YABookgate

[Kari Kamiya]

Fuuuuck if I hadn't put it in storage ages ago, I'd totally be reading my Narnia omnibus now with all this nostalgia-fagging over it. I hadn't touched the books since sixth grade, I believe. The school library or something like that had all seven books that I would check out over time. I actually remember liking The Last Battle (edgy cover with the unicorn's bloodied horn notwithstanding) but I had caught on to the Revelation parallels pretty quickly so I think that was why.

While it's cool to have an omnibus, I really should get the books separately for the covers alone. I adore them so much.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

No wonder I have so few memories of that book despite loving The Golden Compass. It sucked! And it sucked even more than I thought, holy shit. What an utterly pointless story.

Kate Bush's song for the film is one of, if not the best thing about the adaptation.

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

Voyage of the Dawn Treader, I shortened the title sorry.

To my mind one of the best opening lines in all literature...

“There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the “Dawn Treader”

Agree with the consensus about The Last Battle, it was ham handed and far too over the top.

 

[Flexo]

Agree with the consensus about The Last Battle, it was ham handed and far too over the top.

I mean... can you really do an apocalyptic end of the world subtlety?

 

[Vecr]

I mean... can you really do an apocalyptic end of the world subtlety?

I don't see why not, but it couldn't be the main focus of the story or it would be boring. It would have to act as a backdrop. The end of the world doesn't have to be fast.

The Christian end of the world isn't supposed to be subtle though, at least if you consider the whole thing.

 

[Flexo]

The Christian end of the world isn't supposed to be subtle though, at least if you consider the whole thing.

Yeah I'm pretty sure people would notice the earth and heavens getting unmade. Though you could probably do a great dark comedy sketch about a guy who just doesn't notice it all for the longest time (like the opening sequence in Shaun of the Dead).

I don't see why not, but it couldn't be the main focus of the story or it would be boring. It would have to act as a backdrop. The end of the world doesn't have to be fast.

You're thinking of "end of society" stuff - not end of creation. Something like "A Knock at the Cabin."

 

[Vecr]

not end of creation.

You could do that too, but it would either require weird physics and tech stuff or magic as a stand-in. It would be funny to have everything going on in background, with hundreds of entities cooperating so the main character doesn't have to notice what's going on.

 

[⋖ cørdion ⋗]

A Forum of Sneed & Feed

Like really, why are all YA like this? Is it just the copy-paste syndrome of "my youtuber put out another video", but it's books and for women who wanna get off to hot men and women who shoot bows?

 

[Kari Kamiya]

The Last Battle visualized the end of the world to my young mind that made sense and was comforting in how tragically beautiful it will be. Just as there's a beginning, there has to be an ending, but with it comes a new beginning. It's just rather bittersweet because you had to watch your world die in some violent manner before a peaceful passing and something else has to take its place that you weren't born into or have had the chance to love yet. New beginnings are scary because you don't know what it entails, and also you're scared things will turn out the same, turning it into an endless loop.

In a sense, that's a part of eternity. It's probably the most optimistic ending I've seen in terms of an apocalypse, and that's simply because it's parallel to the Bible itself in that Revelation and other prophecies throughout talks about the end of the world but it's considered beautiful for those who believe and witness it.

Granted, it's been many years since I last read it and it's probably not how I remember it and I swear a new Narnia was made albeit Aslan wasn't in charge of it, but that's the takeaway I've had all this time. I know some people took issue with it because not every character got to be there when it would've made for a satisfying bookend, theoretically.

I dunno, C.S. Lewis just wanted to tell the world his testimony about his love for Christ and he felt the best way to do it was to write stories. Far as I know, he didn't care what people thought or said about them.

 

[Zemblan Physics]

Not exactly YA but some of you might enjoy this article in the Chronicle of Higher Education about some truly knives out drama at Pomona College’s English department. I thought the backstabbing at my STEM department was wild, but this is just on another level.

P.S. The mulefa rule, I’ll fight you on that

 

[TapewormSalesman]

A Forum of Sneed & Feed

Like really, why are all YA like this? Is it just the copy-paste syndrome of "my youtuber put out another video", but it's books and for women who wanna get off to hot men and women who shoot bows?

Blame rotund George, if he didn't start the trend, he's sure as hell the most prominent rep. It's a simple way to organize your 70000 part book series and theoretically set them apart from others (except so many are doing it now that they're almost copy-paste) and it makes for an easy abreviation. Due to ASOIAF that naming scheme also invokes "grand fantasy" image. I feel like it's becoming some sort of western woman's version of light novel titles.

 

[Second Missing Primarch]

Not exactly YA but some of you might enjoy this article in the Chronicle of Higher Education about some truly knives out drama at Pomona College’s English department. I thought the backstabbing at my STEM department was wild, but this is just on another level.

P.S. The mulefa rule, I’ll fight you on that

That article sounds exactly like all the petty, bitchy, mean-girl dogpiles we've documented in this thread. But in this case it's so much worse because these aren't some catty wine aunts throwing a shitfit that some author forgot a trigger warning, these are (allegedly) professional scholars who were in charge of teaching impressionable teenagers. No goddamn wonder the world of English literature is such a mess if these are the kind of people who are teaching it.

 

[Kosher Dill]

Not exactly YA but some of you might enjoy this article in the Chronicle of Higher Education about some truly knives out drama at Pomona College’s English department.

It's really something when that repellent department chair is the least unsympathetic person in the story.
It really sounds like a case of just one or two problem employees that no one could figure out how to rein in, rather than "English Lit Is Dead". I'm curious what the department is like now that they've left.

 

[World Famous Quasi Payer]

Indeed, the existence of SEEN In Publishing indicates plenty of us are already getting stuck into the project and our community will grow and diversify in its proper sense. Hopefully within the next few years, we’ll see the emergence of a literary industry that has some balls.

Noticed she didn't say anything about Baen books or self-publishing. Guess her "industry with balls" is just one that agrees with 99% of things the current one does, just without any troons.

A Forum of Sneed & Feed - Like really, why are all YA like this? Is it just the copy-paste syndrome of "my youtuber put out another video", but it's books and for women who wanna get off to hot men and women who shoot bows?

When you curate an industry to remove all the wrong think, you also remove the space for creativity and proper diversity.

Blame rotund George, if he didn't start the trend, he's sure as hell the most prominent rep.

Funny how a lot can be blamed on the mountain that doesn't write.

 

[JJLiautaud]

https://www.stevesailer.net/p/who-could-have-seen-this-coming

Steve Sailer writes about the failures to black up Publishing.

 

[World Famous Quasi Payer]

I'm curious what the department is like now that they've left

About the same, those two aren't the issue. You will always have those who think they are entitled to more or don't have to follow the rules. The question is if the system put in place, the rules, are followed and abuses punished. Its clear nobody on that campus learned a damn thing. The place is in limbo before the next trouble maker turns up to repeat the whole ordeal all over again.

 

[Alexander Thaut]

A Forum of Sneed & Feed

Like really, why are all YA like this? Is it just the copy-paste syndrome of "my youtuber put out another video", but it's books and for women who wanna get off to hot men and women who shoot bows?

Never understood the "women shoot bows" shit in so much modern media because you need to be pretty jacked to make maximum use of bows.

Once AI gets to the point of being able to just pump out YA gooning novels, I can see women just learning how to prompt and put in all the shit they want, then generating their customized gooning books.

That article sounds exactly like all the petty, bitchy, mean-girl dogpiles we've documented in this thread. But in this case it's so much worse because these aren't some catty wine aunts throwing a shitfit that some author forgot a trigger warning, these are (allegedly) professional scholars who were in charge of teaching impressionable teenagers. No goddamn wonder the world of English literature is such a mess if these are the kind of people who are teaching it.

Can't do much because the conservatives didn't engage with the trends for 50 years for fear of being cancelled or dogpiled.

Best we can do is just shill the good stuff. Whether it's the old stuff or good indie publishers.

 

[Flexo]

Never understood the "women shoot bows" shit in so much modern media because you need to be pretty jacked to make maximum use of bows.

"Women can shoot guns so a man's strength doesn't matter."
"Yeah but there weren't any guns back then."
"Ok, so bows and arrows then. Geez, are you stupid?"

Pretty much the logic.

 

[Zbk3VmLfujjzjxBd43tL]

Never understood the "women shoot bows" shit in so much modern media because you need to be pretty jacked to make maximum use of bows.

It's a cliche, but a reasonable one because you don't need a man's muscles to kill someone with a bow. In both Europe and Asia, archaeology shows that something like 30% of battlefield casualties were from arrow wounds. Yes, a woman can't shoot as far as a man and can't use a longbow, but at shorter distances she can still put an arrow in anyone who isn't wearing good armor and that means at the very least an irritating wound, potential of festering, etc. Massed arrow fire was a very good tactic for the same reason massed gun fire was and is. Shoot from relatively close range at a charging enemy or from the wall of a castle and it doesn't really matter if it's a man or a woman shooting. Some arrows will get through, kill a horse, hit a gap in the armor, make the enemy hesitate for even the briefest second, etc.

Although the YA heroine thing is silly because women fighting was almost always a last ditch effort in events like castle sieges.

 

[Alexander Thaut]

"Women can shoot guns so a man's strength doesn't matter."
"Yeah but there weren't any guns back then."
"Ok, so bows and arrows then. Geez, are you stupid?"

Pretty much the logic.

so basically women thinking it's cool and nothing else.

I mean, sure, why not. But my problem is that we keep getting media where women run around beating up men three times their size with gymnastic bullshit that isn't feasible. Sure, superheroes can do it. But someone like the Hunger Games MC isn't equivalent to Wonder Woman or even Black Widow.

It's a cliche, but a reasonable one because you don't need a man's muscles to kill someone with a bow. In both Europe and Asia, archaeology shows that something like 30% of battlefield casualties were from arrow wounds. Yes, a woman can't shoot as far as a man and can't use a longbow, but at shorter distances she can still put an arrow in anyone who isn't wearing good armor and that means at the very least an irritating wound, potential of festering, etc. Massed arrow fire was a very good tactic for the same reason massed gun fire was and is. Shoot from relatively close range at a charging enemy or from the wall of a castle and it doesn't really matter if it's a man or a woman shooting. Some arrows will get through, kill a horse, hit a gap in the armor, make the enemy hesitate for even the briefest second, etc.

Although the YA heroine thing is silly because women fighting was almost always a last ditch effort in events like castle sieges.

That does make a modicum of sense.

YA Heroines are always weird to me when I hear about them. It's nonsensically maintained that women can fight on par with men, but every single time this has been tried IRL it never works.