Sunday, 5 March 2017

Wednesday, 1 March 2017

Caraval by Stephanie Garber

Caraval (Caraval, #1)
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was craving some sort of fantasy to get lost in, so I took a dive into a YA novel again. It was fun, it was fast, it was... romanc-y, which was not as fun.

I liked the plot, I liked the plot twists, even though I predicted like 90% of them. I did get a tiny bit bored in the mid-section of the book, probably because I kept predicting everything. I will admit that the last 50 pages of the novel was pretty exciting and did take me by surprise.

Sunday, 5 February 2017

Review: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

Fahrenheit 451
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

So, I've realized something.
I don't think I can ever read bland YA dystopian ever again, of course there are some really good gems out there, but after reading 1984, A Clockwork Orange, and this novel, my expectations are just too high.

Monday, 30 January 2017

Review: Thieves at Heart by Tristan J. Tarwater

Thieves at Heart (The Valley of Ten Crescents, #1)
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

It started off sooo good. And it ended sooo... not quite as good.

The book starts off with Tavera as a little 6 or 7 year old girl assisting her mother who is a prostitute. She's then adopted by a young man, a thief who happens to notice her skills when she tries to steal from him.

Review: Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America by Barbara Ehrenreich

Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Everybody needs to read this book once in their life.

For the entire book, the author is debunking positive thinking, she references several journal articles, connects her research to capitalism and neoliberal ideology, and she shows how positive psychology is a tool to advance the ideals of the top 1%.

I have so much to say about this book, I don't even know what to say. So out of laziness and being overwhelmed I'm going to just end my fangirling here. Enjoy.

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Mother Earth

The Earth birthed me with
The soft white snow
Of an angel
I fluttered gently to her
Beneath a wintry sky

Sunday, 29 January 2017

Iceberg

On this iceberg, I am born
On this iceberg, I watch them
They are there, in the distance
On the shore
In pairs
In groups
In families
They share my skin
My face
My blood and bones
But they do not share this iceberg

I watch them
Share warmth
Share joy
Share their souls and their homes
I watch them learn
From each other
So I learn too

I learn to speak like them
Smile like them
Act like them
With no teacher
No parent
No partner
Here
On my iceberg

I watch them
Rip their hearts out
In exchange
Like gifts with bloody bows
So I learn too
I learn
To rip my heart out
But there are things that cannot be learned

Alone
On my iceberg
I have ripped out my heart
But nobody is willing to have
The heart
Of a child
That lives on an iceberg

They watch me too
They yell at me
That I speak like them
But not quite
That I walk like them
But not quite
That I am like them
But not quite

They watch me
And they say that I do not shiver
From the cold
But I do shiver
And tremble
And rage
From the frustration
Of my iceberg

So here I sit
On my iceberg
And I watch
I copy
I mimic
I fake

For I am a charlatan
Born with an iceberg
Wearing their skin
Their expressions are my mask
Their actions are my act

So here I sit
On my iceberg
And I watch them
Tether their hearts
With strings made of passion and despair
And I gaze at my own string
Slack and untethered

And I shiver
Not from the solace
Of the cold
But from the solitude
Of my iceberg