Daily Archives: August 18, 2018

Bad Poetry Day – August 18th [Respects to William McGonagall] 10

 in Poetry by

On this wonderful Saturday, you can spend the day reading some really bad poetry. Why?

Because today is Bad Poetry Day!

You may want to pay some respects to William McGonagall, who is known to have written the worst poetry in history.

Check out some other bad poems here. A simple google search will bring up tons!

The Tay Bridge Disaster

by William McGonagall

Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay!
Alas! I am very sorry to say
That ninety lives have been taken away
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

’Twas about seven o’clock at night,
And the wind it blew with all its might,
And the rain came pouring down,
And the dark clouds seem’d to frown,
And the Demon of the air seem’d to say-
“I’ll blow down the Bridge of Tay.”

When the train left Edinburgh
The passengers’ hearts were light and felt no sorrow,
But Boreas blew a terrific gale,
Which made their hearts for to quail,
And many of the passengers with fear did say-
“I hope God will send us safe across the Bridge of Tay.”

But when the train came near to Wormit Bay,
Boreas he did loud and angry bray,
And shook the central girders of the Bridge of Tay
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

So the train sped on with all its might,
And Bonnie Dundee soon hove in sight,
And the passengers’ hearts felt light,
Thinking they would enjoy themselves on the New Year,
With their friends at home they lov’d most dear,
And wish them all a happy New Year.

So the train mov’d slowly along the Bridge of Tay,
Until it was about midway,
Then the central girders with a crash gave way,
And down went the train and passengers into the Tay!
The Storm Fiend did loudly bray,
Because ninety lives had been taken away,
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

As soon as the catastrophe came to be known
The alarm from mouth to mouth was blown,
And the cry rang out all o’er the town,
Good Heavens! the Tay Bridge is blown down,
And a passenger train from Edinburgh,
Which fill’d all the peoples hearts with sorrow,
And made them for to turn pale,
Because none of the passengers were sav’d to tell the tale
How the disaster happen’d on the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

It must have been an awful sight,
To witness in the dusky moonlight,
While the Storm Fiend did laugh, and angry did bray,
Along the Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay,
Oh! ill-fated Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay,
I must now conclude my lay
By telling the world fearlessly without the least dismay,
That your central girders would not have given way,
At least many sensible men do say,
Had they been supported on each side with buttresses,
At least many sensible men confesses,
For the stronger we our houses do build,
The less chance we have of being killed.

Smut and Wingspan – How We Got #SoapGate and Illegal Fanfiction 25

 in Books / Fantasy by

This post contains affiliate links. Please see my full disclosure here.

(Mature language and theme involved in the post – 18+ audiences only)

I don’t know if you are massively part of the Book Twittersphere, but in the last few days, we’re had a massive explosion in #soapgate. If you don’t know exactly what it is, I’m going to summarize it for you, but if you want pictures, you’ll need to look to Twitter (it’s all there!).

So essentially, a book subscription box decided to do a book boyfriend box themed around ACOTAR. Now, in the original listing of this product of Instagram, it did not say 18+ anywhere. It didn’t say this until 3 posts later and orders had been made. On the online listing, the word ‘mature’ is only at the very bottom, and I don’t know many who read the entire listing.

Cutting a long story short, when people got the box, they were shocked to find two things unexpected inside (besides the other stuff). We had a bound fanfiction (which is a BIG NO-NO) and a soap in the shape of a phallic body part….with a suction cup on the end. Now, when I saw the pictures, I thought that it was some kind of adult toy and nearly had a heart attack (I didn’t buy the box but I saw my friends opening it on Instagram).

So there’s two problems with the box. I’ll start with the legal one.

Selling FanFiction for money is illegal!

You are allowed to write FanFiction until you’re blue in the face, and you can share it all over and give it as gifts to friends. But the moment you make any money from that writing, you are breaking the law. People say, ‘Well 50 Shades of Grey was a FanFiction of Twilight’, and while that is true, the premise of the story, like deep down, is similar, but the story itself has no clear connections such as character names, et ceterea.

FanFiction generally keeps the same world, same characters, same personalities – it’s the same thing as the story except they change what the characters do or who they pair with.

If you sell FanFiction, true FanFiction, you are stealing an authors writing. In this case, that was Sarah J. Maas’ writing. So that was the first big no-no.

Next, why are you putting dick soap into a box for kids?

I first do need to mention that this book, while it is YA, I don’t classify it as that – it’s more NA and even borderlines on adult. When I initially got the book a year ago to start the series, I thought it was Fantasy with romance. But once I got to the first sex scene I thought I was reading an adult erotic romance novel. To say I was shocked would be an understatement. For an adult, it’s fine. But for a YA reader (who could be 13), it was unacceptable.


Now, I don’t mind romance in books. Romance is healthy. Kids need to read about romance. But sex? I don’t think that a 13 year old should be reading it to completely normalize sex for them. We have kids who believe that condoms aren’t needed because of pornographic videos and stories they read online, they think that relationships aren’t messy because of the beautiful romance stories that they read..the last thing you need is your young kid reading a hot and steamy sex scene before they even truly know what sex is. It is going to alter their perceptions on things.

Some parents don’t mind what their kids read, or don’t have the time to be involved, and if they aren’t…then they could be reading some really questionable things. Hands on parents, or parents that give any attention, whatsoever, to the kids, will not want their young ones reading something this graphic. We got some questionable themes going on here people! Wake up!

It can be hard being a YA author to write romance scenes for older YA because if you’re 17 or 18, reading that kind of scene may be less shocking and more what you’re looking for. So that’s why I think NA (new adult) is perfect. It’s in between YA and adult…as we have no distinction between younger YA and older YA. So I’m not really blaming the author here. Maybe a potential warning system in books would be better (kind of like trigger warnings) that authors can put to warn parents what the book could contain to stop people from being so shocked. But, that is besides the point and a whole other blog post.

I want to know why the person who made the box thought it was okay to put a male genitalia object in a book designed for kids without the proper warning until they had sold copies. It’s funny, they claim they put the warning on the first post and all the screen shots clearly show that there was absolutely no warning. To me, that’s kind of lying and if I paid $50 for a box like this, I’d be furious…especially if I had purchased it for my kid. Even adult videos have to put clear warnings on their videos by law.

What has the world come to that book boxes include smutty fanfiction and genitalia shaped soaps?!

WHAT IS HAPPENING IN THE BOOK COMMUNITY?

What are you thoughts?