10 Answers2026-06-21
I picked ‘Wave, Listen to Me!’, a workplace drama with supernatural elements, as it is a hidden gem. A loud and boorish waitress accidentally gets hired for a late-night radio show after a night of heavy drinking and actually turns out to be great at it. The show looks at the crazy mayhem of working in live radio and the burnout of creating something new while also exploring career change in your late 20s. The protagonist, Minare, is an amazing, adult, woman – flawed, fierce and passionate. It’s really sharp, funny and has loads of heart.
8 Answers2026-07-29
It is hard to go wrong with a perennial favorite recommended on every academic list of great novels – including ‘Middlemarch’, ‘Anna Karenina’ and ‘Moby-Dick’, all of which have been lauded by generations of literary critics for their groundbreaking structures and themes. Today, we also have a list of more recent novels that have received widespread critical acclaim. These include ‘Wolf Hall’ by Hilary Mantel, a revolutionary historical novel written in the present tense that swept the board at last year’s book awards, and ‘The Goldfinch’ by Donna Tartt, a ‘Dickensian’ novel that divided opinion among readers but won the Pulitzer Prize. However, it is the longer lists of novels that have been shortlisted for a prize that really offer the most interesting suggestions. For example, the shortlist for the International Booker Prize introduced me to a number of stunningly great translated novels including South Korean novel ‘The Vegetarian’. These are the novels that literary critics praise because they expand the literary conversation in some way.
8 Answers2025-11-24
After romance there is always love lost. It's a fairly universally acknowledged truth. Often these storylines follow on from a previous romantic work but while that first was taking its characters from abstemious lust to something way more real this other work looks at how people grow apart over time. The most definitive work on human growth and how time and space can tear apart two people with the deepest of connections of childhood is 5 Centimeters per Second.
'The Garden of Words' is another beautifully written and directed film by Makoto Shinkai. This one is a bit shorter, and a lot denser. It follows a young student who meets a older woman in a garden’s pavilion on rainy mornings. Their relationship is ambiguous and there’s a clear feeling of both of them being saved by the other from their lonely lives. It’s a poem-like film and it explores the idea of a fleeting but very impactful connection with another human being. In contrast, ‘I Want to Eat Your Pancreas’ is not exactly a romantic film, although there is a very deep and powerful romance in it. Instead it explores the impact that a truly deep and honest connection can have on someone’s life, even if it’s not meant to last.
11 Answers2026-06-23
The site is still shut down which I'm very bitter about. It had a really unique layout and even though the comments were somewhat dysfunctional on occasion, reading through the comments for every episode was half the fun of watching the show. All the replacement sites for the show are pretty soulless compared. The "legitimate" sites have very basic, uninterested designs and the "pirate" sites are all just video streams of TV shows with big "DOWNLOAD NOW" buttons all over them. I'm forced to watch the show on one site and then go to Reddit or the show's Discord channel to discuss the show with others. The experience of watching TV shows has been severely split.
10 Answers2025-11-04
There are lots of podcasts discussing the series, PJO. Many of these will have an episode or even a whole segment on fan creations including lots of fanfiction. It’s lovely to hear the hosts discussing the different stories and debating over their favorites. It makes you want to read the story for yourself! They usually include links to access the stories in the show notes. It’s like getting a book recommendation from your friend.
10 Answers2026-06-20
Exploring BDSM themes in anime can be a wild ride, especially when series blend psychological depth with audacious storytelling. 'Nana to Kaoru' stands out for its surprisingly tender take on the dynamic between two childhood friends navigating dominance and submission. It’s less about shock value and more about trust and emotional vulnerability—something I didn’t expect going in. Then there’s 'Perfect Blue,' which isn’t strictly BDSM but uses power dynamics in a chilling psychological thriller format. The way it twists perception and control left me gripping my seat.
For something more overt, 'Kite Liberator' dives into darker territories with its assassin protagonist and morally ambiguous relationships. It’s gritty and unapologetic, though not everyone’s cup of tea. What fascinates me is how these series often use BDSM as a lens to explore broader themes like agency or trauma, rather than just titillation. If you’re curious, approach with an open mind—some moments are uncomfortable, but that’s part of their raw appeal.
9 Answers2026-06-22
Someone mentioned Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend (the classic extreme anime with tons of bondage and tentacles). That’s a sort of extreme classic. It’s not really a normal series (it’s a bunch of OVA movies), but it is worth watching as a sort of historical curiosity. Most of the plots are messed up in extreme ways. I didn’t find it enjoyable to watch, but it’s a sort of landmark of sorts for extreme anime, so I’d recommend it to anyone who wants to know where a lot of these very extreme plot devices and elements came from. It’s not for everyone, but it is a piece of anime history, for better or worse.
9 Answers2025-07-12
I am also referring to Julia Quinn’s pre-Netflix Bridgerton books. While these have been made gorgeously visual for the series, the books are primarily dialogue-driven. So, for example, the pall-mall scene in The Viscount Who Loved Me is a fantastic scene of competitive flirtatiousness and witty repartee, far more accessible than Georgette Heyer’s terrifically-witty repartee but equally consistently charming and character-revealing.
Another author with very clever dialogue is Mary Balogh. Often her dialogue is even more subtle than Quinn’s and is used to reveal deep emotions. Balogh’s dialogue is quiet and witty and often used to observe others or to slowly reveal to the reader the hero/heroine’s growth as they slowly break down their walls to each other. A wonderful example of this is ‘Slightly Married’ from her Bedwyn series.
9 Answers2026-07-28
While modern takes on the academic patron are fairly run of the mill, their fantasy or historical counterparts can be rather fun to read. The Ancient Magus’ Bride comes to mind – Chise is very young, but her academic patron has the air of a mentor and is extremely caring. Kakuriyo: Bed and Breakfast for Spirits is another good example where the female lead is quite pragmatic for her age and thus older in spirit. Reading how the core aspects of this trope translate to non-modern settings is quite interesting, particularly how the power dynamics are intensified and thus often even add to the story’s political or social intrigue.
12 Answers2025-11-06
Looking at purely accessible production values (ie: good anime with decent plots and nice animation) then titles from the last 5-10 years would be best for a beginner. Before then there were titles, yes, but they’re rough by today’s standards. So maybe make a filter for ‘titles from the last 5 years’ and pick the most popular one to start with.