Hayley

Isn't Peachpit a publisher of educational texts?

Yeah, this would be a good category. The Victorian Popular Fictions Journal has some great free ones: Victorian Popular Fictions Journal – Victorian Popular Fiction Association Well that saves me a job, thank you . This would be a different set up to last year - as we all voted for our top three categories and were therefore reading books from those same three categories. But I'm happy for there to be a more open choice this year if everyone wants to try that out instead!

The way we did it last year was by specific challenges. After the vote we had 'read a sensation novel', 'read several chapters from a penny blood/ penny dreadful' and 'read something Victorian and gothic'. We didn't have to all choose Lady Audley's Secret for the sensation novel, but we did . If I remember correctly, Luna and I chose a Frey and McGray book for the 'gothic' challenge, while Kev chose Dracula? I think it works nicely that way because it gives people a bit more choice - and we still ended up having interesting conversations when we weren't reading the exact same books! I would like to throw in the suggestion... A Victorian Ghost Story Both of these are on my to-read list! It's good but I definitely wouldn't describe it as fun 😅. This could become a 'read a Bronte book' category? I think The Professor is nearly as short as Agnes Grey, but I haven't read that one. What kind of books were you thinking of? Like the penny blood ones? If anybody wants it, by the way, last years thread is here:

Yay! Hopefully even more people will join us still but feel free to start throwing in suggestions for things we could read!

Last year I really enjoyed our Victober reading challenge. Would anybody like to join me in another this year!? We would be reading books/short fiction/poetry either written in or set in the Victorian era, with votes for the texts over the weekend and a start date of Monday, October 3rd.

I am! Good idea

I really liked this for the first part but there was something I didn’t like about the way it progressed… look forward to hearing your thoughts once you’re finished .

That's the one! I chose it over the Stephen Fry version because Stephen Fry's was abridged. Absolutely! It's impossible to get into a story if you're distracted by the narrator's voice.

I will have to check the one I had because honestly, it's awful. The narrator reads the dialogue in such a strangely drawn-out way, it sounds like the characters are whining all the time! I definitely wouldn't be able to work while listening to an audiobook though. I think I could drive while listening, but I wouldn't really be paying full attention to it. When I read I picture what's happening in my head, and that might be dangerous while driving 😅

He's not actually a devil, but you might like the character of Death in Terry Pratchett's Discworld books. Reaper Man in particular shows him as a flawed character, unsure about what he wants and definitely having some psychological issues to overcome. It has a humorous tone though. I think that Neil Gaiman wrote some spin-off comics where the devil from Sandman is the main character too. Pretty sure it's called Lucifer.

This proves my point above This is far too kind, the feel of the forum really is so much more to do with all of you! But it was still lovely to read and I appreciate it

Why does being Victorian make it extra girly? I do remember having this feeling of regret after reading a scary book when I was probably about 13, but I can't remember what it was now. It had a particularly gruesome/creepy image in it that I just wished I hadn't ever imagined!

I just checked and I've read 25. Some of my favourites are in there - I love David Copperfield (although I do think Bleak House is technically the better book, as in the most impressive demonstration of Dickens' writing), The Woman in White, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and His Dark Materials. I think the latter should be read in order to really understand what's happening and why, but I do remember the last book having a very different feel to it because of the different settings.

George MacDonald is an interesting one for representing Christian belief in fiction, if you like fantasy. Phantastes was my favourite of his but Lilith might be the most interesting one for religious references.

Agree that I've seen them listed like this before (or at least the Chronicles of Narnia), so it does seem t be generally accepted... but I also agree with France that it seems a bit of a cheat! Some of the Chronicles of Narnia books are very clearly better than others, for example! And I personally prefer to ignore the existence of the last one 😅 Thoroughly agree with this statement though

Aww, thank you but I can't take credit for that, it was already a really friendly place - that's why I really didn't want it to end! We just have lots of very lovely people (like you!) contributing to our forum

We have a spoiler function that hides the content from everyone until they click it, so you can't accidentally read a spoiler. I just edited yours for you, so you can see how it works, but in future you can just click the little eye icon at the top of the text box if you need to include something you think might be a spoiler

Reading these is making me feel incredibly lucky that I happened to find a nice forum first! This was literally my fear. And this is just disgusting behaviour! Honestly, what is wrong with some people!? This is just intriguing though. She had robot dogs???

I find the Dupin stories really interesting in terms of their influence. I know that a lot of people consider it to be the first example of detective fiction. It's also (definitely, as far as I'm aware) the first 'locked room' mystery .

A tiny bit late, but final thoughts on Cymbeline: -It's not the best of Shakespeare's plays, but it was still interesting. The ending starts to get quite silly, almost comedic, which was a bit weird. I was definitely expecting it to be more... well, tragic. -The actual resolution of the play seemed oddly brief. -Still happy that Cloten got his head chopped off.

That was the same for me, actually. I really didn't want a group who were snobbish about the 'right' or worthy kinds of books! I had no idea that all of this happened, it must have been before I joined! An interesting piece of BCF history! But well done you for coming to the rescue of the forum . And I'm sure that, even if Michelle wasn't sure whether she could trust you at the time, she knew she could trust you after that!

And the winner is... @MissMohawk! Congratulations (please check your PM's and I'll get them all sent to you ASAP!)

Wow @muggle not that is beautiful! It has to be extra lucky when it's that bright, right?

I guess this is partly me being nosey, but I was wondering what bought everyone here in the first place. How did you all find the forum? What made you decide to post for the first time? I joined when I started university. I had imagined that, doing a literature course, I would meet lots of people who also really loved books... but I didn't. I remembered one of my English teachers at school (who I loved) talking about a book club she was in, and I thought it would be really nice to have to have other people to discuss books with (and not just for the sake of assessments!). So, sitting in my little student flat one evening in Liverpool, I searched 'online book forum' and BCF popped up! Everyone seemed really friendly with each other, so even though I was nervous about doing something wrong, I decided to post and see what happened - and I never left . So, what made you join?

I think it's sorted now. Haven't actually tested it myself though!