As part of a LibraryThing (LT) challenge related to reading British authors, I have been working through Rosemary Sutcliff‘s Roman Britain Trilogy. In The Silver Branch, the second book, she uses the word “tatterdemalion” several times. From context, it was easy to guess at the definition provided by Merriam Webster: ragged or disreputable in appearance. I also discovered that it is the name of a character in the Marvel comic series.

I spent a bit of time poking around the Internet to learn more about the author. My favorite find was that Rosemary Sutcliff has a fandom Wiki site. I had never heard of her before–that’s part of the reason I do the LT challenges as they get me out of my comfort zone–but others certainly had. I was a bit surprised to learn that the books, which feature plenty of bloodshed and death, were written for children.

Through the Wiki, I was led to her memorial Twitter site kept in her honor by a god child. The first tweet was a quoted retweet of one of those gorgeous library pictures of multiple levels of books. The poster agreed it was beautiful but pointed out its drawbacks and I like this god child already.

I’ve enjoyed the first two books and the third one is on the library pile so may dive in tonight. My goal of reading more and doom scrolling less has already led to many happy hours with a book in my hand.