TheUrbanBibliophile

** DISCLAIMER! - contains a lot of spoilers about the book **

** Read at your own risk of spoiling the storyline **

so i just finished the silent patient and my god what a fucking ride. after finishing it, i literally could not articulate it whatsoever cause i was trying to put 2+2 together for ages. the sheer cleverness of the writer had astounded me. i was also extremely shocked at how the writer was able to wrap up the entire plot of the book in not more than 20 pages max, managed to keep it completely unexpected and while doing so, evoke such a powerful reaction from the readers. i would bow. the storyline was absolutely fresh. it was very original and it was written in a language which was easy to read through and easy to visualize. that’s what i really liked about the book. it was written incredibly well written especially the main characters i.e alicia berenson (the patient) and theo faber (the psychotherapist). the character development happened very smoothly and slyly. the length was also perfect. what i mean to say is, it is not unnecessarily long wherein it is getting too descriptive and at the same time, it was also not too short and abrupt. i felt like all the words in the book were written judiciously and all the details had a role to play in the overall story. every single word had a purpose. none of the bits seemed overexplained (*coughs in king*) or irrelevant. for me personally, it surprisingly had a lot of elements which i really like in general and did not expect to be in it judging by the first look or the first few pages. i am talking about the use of greek mythology, particularly the tragic story of alcestis, art, interpretation of art and psychology. usually i don’t come across these themes when i’m reading about a murder (i'm fairly a new reader, more like a resurrected reader). at least in contemporary fiction. another thing that kept me on edge every step of the way was the fact that the climax wasn’t revealed till the last few pages of the book. I would like to emphasize on the word ‘few’ cause the story is wrapped up in pretty much the last 10-15 pages of the book which is something extremely risky and difficult. The fact that the writer was able to summarize the entire plot and tie all the loose ends in the final 10 pages is something that is definitely worth all the appreciation in the world. to do such a task and so effortlessly needs a lot of skill, planning and courage. the last 10-15 pages were the ‘make it or break it’ point in the book which was handled very intelligently and naturally it evoked the intended reaction out of the readers. the readers made it through triumphantly without any chance of disappointment. now, diving into the main plot points which got me fkn charged with emotions was obviously, without a doubt, the ending. I felt like such an idiot for not seeing it coming. for some reason i saw kathy cheating on theo and, alicia and gabriel’s story as two separate things altogether. i did not, for once, get the slightest inclination that maybe the two can be related. i just don’t know why. maybe i trusted theo as a character way too much. i know that agatha christie had a big influence on the writer and boy, did he manage to pull a complete ‘roger ackroyd’ on us. it makes complete sense. why alicia ‘opened up’ to him out of all the people who tried to cure her, why theo insisted on having her as his patient, why he believed her ‘strange man’ theory unlike all the others, why alicia randomly attacked him etc. i did not understand the whole ‘strange man’ trope till i unconsciously found theo outside gabriel/alicia’s house while following the man who kathy cheated on him with. everything was in front of my eyes and still i wasn’t able to grasp it. even then the mere fact that theo was following some random man and the fact that alicia also complained of being watched/stalked did not ring a bell. it was only when he notices alicia berenson from the summerhouse, did i have my hallelujah moment. however, my dumbass brain still wanted to get confirmation, which it did by the end of the next chapter. when this happened, my mind went along the lines of, ‘wasn’t alicia in coma?’. That’s when

ever since the BLM restarted last year, my urge to educate myself in this area has become unstoppable. this area of history and politics are not really covered in length (if at all) where i’m from and therefore i decided to do some research of my own. i came across some exquisite content in all formats. be it books, movies, documentaries, podcasts, articles etc. i wanna share it all with you in the hope that other people who are interested to learn about this can easily access some basic material immediately. i am also aware of the fact that since I’m not a student of this subject and neither do I work in this field, i might have missed a lot of very important texts or material that might be obvious to other people from different parts of the world and different fields. in that case, i urge anyone to comment with the links of whatever material they have access to, in the comments. it’ll be of great help to everyone who is trying to actively educate themselves in this topic and very efficient.

i am attaching a google docs link of all the material i was able to find over the past couple of weeks on the topic. i will keep updating this the moment i find something new.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BjoOVvcjbg00l199kdUQ2KdST32eLJDrFZiyVVXGIvw/edit?usp=drivesdk

please consider this as a digital archive of whatever we can find on the issue and help each other out. if this document proves useful to anyone, that fulfils my purpose with this.

thanks! stay safe! x

I listen to a lot of podcasts, so I thought I’d make a list:

History/Weird Stories:

Lore: (weird/creepy/interesting stories about the origins of folklore)

Myths and Legends: (guy tells stories from mythology it’s really good)

The Dollop: (two dudes tell weird stories mostly from America)

Slow Burn: A Podcast About Watergate

Stuff You Missed in History Class: (interesting stories from history)

Mysteries Abound: (more weird stories)

Family Ghosts: (people talk about secrets from their families)

S-Town: (crazy stuff in not the greatest small town)

The Conspirators: (more weird stories)

Unexplained: (you guess it more weird stories)

You Must Remember This: (Hollywood stories)

Crime:

My Favorite Murder: (the best - two hilarious women talk about murder and true crime in general) 

Stranglers: (about the Boston Strangler - this one does go into quite a lot of detail so if you don’t want that avoid this one)

Detective: (detectives talk about their experiences. My fave is season one with Lt. Joe Kenda)

Atlanta Monster: (discusses the infamous Atlanta Child murders - did the right man go to jail?)

Black Hands - A Family Mass Murder: (Bain family murders - who did it? This is a particularly infamous NZ murder)

Casefile:  (Australian Murders - again some of them can be pretty intense)

Crimetown: (okay this podcast is amazing, it’s like something out of a movie - basically corruption and gangsters in Rhode Island)

Convicted: (man is accused of murdering his daughter and sent to jail, but did he do it?)

Dirty John: (Debra Newell marries a dude she thinks is perfect - this is a terrible idea and you will scream at her)

Hollywood and Crime: (links a bunch of murders to the Black Dahlia killing - I think s2 goes into the Manson murders. Really good but again they go into quite a bit of detail about some of the murders so if you’re squeamish maybe don’t listen)

In the Dark: (okay this one is a little rough because it’s about a terrible child murder, that being said it’s really well produced it did make me cry though)

Someone Knows Something: (s1 is about a missing kid and is kind of sad but not super horrible, s2 is about a woman who went missing just days after being proposed to on live TV and s3 is about a clan murder in the 60s - probably my fave season - s4 is about an unsolved bomb murder)

The Fall Line: (two African American girls go missing and the criminal justice system fails to do a thing about it - prepare to get angry)

Thin Air: (missing people)

Trace: (unsolved murder)

Fictional:

Welcome to Nightvale: (hard to explain, weird stories, weird town)

Limetown: (the second season is supposed to be coming - years ago three hundred people went missing from a top secret science facility and a journalist wants answers)

Other:

The Mental Illness Happy Hour: (a pretty cool podcast where people talk about mental illness)

Dear Hank and John: (A comedy podcast about death and involving highly dubious advice)

**This is not a full list! Message me with additions and I will keep it going. Some may repeat in different categories**

Case (or multiple) per episode crime drama:

Forensic Files

Cold Case Files

The X-Files

Law and Order (Original, SVU, and Criminal Intent)

Criminal Minds

NCIS

NCIS: Los Angeles

Bones

Firsthand Accounts:

Snapped

Evil Lives Here

Unsolved Mysteries

I Survived

The Confession Tapes

I Am A Killer

Fear Thy Neighbor

Drugs/Organized Crimes:

Narcos

Ozark

Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul

How To Fix A Drug Scandal

Drugs Inc.

Drug Lords

Cocaine

Icarus

Screwball

The Legend of Cocaine Island

Operation Odessa

Murder Mountain

Fear City: New York vs The Mafia

Dramatization of a real event:

Chernobyl

Unbelievable

Dirty John

Mindhunter

When They See Us

The Assassination of Gianni Versace: An American Crime Story

The OJ Simpson Trial: An American Crime Story

Orange is the New Black

The Act

Foxcatcher

A Crime to Remember

Documentaries (One Part):

The Cheshire Murders

Cropsey

Paradise Lost

Abducted in Plain Sight

Amanda Knox

Long Shot

Roll Red Roll

Audrie & Daisy

The Fear of 13

Out Of Thin Air

Thin Blue Line

The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson

Lessons From A School Shooting: Notes on Dunblane

Team Foxcatcher

Interview With a Serial Killer

Amanda Knox

ReMastered: Who Killed Jam Master Jay?

Docuseries (Multi-Parts):

Tiger King

Conversations With A Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes

Inside The Real Narcos

The Trials of Gabriel Fernandez

The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann

Unabomber: In His Own Words

The Keepers

The Staircase

The Pharmacist

The Devil Next Door

The Confession Killer

Making a Murderer

I Love You, Now Die

The People vs. OJ Simpson

Don’t Fuck With Cats: Hunting An Internet Killer

Evil Genius: The True Story of America’s Most Diabolical Bank Heist

Killer Inside: The Mind of Aaron Hernandez

The Innocent Man

The Menendez Murders

Casting JonBenet

Captive

Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer

Trial 4

The Case Against Adnan Syed

Carmel: Who Killed Maria Marta?

Trial By Media

Lorena

Smiley Face Killers: The Hunt for Justice

Outcry

Killer Kids

The Killing Season

Based on a Serial Killer Movies:

My Friend Dahmer

Dahmer

Gacy

Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile

Zodiac

The Snowtown Murders

Monster

Summer of Sam

From Hell

Bernie

Badlands

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer

The Boston Strangler

Ed Gein

Wolf Creek

Speck

Karla

The Town That Dreaded Sundown

The Night Stalker

The Hunt for the BTK Killer

The Deliberate Stranger

Out of the Darkness

Eaten Alive

Citizen X

10 Rillington Place

The Gray Man

Green River Killer

The Iceman

Who Killed Atlanta’s Children?

Killer: A Journal of Murder

Cults:

Wild Wild Country

Waco

Bikram: Yogi, Guru, Predator

Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath

Holy Hell

Deprogrammed

Jonestown: Paradise Lost

Children of God

Jesus Camp

Source Family

Fraud:

Sour Grapes

Dirty Money

Catfish

Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened

Fyre Fraud

Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Catch Me If You Can

The Inventor: Out For Blood in Silicon Valley

The Imposter

The Con

Love Fraud

Quiz

Fictional Crime Thrillers:

You

Dexter

Twin Peaks

Hannibal

Bates Motel

American Horror Story

Dark

How To Get Away With Murder

The Stranger

Dead to Me

Broadchurch

American Crime

Thirteen Reasons Why

Black Mirror

Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul

Killing Eve

Big Little Lies

Harper’s Island

A Wilderness of Error

Paranormal Series:

Celebrity Ghost Stories

Stranger Things

I Am Not Okay With This

Paranormal Survivor

Ancient Aliens

The X-Files

So Weird

i was always thinking about what new skills i can garner all the time, which is not a bad thing at all but it never hit me to go back to what i was always interested in. 

we all have a few things in our mind or on our life which we put for later, for when ‘we have more time’ or things we want to get back to but can’t. 

i tried to do that these few months and my goodness, was it explosive. 

this time, although it’s something i have already done before, the intensity with which im back into it is inexplicable. i did not realize and definitely did not see it coming. 

now when i game or research/read history, it’s a whole new experience but at the same time, a comfort zone. it’s whole different lane in a path i was already familiar with. i wanna learn so many things about the space which i would’ve never thought of, had i still been a child. it’s like a weird puzzle piece of my life which was lost for several years and now i have finally found it and put it back together with the main picture. 

it has changed the way i think, changed the way i plan for my future, made me realize so many things in the present which i was unclear about. it is so powerful because now i feel like my life has come a full circle and i still have that potential of doing things i didn’t think i could ever get back to. 

all i’m saying is, nostalgia and getting back to childhood habits just might have an accidental huge impact in your life and who knows, maybe that’s what you’ve been trying to search for all this time. 

like i promised, here are the links: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHE1cJF3OZs&t=158s

my dear fellow tumblr mates and readers, 

recently i have been thinking a lot and analyzing the crazy times we’re living in right now. naturally, i realized a lot of things that has changed drastically. some might say it is for the good and some might say it is for the bad but like people say, ‘change is the only constant’ and this time, i really resonated with that. i am living through it and am consciously noticing every period of change in my life. 

the thing in particular that i want to address with this post is the concept of nostalgia and no, this thought did not come randomly to me, it was fed to me by the youtube algorithms and two of my favourite youtubers who just came out with videos involving the concept of nostalgia (which ofc i will link it). 

It just got me thinking. 

over the past 8 months of being indoors, it came with a lot of time in my hands with which i experimented a lot. there were new skills which i learnt like cooking and old skills which were brought back. 

now that’s my hypothesis for this rant: getting back to my old self 

let’s rewind back to pre-corona where we were physically going out to work, to meet friends, university, travelled etc and lets try to intertwine it with adult life. 

Although these things are and were extremely fun to do, it is sad to realize that in order to gain these new interests, i had to give up a few. those few mainly included the things which used to be a big part of my childhood.

i really really am looking forward to it considering im really into reading about the templars and the crusades. i'll link some podcast eps down below of the same.

but im also worried about the historical accuracy of the same. the games are absolutely brilliant however the adapted books/movie haven't exactly been upto the mark for me and i sincerely hope that this is better.

also after watching medici, i have some high standards for the accuracy part of it considering i was literally reading history to get show spoilers, which was what happened in the show as well.

anyway just wanna hear some of your thoughts on it. feel free to rant.

here are some links:

https://castbox.fm/vb/50369017 - History Extra Podcast

https://castbox.fm/vb/232527432 - Secret Societies Podcast (this also has a part 2)

https://youtu.be/ruhnvXy48Yw - Timeline World History Documentaries (youtube)

today morning, as i was recovering from my post-early-morning-class laziness/sleepiness, i came across this very interesting website through one of the youtube channels i’m subscribed to. the website in itself seems like a regular literary blog with literature articles by various people, but there was one segment in that which intrigued me beyond measure. it consisted of letters.

the segment is of the sort where everyday, they post a letter whose date of writing coincides with real life dates. so today being 17th Aug, i get to read a letter written by someone for someone, dated 17th Aug, whichever year. the interesting part is that these are not ordinary letters. these letters are written by well-known people during their time to their loved ones. these people include really famous writers like Virginia Wolff who had written a letter to her husband (her suicide note), philosophers, thinkers and other influential people of the time. there was this letter written by Simone de Beauvoir to Jean Paul Sartre where she is simply talking about her life in america, about the simplicity of life, the lectures she has to deliver over the couple of days, how Ivan Moffat (she was staying with him at the time i.e 1947) was so anti-americans in his ideologies but the first thing one could tell about him through his mannerisms was how american he was, her conversations with them etc. it’s so fascinating to read about these infamous people writing about their ordinary lives, them doing mundane things. 

all this got me thinking about the art of writing letters. how it’s dying (if it isn’t already dead). if people can bring it back, it will only be because of the fact that they want to write for the sake of it. i personally have never known how it feels to have a letter written to me, how it feels to read all the thoughts that’s been put into writing it and the effort. im not complaining but there is something about having that physical piece of paper in your hand, which is completely dedicated to you by someone. i understand that the world is moving at an immense pace but isn’t there a whole set of people trying to protect these things, just because of it? aren’t there people who like antiquities just because of how outdated they are or alien they’ve become? 

- honestly i just want to spark a discussion using this post. would love to hear your two cents about this. do not hesitate to go all out in the comment box. i will read every word of it. i’m very intrigued and would love to hear people’s thoughts on all this. do write!

here are some amazing history books written by indian authors/based in india:

Ivory Throne by Manu S. Pillai - This is an account of one of the last queens of Travancore, Sethu Lakshmi Bai. It talks about a very interesting concept which is unlike how society usually works; it talks about a matrilineal heritage where it is the women who are the heads of the households. Royal families need daughters to pass down their lineage and succession and a SHIT TON on women empowerment. It completely shatters the idea that the society can only be run by men. It involves lot of brave and wild stories of queens, how women were worshipped and were basically the backdone of their entire existence, that is, before the British invasions took place and their victorian ideologies on what is moral and what is not.

Rebel Sultans by Manu S. Pillai - This book deals with the 13th century all the way till the 18th century and primarily talks about the history of the Deccan in India. Again being Indians and having an exorbitant amount of diversity, it is almost an impossible job for a person to know the complete history of the country. That being said, all the historical education that is provided focuses on the main events in history which are mainly North-Indian. This books sheds light on a completely different and equally interesting (if not more) dynasty altogether, highlighting the importance of the other states of the country as well. This book talks about the rise and fall of the Vijayanagara Empire, influences of Alauddin Khilji and a lot more. Do not take this as your usual boring history textbook, I assure you that it is not. *i swear i have a crush on this dude and his brains*

City of Djinns by William Dalrymple - This book is written from a first person perpective, that is of the author himself and his love for the city of Delhi. He talks about his own anecdotes, of his life in Delhi along with his wife. He manages to perfectly weave his own stories with the context of the city’s own history, culture and politics. He navigates through some of the peak and extremely important events that take place. For instance, the Indira Gandhi assassination and the Sikh riots. He also focuses on a lot of the forgotten areas of the city like the broken tombs. He reminiscies about certain parts of the city looked like and known for, as compared to now. He also includes a lot of accounts of people who chose to stay in Delhi after the British Raj and several other stories.

I Am Divine, So Are You by Devdutt Patnaik: This book is the first ever account that I have read which talks about the queer history of India. These two key words were enough for me to grab this book without a blink. The author is extremely famous for writing about the mythologies and folklores of India. He has done a wonderful job trying to trace back the queer history back to the history, the texts, various myths and legends that involved trans people, of men getting attracted to men etc. It is a really satisfactory read and honestly, it just made me really happy.

The Book of Indian Kings by multiple authors: This book is a collection of small pieces of history involving the magnificent rajas and their kingdoms. Each story is written by a different author, each of them being pioneers in indian history themselves. This book is short and is a quick read with a lot of different stories, A LOT of diversity and thoroughly entertaining.

let me know your thoughts on each of these books. ALSO i think these kind of books are what MAKES indian dark academia. like p e r f e c t vibes.

i've always been interested in history and when i saw this, it led me into deep research about the botticelli, michelangelo (hence the name), simonetta vespucci, venus and mars ooo my interests have been tickled

if anyone has good material about the medici history and the artists they bred, like articles, podcasts, books, please share!

this channel features some of the best and hidden gems of philosophy discussing various hot topics of their time

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you're welcome xx