maesamine asked: What books/stories do you really like/find insightful/evocative? A lot of what you write involves things that are super evocative for me, (hi northern caves and that undertale thing) especially religious and/or values stuff, so I'd love to know c:

(Sorry for answering this so late)

I’m not sure my recs here will be useful for you bc it depends a lot on what you’re looking for.  For instance, Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived In The Castle is one of my favorite books and has the sort of emotional intensity and “heightened reality / immersion” that I hoped to produce in TNC, but isn’t (directly) about religious/spiritual/moral issues.

My favorite novel ever, Adam Levin’s The Instructions, hits every one of the aforementioned notes (including “religious/spiritual/moral issues”) but it’s very long and only reaches full intensity after a long gradual build.  But if you’re willing to delve into a 1000-page novel about 4 days at a middle school, it has my highest recommendation.

Wallace Shawn’s monologue The Fever is short and conveys a certain kind of moral agony very accurately and very intensely – definitely check it out.

For more, check out my Goodreads reviews and see if anything resonates.