Welcome to Litsy!

“Beauty was deceptive. I would rather wear my pain, my ugliness. I was torn and stitched. I was a strip mine, and they would just have to look. I hoped I made them sick. I hoped they saw me in their dreams.”

#VolumesandVocals
#LoveYourself

https://youtu.be/oyEuk8j8imI

Ingrid is prone to the unhealthy and obsessive type of love, which gets her into deep trouble and in prison! Meanwhile her only child struggles with one dysfunctional foster home after another…

“Love taken to extremes can be dangerous.”
#ThemedThursday @dabbe

Everyone is welcome to play!

All kinds of #betrayal and abandonment in this novel!

#IndelibleMoments @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

“Let me tell you a few things about regret...There is no end to it. You cannot find the beginning of the chain that brought us from there to here. Should you regret the whole chain, and the air in between, or each link separately as if you could uncouple them? Do you regret the beginning which ended so badly, or just the ending itself?”

#Unhealthy
#MayMoms

Astrid‘s mom Ingrid would fit many of the #MayMoms prompts…but for today I‘ll choose #unhealthy

@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

Uhm I might be a little late to this discussion 👀🤣

🌻 White Oleander - Janet Fitch
🌻 Quicksand House - Carlton Mellick III
🌻 Bunny - Mona Awad
🌻 The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern
🌻 Some Laneys Died - Brooke Skipstone
🌻 Where the Forest Meets the Stars - Glendy Vanderah
🌻 Girl Serpent Thorn - Melissa Bashardoust
🌻 Jubilee - Jennifer Givhan
🌻 Till the Score is Paid - Gemma Amor
🌻 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
🌻 Horns - Joe Hill

An old and stubborn favorite that I enjoy revisiting when I in need of favorite!

“That was the thing about words, they were clear and specific - chair, eye, #stone - but when you talked about feelings, words were too stiff, they were this and not that, they couldn't include all the meanings. In defining, they always left something out.” #QuotsyOct21

Found an old picture od mine. Look at my little stacks

Wow, I tried reading this last year- I haven‘t had such a strong reaction to a book in a while. I absolutely hated all the characters and the lens through which events were presented. Had to bail about a third of the way through. Anyone else?!

Doing a re-read for book 41 of 2021
It's been about six years

Spend another lovely autumn morning, reading at a local coffee shop, called Inibos!! 🤗🤗

I love holiday gifts!!!😍😍😍

A cheese platter from the lovely Fairview and a special bottle Red Muscadel send along from a very very dear friend in Montegu!!🍷🧀

The perfect pairing for my reading tonight! 🤗🤗🤗

#readingwithfriends #autumnsun 😍😎

Ingrid is sent to prison for murdering her lover, and her 12 y/o daughter Astrid is put into foster care. Astrid‘s time in various foster homes is disturbing to say the least. Ingrid and Astrid‘s relationship is so toxic it‘s heartbreaking and infuriating. The story and characters won‘t soon be forgotten!
#bookspinbingo
#tbrdeckofcards
#booked2021 #colorintitle
#pop21 - bestseller from the 1990s

Rainy early morning read. Happy Friday! 😊

#quotsyjuly20 #quotsycatchup #turquoise @TK-421

#QuotsyJuly20 Day 9: #Turquoise

I‘ll always recommend White Oleander to anyone and everyone and it does have the strong female characters she‘s looking for and family drama. Same for burn our bodies down. All books have strong female characters and for me they were all 5 star books 🌻

#recsforbecks

🌻 White Oleander
🌻 Please Kill Me: the uncensored oral history of punk
🌻Where the Forest Meets the Stars

#Favs

Got my first #LitsyLove note in the mail toda! Thank you @magyklyXdelish for the letter and the book recommendations to add to my list ❤️🌻🌻🌻

(Also this picture from our evening walk - everything is more enchanting in the night light)

#7Days7Books - Books that have made a lasting impression on me

#Day1 - This book was like a revolution to me in my teens. I think everyone has that one book that they can read over and over and gain something new each time. This is that book for me. It touched my soul and to this day is my favorite of all time.

@Eggs have you done this challenge yet? 😊

@MrsWatsonReads thanks for tagging me in this challenge :)

#QuotsyApr20 Day 25: #Bird

#BookNDinner! Accompaniment this pleasant and gray evening is: my garden salad with olive oil & balsamic vinaigrette, New England clam chowder, and sparkling mineral water. MMMmmm 😋! This has been another presentation of: #MrBookKitchen. Happy reads & happy eats! 😎👌🏻

Background music: 🎶 the “Instrumental Backdrop” playlist on Spotify 🎶

#BookNDinner! I‘m upping my salad game in 2020, so you might get bored with these—sorry, let me know, lol. Accompaniment this frigid & snowy evening: a salad of mixed green & spinach, mushrooms, cucumber, tomatoes, black olives, carrots, radish, mozzarella & parmesan, walnuts, sunflower seeds, fajita chicken, in olive oil & balsamic vinegar; and sparkling mineral water. MMMmm 😋! Another presentation of: #MrBookKitchen. Happy reads & eats! 😎👌🏻

#MOvember I‘m posting for Saturday because my college roommate is staying with me for a few days and I have a feeling I won‘t be getting too much Litsying in!!!!

Astrid and Ingrid are both #LivingForLove Astrid from her mother, Ingrid and Ingrid from her lover, Barry. This was a really heartbreaking portrait of loneliness and coming of age story set within a complex novel.

Ingrid is #acharacteryoulovetohate. For starters, she‘s a murderer, and generally unlikeable and egocentric

#gratefulreads

@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks
@OriginalCyn620

"Always learn poems by heart. They have to become the marrow in your bones. Like fluoride in the water, they'll make your soul impervious to the world's soft decay."

"If you expect to find people who will understand you, you will grow murderous with disappointment. The best you'll ever do is to understand yourself, know what it is that you want, and not let the cattle stand in your way."

Fan girl moment!!! Janet Fitch is following me!! One of my all time favorite books is White Oleander!

Such a good book!
#ChillingPhotoChallenge #poison
#scarathlon #TeamStoker 1pt
@TheReadingMermaid

There were some obnoxious characters in this one: Starr the stripper/alcoholic shrew. Marvel, the mean foster mom. Ingrid, the hostile narcissist. And yet Astrid thrives...

#obnoxious #augustabc

Exquisite writing. Hard to read at times, the heartbreak of Astrid‘s critical childhood years in the foster system. But it is still a 5 star 🌟 book: I‘ll be thinking about this one for a long time ...

@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks ❤️

Book haul #3
13 books for two dollars! 📚😃👍
I've already read White Oleander, but it was on my want to own list, so I had to snag it!

#white #colormepretty @Sweetkokoro

This was a very powerful and unforgettable story about a toxic relationship between a mother and daughter. It‘s actually a pretty sad book but once I started, I couldn‘t put it down. Wow! It‘s like a punch in the gut. 5-stars!

I am a little backed up on my reading. I am just now getting around to a book that @Wife sent me last October. Oh well, you know what they say, “better late than never“. I‘m sure I am going to enjoy it.

“We strive for beauty and balance, the sensual over the sentimental.”

#B&WBooks
#JazzyJune

#WanderingJune #Californication
I missed this book when it was an Oprah pick in ‘99. One of the best books I‘ve read so far this year.
The writing is gorgeous, particularly the descriptions of California. Ingrid‘s poetry just seeps into the prose. As a character she‘s captivating- Narcissistic, manipulative and the world‘s most awful mother! It‘s a heartbreaking story of a her daughter‘s coming of age, in a foster system that repeatedly fails her.

My Oleander bloomed🌏💚🦋💐

#Bookhaul $3.25 at Salvation Army!

White Oleander
The Girls of Atomic City
Commonwealth
The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks

📚📚📚

Thanks soo much @Wife for my birthday gifts!!!!! 😃♥️🎉 shocked how well she captured my obsessions!!! White Oleander, The Tudors, Witches lol 🤣 even down to the candies!!! So super happy to finally have a copy of White Oleander!!! 😍The book hangover was REAL!!!! 😂took a quick picture at work so I could hurry up and dive into the candies!! 😁

#QuotsyMar19 Day 13: A #jewel of hatred. I have not read the book yet, unfortunately, nor have I seen the film. Is it any good?

This book was a nice surprise. I went into it knowing nothing except that it had been made into a movie that I hadn't seen. Thoroughly entertaining and full of strong women characters.

I haven't read the book yet, but I loved the movie.
#flowers #literarylove
@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks @vkois88

A few days late as it was tough thinking of a villainous character.

Ingrid Magnussen though not poorly written, her narcissistic personality definitely qualifies her as a villain. She is ferocious with her manipulation towards her daughter Astrid even while serving a prison sentence.

#lovehate @ErinSueG @WhiskeyMistress

Nothing at all like what I expected but so, so good. Characters I will remember forever.

Books I can't wait to read

#ampersandjan19 "Anticipation"
I cannot wait to read White Oleander