I have been watching the downfall of Snow White with quiet fascination. Part of the drama is occurring over at IMDB where, on release date, it started with an abysmal 2.7, and has only fallen since then. For a while it reached #13 on IMDB’s lowest rated movies of all time, but it was eventually removed from the list completely. (This is a common occurrence for movies getting review-bombed). But if you do an advanced search, you can still see that it is currently the lowest rated film of all time with 107k+ reviews. And you won’t find a film with a lower rating until you get to 97k reviews. (That honor goes to Sadak 2).

So then, the question is, is it really that bad? Well, I’ll just cut to the chase: No, it’s not that bad. It’s not great, but it’s not terrible. I’d give it a ⁶⁄₁₀, maybe a 7. Here’s my non-political explanation of why (if you want to know about the controversies surrounding the film, but have nothing to do with the …

Pardon the rant, but I can’t be the only one feeling this way. I was browsing Amazon hoping to find my next obsession in fantasy fiction when I noticed this trend of modern fantasy written in the last 5-10 years where every other damn book, even by different authors, has a title like “THING of THIS and THAT”. More and more scrolled by and I found my mind immediately dismissing every book with this kind of title. I blame both George RR Martin and Sara J Maas. A Song of Ice and Fire, A Court of Thorns and Roses, House of Flame and Shadows, what’s next? Kingdom of Shits and Giggles? When will this trend end? Does this get on anyone else’s nerves?

I await the comments of thoughts and opinions.

Hello everyone! You posted your list of top 10 favorite books or series and we have (finally) completed the list. This list includes all entries with 5 or more votes.

Voting thread here

Full list can be found here.

Previous poll results from 2023 and the Top Lists Wiki

This year had nearly 1,074 individual votes with over 10,000 total votes. There are nearly 1,348 series/novels on the full list.

Special thanks to the other mods for helping out majorly, especially u/Valkhyrie for wrangling so many Goodreads links.

|Rank|Series|Votes|Author|Rank Change| |:-|:-|:-|:-|:-| |1|Middle-Earth Universe|404|J.R.R. Tolkien|1| |2|First Law World|353|Joe Abercrombie|1| |3|A Song of Ice and Fire|336|George R.R. Martin|1| |4|The Stormlight Archive|293|Brandon Sanderson|-3| |5|Realm of the Elderlings|269|Robin Hobb|2| |6|Malazan Universe|240|Steven Erikson and Ian C. Esslemont|3| |7|Wheel of Time|222|Robert Jordan|-1| |8|Discworld|210|Terry Pratchett|0| |8|Mistborn|210|Brandon Sanderson|-3| |10| …

So, I’ve seen this weird idea floating around that the publishing industry is dead-set against male readers–like there’s some hush-hush boardroom meeting where executives rub their hands together, plotting to exclude every man from the literary world. Trust me, that’s not happening. Publishers are out to make money, and if there’s a market for it–be it epic fantasy sagas with wizard bros, gritty contemporary thrillers, or even romance novels set on moon colonies–they’ll publish it.

But let’s pause for a second and look at what’s actually happening in bookstores and across the broader literary landscape. Walk into one–I’ll wait. See that fantasy section with 47 different sword-wielding dudes on the covers? The thrillers where a grizzled ex-CIA guy saves America from a vague European villain? The romance novels featuring a rugged billionaire who definitely isn’t toxic? Those aren’t dusty relics. They’re still selling like hotcakes, with extra syrup. Nobody’s …

The other day I emailed Nathan Ballingrud and Vajra Chandrasekera, both incredible writers. I just wanted to let them know that I loved their work and asked them a question or two about it. They both got back to me very quickly and seemed really happy to hear from a fan. Not all writers have emails or contact forms available, and some are definitely too famous to reply, but give it a shot especially with your lesser known faves.

From the publisher’s Instagram:

https://preview.redd.it/e4qjl888xlqe1.png?width=493&format=png&auto=webp&s=c7c48682b1dafeaaea4421c03041215fc5796267

On March 14, President Trump issued an Executive Order to drastically cut the Institute of Museum and Library Services. “If the administration follows the same playbook it has in targeting other small agencies for closure, IMLS could be shut down.”

IMLS provides vital grants like the Grants to States program and National Leadership Grants, which support programs in communities, art conservation, and accessibility efforts. If these functions are disrupted, it could affect the core operations of museums and libraries everywhere. This means summer reading programs and grants for electronic resources like Libby and Overdrive across the country.

Please take a few minutes to email or call your representatives to urge them to protect IMLS.

Email with a template from ALA: https://app.oneclickpolitics.com/campaign-page?cid=9CyapZUB9sorxFLO4J0c&lang=en

Call with a script: 5 calls https://5calls.org/

Find your representative to call or email: …

Erotic fiction author Lauren Tesolin-Mastrosa — who writes under the name Tori Woods — is facing charges over producing/possessing child abuse material.

The book in question, Daddy’s Little Toy, features a DDLG relationship with a 29 year age gap between the male and female protagonists with the story starting when the girl FINALLY turns 18. The book depicts the male attracted to the girl when she was 3 years of age and has an entire section dedicated to the toddler’s private parts in details. The content of the book, particularly in relation to when the girl was underage, has raised questions over the author - the cherry on top is her dedication to her children who she claims “she will never see the same way again” People Magazine The Guardian

Edit - I don’t know if arrested is necessarily the correct term here.

Just finished ‘Old Man’s War’ and I have to say - what a novel. Lot of novels start well but then kinda get draggy halfway through with too much exposition or world building that often gets in the way of crisp storytelling. But this one always had some or the other surprise being uncovered and I especially loved how much humour Scalzi was able to generate from the idea of making super-soldiers out of 75 years olds. He also didn’t dwell too much into the moral dilemma in what the CDF was doing (not to say that those points were not brought up).

Also, the aliens really felt like aliens in that they were totally unknown quantities (like Clarke’s ‘Rendezvous with Rama’ or Chiang’s ‘Story of Your Life’) and only a person good at improvising can figure out a way to deal with the crazy situations presented in the book. The thing that most stayed with me were the passages of him remembering/telling about his wife and how that …

Pic 1: First contact books

Pic 2: Random sci fi books I’ve acquired second hand except the last three which are alien-haunting-people books

Pic 3: The Spin trilogy. Spin happens to be my fave sci fi book of all time

Pic 4: All together

I’m very deep in depression. Trying to read anything positive isn’t helping so I want to wallow in misery a bit. The kind of book I’m looking for is hard to describe. I want something heavy and depressing to read, but I don’t want that to be its gimmick and its sole focus. It doesn’t have to be sad constantly, in fact it should do it strategically. A good example would be the Rifters trilogy by Peter Watts. Not talking about the fucked up elements in it in particular, just the atmosphere it had so to speak. As a bonus, preferably it won’t end on a positive note.

Just to be precise, I’m looking for something more futuristic and high tech-y, but I won’t complain if your suggestion fits the atmosphere I’m searching for even if it isn’t high tech future.

Sorry if this sounds like too much and thanks in advance!

Edit: Oh wow, that was an overwhelming amount of suggestions so fast! Going slowly by each one by one, thank you all! …

Sept 18, 2025 496 pages

Yuri Gagarin is a private investigator, who picks up small cases from his local community, runs into trouble with the local police, and generally ekes out a living as best he can. He’s aboard the Halcyon - a starship, hurtling through space, carrying thousands of passengers with thousands more sleeping the journey away.

Only his usual investigative work - catching cheating spouses, and small time con artists - is about to take a turn. He’s hired by a mysterious woman called Ruby Red to look into a death in one of Halcyon’s most elite families … and then warned off the case again by a second mysterious woman called Ruby Blue. Caught between the two, he’s about to be embroiled in a murder mystery in which - at any moment - he could be the latest victim.

Gripping, fast-paced fun this is a classic noir mystery with a science fiction twist, which will keep you guessing, and on the edge of your seat, to the end.

A fresh new …

I just finished this 2022 Nebula Award winning novel. I thought the idea of the world was pretty cool. We start off in a 1910’s Egypt, where 40 years after djinn are released back into the world, things are looking a bit different. The steampunk aspects of the book are mostly in the background which I liked. Meeting different types of djinn was also a highlight, reminding me I really should finish “One Thousand and One Nights.” Which the reading of was a great primer for this world I know very little about. The author’s seeming obsession with fashion was a bit off putting for me, but I’m sure it will appeal to some readers. My favorite thing about this book was the action scenes, which I felt were very well done. So many authors try to make action scenes big, or grand, or dense, or… whatever. But Clark really did a great job at showing the excitement without getting bogged down in the intricate details of combat. The central mystery and …

Not in a relatable sitcom joke kind of way. Not in a “ugh, Mondays” kind of way.

Severance understands the quiet, spiritual erosion of doing something meaningless for money. The strange violence of smiling while you feel yourself disappear.

It gets that work isn’t just “boring”—it can be dehumanizing in ways we don’t have words for yet. That’s what makes it so compelling. It doesn’t exaggerate anything. In its own way, it just looks at modern office life with total honesty.

And when you do that? It already looks like horror.

*JUST SAW (sorry for the crap grammar, I did not leave the movie early)

I have seen this film before many times, but I’m telling you - seeing a film as beautiful as this in IMAX 4k just took it to another level.

There were certain moments that felt completely fresh to me (a lot of the scenes of nature and solace) that just took my breath away (the raindrops covering rocks, dewdrops on moss dripping, rolling thunderstorms in the valley…)

Our theatre was very full tonight and you could hear a pin drop during the quiet moments in the Deer Gods pond because of just how gorgeous the scene was. Joe Hisaishi’s score just soars, it truly is perfect.

If you have any opportunity to catch this limited showing this weekend - don’t miss this. It’s a true work of art.