7 books
—
2 voters
Tolkien’s works served for me, as they have for many, as a gateway to the Middle Ages, inspiring an enduring fascination with medieval literature. (Tolkien’s books should probably come with some kind of warning attached: Caution! May Turn
...more
“Everything we know of horror and dread is connected primarily with war. Stalin's Gulags and Auschwitz were recent gains for evil. History has always been the story of wars and military commanders, and war was, we could say, the yardstick of horror. This is why people muddle the concepts of war and disaster. In Chernobyl, we see all the hallmarks of war: hordes of soldiers, evacuation, abandoned houses. The course of life disrupted. Reports on Chernobyl in the newspapers are thick with the language of war: 'nuclear', 'explosion', 'heroes'. And this makes it harder to appreciate that we now find ourselves on a new page of history. The history of disasters has begun. But people do not want to reflect on that, because they have never thought about it before, preferring to take refuge in the familiar. And in the past. Even the monuments to the Chernobyl heroes look like war memorials.”
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
“What happens before birth and resumes after death - this is more real than the brief spark of life. Out lives just carry the physical burden of carrying energy forward. We put on suits of meat as training, as a challenge. We all know this is temporary.”
― Split Tooth
― Split Tooth
“I have been birds and branches. I have been bees and wolves. I have been ether flooding the void between stars, tangling their breath into networks of song. I have been fish and plankton and humus, and all these have been me.”
― This Is How You Lose the Time War
― This Is How You Lose the Time War
“The traumatized, we might say, carry an impossible history within them. Or they become themselves the symptom of a history that they cannot entirely possess (and thus which possesses them).”
― Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative and History
― Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative and History
“We're afraid of everything. We're afraid for our children, and for our grandchildren, who don't exist yet. They don't exist, and we're already afraid. People smile less, they sing less at holidays. The landscape changes, because instead of fields the forest rises up again, but the national character changes too. Everyone's depressed. It's a feeling of doom. Chernobyl is a metaphor, a symbol. And it's changed our everyday life, and our thinking.”
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
Lesbian Book Club
— 5036 members
— last activity 14 hours, 6 min ago
Come and read with us. Here there are classics, non-fiction, fiction, and many more in LGBTQA+ literature. Find authors that you would have never read ...more
Classics and the Western Canon
— 4958 members
— last activity May 20, 2026 06:54PM
This is a group to read and discuss those books generally referred to as “the classics” or “the Western canon.” Books which have shaped Western though ...more
J.R.R. Tolkien
— 3853 members
— last activity Dec 26, 2025 03:51AM
Discussion, recommendations, and all-over appreciation for Britain's own myth maker, Professor J.R.R. Tolkien. ...more
Zookeepers Book Club
— 332 members
— last activity May 09, 2026 08:19AM
For every trainer or zookeeper! For anyone who has a career with animals or is planning one. For volunteers looking for a way to get their foot in the ...more
Core Conversations
— 1351 members
— last activity Dec 04, 2024 03:30PM
Columbia College alumni and friends, please join us as we revisit not only the Core Curriculum texts, but also the lively discussion and debate charac ...more
Emily’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Emily’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
More friends…
Folk Tale/Fantasy/Mythological Retellings With Dubious But Titillating Heterosexual Relationships
More…
Polls voted on by Emily
Lists liked by Emily













































