literature
Geek literature from the New York Times or the recesses of online. Our favorite stories showcase geeks.
Book Review: "Julie Chan is Dead" by Liann Zhang . Top Story - May 2026.
This book popped up everywhere on my Facebook feed, every few adverts were about this book and how addictive, funny and dark it was. I was grabbed by obviously, the bright colours, the promise of something addictive to read and the basic premise of a twisted and horrific version of The Parent Trap with some minor changes. Now, books that make these promises often do not live up to expectation - but this one definitely did. Yes, it is just as addictive as it says on the adverts and I obviously devoured the whole thing in just one sitting. When I looked up at the world again once the book was over, nothing was quite the same.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Among the Bohemians" by Virginia Nicholson
When I bought this book I knew it was going to mean something. I had never heard of the book, never heard of the author and yet, there was something that drew me to it. Perhaps it was the chance to learn about new authors I hadn't heard of (even though the vast majority of them I had heard of before), maybe it was the front cover which read 'Experiments in Living' - or maybe it was because the term 'bohemian' was about to be broken down and rebuilt in an image of something to do with Modernism. No, it isn't the Bloomsbury Group - though they would call themselves bohemians - they were perhaps the reason the movement began to break down. There's something raw and powerful about these people who lived on basically nothing, borrowing each other money and skipping meals when they couldn't afford to eat. They lived in squalor. They lived without even basic necessities. But who were they really?
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Witches" by Tracy Borman
Tracy Borman is not a woman whom I have read a lot by, but I am planning to read more of her bibliography since diving into this incredible text. Witches is a nonfiction history of the Witch Trials under the direction of James I and starts off with an image of James as king by comparison to others. What we have elsewhere though is a country under constant struggle with itself for identity. Catholicism is filled with pageantry and mysticism, alchemy rides around practically unscathed. Yet, with the Protestant Reformation came something more stripped back and all that was left behind was displayed front and centre as a threat to the new belief system. Borman looks at this under a microscope, checking for stories of witches, fairies and goblins - things that regular people back then believed in. So why should the Devil and his human minions be a step too far?
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Bless Your Heart" by Lindy Ryan
You can imagine my surprise when I found this book for a cheap price on my Kindle. Bless Your Heart blends urban horror and folk horror together to create this strange hybrid. I think we should remember the rule of horror: if there's too much going on in terms of story and characters, it can lead to the reader being taken out of the atmosphere, thus failing to actually experience any of the horror in question. I would say that in the backstories which happens during the beginning, especially the one concerning the youngest Evans woman, this is true. But the author quickly picks this up and gets on with showing us the true horrors that await us in the funeral parlour.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Moby-Dick by Herman Melville
Background and Context: I remember the first time I read this book. I'm not going to lie, I was a teenager and it was really difficult. I needed a dictionary and a relatively less impressive version of the internet to look up whaling practices. It took a while and yet, when I broke through the top of the water and I could finally breathe afterwards, I felt something wash over me. It was on the whole, a beautiful story, with wonderful themes and ultimately, I cried. I have read it twice since and each time, I always take that same amount of time with it. I read it slowly, I savour the words and phrases and I learn something new about humanity. This is a lesson in: when someone tells you that Moby-Dick basically invented the concept of the Great American Novel - believe them.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "The Extinction of Experience" by Christine Rosen
Christine Rosen's book was brought to my attention because of a video I saw on YouTube that was referring to it and using it to make a point about experiences and consumerism. The quotations seemed to have been cherry-picked as they always are in YouTube videos and atop of this, they are quotations that are used by hundreds of YouTubers and GoodReads reviewers and so, the idea that the YouTuber had read the book very quickly went down the drain. There are some good points in this book, so don't misunderstand me here. I feel however, that Rosen very conveniently leaves out some main points about society that have changed the way we experience things that are not dependent on social media and algorithms. Something that I feel is just as important: the lack of money and the rising prices of basically everything.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Free Verse. Content Warning.
I see the term free verse thrown around on this platform to refer to anything without terminal rhyme. That’s fallacious—end rhyme is one element of form; meter is another, and a great deal of unrhymed poetry is metered. Blank verse is not free verse.
By Harper Lewis 5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "1066 and Before All That" by Ed West
Yes, I've been reading really long history books lately and so, I wanted to try one that wasn't only short, but is described as being very, very short. At only 184 pages, it doesn't really seem long enough to cover the entire history of the country up to the Battle of Hastings, but reader it is. Interesting and often funny, there is a lot too this book that many might feel is underdeveloped or underdone. But the point of this book isn't to make some bold claims and academic insights, instead it is to make the reader think and often, laugh. The oddities of the past are on full display and I can't say there are many interesting books like this one about this particular time in history.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "The Hand That First Held Mine" by Maggie O'Farrell
So it isn't as great and intense as The Marriage Portrait and not as emotional as Hamnet, but this book by Maggie O'Farrell is still a fantastic read. Lexie (known first as Alexandra) has been kicked out of university when she meets the older male, Innes Kent who looks on as she attempts to read a book outside whilst he mother screams at her. In another story, Elina has just had a baby and her boyfriend (the father), Ted, isn't being all that helpful but is whiny in a way that seems helpless. Both of these women find themselves stuck in a situation they didn't really create, both are wonderful characters. Maggie O'Farrell's writing is incredible as always and this is yet another addition to her great bibliography.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Greek Mythology Was Never “Historically Accurate”
Every few months, the internet collectively loses its mind over a casting decision. This time, the outrage machine has attached itself to a new adaptation of The Odyssey after reports circulated about Lupita Nyong’o portraying Helen of Troy and Elliot Page portraying Achilles.
By Jenna Deedy5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "English Pastoral" by James Rebanks
I'm giving James Rebanks another chance since I only half-enjoyed his book The Shepherd's Life because of the nonsensical rags-to-riches story which ruined the book for me. The whole 'I'm not like these posh people in Oxford, so I am better than them by default' thing got old after about two pages. I wanted to read English Pastoral because I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Hopefully, having read essentially what is his memoirs, he couldn't do more of that stuff now. I was mostly correct. This book is much, much better than The Shepherd's Life and details more about the agricultural landscape, the family farm we know so much about now and how industrialisation changed the centuries. As this focuses much more on the disappearing landscape that Wordsworth was so keen on living in and preserving, the text itself comes off as more confident and tolerable for the reader.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
Book Review: "The Way Home" by Mark Boyle
Perhaps I thought this book was going to be so boring that I didn't actually bother spending money on it. Yes, I got it for free. But as an interim book, this wasn't actually that boring at all. In fact, the further I got into the book, the more fascinating it became (keep going past the stuff about composting manure, I promise it gets more interesting). The author's want to live away from modern technology and all its infrastructures initially seems like an experiment doomed to fail, but as we get more into the text we see that he is pretty determined to live like this. Complete with little side stories and supporting literature such as books by Robert Macfarlane - this book was surprisingly enjoyable.
By Annie Kapur5 months ago in Geeks
