself really works.]]> 320 Tina Horn 0306832569 Marissa 5 4.06 Why Are People Into That?: A Cultural Investigation of Kink
author: Tina Horn
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.06
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/07/20
date added: 2024/07/20
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]]> <![CDATA[Therapeutic BDSM: An Alternative Form of Healing]]> 212466360 172 Yulinda Rahman Ph.D. Marissa 0 currently-reading 2.00 Therapeutic BDSM: An Alternative Form of Healing
author: Yulinda Rahman Ph.D.
name: Marissa
average rating: 2.00
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/18
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Blood at the Root (Blood at the Root, #1)]]> 198688474
Ten years ago, Malik's life changed forever the night his mother mysteriously vanished and he discovered he had uncontrollable powers. Since then, he has kept his abilities hidden, looking out for himself and his younger foster brother, Taye. Now, at 17, Malik is finally ready to start a new life for both of them, far from the trauma of his past. However, a daring act to rescue Taye reveals an unexpected connection with his long-lost a legendary conjurer with ties to a hidden magical university that Malik’s mother attended.

At Caiman University, Malik’s eyes are opened to a future he never could have envisioned for himself— one that includes the reappearance of his first love, Alexis. His search for answers about his heritage, his powers, and what really happened to his mother exposes the cracks in their magical community as it faces a reawakened evil dating back to the Haitian Revolution. Together with Alexis, Malik discovers a lot beneath the surface at feuding covens and magical politics, forbidden knowledge and buried mysteries.

In a wholly unique saga of family, history and community, Malik must embrace his legacy to save what's left of his old family as well as his new one. Exploring the roots and secrets that connect us in an unforgettable contemporary setting, this heart-pounding fantasy series opener is a rich tapestry of atmosphere, intrigue, and emotion.]]> 432 LaDarrion Williams 0593711920 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.04 2024 Blood at the Root (Blood at the Root, #1)
author: LaDarrion Williams
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/07/18
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women White Feminists Forgot]]> 51276487 'It is absolutely brilliant, I think every woman should read it' PANDORA SYKES, THE HIGH LOW
'My wish is that every white woman who calls herself a feminist will read this book in a state of hushed and humble respect ... Essential reading' ELIZABETH GILBERT

I'm a feminist. Mostly.
I'm an asshole. Mostly.

All too often the focus of mainstream feminism is not on basic survival for the many, but on increasing privilege for the few.


Meeting basic needs is a feminist issue. Food insecurity, the living wage and access to education are feminist issues. The fight against racism, ableism and transmisogyny are all feminist issues.


White feminists often fail to see how race, class, sexual orientation and disability intersect with gender. How can feminists stand in solidarity as a movement when there is a distinct likelihood that some women are oppressing others?


Insightful, incendiary and ultimately hopeful, Hood Feminism is both an irrefutable indictment of a movement in flux and also clear-eyed assessment of how to save it.]]> 290 Mikki Kendall 1526622734 Marissa 0 to-read 4.19 2020 Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women White Feminists Forgot
author: Mikki Kendall
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/18
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]]> <![CDATA[The Trouble with White Women: A Counterhistory of Feminism]]> 57007650 An incisive history of self-serving white feminists and the inspiring women who’ve continually defied them

Women including Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Margaret Sanger, and Sheryl Sandberg are commonly celebrated as leaders of feminism. Yet they have fought for the few, not the many. As award-winning scholar Kyla Schuller argues, their white feminist politics dispossess the most marginalized to liberate themselves.

In The Trouble with White Women, Schuller brings to life the two-hundred-year counter history of Black, Indigenous, Latina, poor, queer, and trans women pushing back against white feminists and uniting to dismantle systemic injustice. These feminist heroes such as Frances Harper, Harriet Jacobs, and Pauli Murray have created an anti-racist feminism for all. But we don’t speak their names and we don’t know their legacies. Unaware of these intersectional leaders, feminists have been led down the same dead-end alleys generation after generation, often working within the structures of racism, capitalism, homophobia, and transphobia rather than against them. 

Building a more just feminist politics for today requires a reawakening, a return to the movement’s genuine vanguards and visionaries. Their compelling stories, campaigns, and conflicts reveal the true potential of feminist liberation. The Trouble with White Women gives feminists today the tools to fight for the flourishing of all.
 ]]> Kyla Schuller 1549130358 Marissa 0 to-read 4.44 2021 The Trouble with White Women: A Counterhistory of Feminism
author: Kyla Schuller
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/18
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]]> <![CDATA[White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color]]> 53260224 This explosive book of history and cultural criticism reveals how white feminism has been used as a weapon of white supremacy and patriarchy deployed against Black and Indigenous women, and women of color.

Taking us from the slave era—when white women fought in court to keep "ownership" of their slaves—through the centuries of colonialism—when they offered a soft face for brutal tactics—to the modern workplace, White Tears/Brown Scars tells a charged story of white women's active participation in campaigns of oppression. It offers a long overdue validation of the experiences of women of color.

Examining subjects as varied as The Hunger Games, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the viral BBQ Becky video, and nineteenth-century lynchings of Mexicans in the American Southwest, Ruby Hamad undertakes a new investigation of gender and race. She shows how the division between innocent white women and racialized, sexualized women of color was created, and why this division is crucial to confront.

Along the way, there are revelatory responses to questions like: Why are white men not troubled by sexual assault on women? (See Christine Blasey Ford.) With rigor and precision, Hamad builds a powerful argument about the legacy of white superiority that we are socialized within, a reality that we must apprehend in order to fight.

"A stunning and thorough look at White womanhood that should be required reading for anyone who claims to be an intersectional feminist. Hamad’s controlled urgency makes the book an illuminating and poignant read. Hamad is a purveyor of such bold thinking, the only question is, are we ready to listen?" —Rosa Boshier, The Washington Post]]> 284 Ruby Hamad 194822674X Marissa 0 to-read 4.55 2020 White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color
author: Ruby Hamad
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Against White Feminism: Notes on Disruption]]> 55298403 Against White Feminism, centering women of color in this transformative overview and counter-manifesto to white feminism’s global, long-standing affinity with colonial, patriarchal, and white supremacist ideals.

Covering such ground as the legacy of the British feminist imperialist savior complex and “the colonial thesis that all reform comes from the West” to the condescension of the white feminist–led “aid industrial complex” and the conflation of sexual liberation as the “sum total of empowerment,” Zakaria follows in the tradition of intersectional feminist forebears Kimberlé Crenshaw, Adrienne Rich, and Audre Lorde. Zakaria ultimately refutes and reimagines the apolitical aspirations of white feminist empowerment in this staggering, radical critique, with Black and Brown feminist thought at the forefront.]]> 244 Rafia Zakaria 1324006617 Marissa 0 to-read 4.30 2021 Against White Feminism: Notes on Disruption
author: Rafia Zakaria
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Love and Asperger's: Practical Strategies To Help Couples Understand Each Other and Strengthen Their Connection]]> 55656104
Life with a partner whose neurotype is different than yours is filled with moments that are surprising, unique, and sometimes challenging. If one of you is on the Autism Spectrum and the other is neurotypical, this Aspergers books is a helpful and inclusive guide to understanding the nature of your relationship and navigating its particular obstacles—while keeping your love for each other at the center of everything.

Even though Aspergers is no longer an official diagnosis, many people—like you or your partner—may still fit the Aspergers profile and identify with the term. This book is designed with you in mind, featuring expert advice from relationship therapist Kate McNulty. Inside, you'll find engaging scenarios of couples experiencing similar challenges, combined with practical, evidenced-based solutions that address the needs and perspectives of both partners equally.

Love and Aspergers helps

Work together—Find easy ways to improve communication, cultivate emotional and physical intimacy, and maintain a commitment to learning about each other.Appreciate your differences—Open a window into the inner world of your partner, and the ways in which their experiences differ from yours so you can convey your own perspective more effectively.Break through the stereotypes—Sort out myths and facts so you can understand neurotypical and neurodiverse thinking and make your life together as a couple more loving and more rewarding.Deepen your relationship and your communication with an enlightening book on Aspergers and love.]]> 162 Kate McNulty 1647394279 Marissa 0 3.96 Love and Asperger's: Practical Strategies To Help Couples Understand Each Other and Strengthen Their Connection
author: Kate McNulty
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.96
book published:
rating: 0
read at: 2024/07/18
date added: 2024/07/18
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]]> <![CDATA[A Game of Retribution (Hades Saga, #2)]]> 55454619
Usually, fear prevents retaliation.

But not this time.

When Hera, Goddess of Women, approaches Hades with a plan to overthrow Zeus, he declines to offer help. As punishment, Hera sentences Hades to perform a series of labors. Each feat seems more impossible than the last and draws his attention away from Persephone—whose own tragedy has left her questioning whether she can be Queen of the Underworld.]]> 464 Scarlett St. Clair Marissa 0 3.93 2022 A Game of Retribution (Hades Saga, #2)
author: Scarlett St. Clair
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Queer Blues: The Hidden Figures of Early Blues Music]]> 98661836 468 Darryl W. Bullock 1787592553 Marissa 0 to-read 3.69 Queer Blues: The Hidden Figures of Early Blues Music
author: Darryl W. Bullock
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.69
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/06/04
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Klansman’s Son: My Journey from White Nationalism to Antiracism]]> 195660561 From the former heir-apparent to white nationalism, The Klansman’s Son is an astonishing memoir of a childhood built on fear, of breaking from a community of hate.

Derek Black was raised to take over the white nationalist movement in the United States. Their father, Don Black, was a former Grand Wizard in the Ku Klux Klan and started Stormfront, the internet’s first white supremacist website—Derek built the kids’ page. David Duke, was also their close family friend and mentor. Racist hatred, though often wrapped up in respectability, was all Derek knew.

Then, while in college in 2013, Derek publicly renounced white nationalism and apologized for their actions and the suffering that they had caused. The majority of their family stopped speaking to them, and they disappeared into academia, convinced that they had done so much harm that there was no place for them in public life. But in 2016, as they watched the rise of Donald Trump, they immediately recognized what they were hearing—the spread and mainstreaming of the hate they had helped cultivate—and they knew that they couldn’t stay silent.

This is a thoughtful, insightful, and moving account of a singular life, with important lessons for our troubled times. Derek can trace a uniquely insider account of the rise of white nationalism, and how a child indoctrinated with hate can become an anti-racist adult. Few understand the ideology, motivations, or tactics of the white nationalist movement like Derek, and few have ever made so profound a change. When coded language and creeping authoritarianism spread the ideas of white nationalists, this is an essential book with a powerful voice.]]> 320 R. Derek Black 1419764780 Marissa 0 to-read 4.04 2024 The Klansman’s Son: My Journey from White Nationalism to Antiracism
author: R. Derek Black
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/06/04
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]]> <![CDATA[House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City, #2)]]> 40132775
The Asteri have kept their word so far, leaving Bryce and Hunt alone. But with the rebels chipping away at the Asteri’s power, the threat the rulers pose is growing. As Bryce, Hunt, and their friends get pulled into the rebels’ plans, the choice becomes clear: stay silent while others are oppressed, or fight for what’s right. And they’ve never been very good at staying silent.

In this sexy, action-packed sequel to the #1 bestseller House of Earth and Blood, Sarah J. Maas weaves a captivating story of a world about to explode―and the people who will do anything to save it.]]> 805 Sarah J. Maas 1408884429 Marissa 0 to-read 4.38 2022 House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City, #2)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/05/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Crying in H Mart 54814676
In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humour and heart, she tells of growing up the only Asian-American kid at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother’s particular, high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother’s tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food. As she grew up, moving to the east coast for college, finding work in the restaurant industry, performing gigs with her fledgling band – and meeting the man who would become her husband – her Koreanness began to feel ever more distant, even as she found the life she wanted to live.

It was her mother’s diagnosis of terminal pancreatic cancer, when Michelle was twenty-five, that forced a reckoning with her identity and brought her to reclaim the gifts of taste, language, and history her mother had given her.

Vivacious, lyrical and honest, Michelle Zauner’s voice is as radiantly alive on the page as it is onstage. Rich with intimate anecdotes that will resonate widely, Crying in H Mart is a book to cherish, share, and reread.]]> 256 Michelle Zauner 0525657746 Marissa 0 to-read 4.23 2021 Crying in H Mart
author: Michelle Zauner
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/21
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]]> <![CDATA[I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokpokki]]> 49228706
PSYCHIATRIST: So how can I help you?

ME: I don't know, I'm – what's the word – depressed? Do I have to go into detail?

Baek Sehee is a successful young social media director at a publishing house when she begins seeing a psychiatrist about her - what to call it? - depression? She feels persistently low, anxious, endlessly self-doubting, but also highly judgmental of others. She hides her feelings well at work and with friends, performing the calmness her lifestyle demands. The effort is exhausting, overwhelming, and keeps her from forming deep relationships. This can't be normal. But if she's so hopeless, why can she always summon a yen for her favorite street food: the hot, spicy rice cake, tteokbokki? Is this just what life is like?

Recording her dialogues with her psychiatrist over a twelve-week period, and expanding on each session with her own reflective micro-essays, Baek begins to disentangle the feedback loops, knee-jerk reactions, and harmful behaviors that keep her locked in a cycle of self-abuse. Part memoir, part self-help book, I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki is a book to keep close and to reach for in times of darkness. It will appeal to anyone who has ever felt alone or unjustified in their everyday despair.


——————


Aku: Bagaimana caranya agar bisa mengubah pikiran bahwa saya ini standar dan biasa saja?

Psikiater: Memangnya hal itu merupakan masalah yang harus diperbaiki?

Aku: Iya, karena saya ingin mencintai diri saya sendiri.

-----

I Want To Die But I Want To Eat Tteokpokki adalah esai yang berisi tentang pertanyaan, penilaian, saran, nasihat, dan evaluasi diri yang bertujuan agar pembaca bisa menerima dan mencintai dirinya.

Buku self improvement ini mendapatkan sambutan baik karena pembaca meraskan hal yang sama dengan kisah Baek Se Hee sehingga buku ini mendapatkan predikat bestseller di Korea Selatan.]]> 232 Baek Se-hee 6237351035 Marissa 0 currently-reading 3.21 2018 I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokpokki
author: Baek Se-hee
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.21
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/21
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> <![CDATA[The Kamogawa Food Detectives (Kamogawa Food Detectives, #1)]]> 154488299 The Kamogawa Food Detectives is the first book in the bestselling, mouth-watering Japanese series for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold.

What’s the one dish you’d do anything to taste just one more time?

Down a quiet backstreet in Kyoto exists a very special restaurant. Run by Koishi Kamogawa and her father Nagare, the Kamogawa Diner serves up deliciously extravagant meals. But that’s not the main reason customers stop by . . .

The father-daughter duo are ‘food detectives’. Through ingenious investigations, they are able to recreate dishes from a person’s treasured memories – dishes that may well hold the keys to their forgotten past and future happiness. The restaurant of lost recipes provides a link to vanished moments, creating a present full of possibility.

A bestseller in Japan, The Kamogawa Food Detectives is a celebration of good company and the power of a delicious meal.]]> 201 Hisashi Kashiwai 0593717716 Marissa 0 to-read 3.67 2013 The Kamogawa Food Detectives (Kamogawa Food Detectives, #1)
author: Hisashi Kashiwai
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2013
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/21
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]]> <![CDATA[How Does It Feel? (Infatuated Fae, #1)]]> 122447584 Unyielding family allegiance
Three deadly challenges

THE HUMAN.
    When a trip into the forest to collect a rare mushroom goes horribly wrong, I find myself falling through a fairy portal and straight into the arms of the Unseelie Fae prince. The dangerously unhinged and handsome Unseelie Fae prince.
   What could be more horrible than that? He thinks I'm an assassin sent by the humans to kill him, not a biologist.
   Determined to kill me first, and rid himself of the human he has unwillingly grown obsessed with, yet also needing to entertain his people, the villain challenges me to three deadly trials.
          If I survive, I gain my freedom. But if not...
The Fae.
    I've never felt anything but hate and loathing until my eyes found hers--the vile human assassin's. She is a parasite that has mercilessly latched onto my mind and won't let me free.
    My hand itches to be ungloved and feel her smooth skin, even though I would never. The Unseelie Fae royals would rather burn than touch a repulsive human.
     I fear that if I do not destroy the girl soon, she may be the only thing that's capable of truly destroying me.]]> 388 Jeneane O'Riley Marissa 4 3.62 2023 How Does It Feel? (Infatuated Fae, #1)
author: Jeneane O'Riley
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2024/05/21
date added: 2024/05/21
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Game of Fate (Hades Saga, #1)]]> 54626426
Despite her attraction to the god, Persephone, an ambitious journalism student, is determined to expose Hades for his cruel and ruthless ways.

Hades finds himself faced with the impossible—proving his future bride wrong. Despite his efforts, there are forces who wish to keep the two apart and Hades comes to realize he will do anything for his forbidden love, even defy Fate.]]> 379 Scarlett St. Clair Marissa 3 3.92 2020 A Game of Fate (Hades Saga, #1)
author: Scarlett St. Clair
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2024/05/11
date added: 2024/05/11
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Gathering of Shadows (Shades of Magic, #2)]]> 20764879 "WITH SO MANY WOLRDS ON THE MAP, THERE'S PLENTY LEFT TO DISCOVER." - NPR

It has been four months since a mysterious obsidian stone fell into Kell's possession. Four months since his path crossed with Delilah Bard. Four months since Prince Rhy was wounded, and since the nefarious Dane twins of White London fell, and four months since the stone was cast with Holland's dying body through the rift—back into Black London.

Now, restless after having given up his smuggling habit, Kell is visited by dreams of ominous magical events, waking only to think of Lila, who disappeared from the docks as she always meant to do. As Red London finalizes preparations for the Element Games—an extravagant international competition of magic meant to entertain and keep healthy the ties between neighboring countries—a certain pirate ship draws closer, carrying old friends back into port.

And while Red London is caught up in the pageantry and thrills of the Games, another London is coming back to life. After all, a shadow that was gone in the night will reappear in the morning. But the balance of magic is ever perilous, and for one city to flourish, another London must fall.]]> 512 V.E. Schwab 0765376474 Marissa 0 4.18 2016 A Gathering of Shadows (Shades of Magic, #2)
author: V.E. Schwab
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2024/05/05
date added: 2024/05/05
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]]> <![CDATA[A Conjuring of Light (Shades of Magic, #3)]]> 29939230 Witness the fate of beloved heroes—and enemies.

THE BALANCE OF POWER HAS FINALLY TIPPED....
The precarious equilibrium among four Londons has reached its breaking point. Once brimming with the red vivacity of magic, darkness casts a shadow over the Maresh Empire, leaving a space for another London to rise.

WHO WILL CRUMBLE?
Kell—once assumed to be the last surviving Antari—begins to waver under the pressure of competing loyalties. And in the wake of tragedy, can Arnes survive?

WHO WILL RISE?
Lila Bard, once a commonplace—but never common—thief, has survived and flourished through a series of magical trials. But now she must learn to control the magic, before it bleeds her dry. Meanwhile, the disgraced Captain Alucard Emery of the Night Spire collects his crew, attempting a race against time to acquire the impossible.

WHO WILL TAKE CONTROL?
And an ancient enemy returns to claim a crown while a fallen hero tries to save a world in decay.]]> 624 V.E. Schwab 0765387468 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.28 2017 A Conjuring of Light (Shades of Magic, #3)
author: V.E. Schwab
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/05
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> The Familiar 133286777
What begins as simple amusement for the bored nobility takes a perilous turn when Luzia garners the notice of Antonio Pérez, the disgraced secretary to Spain's king. Still reeling from the defeat of his armada, the king is desperate for any advantage in the war against England's heretic queen—and Pérez will stop at nothing to regain the king's favor.

Determined to seize this one chance to better her fortunes, Luzia plunges into a world of seers and alchemists, holy men and hucksters, where the line between magic, science, and fraud is never certain. But as her notoriety grows, so does the danger that her Jewish blood will doom her to the Inquisition's wrath. She will have to use every bit of her wit and will to survive—even if that means enlisting the help of Guillén Santangel, an embittered immortal familiar whose own secrets could prove deadly for them both.]]> 379 Leigh Bardugo 125088425X Marissa 0 currently-reading 3.71 2024 The Familiar
author: Leigh Bardugo
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/05
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> <![CDATA[Unlearning Shame: How We Can Reject Self-Blame Culture and Reclaim Our Power]]> 150247407
Systemic Shame is the socially engineered self-loathing that says we are solely to blame for our circumstances. It tells us that poverty is remedied by hard-working people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, that marginalized people are personally responsible for solving the problem of their own oppression, and that massive global crises like climate change can be solved with individual action. Feeling overwhelmed? That’s your problem, too. The more we try and ultimately fail to live up to impossible societal standards of moral goodness, the more shame we feel—and the more we retreat into isolation and despair.

Social psychologist Dr. Devon Price knows firsthand the destructive effects of Systemic Shame; he experienced shame and self-hatred as he grappled with his transgender identity, feeling as if his suffering was caused by his own actions rather than systems like cissexism. And it doesn’t just end with internal feelings of anguish. It causes us to judge other people the same way we fear being judged, which blocks us from seeking out the acceptance and support we need and discourages us from trying to improve our communities and our relationships.

In Unlearning Shame , Dr. Price explores how we can deal with those hard emotions more effectively, tackling the societal shame we’ve absorbed and directed at ourselves. He introduces the antidote to Systemic expansive recognition, an awareness of one’s position in the larger social world and the knowledge that our battles are only won when they are shared. He provides a suite of exercises and resources designed to combat Systemic Shame on a personal, interpersonal, and global level through rebuilding trust in yourself, in others, and in our shared future.

By offering a roadmap to healing and a toolkit of actionable items, Unlearning Shame helps us reject hopelessness and achieve sustainable change and personal growth.]]> 368 Devon Price 0593581210 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.18 Unlearning Shame: How We Can Reject Self-Blame Culture and Reclaim Our Power
author: Devon Price
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.18
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date added: 2024/05/05
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]]> Sociopath 210707895 I can't stand your friends.
I'm a liar. I'm a thief. I'm highly manipulative. I don't care what other people think. I'm capable of almost anything.'

Sociopath: A Memoir is at once a mesmerizing tale of a life lived on the edge of the law, a redemptive love story and a moving account of one woman's battle to create a place for herself and the 5% of the population who are also - like her - sociopaths.

Ever since she was a small child, Patric Gagne knew she was different. Although she felt intense love for her family and her best friend, David, these connections were never enough to make her be 'good', or to reduce her feelings of apathy and frustration. As she grew older, her behaviour escalated from petty theft through to breaking and entering, stalking, and worse.

As an adult, Patric realized that she was a sociopath. Although she instantly connected with the official descriptions of sociopathy, she also knew they didn't tell the full story: she had a plan for her life, had nurtured close relationships and was doing her best (most of the time) to avoid harming others. As her darker impulses warred against her attempts to live a settled, loving life with her partner, Patric began to wonder - was there a way for sociopaths to integrate happily into society? And could she find it before her own behaviour went a step too far?]]> 368 Patric Gagne 1529094909 Marissa 0 currently-reading 3.64 2024 Sociopath
author: Patric Gagne
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/05
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]]> <![CDATA[Nonmonogamy and Neurodiversity: A More Than Two Essentials Guide]]> 62098907
This book is for neurodivergent people considering or practicing nonmonogamy. Its goal is to help neurodivergent people understand how well-suited they are to the polyamorous life, and to help them recognize and manage the challenges that being neurodivergent can bring to nonmonogamy. It is also for the partners and potential partners of neurodivergent people, to encourage them to understand different perspectives and to help them be understanding, accommodating and well-informed. Nomonogamous relationships do not belong exclusively to the neurotypicals, but to us all.,
 ]]> 104 Alyssa Gonzalez 1990869130 Marissa 0 currently-reading 3.61 2023 Nonmonogamy and Neurodiversity: A More Than Two Essentials Guide
author: Alyssa Gonzalez
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/05
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[Dissociation Made Simple: A Stigma-Free Guide to Embracing Your Dissociative Mind and Navigating Daily Life]]> 62675006
Guided by clinical counselor Jamie Marich--a trauma-informed clinician living with a dissociative disorder herself--this book tells you everything you need to know about dissociation...but were too afraid to ask.
Here, you’ll learn:

What dissociation is--and why it’s a natural response to trauma

How to understand and work with your “parts”--the unique emotional and behavioral profiles that can develop from personality fragmentation

There’s nothing shameful about dissociating--that, in fact, we can all dissociate

Skills and strategies for living your best, authentic, and most fulfilled life

What to look for in a therapist: choosing a healer who sees you and gets it

Foundational elements of healing from trauma, including PTSD and C-PTSD

With practical guided exercises like “The Dissociative Profile” and “Parts Mapping,” this book is written for those diagnosed with dissociative disorders, clinicians and therapists who treat trauma and dissociation, and readers who are exploring whether they may have dissociative symptoms or a condition like dissociative identity disorder (DID). Dissociation Made Simple breaks it all down accessibly and comprehensively, with empowerment and support--and without stigma, judgment, or shame.]]> 266 Jamie Marich 1623177219 Marissa 5 4.03 Dissociation Made Simple: A Stigma-Free Guide to Embracing Your Dissociative Mind and Navigating Daily Life
author: Jamie Marich
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.03
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/05/05
date added: 2024/05/05
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Such an important read! This is for anyone who works with traumatized people, traumatized people themselves, and anyone who knows someone who has been traumatized. So that means EVERYONE. This book helps to de-stigmatize the experience of dissociation (something we all do everyday!) and does such a wonderful job. It’s one of the top 3 books I aspire to read a licensed mental health counselor recommend to everyone.
]]> <![CDATA[Decolonizing Therapy: Oppression, Historical Trauma, and Politicizing Your Practice]]> 62594254 480 Jennifer Mullan 1324019166 Marissa 5 4.36 Decolonizing Therapy: Oppression, Historical Trauma, and Politicizing Your Practice
author: Jennifer Mullan
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.36
book published:
rating: 5
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date added: 2024/05/05
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A must read for everyone in the mental health fields. This book is pure harm reduction!
]]> <![CDATA[A Touch of Darkness (Hades & Persephone, #1)]]> 43175155 This is a previously-published edition - ASIN: B07S9HLL34

Persephone is the Goddess of Spring by title only. The truth is, since she was a little girl, flowers have shriveled at her touch. After moving to New Athens, she hopes to lead an unassuming life disguised as a mortal journalist.

Hades, God of the Dead, has built a gambling empire in the mortal world and his favorite bets are rumored to be impossible.

After a chance encounter with Hades, Persephone finds herself in a contract with the God of the Dead and the terms are impossible: Persephone must create life in the Underworld or lose her freedom forever.

The bet does more than expose Persephone’s failure as a Goddess, however. As she struggles to sow the seeds of her freedom, love for the God of the Dead grows—and it’s forbidden.]]> 438 Scarlett St. Clair Marissa 4 3.75 2019 A Touch of Darkness (Hades & Persephone, #1)
author: Scarlett St. Clair
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2019
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[A Touch of Malice (Hades x Persephone Saga, #3)]]> 55604481 418 Scarlett St. Clair Marissa 3 3.89 2021 A Touch of Malice (Hades x Persephone Saga, #3)
author: Scarlett St. Clair
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2021
rating: 3
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date added: 2024/05/05
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]]> <![CDATA[A Touch of Ruin (Hades x Persephone Saga, #2)]]> 53143734
Hades, God of the Dead, is burdened by a hellish past that everyone's eager to expose in an effort to warn Persephone away.

Things only get worse when a horrible tragedy leaves Persephone's heart in ruin and Hades refusing to help. Desperate, she takes matters into her own hands, striking bargains with severe consequences.

Faced with a side of Hades she never knew and crushing loss, Persephone wonders if she can truly become Hades' queen.]]> 417 Scarlett St. Clair Marissa 3 3.73 2020 A Touch of Ruin (Hades x Persephone Saga, #2)
author: Scarlett St. Clair
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2020
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich]]> 17125 The only English translation authorized by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

First published in the Soviet journal Novy Mir in 1962, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich stands as a classic of contemporary literature. The story of labor-camp inmate Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, it graphically describes his struggle to maintain his dignity in the face of communist oppression. An unforgettable portrait of the entire world of Stalin's forced work camps, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is one of the most extraordinary literary documents to have emerged from the Soviet Union and confirms Solzhenitsyn's stature as "a literary genius whose talent matches that of Dosotevsky, Turgenev, Tolstoy"--Harrison Salisbury

This unexpurgated 1991 translation by H. T. Willetts is the only authorized edition available, and fully captures the power and beauty of the original Russian.]]> 182 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Marissa 0 to-read 3.98 1962 One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
author: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1962
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/03/15
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]]> <![CDATA[The Midnight Library (The Midnight World, #1)]]> 102189586 The dazzling reader-favorite about the choices that go into a life well lived, from the acclaimed author of How To Stop Time and The Comfort Book.

Somewhere out beyond the edge of the universe there is a library that contains an infinite number of books, each one the story of another reality. One tells the story of your life as it is, along with another book for the other life you could have lived if you had made a different choice at any point in your life. While we all wonder how our lives might have been, what if you had the chance to go to the library and see for yourself? Would any of these other lives truly be better?

In The Midnight Library, Matt Haig's enchanting blockbuster novel, Nora Seed finds herself faced with this decision. Faced with the possibility of changing her life for a new one, following a different career, undoing old breakups, realizing her dreams of becoming a glaciologist; she must search within herself as she travels through the Midnight Library to decide what is truly fulfilling in life, and what makes it worth living in the first place.]]> 288 Matt Haig 0525559493 Marissa 0 to-read 3.99 2020 The Midnight Library (The Midnight World, #1)
author: Matt Haig
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/02/06
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]]> <![CDATA[A Darker Shade of Magic (Shades of Magic, #1)]]> 22055262 STEP INTO A UNIVERSE OF DARING ADVENTURE, THRILLING POWER, AND MULTIPLE LONDONS.

Kell is one of the last travelers—magicians with a rare, coveted ability to travel between parallel universes, connected by one magical city.

There's Grey London, dirty and boring, without any magic, and with one mad king—George III. Red London, where life and magic are revered—and where Kell was raised alongside Rhys Maresh, the rougish heir to a flourishing empire. White London—a place where people fight to control magic and the magic fights back, draining the city to its very bones. And once upon a time, there was Black London. But no one speaks of that now.

Officially, Kell is the Red Traveler, ambassador of the Maresh empire, carrying the monthly correspondences between the royals of each London. Unofficially, Kell is a smuggler, servicing people willing to pay for even the smallest glimpses of a world they'll never see. It's a defiant hobby with dangerous consequences, which Kell is now seeing firsthand.

Fleeing into Grey London, Kell runs into Delilah Bard, a cutpurse with lofty aspirations. She first robs him, then saves him from a deadly enemy, and finally forces Kell to spirit her to another world for a proper adventure.

Now perilous magic is afoot, and treachery lurks at every turn. To save all of the worlds, they'll first need to stay alive.]]> 400 V.E. Schwab 0765376458 Marissa 0 4.03 2015 A Darker Shade of Magic (Shades of Magic, #1)
author: V.E. Schwab
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/12
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]]> <![CDATA[How to Keep House While Drowning]]> 60139504 How to Keep House While Drowning will introduce you to six life-changing principles that will revolutionize the way you approach home care—without endless to-do lists. Presented in 31 daily thoughts, this compassionate guide will help you begin to get free of the shame and anxiety you feel over home care.

Inside you will learn:
· How to shift your perspective of care tasks from moral to functional;
· How to stop negative self-talk and shame around care tasks;
· How to give yourself permission to rest, even when things aren’t finished;
· How to motivate yourself to care for your space.]]> 151 K.C. Davis 166800285X Marissa 5 4.19 2022 How to Keep House While Drowning
author: K.C. Davis
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2022
rating: 5
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date added: 2023/11/22
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]]> <![CDATA[The Darkest Part of the Forest]]> 20958632
Hazel lives with her brother, Ben, in the strange town of Fairfold where humans and fae exist side by side. The faeries’ seemingly harmless magic attracts tourists, but Hazel knows how dangerous they can be, and she knows how to stop them. Or she did, once.

At the center of it all, there is a glass coffin in the woods. It rests right on the ground and in it sleeps a boy with horns on his head and ears as pointed as knives. Hazel and Ben were both in love with him as children. The boy has slept there for generations, never waking.

Until one day, he does…

As the world turns upside down, Hazel tries to remember her years pretending to be a knight. But swept up in new love, shifting loyalties, and the fresh sting of betrayal, will it be enough?]]> 328 Holly Black 0316213071 Marissa 3 3.86 2015 The Darkest Part of the Forest
author: Holly Black
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2023/11/08
date added: 2023/11/08
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]]> <![CDATA[The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love]]> 17601
In The Will to Change, bell hooks gets to the heart of the matter and shows men how to express the emotions that are a fundamental part of who they are—whatever their age, marital status, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. But toxic masculinity punishes those fundamental emotions, and it’s so deeply ingrained in our society that it’s hard for men to not comply—but hooks wants to help change that.

With trademark candor and fierce intelligence, hooks addresses the most common concerns of men, such as fear of intimacy and loss of their patriarchal place in society, in new and challenging ways. She believes men can find the way to spiritual unity by getting back in touch with the emotionally open part of themselves—and lay claim to the rich and rewarding inner lives that have historically been the exclusive province of women. A brave and astonishing work, The Will to Change is designed to help men reclaim the best part of themselves.]]> 208 bell hooks 0743456084 Marissa 4 4.35 2003 The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love
author: bell hooks
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2003
rating: 4
read at: 2023/08/29
date added: 2023/08/29
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]]> <![CDATA[The Left-Handed Booksellers of London (Left-Handed Booksellers of London, #1)]]> 49867186 A girl’s quest to find her father leads her to an extended family of magical fighting booksellers who police the mythical Old World of England when it intrudes on the modern world. From the bestselling master of teen fantasy, Garth Nix.

In a slightly alternate London in 1983, Susan Arkshaw is looking for her father, a man she has never met. Crime boss Frank Thringley might be able to help her, but Susan doesn’t get time to ask Frank any questions before he is turned to dust by the prick of a silver hatpin in the hands of the outrageously attractive Merlin.

Merlin is a young left-handed bookseller (one of the fighting ones), who with the right-handed booksellers (the intellectual ones), are an extended family of magical beings who police the mythic and legendary Old World when it intrudes on the modern world, in addition to running several bookshops.

Susan’s search for her father begins with her mother’s possibly misremembered or misspelt surnames, a reading room ticket, and a silver cigarette case engraved with something that might be a coat of arms.

Merlin has a quest of his own, to find the Old World entity who used ordinary criminals to kill his mother. As he and his sister, the right-handed bookseller Vivien, tread in the path of a botched or covered-up police investigation from years past, they find this quest strangely overlaps with Susan’s. Who or what was her father? Susan, Merlin, and Vivien must find out, as the Old World erupts dangerously into the New.]]> 416 Garth Nix 006268325X Marissa 4 3.80 2020 The Left-Handed Booksellers of London (Left-Handed Booksellers of London, #1)
author: Garth Nix
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2020
rating: 4
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date added: 2023/08/29
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]]> <![CDATA[Hounded (The Iron Druid Chronicles, #1)]]> 9533378
Unfortunately, a very angry Celtic god wants that sword, and he’s hounded Atticus for centuries. Now the determined deity has tracked him down, and Atticus will need all his power—plus the help of a seductive goddess of death, his vampire and werewolf team of attorneys, a bartender possessed by a Hindu witch, and some good old-fashioned luck of the Irish—to kick some Celtic arse and deliver himself from evil.]]> 304 Kevin Hearne 0345522478 Marissa 3 4.09 2011 Hounded (The Iron Druid Chronicles, #1)
author: Kevin Hearne
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/24
date added: 2023/02/24
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]]> <![CDATA[Hell Bent (Ninth House Trilogy, #2)]]> 60652997 Wealth. Power. Murder. Magic. Alex Stern is back and the Ivy League is going straight to hell.

Find a gateway to the underworld. Steal a soul out of hell. A simple plan, except people who make this particular journey rarely come back. But Galaxy “Alex” Stern is determined to break Darlington out of purgatory―even if it costs her a future at Lethe and at Yale.

Forbidden from attempting a rescue, Alex and Dawes can’t call on the Ninth House for help, so they assemble a team of dubious allies to save the gentleman of Lethe. Together, they will have to navigate a maze of arcane texts and bizarre artifacts to uncover the societies’ most closely guarded secrets, and break every rule doing it. But when faculty members begin to die off, Alex knows these aren’t just accidents. Something deadly is at work in New Haven, and if she is going to survive, she’ll have to reckon with the monsters of her past and a darkness built into the university’s very walls.

Thick with history and packed with Bardugo’s signature twists, Hell Bent brings to life an intricate world full of magic, violence, and all too real monsters.]]> 481 Leigh Bardugo 1250313104 Marissa 4 4.08 2023 Hell Bent (Ninth House Trilogy, #2)
author: Leigh Bardugo
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/24
date added: 2023/02/24
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]]> <![CDATA[How Can I Get Through to You?: Closing the Intimacy Gap Between Men and Women]]> 402075 "What happened to the passion we started with?
Why aren't we as close as we used to be?"

PROBLEM: If you are a woman who is unfulfilled in your marriage...if you feel unheard or overburdened...if you quietly live in a state of slow-burn resentment...
PROBLEM: If you are a man unhappy that your partner seems so unhappy with you...if you feel bewildered, unappreciated, or betrayed...

This book offers a solution

Bestselling author and nationally renowned therapist Terrence Real unearths the causes of communication blocks between men and women in this groundbreaking work. Relationships are in trouble; the demand for intimacy today must be met with new skills, and Real -- drawing on his pioneering work on male depression -- gives both men and women those skills, empowering women and connecting men, radically reversing the attitudes and emotional stumbling blocks of the patriarchal culture in which we were raised. Filled with powerful stories of the couples Real treats, no other relationship book is as straight talking or compelling in its innovative approach to healing wounds and reconnecting partners with a new strength and understanding.]]> 304 Terrence Real 0684868784 Marissa 0 to-read 4.27 2001 How Can I Get Through to You?: Closing the Intimacy Gap Between Men and Women
author: Terrence Real
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/24
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]]> <![CDATA[The Quantum World: The Disturbing Theory at the Heart of Reality]]> 30842743 Quantum theory is our very best description of the microscopic world of atoms and their constituents. It has given us lasers, computers and nuclear reactors, and even tells us how the sun shines and why the ground beneath our feet is solid. Yet the quantum world defies our sensibilities - it is a place where objects can be in two places at once, influence each other at opposite sides of the cosmos and nothing is as it seems until you measure it. Why is the quantum world so strange? Where does it begin and end? And what does this mean for the bedrock of reality? In attempting to address such frontier questions, physicists have come to realise that the quantum world promises exciting new technologies: the ability to communicate with absolute security, computers more powerful than anything built before and even quantum teleportation. In The Trouble With Reality leading physicists and New Scientist take us on journey through the quantum world, its mind-bending properties and the technologies transforming our world. There is a sting in the tale: is quantum theory truly the ultimate theory of reality?

]]> 240 New Scientist 1857886682 Marissa 0 to-read 3.90 The Quantum World: The Disturbing Theory at the Heart of Reality
author: New Scientist
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.90
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/01/22
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]]> Vicious (Villains, #1) 40874032 A masterful tale of ambition, jealousy, desire, and superpowers.

Victor and Eli started out as college roommates—brilliant, arrogant, lonely boys who recognized the same sharpness and ambition in each other. In their senior year, a shared research interest in adrenaline, near-death experiences, and seemingly supernatural events reveals an intriguing possibility: that under the right conditions, someone could develop extraordinary abilities. But when their thesis moves from the academic to the experimental, things go horribly wrong.

Ten years later, Victor breaks out of prison, determined to catch up to his old friend (now foe), aided by a young girl whose reserved nature obscures a stunning ability. Meanwhile, Eli is on a mission to eradicate every other super-powered person that he can find—aside from his sidekick, an enigmatic woman with an unbreakable will. Armed with terrible power on both sides, driven by the memory of betrayal and loss, the archnemeses have set a course for revenge—but who will be left alive at the end?

In Vicious, V. E. Schwab brings to life a gritty comic-book-style world in vivid prose: a world where gaining superpowers doesn't automatically lead to heroism, and a time when allegiances are called into question.]]> 402 V.E. Schwab Marissa 3 4.15 2013 Vicious (Villains, #1)
author: V.E. Schwab
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2013
rating: 3
read at: 2023/01/14
date added: 2023/01/14
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]]> <![CDATA[The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue]]> 50623864 A life no one will remember. A story you will never forget.

France, 1714: In a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever—and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world. But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.]]> 448 V.E. Schwab 0765387565 Marissa 4 4.14 2020 The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue
author: V.E. Schwab
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2022/12/24
date added: 2022/12/24
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]]> <![CDATA[The Mask of Mirrors (Rook & Rose, #1)]]> 51340378 Fortune favors the bold. Magic favors the liars.

Ren is a con artist who has come to the sparkling city of Nadežra with one goal: to trick her way into a noble house, securing her fortune and her sister's future.

But as she's drawn into the elite world of House Traementis, she realizes her masquerade is just one of many surrounding her. And as nightmare magic begins to weave its way through the City of Dreams, the poisonous feuds of its aristocrats and the shadowy dangers of its impoverished underbelly become tangled…with Ren at their heart.

The Mask of Mirrors is the unmissable start to the Rook & Rose trilogy, a dazzling and darkly magical fantasy adventure by Marie Brennan and Alyc Helms, writing together as M. A. Carrick.]]> 630 M.A. Carrick 0356515176 Marissa 0 to-read 3.99 2021 The Mask of Mirrors (Rook & Rose, #1)
author: M.A. Carrick
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/12/11
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Pandora's Jar: Women in the Greek Myths]]> 51135393
Stories of gods and monsters are the mainstay of epic poetry and Greek tragedy, from Homer to Virgil to from Aeschylus to Sophocles and Euripides. And still, today, a wealth of novels, plays and films draw their inspiration from stories first told almost three thousand years ago. But modern tellers of Greek myth have usually been men, and have routinely shown little interest in telling women’s stories.

Now, in Pandora’s Jar, Natalie Haynes – broadcaster, writer and passionate classicist – redresses this imbalance. Taking Greek creation myths as her starting point and then retelling the four great mythic sagas: the Trojan War, the Royal House of Thebes, Jason and the Argonauts, Heracles, she puts the female characters on equal footing with their menfolk. The result is a vivid and powerful account of the deeds – and misdeeds - of Hera, Aphrodite, Athene and Circe. And away from the goddesses of Mount Olympus it is Helen, Clytemnestra, Jocasta, Antigone and Medea who sing from these pages, not Paris, Agamemnon, Orestes or Jason.]]> 320 Natalie Haynes 1509873112 Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.22 2020 Pandora's Jar: Women in the Greek Myths
author: Natalie Haynes
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/11/26
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]]> <![CDATA[A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)]]> 10572
It is a tale in which brother plots against brother and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside. Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory may go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel...and the coldest hearts. For when kings clash, the whole land trembles.

Here is the second volume in George R.R. Martin magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Storm of Swords. As a whole, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, bringing together the best the genre has to offer. Magic, mystery, intrigue, romance, and adventure fill these pages and transport us to a world unlike any we have ever experienced. Already hailed as a classic, George R.R. Martin stunning series is destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.]]> 1009 George R.R. Martin Marissa 4 4.42 1998 A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2022/11/26
date added: 2022/11/26
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]]> <![CDATA[A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3)]]> 62291 An alternate cover for this ISBN can be found here

Here is the third volume in George R.R. Martin's magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings. Together, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.

Of the five contenders for power, one is dead, another in disfavor, and still the wars rage as alliances are made and broken. Joffrey sits on the Iron Throne, the uneasy ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. His most bitter rival, Lord Stannis, stands defeated and disgraced, victim of the sorceress who holds him in her thrall. Young Robb still rules the North from the fortress of Riverrun. Meanwhile, making her way across a blood-drenched continent is the exiled queen, Daenerys, mistress of the only three dragons still left in the world. And as opposing forces manoeuver for the final showdown, an army of barbaric wildlings arrives from the outermost limits of civilization, accompanied by a horde of mythical Others—a supernatural army of the living dead whose animated corpses are unstoppable. As the future of the land hangs in the balance, no one will rest until the Seven Kingdoms have exploded in a veritable storm of swords...]]> 1177 George R.R. Martin Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.55 2000 A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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]]> John Waters: Change of Life 21985603 142 Lisa Phillips 0810991756 Marissa 0 to-read 4.55 2004 John Waters: Change of Life
author: Lisa Phillips
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2004
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/10/11
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]]> <![CDATA[Crooked Kingdom (Six of Crows, #2)]]> 22299763
Kaz Brekker and his crew of deadly outcasts have just pulled off a heist so daring even they didn't think they'd survive. But instead of divvying up a fat reward, they're right back to fighting for their lives.

Double-crossed and badly weakened, the crew is low on resources, allies, and hope. As powerful forces from around the world descend on Ketterdam to root out the secrets of the dangerous drug known as jurda parem, old rivals and new enemies emerge to challenge Kaz's cunning and test the team's fragile loyalties.

A war will be waged on the city's dark and twisting streets - a battle for revenge and redemption that will decide the fate of the Grisha world.]]> 561 Leigh Bardugo Marissa 4 4.56 2016 Crooked Kingdom (Six of Crows, #2)
author: Leigh Bardugo
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2022/08/21
date added: 2022/08/21
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]]> <![CDATA[The ADHD Effect on Marriage: Understand and Rebuild Your Relationship in Six Steps]]> 8605947 233 Melissa Orlov 1886941971 Marissa 0 currently-reading 3.87 2010 The ADHD Effect on Marriage: Understand and Rebuild Your Relationship in Six Steps
author: Melissa Orlov
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/08/14
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]]> <![CDATA[Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1)]]> 23437156 Alternate cover of ISBN 9781627792127

Ketterdam: a bustling hub of international trade where anything can be had for the right price—and no one knows that better than criminal prodigy Kaz Brekker. Kaz is offered a chance at a deadly heist that could make him rich beyond his wildest dreams. But he can’t pull it off alone...

A convict with a thirst for revenge

A sharpshooter who can’t walk away from a wager

A runaway with a privileged past

A spy known as the Wraith

A Heartrender using her magic to survive the slums

A thief with a gift for unlikely escapes

Six dangerous outcasts. One impossible heist. Kaz’s crew is the only thing that might stand between the world and destruction—if they don’t kill each other first.]]> 465 Leigh Bardugo 1627792120 Marissa 4 4.45 2015 Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1)
author: Leigh Bardugo
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.45
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2022/08/14
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]]> <![CDATA[Rule of Wolves (King of Scars, #2)]]> 36307674
The wolves are circling and a young king will face his greatest challenge in the explosive finale of the instant #1 New York Times-bestselling King of Scars Duology.

The Demon King. As Fjerda's massive army prepares to invade, Nikolai Lantsov will summon every bit of his ingenuity and charm—and even the monster within—to win this fight. But a dark threat looms that cannot be defeated by a young king's gift for the impossible.

The Stormwitch. Zoya Nazyalensky has lost too much to war. She saw her mentor die and her worst enemy resurrected, and she refuses to bury another friend. Now duty demands she embrace her powers to become the weapon her country needs. No matter the cost.

The Queen of Mourning. Deep undercover, Nina Zenik risks discovery and death as she wages war on Fjerda from inside its capital. But her desire for revenge may cost her country its chance at freedom and Nina the chance to heal her grieving heart.

King. General. Spy. Together they must find a way to forge a future in the darkness. Or watch a nation fall.]]> 592 Leigh Bardugo 1510109188 Marissa 0 to-read 4.32 2021 Rule of Wolves (King of Scars, #2)
author: Leigh Bardugo
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/08/12
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]]> <![CDATA[King of Scars (King of Scars, #1)]]> 36307634 Face your demons... or feed them.

The dashing young king, Nikolai Lantsov, has always had a gift for the impossible. No one knows what he endured in his country's bloody civil war--and he intends to keep it that way. Now, as enemies gather at his weakened borders, Nikolai must find a way to refill Ravka's coffers, forge new alliances, and stop a rising threat to the once-great Grisha Army.

Yet with every day a dark magic within him grows stronger, threatening to destroy all he has built. With the help of a young monk and a legendary Grisha general, Nikolai will journey to the places in Ravka where the deepest magic survives to vanquish the terrible legacy inside him. He will risk everything to save his country and himself. But some secrets aren't meant to stay buried--and some wounds aren't meant to heal.]]> 527 Leigh Bardugo 125014227X Marissa 0 to-read 4.15 2019 King of Scars (King of Scars, #1)
author: Leigh Bardugo
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/08/12
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]]> <![CDATA[Paper & Blood (Ink & Sigil, #2)]]> 55905023 Kevin Hearne returns to the world of the Iron Druid Chronicles in book two of a spin-off series about an eccentric master of rare magic solving an uncanny mystery in Scotland.

There’s only one Al MacBharrais: Though other Scotsmen may have dramatic mustaches and a taste for fancy cocktails, Al also has a unique talent. He’s a master of ink and sigil magic. In his gifted hands, paper and pen can work wondrous spells.

But Al isn’t quite alone: He is part of a global network of sigil agents who use their powers to protect the world from mischievous gods and strange monsters. So when a fellow agent disappears under sinister circumstances in Australia, Al leaves behind the cozy pubs and cafes of Glasgow and travels to the Dandenong Ranges in Victoria to solve the mystery.

The trail to his colleague begins to pile up with bodies at alarming speed, so Al is grateful his friends have come to help—especially Nadia, his accountant who moonlights as a pit fighter. Together with a whisky-loving hobgoblin known as Buck Foi and the ancient Druid Atticus O’Sullivan, along with his dogs, Oberon and Starbuck, Al and Nadia will face down the wildest wonders Australia—and the supernatural world—can throw at them, and confront a legendary monster not seen in centuries.]]> 304 Kevin Hearne 1984821288 Marissa 4 4.10 2021 Paper & Blood (Ink & Sigil, #2)
author: Kevin Hearne
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2022/07/18
date added: 2022/07/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Tantra Illuminated: The Philosophy, History, and Practice of a Timeless Tradition]]> 15731041 Tantra Illuminated takes the reader on a fascinating journey to the very heart of Tantra: its key teachings, foundational lineages, and transformative practices.

Since the West's discovery of Tantra 100 years ago, there has been considerable fascination, speculation, and more than a little misinformation about this spiritual movement. Now, for the first time in the English language, Tantra Illuminated presents an accessible introduction to this sacred tradition that began 1,500 years ago in the far north of India. Translated from primary Sanskrit sources and offering a profound look at spiritual practice, this book reveals Tantra's rich history and powerful teachings.

]]> 506 Christopher D. Wallis 193710401X Marissa 0 currently-reading 4.51 2011 Tantra Illuminated: The Philosophy, History, and Practice of a Timeless Tradition
author: Christopher D. Wallis
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.51
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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]]> Before You Break (Secrets #1) 34818736 340 K.C. Wells 1635336988 Marissa 0 3.99 2017 Before You Break (Secrets #1)
author: K.C. Wells
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[An Unlocked Mind (Secrets, #2)]]> 36602444
The more time he spends around Rob, the more convinced Vic becomes of two things—one, something is eating away at Rob, and two, he’s looking for something. Every instinct tells Vic to help him, but trying to unlock the secrets hidden in Rob’s mind requires a key. All Vic has to do is find it. Because maybe then he’ll get to see the real Rob, the man who’s scared to let go….]]> 316 K.C. Wells 1640800875 Marissa 0 4.04 2017 An Unlocked Mind (Secrets, #2)
author: K.C. Wells
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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]]> Ink & Sigil (Ink & Sigil, #1) 49183690
But he is also cursed. Anyone who hears his voice will begin to feel an inexplicable hatred for Al, so he can only communicate through the written word or speech apps. And his apprentices keep dying in peculiar freak accidents. As his personal life crumbles around him, he devotes his life to his work, all the while trying to crack the secret of his curse.

But when his latest apprentice, Gordie, turns up dead in his Glasgow flat, Al discovers evidence that Gordie was living a secret life of crime. Now Al is forced to play detective – while avoiding actual detectives who are wondering why death seems to always follow Al. Investigating his apprentice’s death will take him through Scotland’s magical underworld, and he’ll need the help of a mischievous hobgoblin if he’s to survive.]]> 336 Kevin Hearne 1984821253 Marissa 0 4.07 2020 Ink & Sigil (Ink & Sigil, #1)
author: Kevin Hearne
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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]]> Elektra 58725016
Clytemnestra
The sister of Helen, wife of Agamemnon - her hopes of averting the curse are dashed when her sister is taken to Troy by the feckless Paris. Her husband raises a great army against them, and determines to win, whatever the cost.

Cassandra
Princess of Troy, and cursed by Apollo to see the future but never to be believed when she speaks of it. She is powerless in her knowledge that the city will fall.

Elektra
The youngest daughter of Clytemnestra and Agamemnon, Elektra is horrified by the bloodletting of her kin. But, can she escape the curse, or is her own destiny also bound by violence?]]> 291 Jennifer Saint 125077361X Marissa 0 to-read 3.63 2022 Elektra
author: Jennifer Saint
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2022/06/04
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]]> Ariadne 54860614
When Theseus, the Prince of Athens, arrives to vanquish the beast, Ariadne sees in his green eyes not a threat but an escape. Defying the gods, betraying her family and country, and risking everything for love, Ariadne helps Theseus kill the Minotaur. But will Ariadne's decision ensure her happy ending? And what of Phaedra, the beloved younger sister she leaves behind?

Hypnotic, propulsive, and utterly transporting, Jennifer Saint's Ariadne forges a new epic, one that puts the forgotten women of Greek mythology back at the heart of the story, as they strive for a better world.]]> 308 Jennifer Saint 125077358X Marissa 4 3.76 2021 Ariadne
author: Jennifer Saint
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2021
rating: 4
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date added: 2022/06/04
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]]> <![CDATA[A Court of Frost and Starlight (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #4)]]> 50659471
Yet even the festive atmosphere can't keep the shadows of the past from looming. As Feyre navigates her first Winter Solstice as High Lady, her concern for those dearest to her deepens. They have more wounds than she anticipated-scars that will have a far-reaching impact on the future of their court.

Bridging the events of A Court of Wings and Ruin with the later books in the series, A Court of Frost and Starlight explores the far-reaching effects of a devastating war and the fierce love between friends.]]> 272 Sarah J. Maas 1635575621 Marissa 2 3.67 2018 A Court of Frost and Starlight (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #4)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2018
rating: 2
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]]> <![CDATA[A Court of Wings and Ruin (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #3)]]> 50659472 The epic third novel in the #1 bestselling Court of Thorns and Roses series by global phenomenon Sarah J. Maas.

Feyre has returned to the Spring Court, determined to gather information on Tamlin's actions and learn what she can about the invading king threatening to bring her land to its knees. But to do so she must play a deadly game of deceit. One slip could bring doom not only for Feyre, but for everything-and everyone-she holds dear.

As war bears down upon them all, Feyre endeavors to take her place amongst the High Fae of the land, balancing her struggle to master her powers-both magical and political-and her love for her court and family. Amidst these struggles, Feyre and Rhysand must decide whom to trust amongst the cunning and lethal High Lords, and hunt for allies in unexpected places.

In this thrilling third book in the #1 bestselling series from Sarah J. Maas, the fate of Feyre's world is at stake as armies grapple for power over the one thing that could destroy it.]]> 699 Sarah J. Maas 1635575605 Marissa 2 4.45 2017 A Court of Wings and Ruin (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #3)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.45
book published: 2017
rating: 2
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date added: 2022/06/04
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]]> <![CDATA[A Court of Mist and Fury (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #2)]]> 50659468
Feyre has undergone more trials than one human woman can carry in her heart. Though she's now been granted the powers and lifespan of the High Fae, she is haunted by her time Under the Mountain and the terrible deeds she performed to save the lives of Tamlin and his people.

As her marriage to Tamlin approaches, Feyre's hollowness and nightmares consume her. She finds herself split into two different one who upholds her bargain with Rhysand, High Lord of the feared Night Court, and one who lives out her life in the Spring Court with Tamlin. While Feyre navigates a dark web of politics, passion, and dazzling power, a greater evil looms. She might just be the key to stopping it, but only if she can harness her harrowing gifts, heal her fractured soul, and decide how she wishes to shape her future-and the future of a world in turmoil.

Bestselling author Sarah J. Maas's masterful storytelling brings this second book in her dazzling, sexy, action-packed series to new heights.]]> 626 Sarah J. Maas 1635575583 Marissa 2 4.63 2016 A Court of Mist and Fury (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #2)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.63
book published: 2016
rating: 2
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]]> <![CDATA[A Court of Thorns and Roses (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #1)]]> 50659467
At least, he’s not a beast all the time.

As she adapts to her new home, her feelings for the faerie, Tamlin, transform from icy hostility into a fiery passion that burns through every lie she’s been told about the beautiful, dangerous world of the Fae. But something is not right in the faerie lands. An ancient, wicked shadow is growing, and Feyre must find a way to stop it, or doom Tamlin—and his world—forever.

From bestselling author Sarah J. Maas comes a seductive, breathtaking book that blends romance, adventure, and faerie lore into an unforgettable read.]]> 419 Sarah J. Maas 1635575567 Marissa 3 4.13 2015 A Court of Thorns and Roses (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #1)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2015
rating: 3
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]]> Peter Darling 58170822
The only person who truly missed Peter is Captain James Hook, who is delighted to have his old rival back. But when a new war ignites between the Lost Boys and Hook’s pirates, the ensuing bloodshed becomes all too real – and Peter’s rivalry with Hook starts to blur into something far more complicated, sensual, and deadly.]]> 310 Austin Chant 1087818192 Marissa 4 4.07 2017 Peter Darling
author: Austin Chant
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2022/06/04
date added: 2022/06/04
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]]> <![CDATA[The Body Is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love]]> 34956885 A global movement guided by love.

Humans are a varied and divergent bunch with all manner of beliefs, morals, and bodies. Systems of oppression thrive off our inability to make peace with difference and injure the relationship we have with our own bodies.

The Body Is Not an Apology offers radical self-love as the balm to heal the wounds inflicted by these violent systems. World-renowned activist and poet Sonya Renee Taylor invites us to reconnect with the radical origins of our minds and bodies and celebrate our collective, enduring strength. As we awaken to our own indoctrinated body shame, we feel inspired to awaken others and to interrupt the systems that perpetuate body shame and oppression against all bodies. When we act from this truth on a global scale, we usher in the transformative opportunity of radical self-love, which is the opportunity for a more just, equitable, and compassionate world--for us all.]]> 137 Sonya Renee Taylor 1626569762 Marissa 4 4.20 2018 The Body Is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love
author: Sonya Renee Taylor
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2018
rating: 4
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date added: 2022/03/05
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]]> <![CDATA[Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures]]> 52668915
Neither plant nor animal, it is found throughout the earth, the air and our bodies. It can be microscopic, yet also accounts for the largest organisms ever recorded, living for millennia and weighing tens of thousands of tonnes. Its ability to digest rock enabled the first life on land, it can survive unprotected in space, and thrives amidst nuclear radiation.

In this captivating adventure, Merlin Sheldrake explores the spectacular and neglected world of fungi: endlessly surprising organisms that sustain nearly all living systems. They can solve problems without a brain, stretching traditional definitions of ‘intelligence’, and can manipulate animal behaviour with devastating precision. In giving us bread, alcohol and life-saving medicines, fungi have shaped human history, and their psychedelic properties, which have influenced societies since antiquity, have recently been shown to alleviate a number of mental illnesses. The ability of fungi to digest plastic, explosives, pesticides and crude oil is being harnessed in break-through technologies, and the discovery that they connect plants in underground networks, the ‘Wood Wide Web’, is transforming the way we understand ecosystems. Yet they live their lives largely out of sight, and over ninety percent of their species remain undocumented.

Entangled Life is a mind-altering journey into this hidden kingdom of life, and shows that fungi are key to understanding the planet on which we live, and the ways we think, feel and behave. The more we learn about fungi, the less makes sense without them.]]> 352 Merlin Sheldrake 0525510311 Marissa 5 4.31 2020 Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures
author: Merlin Sheldrake
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2020
rating: 5
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date added: 2022/01/12
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]]> <![CDATA[What Every Mental Health Professional Needs to Know About Sex]]> 30556538 DSM-5, new theoretical approaches, new pharmacological treatments, updated information on STDs, new understandings of transgender individuals, the impact of same-sex marriage laws, controversies over sex addiction, and much more. Chapters are enhanced with the addition of new take-away points, additional worksheets, and a glossary.

Distinguished by an easy-to-read, down-to-earth approach, the text provides plentiful information, tools, and exercises to increase the confidence and comfort of both trainee and experienced mental health professionals treating sexual issues. Based on the premise that the therapist must be comfortable with his or her own sexuality in order to provide effective treatment, the book discusses the characteristics of healthy sexuality for both client and therapist and addresses issues of discomfort that may arise for the therapist.

New to the Second Edition:


Sexual and other disorders in DSM-5

New understandings of sexual identity and fluidity, including transgender
Legal status of same-sex marriage
New pharmacological treatments for sexual issues
New methods of sexological research
Updated and expanded coverage of assessment tools
Mindfulness interventions
Supplemental Instructor's Manual with quizzes and chapter-by-chapter PowerPoint slides
Updated Practitioner Resources including informational handouts and illustrations]]> 361 Stephanie Buehler 0826174442 Marissa 4 4.04 2013 What Every Mental Health Professional Needs to Know About Sex
author: Stephanie Buehler
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2020/05/16
date added: 2021/10/23
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]]> Use Me, Daddy (Club 83 #2) 45481185
Cole’s not looking for someone to love him. He wants to be used and discarded. That's much easier than getting tangled up in emotions. And there’s no way he will ever let another man take control. He tried that once and nearly lost himself before he got out. Now, he’s focused on running his coffee shop and getting a little action when the urge strikes.

Bear moved to Annandale looking for a fresh start. The way things ended with his last boy, he’s shied away from a crucial part of who he is. As the head bouncer at Club 83, he’s used to seeing beautiful men every night. When he meets Cole, he can’t deny the chemistry between them. The more Cole insists he doesn’t want Bear to be gentle with him, the more compelled he is to teach Cole there has to be a balance for their dynamic to work.

Will they be able to overcome past hurts so they can admit they need one another?]]> 188 Quinn Ward Marissa 0 4.04 2019 Use Me, Daddy (Club 83 #2)
author: Quinn Ward
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2021/10/03
date added: 2021/10/03
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]]> <![CDATA[American Gods (American Gods, #1)]]> 30165203
Together they embark on a profoundly strange journey across the heart of the USA, whilst all around them a storm of preternatural and epic proportions threatens to break.

Scary, gripping and deeply unsettling, American Gods takes a long, hard look into the soul of America. You'll be surprised by what - and who - it finds there...]]> 635 Neil Gaiman Marissa 5 4.10 2001 American Gods (American Gods, #1)
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at: 2021/10/03
date added: 2021/10/03
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]]> <![CDATA[The Tibetan Book of the Dead: The Great Liberation Through Hearing in the Bardo]]> 412062 The Tibetan Book of the Dead emphasizes the practical advice that the book offers to the living. The insightful commentary by Chögyam Trungpa, written in clear, concise language, explains what the text teaches us about human psychology. This book will be of interest to people concerned with death and dying, as well as those who seek greater spiritual understanding in everyday life.]]> 236 Padmasambhava 0877736758 Marissa 4 3.93 1350 The Tibetan Book of the Dead: The Great Liberation Through Hearing in the Bardo
author: Padmasambhava
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1350
rating: 4
read at: 2016/05/06
date added: 2021/09/20
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]]> <![CDATA[Someone to Keep Me (Collars and Cuffs, #3)]]> 19453849
Eighteen-year-old Scott Keating knows a whole world exists beyond his parents’ strict control, but until he gains access to the World Wide Web, he really has no idea what’s out there. In a chat room, Scott meets “JeffUK.” Jeff loves and understands him, and when he offers to bring Scott to the UK, Scott seizes his chance to escape his humdrum life and see the world. But when his plane touches down and Jeff isn’t there, panic sets in.

Collars & Cuffs favorite barman and Dom-in-training, Ben Winters, drops his sister off at the airport and finds a lost, anxious Scott. Hearing Scott’s story sets off alarm bells, along with his protective instincts. Taking pity on the naïve boy, Ben offers him a place to crash and invites him to Collars & Cuffs, hoping his bosses will know how to help. Scott dreams of belonging to someone, heart and soul. Ben longs for a sub of his own. And neither man sees what’s right under his nose.]]> 246 K.C. Wells 162798433X Marissa 0 erotica 3.76 2014 Someone to Keep Me (Collars and Cuffs, #3)
author: K.C. Wells
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/08/16
shelves: erotica
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Dance with Domination (Collars and Cuffs, #4)]]> 22061453 Collars and Book Four

Recently returned to the UK after living in the States since he was eleven, Andrew Barrett is determined to keep busy and make a new life for himself. He works full time as a copywriter and strips at a club on Canal Street on weekends. But it still leaves him too much time to think. Then he finds the BDSM club, Collars & Cuffs, where at twenty-nine, he is their youngest Dom. Young doesn’t mean inexperienced, however. All this activity keeps him focused with no time to dwell on the past. But the past has a way of intruding on the present.

It’s been four long years since Gareth Michaels last set foot inside Collars & Cuffs. But when he finally summons his courage and steps back into his former world, he finds the man who drove him away is still a member, and what's more, he wants Gareth back. Two men in pain need the freedom they find in each other, but it takes another man’s horrific plans to make them see it.]]> 220 K.C. Wells 1627988904 Marissa 3 erotica 4.00 2014 A Dance with Domination (Collars and Cuffs, #4)
author: K.C. Wells
name: Marissa
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2014
rating: 3
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date added: 2021/08/16
shelves: erotica
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Archive of the Forgotten (Hell's Library, #2)]]> 50482961 In the second installment of this richly imagined fantasy adventure series, a new threat from within the Library could destroy those who depend upon it the most.

The Library of the Unwritten in Hell was saved from total devastation, but hundreds of potential books were destroyed. Former librarian Claire and Brevity the muse feel the loss of those stories, and are trying to adjust to their new roles within the Arcane Wing and Library, respectively. But when the remains of those books begin to leak a strange ink, Claire realizes that the Library has kept secrets from Hell--and from its own librarians.

Claire and Brevity are immediately at odds in their approach to the ink, and the potential power that it represents has not gone unnoticed. When a representative from the Muses Corps arrives at the Library to advise Brevity, the angel Rami and the erstwhile Hero hunt for answers in other realms. The true nature of the ink could fundamentally alter the afterlife for good or ill, but it entirely depends on who is left to hold the pen.]]> 352 A.J. Hackwith 1984806394 Marissa 4 fiction-fantasy 3.80 2020 The Archive of the Forgotten (Hell's Library, #2)
author: A.J. Hackwith
name: Marissa
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/06/17
date added: 2021/08/12
shelves: fiction-fantasy
review:

]]>