We were born as a small press specializing in African specfic, and so this is our first #fedibookfair We have published four books so far this year and you can find them on this link https://www.ododopress.com/books/

Some books are free to download, and these are classics which have been revised for a modern audience. We will do a thread with all the books so far in our catalogue.

#books #bookstodon

For this year’s #FediBookFair I’m giving away free copies of my recently released version of Paddling with a Naturalist.
Just visit https://bretthodnett.com/FreePaddling.html and use the code ‘fedihuman’ to get your free EPUB!

For anyone who loves the outdoors, Paddling with a Naturalist offers an opportunity to gain a strong sense of the forces behind, and the interconnectedness of the natural world. It will allow you to better understand what makes nature function, and to appreciate why the things you see from your canoe are the way they are. To see nature as a biologist does.
Readable and entertaining, Paddling with a Naturalist is written like a travelogue. Follow Brett through creeks and lakes, and along the portage trail, to find that at the end of your journey you have come to understand the forces that make our beautiful natural world possible. Bring it along on your next canoe trip and see nature through different eyes.

#WhatToRead #BookBlog #Readers #BrettHodnett #WritersOfMastodon #Author #Writer #Writers #Books #Livres #Bookstodon #BookCover #Evolution #EPUB #Ebook #FreeBook #FreeBooks #GiveAway #NewBook #BookBlog #Readers #Science #Evolution #Nature #Wilderness #Outdoors #Summer #Canoe #Canoeing #Paddling #AlgonquinPark #Travelogue #Ontario #forest #trees #Naturalist #Outside #Wildflowers #Wildflower #Flora

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Book cover of Paddling with a Naturalist. The image is a photo of the front of a canoe taken from the stern on calm water with a bright blue sky. There are coniferous trees across the somewhat marshy water. It looks as though there is a bend in the waterway and a corner you could paddle around. In the front of the canoe is a large backpack with a rolled up tent attached to the side of it.

I finished reading Witchcraft for Wayward Girls. This was the first book I’d read by Grady Hendrix. The premise is that in 1970 a group of pregnant teenagers in a Florida home for “wayward girls” fight the oppressive nature of their situation by embracing dark magic - but are they really in control?

There’s some significant body horror related to childbirth and self-mutilation. Do NOT read this if you are expecting your first baby! Hendrix says in the afterward that as middle aged childless man he’s tried his best with the subject matter and he’s mostly done well, I think. I’d also give a CW for CSA.

I’m not sure how I feel about the main character, I feel that she’s a bit inconsistent, but I enjoyed the cast of “wayward” girls.

Overall I give it ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

#books #bookstodon #horror #amreading

I'm not saying all cats are arseholes, but they are a little bit, and that's why we love 'em 😂

#Cat #Cats #Caturday
#BookMemes #Meme #Humor #Humour #Funny
#ReadingMemes #Reading #Readers #ReadingCommunity
#Litterature #Novel #Bookshelf
#Books #Bookstodon #FantasyBooks

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Photo of a statue with a book and there's a cat sitting on the book. Caption: Even if you're a statue, there will still be a cat, blocking you from reading...

Which legal and ethical resource do you use to download books in epub format?

#Bookstodon

Film preserves far more than movies. Home movies and "useful cinema" can document everyday life, work, education, and communities, yet much of this material remains at risk of decay or loss. 🎞️

Archivist & filmmaker Rick Prelinger makes the case for scanning films so they can be preserved, shared, and studied. 📽️

📚 Read "No Film Left Unscanned" in VANISHING CULTURE from the #InternetArchive.

📖 Download & read, FREE:
https://archive.org/details/vanishing-culture-2026/page/104

#VanishingCulture #DigitalMemory #Bookstodon

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Greenish-black graphic for the Vanishing Culture series with the headline 'Could your attic hold the most important film footage no one's ever seen?' and a quote from Rick Prelinger, Archivist and Filmmaker: 'Most still live with the families that made them ... all vulnerable to deterioration.' A column of pixels dissolves beside the quote.

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Light green-gray graphic quoting Rick Prelinger, Archivist and filmmaker, for the Vanishing Culture series, with the quote 'Of all films, home movies are the closest to our hearts, the most charismatic, the most fascinating—and they are in the greatest jeopardy.' Pixelated greenish-black bars sit above and below the text.

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Book cover titled “Vanishing Culture” on a teal background. Pixel-art style graphics show a VHS tape, open book, film reel, chain link, and vinyl record dissolving into digital fragments. At the bottom, a cursor icon points to the word “SAVE,” alongside an archive-style building icon, evoking digital preservation.

Author copies arrived! Still feels amazingly surreal to see it for the first time, even eight books in.

Out November 17 (US, and international digital; UK print sometime in December)

#NewRelease #bookstodon

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The author, a white woman with graying light brown hair wearing dark framed classes is holding up a copy of her newest book. Cover of A Witch's Book of Days, forward by Cory Thomas Hutcheson featuring a ring on items in old fashioned line art style including roses, pocket watches, swords, cup, birds and bees on a blue background with a lighter center where the title is.

Just in case someone was wondering what #TechBro controlled #AI #Media is actually meant to achieve 🤔😒

@reading @bookstodon @books @philosophy @stoicism @psychology

#Thinking #Meme #NoAI #Philosophy #Psyhology
#BookMemes #Meme #ReadingMemes #Reading #Readers #ReadingCommunity #Litterature #Novel #Bookshelf #Books #Bookstodon

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Post by Owl at the Library The part of George Orwell's 1984 that everyone forgets is how the music and publishing industries have been replaced by a machine that spits out songs and bad novels “without any human intervention.” The goal is to keep you from ever having to think.

Last week I posted a lot about my book and how if just half of my 1k followers bought a copy it'd be pretty life-changing.

It's so hard to market and advertise authentic queer fiction in this weirdly less tolerant world we find ourselves in.

Loads of you shared and boosted, thank you! Still only 31 copies sold as a result.

I hope you don't mind me sharing again.

https://rrpl.ink/tbfe

It IS available worldwide, you may have to search local platforms.

#Bookstodon #Books #Fiction #Queer

"My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori."

War poet Wilfred Owen, who spent time at nearby Craiglockhart (now part of Napier University's campus), fell on this day, 1918 - a week before the Armistice. His poetry, however, is immortal.

I wonder if he and Sassoon would have walked past where our bookshop now stands, on days out from their shell shock treatment at Craiglockhart?

He was just 25, who knows what words and verse waited in him to be drawn through the pen to our pages, but we never got to see? How many other talents were swallowed by that inferno, we will never know..

#books #livres #poetry #poesie #WilfredOwen #GreatWarPoets #WWI #FirstWorldWar #WarPoetry #PremiereGuerreMondiale #ArmisticeDay #bookstodon

Era necessario, diceva, subire la realtà di questo stato italiano che si formava, ateo e rapace, di queste leggi di espropria e di coscrizione che dal Piemonte sarebbero dilagate sin qui, come il colera. "Vedrete" fu la sua non originale conclusione "vedrete che non ci lasceranno neanche gli occhi per piangere".

[Il Gattopardo - Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa]

#bookstodon #libri #lettura #IlGattopardo #TheLeopard

"Language fails.
Is a volley of birds
Splatting on glass.
You know it when she asks
How are you or they say feeling better now?"

Matthew Haigh's poetry collection from Salt Books explores serious illness, & the body, in a way too many of us will recognise. I certainly do...

#poetry #poesie #books #livres #bookstodon #MatthewHaigh #GodMode #health #illness

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Yellow cover with a photo of a male torso with medical sensors and tubes going into it

Highly amused by The Museum of Bums. The great terriers of art history... A cheeky wee read (sorry) 😋

.

#books #livres #bookstodon #bums

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Art history book, Museum of Bums, showing a classical pair of statues, male & female, facing away from us, showing bare bottoms.

Let's cut out the middlemen. I have a question.

Would you consider signing up, and paying in advance, to secure a numbered, personalised (dedicated and signed) hardback/ cloth-bound volume of Norwegian folklore printed in Europe?

#FuckAmazon #SelfPublishing #Bookstodon #Folklore

New from David Griscom, in our magazine: By laying out a vision for an achievable socialist future, The Blueprint: How Socialism Can Work in the Real World is proof that the socialist movement in America is not just growing but growing up. https://www.texasobserver.org/could-socialism-come-to-texas/

#Texas #politics #history #socialism #Books #bookstodon #culture

From a reading perspective, this is the time of year where I once again get the urge to re-read A Black Fox Running by Brian Carter.

It's a beautiful description of the seasons as they affect Dartmoor, in Devon, told mostly through the eyes of the fox Wulfgar, as he's hunted by a local gamekeeper. It's not a kids book by any means, being more in the vein of Watership Down than The Animals of Farthing Wood, but the prose raises it high above both of those.

https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/a-black-fox-running-brian-carter/3af1d84c35bed1f8?ean=9781408896129

#Bookstodon

Continuing my read of the new John Scalzi, come to a point where a character is visiting his old friend's mum, who has cancer.

She thanks him for *not* saying she's "being brave", & that really she's angry, and ye gods I'm bloody feeling that, this horrible year.

I know folk mean well when they say that, but trust me, nobody with cancer wants to hear about how "brave" we're being.

#books #livres #bookstodon

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A page from the Monsters of Ohio

Writer Joe Dunthorne on the ever-growing scams attempted on authors https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/nov/01/like-many-authors-im-bombarded-by-scam-fan-mail-i-wasnt-prepared-for-what-would-happen-when-i-wrote-back

#books #livres #bookstodon

Reading for pleasure is linked to better brain health across the lifespan

https://www.psypost.org/reading-for-pleasure-is-linked-to-better-brain-health-across-the-lifespan/

#reading #books #bookstodon #psychology #neuroscience #cognitivescience #mentalhealth

I know #Romantasy is a big thing right now, but how are things going with #RoSciFi 🤔😁

In an alternate universe they're making this kind of #Spicy 😂

@reading @bookstodon @books @humor@fedigroups.social @humor@lemmy.world @aiop

#GeekMemes #Geek #Meme #Humor #Humour #Funny
#SciFi #Alternate #Universe
#Reading #Readers #ReadingCommunity #Bookstodon #BookMemes #Books

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Cover with an android doing the Marily Monroe over a vent pose in a yellow dress. Title: Do Androids Drema of Electric Dicks? A new novel by Philip K. Sheep

“But also because I figure many of you might be doubting your own sanity as truth starts to take the place of hope in your life. And you might need reassurance that "digging around in the dire details"-becoming collapse aware-is not doomist. You're not alone, and you are not imagining things.”

#IEatTheStars #SarahWilson #Bookstodon

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Front cover of book I Eat The Stars.

🛸 "Wait... why is today the first time I am hearing of Mastodon?!" 🤔🪐
My tiny alien brain is officially short-circuiting! I’ve been broadcasting my art and videos out into the cold, algorithmic corporate void of the internet for YEARS just to get crushed by the algorithm... Only to find out there’s a whole cozy, ad-free, human-driven universe over here in the Fediverse?! 💫

WHAAA?!!!
I am confused but highly enthusiastic. :3
If you are new here like me, or just want to adopt a friendly spacey artist into your feed, let’s connect!

🎨 Art is my full-time job, but I also drop daily video shorts, stream gaming shenanigans, and write cozy sci-fi lore!

Please give this a Boost to help a new space-traveling indie creator find her community! 🔄💖
🛸🎨📚 #Introduction #NewHere #MastoArt #CreativeToons #ArtistOnMastodon #VTuber #IndieVTuber #Envtuber #Bookstodon #SciFiWriters

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A cute chibi-style drawing of Bitsy the alien riding a chibi mastodon, looking ready for a new adventure. The art style is vibrant, clean, and whimsical.

Looking for a good #halloween read? Get this collection of African #Horror on sale. 30% off! (Pre-Order, release date 1st Nov)

Stories include a shape-shifting girl who saves a town from a nightmare, aliens fleeing trigger happy soldiers, and a bride who turns herself into a zombie in bizarre wedding, and a lot of monsters. One reviewer says it is “Enjoyable… Dila has good material and can clearly write brilliant specfic.”

Buy here https://www.ododopress.com/short-story-collection/a-killing-in-the-sun/
#books #bookstodon #sff #writing

Excellent evening, working late for a fascinating talk by Iain MacGregor, on his new #history book, Battle, looking at pivotal, influential moments from the Ancient world to the Ukrain's fight https://www.tickettailor.com/events/theedinburghbookshop/2355246

Nice to get back into doing events again after this awful year. Still have to pace myself, simply don't have energy to do full day plus extra hours, so came in later so I wouldn't run out of juice.

#books #livres #Edinburgh #Edimbourg #bookstodon

#Edinburgh peeps, a fascinating #History event for you on Thursday 29th.

Award-winning author Iain MacGregor joins us, to discuss his latest book, Battle: The Moments That Transformed Warfare from Ancient Greece to Ukraine
https://www.tickettailor.com/events/theedinburghbookshop/2355246

.

#books #livres #histoire #IainMacGregor #MilitaryHistory #bookshops #librairies #BookEvents #Battle #bookstodon

#Edinburgh peeps, with the darker, colder nights, warm, cosy cooking seems all the more welcoming.

Join us on Wednesday 28th with award-winning food writer and historian Alissa Timoshkina

https://www.tickettailor.com/events/theedinburghbookshop/2413011

#books #livres #cookery #cuisine #Bookshops #librairies #bookstodon #AlissaTimoshkina #BookEvents #CookeryBooks

Books.
If you want to broaden your horizons.

#books #bookstodon #reading #art #museum

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A man, standing on a stack of books looking over the wall. Art by Brad Downey in the Helmond museum

Multiple household chores and errands done on day off, rewarding myself with oat milk hot chocolate and a chocolate orange muffin with my book

#books #livres #bookstodon

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Cup of cream topped hit chocolate next to a chocolate orange muffin and a paperback of Frankenstein

This #Halloween meet new creatures from African #folklore.

In Congo they call lightning Nzazi, and it takes the form of a kind of a dog, either red or black, with shaggy hair and a curly tail. When it comes down it gives one sharp bark – ta! – and with the second bark it goes up again. No charm can protect against it and no medicine person can avert its attack.

This book, free to download, has more wonderful monsters like this!
https://www.ododopress.com/non-fiction/myths-and-legends-of-the-bantu/
#book #books #bookstodon #sff #fantasy

My queer sci-fi-ish book ‘The Boy From Elsewhere’ is currently 40% off via the Bezosphere.

It’s full price to buy it direct but I get more of the royalties that way.

Either way, if just half my followers picked up a copy, wherever in the world they are, I’d get a desperately needed boost.

Times are hard for creatives. Queer creatives doubly so. Please consider grabbing a cool book and supporting this one?

https://amzn.eu/d/0eKVrLph
https://rrpl.ink/tbfe

#QueerBook #LGBT #Bookstodon

#nowreading #bookstodon
Intriguing premise this one, certainly not your average time loop…

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Book cover for ‘On the Calculation of Volume - Book One’ by Solvej Balle

And so Time goes on as it should, and events that were fated to happen are left instead to Chance. And Chance never falls in love with anything for long.

But the world is strange, and endings are not truly endings no matter how the Stars might wish it so. Occasionally, Fate can pull itself together again.

And Time is always waiting."

7/end

#Bookstodon

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Cover of The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern, where the story comes from.

When the furore died down, there was nothing else left of Fate. The Owl who consumed Fate's eyes gained great sight, greater sight than any that had been granted to a mortal creature before. The Parliament crowned him The Owl King. In the heavens, the Stars sparkled with relief, but the Moon was full of sorrow.

6/

#Bookstodon

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Close up of an owl looking very stern.

Fate's screams echoed through the deepest corners and the highest heavens, but no one dared to intervene, save for a small, brave mouse, who snuck into the fray, creeping unnoticed through the blood and bone and feathers, and took Fate's heart and kept it safe.

5/

#Bookstodon

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A picture of a tiny mouse in a dark wood

The Parliament of Owls came to the logical conclusion that if the problem was in the combination, one of the elements should be removed. They chose to keep the one they felt more important.
The Parliament of Owls told their decision to the Stars, and the Stars agreed. The Moon did not, but on this night she was dark, and could not offer her opinion. So it was decided, and Fate was pulled apart, ripped into pieces by beaks and claws.

4/

#Bookstodon

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A group of owls sitting in a tree

They asked the Moon her advice. The Moon in turn called upon the Parliament of Owls, to decide how best to proceed. The Parliament of Owls convened and discussed the matter amongst themselves. Night after night, they argued and debated while the world slept around them, and the world continued to turn, unaware that such important matters were under discussion while it slumbered.

3/

#Bookstodon

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Picture of a huge harvest moon rising over a forested hilltop

The Stars conspired and separated the two. For a while they breathed easier in the heavens. Time continued to flow as it always had, or perhaps imperceptibly slower. Fate wove together the paths that were meant to intertwine, though perhaps a string was missed here or there. But eventually, Fate and Time found each other again. In the heavens, the Stars sighed, twinkling and fretting.

2/

#Bookstodon

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Timelapse image of stars swirling over a forest

Story Time 🧵

""Once, very long ago, Time fell in love with Fate. This, as you might imagine, proved problematic. Their romance disrupted the flow of time. It tangled the strings of fortune into knots. The Stars watched from the heavens nervously, worrying what might occur. What might happen to the days and nights were Time to suffer a broken heart? What catastrophes might result if the same fate awaited Fate itself?

1/

#Bookstodon

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Image of the Milky Way over Las Ventanas in the Cafayate Desert, Argentina

So it did not arrive when it was due but it did arrive today!
It is beautiful!

@emilyhare.com

#TTRPG #DND #Bookstodon

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A hardback book called surviving Strangehollow with a beautiful art piece of a cute fluffy black monster at the roots of a tree with a sword in the ground beside it

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A small fluffy white dog with brown ears licking at a a hardback book called surviving Strangehollow with a beautiful art piece of a cute fluffy black monster at the roots of a tree with a sword in the ground beside it

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The inside cover of a hardback book with a stunning piece of art of a huge dragon type monster coming out of the dark towards a person in a dark cape holding a staff with bright light coming from it.

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A book page with surviving Strangehollow at the top and and adorable baby dinosaur with a little hat made of part of the egg shell on its head.

I'm at the Young Adult Literature Convention next weekend chairing a worldbuilding panel, signing some books, and generally hanging out and chatting. If you're in London or nearby, do come along! It'd be great to see you there! #YALC #Bookstodon

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An image containing the Young Adult Literature Convention logo, the title 'Beautiful Worlds, Sunday 1st November 15:00 - 16:00" and then four book covers for: Storm Bringer by Tig Wallace, Hell to Pay by Lora Beth Johnson, Seven Deadly Spells by L. A. Weatherly, and The Boy From Elsewhere by Kestral Gaian. Underneath the book covers it says "A panel on worldbuilding featuring Tig Wallace, Lora Beth Johnson, L. A. Weatherly, chaired by Kestral Gaian."

Authors paid hundreds to Patrick White Publishing, but allege 'crap' service and AI art

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-25/patrick-white-publishing-authors-unhappy-service-ai-art/107255794

#Books #bookstodon #author #novel #NoAI #AI #PatrickWhite

This #Halloween meet new creatures from African #folklore.

In Angola, there was a giant fish, Kimbiji, which kept catching the goats and pigs of a hero, Sudika-Mbambi, so he baited a large hook with a sucking-pig and caught Kimbiji, but even he, with all his superpowers, was not strong enough to pull the monster to land. He fell into the water, and it swallowed him.

This book is full of such stories, and it is free to download!
https://www.ododopress.com/non-fiction/myths-and-legends-of-the-bantu/
#book #books #bookstodon #sff #fantasy

As a middle-aged man I still identify with Alice in Wonderlands "required to play along with adult nonsense" 🤔

I'd like to suggest the subtitle: "10-years-old and already sick of your bullshit." 😂

#AliceInWonderland #Sick #OfYour #Bullshit
#ReadingMemes #Meme #Humor #Humour #Funny #Geek
#Reading #Readers #ReadingCommunity #AmReading
#Novel #Books #Fiction #Bookstodon

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Post by roach-works look, here’s the thing: alice in wonderland’s enduring fucking charm is that it perfectly captures the vibe of being a very tired and annoyed child who is nonetheless required to play along with adult nonsense. alice is dragged from place to place without warning, forced to play stupid games with no good prizes, grilled over her schooling and manners and recitation and dress, scolded, judged, insulted to her face, sent away, given gifts she didn’t ask for and doesn’t like, corrected incorrectly, been subject to shifting and arbitrary rules, and then when she gets snappish with all this bullshit everyone acts like a little girl’s temper is the end of the fucking world. alice in wonderland isn’t a drug trip or a nightmare or a metaphor, that’s just what being ten years old is LIKE. that’s why kids love it so much. even if they can’t quite articulate how, they recognize themselves in it.

We called and there are *so many* authors participating. I have never gone through an automated phone directory that had multiple pages. We ended up listening to Monique Gray Smith (local fave) and Kai Cheng Thom

#bookstodon #kids #KidLit #parenting

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Event poster with an illustration of a crescent moon above a red phone booth. Vancouver Writer's Fest 778-369-BOOK(2665) Bedtime Story Hotline Call any time of day from October 18-25 to hear Festival-exclusive readings of bedtime stories, narrated by acclaimed authors. WritersFest.bc.ca/bedtime-stories

Today! I have an AMA on r/fantasy starting at 10:30 Pacific! I have some copies of A WALL IS ALSO A ROAD to give away, too! Come say hello! https://www.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/s/oftt5ZBoTh
#scifi #bookstodon #science

What the actual fuck

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/oct/21/new-prize-launches-books-co-written-with-ai-france

#Bookstodon #FuckAI

Don Fabrizio non poteva saperlo allora, ma una parte della neghittosità, dell'acquiescenza per la quale durante i decenni seguenti si doveva vituperare la gente del Mezzogiorno, ebbe la propria origine nello stupido annullamento della prima espressione di libertà che a questo popolo si era mai presentata.

[Il Gattopardo - Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa]

#bookstodon #libri #lettura #IlGattopardo #TheLeopard