Easily threatened men always acted like fools.

This is pitched as Moulin Rouge + Phantom of the Opera. I‘ve seen Phantom on stage twice (thanks, high school French class field trips!) but somehow never saw Moulin Rouge...but it still sounds like a pretty interesting concept! #NowReading

Contradictory, but I read nearly the entire book in one day, yet found it mostly boring. The short chapters made it very readable, & at times the exploration of grief was moving, but mostly it went about as deep as a kiddie pool. Pretty monotonous and hard to believe (wouldn‘t you worry about your mental state in Lydia‘s position??? But she‘s just like “la la la this is fine”) and the ending was cheap. Didn‘t hate it but not much to like. 2/5 ⭐️

TBH I‘m not super eager to read this one and not expecting much from it, based on reviews I‘ve seen and my personal preferences, but I got it in February 2020 and my general rule is that I need to read books within a year of buying them, so it‘s about time I give it a go. #NowReading

An emotional gut-punch. Numerous times I wanted to reach into the pages & hug Adunni or bitch slap people around her. She‘s put thru the wringer, suffering horrible abuse by her father, (forced) husband, & boss. Even more harrowing knowing how realistic her experiences are for many women & girls in the world. Adunni retains hope & ambition w/o being a Pollyanna. Sometimes she‘s a bit foolish but that‘s to be expected. Tough but great debut. 4/5 ⭐️

“My mama say education will give me a voice. I want more than just a voice, Ms. Tia. I want a louding voice,” I say. “I want to enter a room and people will hear me even before I open my mouth to be speaking. I want to live in this life and help many people so that when I grow old and die, I will still be living through the people I am helping.”

I‘m clearly in the minority but I wasn‘t very impressed with this collection. Poems can be observations but observations are not necessarily poems. There were a few striking & beautiful lines, and the longer poems were stronger, but mostly I found this rather pedestrian and oddly twee at times. Many of the poems left me thinking “Huh?” or “Yeah, and?” I might try another of her collections to see if it works better but this was mostly meh. 2/5 ⭐️

Every day I‘m still looking for God
and I‘m still finding him everywhere

Oh the house of denial has thick walls
and very small windows
and whoever lives there, little by little,
will turn to stone.

I hang my head down, feeling a thick, heavy cloth as it is covering me. The thick cloth of shame, of sorrow, of heart pain.

I taste the salt of my tears at the memorying of it all, and when I go back to my mat and close my eyes, I see Mama as a rose flower. But this rose is no more having yellow and red and purple colors with shining leafs. This flower be the brown of a wet leaf that suffer a stamping from the dirty feets of a man that forget the promise he make to his dead wife.

Today was a relieving and wonderful day. Let the healing and the reading commence! #NowReading

Always makes me feel like a bit of a dodo to say a book is too long, but....this was too long. The writing is beautiful of course, and I‘m still so impressed with the world and story she created. But it just felt so dragged out and repetitive at times. Dara‘s chapters got too close to grimdark for me, too. Would still recommend the series if it sounds like your jam, but this kind of fantasy just isn‘t quite mine anymore, I think. 3/5 ⭐️

“It‘s supposed to be the mark of a wise leader, right? The willingness to make sacrifices for a greater good? But nobody ever asks those ‘sacrifices‘ if they‘re willing—they get no say in whether or not their kids die for some supposed greater good. And I come from people like that ... From a country that‘s been fought over by foreigners for centuries. We die, and we bleed, and it‘s a debt the powerful never repay.”

This is why I never babysat nor wanted kids. Betsy is a little nightmare! I LOATHE “pranks” and the idea of finding humor in embarrassing people is cruel and gross. So while I understood why the BSC girls wanted to get her back, I also found it inappropriate for them to sink to her level. Also where the hell were the parents in all this?? This was a weak one, had no real message to it beyond “practical jokes are bad.” 2/5 ⭐️

“I think it is a mistake to judge the Creator by the misdeeds of mortals.”

“But I‘ve got a lot of experience finding slivers of light to cherish when life gets more miserable than usual.”

Good thing #BookSpin put this ABSOLUTE UNIT on my TBR this month, otherwise I‘m not sure when I would have had the motivation to pick it up. I definitely want to read it and finish this series! But it‘s a beast and I also have only vague memories of the second book. Just read a couple thorough recaps of it so hopefully I won‘t feel too lost in this one! #NowReading

Will definitely never look at a marigold the same way! Another cute and fun book in this series. Loved being back with this family and seeing more complex magic being done. Also liked learning more about Leo‘s family, as well as her friend Caroline‘s. I wasn‘t quite as engaged with this one as the first, the plot was a little uneven. But still definitely enjoyable and I look forward to the next one. 3/5 ⭐️

“It‘s exhausting, isn‘t it?” Mrs. Morales asked Abuela, taking a long sip from her own mug. “Being in the living world?”

[Ain‘t it the truth 😞]

I freaking love middle grade covers 🪄🔮 #NowReading

After losing my kitty 3 months ago, I‘m maybe feeling ready to look for a new one, and is it too much to hope she‘ll be able to solve murders like Hamlet?? Another fun one in this series, loved being back at the bookshop with the cantankerous feline. The whodunnit wasn‘t a shock but I don‘t think it needs to be in a cozy. Darla is smart tho sometimes comes across like she‘s 56 instead of 36. But this was fun & quick, funny & sweet at times. 3/5 ⭐️

If the soothing tones of Bob Ross talking about happy trees and clouds couldn‘t improve her day, then nothing good.

[FACTS 👨‍🎨💙]

I read the first in this series last year and it was quite enjoyable—how could it not be when it‘s set in a bookshop and features a cat named Hamlet? Started the second one last night and it‘s a nice respite from the news and work! #NowReading

Should‘ve been “A Bunch of Annoying Kids and Asshole Old Ladies of Ingleside.” I‘m gonna finish the series bc I bought it so I can‘t *not*, but oy, this was not good. As usual the setting & scenery are beautifully written, but that‘s about the only positive. Anne is barely there, no real plot, it‘s a series of vignettes w/the kids & rude women & meanness towards fat & poor people. And the synopsis is false advertising re: Anne & Gilbert. 2/5 ⭐️

I have NOT been overly enjoying this series, but I‘ve gotten through 5 of the 8 books and I‘m a stubborn bitch on weird insignificant things like this. Plus I needed something light and easy to get through after the heartache of the previous book. #NowReading

At one point I had to put this down b/c it was putting right back in my shoes of almost 2 decades ago and the psychologically abusive relationship I was in then. But that‘s also part of why this book is so incredible. It‘s brilliantly crafted & framed, thru innovative structure & the smart POV changes & balancing the macro & micro of abuse, love, queerness, etc. Not an easy read but one you absolutely should if you safely can. Phenomenal. 5/5 ⭐️

One day, a bird slammed into my studio window. I was sitting on a yoga ball and tumbled backward in terror. Almost every residency I‘ve had since, I‘ve found at least one stunned bird sprawled on the ground outside my workspace. I learned: they never see the glass coming. They only see the reflection of the sky.

Putting language to some thing for which you have no language is no easy feat.

Oof. Been there. Not fun. Especially considering how wildly off base it was.

Why is it that badass women who don‘t follow the rules always sound like lesbians to you? A psychiatrist would have a field day with that realization. (Though, in your defense, there is a portrait of her* in a button-down top and with a hat like a park ranger‘s and looking butch as hell hanging on the wall.)

[*Referring to Juliette Gordon Low, founder of the Girl Scouts.]

Part of the problem was, as a weird fat girl, you felt lucky. She did what you‘d wished a million others had done—looked past arbitrary markers of social currency and seen your brain and ferocious talent and quick wit and pugnacious approach to assholes.

You arrange to hang out at her house. You are going to watch The Brave Little Toaster, a movie you haven‘t seen since childhood but that you remember loving and being terrified of.

[LITERALLY ONE OF THE GREATEST CINEMATIC ACHIEVEMENTS THOUGH, now I totally need to watch it again.]

She is sweaty, having just come from the gym, her white-blond hair pulled back in a short ponytail. She has a dazzling smile, a raspy voice that sounds like a wheelbarrow being dragged over stones. She is that mix of butch and femme that drives you crazy.

👆🏻👆🏻👆🏻🙋🏻‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️

My next pick for the #NewYearWhoDis challenge. I actually started reading it late last night and could barely put it down to go to sleep. Very gripping right from the beginning. #NowReading

Apparently the way you catch a queen is by being very boring. This wasn‘t terrible but definitely a letdown as I‘d generally enjoyed the Reluctant Royals series. Very slow, way too much political discussion, and not that I wanted it to be steamier because I skip those parts anyway, but it hardly felt like a romance novel at all. I appreciated Shanti‘s ambitions and that she stood up for herself. But no chemistry and hella slow/weak plot. 2/5 ⭐️

Though she had her usual red lipstick on, she wore pajamas: a yellow velour camisole and matching pants that clung to her hips and thighs and belled out around her feet. She looked soft and plush, like a naughty Pikachu. Sanyu was horrified that such a cursed phrase had ever formed in his mind, but...it was accurate.

[And the worst part is..........Rule 34 🙅🏻‍♀️🙅🏻‍♀️🙅🏻‍♀️]

Let‘s play everyone‘s favorite game, Read Books and Pretend the World Doesn‘t Exist!!!!!!! Because what in the actual fuck. 😣😣😣 #NowReading

Makes me feel a bit dumb to admit this but I had a tough time understanding WTF people were saying a lot of the time in this story. Two countries separated by a common language, I guess, but I‘ve not had similar issues w/Austen or the Brontës or Dickens. I did mostly enjoy this tho, appreciate the look at class divisions & entitlement & a changing society. But it was a bit convoluted and I wasn‘t sold on the main relationship at all. 3/5 ⭐️

Death destroys a man; the idea of Death saves him.

Their grief, though less poignant than their father‘s, grew from deeper roots, for a wife may be replaced; a mother never.

It will be generally admitted that Beethoven‘s Fifth Symphony is the most sublime noise that has ever penetrated into the ear of man.

[BRB making a Spotify playlist called Sublime Noise]

I‘ve had this on my physical TBR shelves since January 2020, and I have a mostly firm rule that I have to read books within a year of buying them. I don‘t know a lot about it but lucythereader on YouTube has absolutely gushed about it, plus it‘s relatively short for a classic and from a flip-through seems to have a lot of dialogue. All good things! #NowReading

Very on brand of me to wish we‘d only had the female POVs w/o the male ones, but it‘s true. The brothers‘ chapters weren‘t as interesting to me & didn‘t add much to the story, which clearly belongs to the sisters. Emotionally harrowing, nuanced look at connection & estrangement, poverty, corruption caused by power or the lack of it. Ending was good but jarring. Struggled w/it being multi-POV *and* time-jumping. But a promising debut novel. 3/5 ⭐️

In the end, our mother was just the first to leave. My family unraveled rapidly, in messy loose knots, hastening away from one another, shamefaced and lonesome, injured solitary animals in a happy world.

Decided to go for one of my #BookSpin books next, because why not? This sounds like it will probably crush my soul, but that‘s a good thing when it comes to books. #NowReading

Decided to go for #BookSpinBingo after all! For the Free squares, I randomized the list of the rest of my physical TBR, then used a random number generator to pick five from that list. I‘ve got a pretty good mix going, I think!

My #BookSpin and #DoubleSpin books for January! Definitely eager for The Empire of Gold because one of my reading goals for 2021 is to finish some series. Thanks @TheAromaofBooks !!

Okay, decided at the last minute to join the #BookSpin fun for the first time! Half of these are books I own, the other half are on my “to buy soon” list—I hope I did this right! Also I know it‘s not super easy to read but I liked the background 😬❄️