Tasha⛓️Sorsha
Ok, so I fully admit I came here after I watched the tv show, which I loved and thought was amazingly done. So to say that I was evisceratingly disappointed by the book is an understatement lol.
Let's be serious, guys. From a technical standpoint the writing is just plain bad. It's a lot of telling instead of showing, and Geralt is the flattest cardboard Gary Stu I've read since James Bond. Sorry to the cult following, but Henry Cavill brings more depth and personality to the character than Sapkowski apparently ever could.
And then we have the blaring sexism. Now, I've already read several reviews from folks who have brought up all the problematic points so I'm not going to get into it. Let's just say I should have known better than to expect more from a male author writing fantasy in the early 90s lol. The show fixed most of his mistakes, which I appreciate.
And for those of you defending it with the old, “BuT iT wAs ThE MeDiEvAl ErA, tHaT's HoW wOmEn WeRe TrEaTeD” let me ask you this: You guys remember that time in our Medieval period when witches cast spells, and elves roamed the earth, and dragons flew in the skies?? Yeah, me neither. It's FANTASY. It can literally be whatever you want. It is perfectly possible to create a devastating, war-torn world with intricate politics and brutal violence without all the rape and objectification of female bodies. You're telling me you're willing to accept dragons and monsters, but you can't fathom a world where rape isn't commonplace, not every male character is a creepy sexist prick (including the ones we're supposed to root for), and not every female is an offensive stereotype specifically written for the male gaze? Your imagination isn't taking you far enough.
Not for me, I'll stick to the show.
I bought this book because it was written by the lovely and wonderful Jeffrey Marsh, who I love very deeply. And they narrated their own audiobook, which was awesome, so I decided to absorb it in this format. Here's some of my favourite takeaways:
1. In a world where we are obsessed with “knowing ourselves”, how fun and exciting is it if we actually don't know who we are? There's plenty of room for adventure and self-discovery along the way. And if we're never certain, we're less likely to get boxed in somewhere we don't want to be.
2. Feeling bad about ourselves not only, well, makes us feel bad, but it's also actually not very productive and can in fact prevent learning and personal growth. When we're busy feeling guilt and shame, we're not actually focused on what we could be learning from a given situation. This seems like a given, but I hadn't given it much thought before they put it into perspective in this way.
3. “We are trained, we think we see so much evidence, about how awful we are.” Being willing to train yourself to see your own goodness is essential to moving forward as a person and enacting positive change within ourselves and in the world. Yes, we'll screw it up. This doesn't make us bad or unworthy, so we need to just refuse to feel bad about it, learn from it, and move on.
4. All Jeffrey's personal anecdotes and stories about growing up as a sparkling, gender-delightful little kid whose shine people constantly tried to dull, and becoming the sparkling, gender-delightful adult they are today.
Highly recommend!!
I'll start with the complaint first: the dates were off. Technically the kids, including Elle, are supposed to be 12 in season 1, which means they should have been born in 1971 (season one is set November 1983). This book has Elle born in 1970, a year older than she's supposed to be in the show. But if you can overlook that, read on...
I'm normally pretty skeptical about books based on tv shows or movies. But this one was actually okay! It was a little difficult reading this when you've seen the show and you know how Terry's story ends, but it was interesting, fairly fast-paced, and gives you a good glimpse into who Jane/Elle's parents might have been. Like others I'm sure, I needed more than to just re-watch Stranger Things for the fifth time until the 4th season comes out, so I turned to the book series. KEEP IN MIND, this is nowhere close to the show in terms of how incredibly great the story is, but it may tide you over a bit if you're waiting impatiently for the next season, like me.
*3.5
The second half was definitely better than the first, so it gets another half-star. Ultimately I was super hyped for this book, but I feel a little underwhelmed. It's missing a lot of depth to it I feel, but it's still a really entertaining read and I'm gonna be finishing the duology because I wanna see how Amora and Bastien fare!
I'm sure I'm just one of many who think that this book should be required reading in Canadian schools. Joseph doesn't just explain what a particular section of the Indian Act means, he goes into detail of how it was formed, amended, etc., and which cultural events took place for the white Canadian government to warrant each section. He goes into detail about the residential school system and the abuses faced within, lists the 94 Calls to Action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and helps us to understand how intergenerational trauma has been passed down in Indigenous families and communities since the first residential school was opened. I'd recommend this one to anyone who wants to expand their education on the residential schools, the Indian Act, or Canada's historical and ongoing treatment of Indigenous people in general.
This was FANTASTIC. It was so sad and hard to read at times, but my god, I can't believe it took me so long to read it! It's always going to be relevant and incredibly poignant and vital to our society as long as police brutality and anti-Black racism exist. This reminded me why we fight against those things and why we can't give up.
In fact, I think this should be required reading for anyone considering a career in law enforcement, particularly white people. It gives an especially detailed look into the effects of police brutality and why exactly so many Black people, justifiably, fear and distrust the police. It's one of those books that can create understanding and clarity, and also act as a call to justice.
It took me a bit of time to begin reading this book, because even if it's a topic I feel passionately about, such as feminism, or in this case, antiracism, I'm one of those people who struggle to read nonfiction. But once I began, I literally just kept going, because I found myself not wanting to stop.
Jason Reynolds has an incredible talent with words, taking Kendi's brilliant Stamped from the Beginning and “remixing” it into an accessible format targeted toward young people. After having read this, I feel much more ready to tackle Kendi's work next. This book smoothly and engagingly guides you through racism against Black people from its very beginning to it's continued existence today, citing examples and events that you may not have even known about after having been taught the bare minimum of Black history in school. He also deconstructs the differences between segregationist, assimilationist, and antiracist thought and actions, and uses these terms throughout the book to explain the reasoning behind movements and events.
Whether you're wanting to supplement your antiracist education or looking for a great place to start, I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
I am super late to the wagon, but there is so much hype around this book, and I get it now. This is a beautifully-told reimagining of Circe's story. It's pretty slow, but I didn't even mind, because Miller was such an amazing story teller. And I'm not usually one to read for prose, but oh my goodness, this writing was beautiful! It was slow-paced without being boring, poetic without being flowery. And can we talk about the UK edition of the cover art? Everything about this book is gorgeous.
Ok, so A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens is probably one of my favourite books, and there are so many versions and retellings, and very few good ones. I picked this one up because the premise actually looked kind of funny and interesting, and a pretty cool take on Dickens with the whole “Project Scrooge” thing. But with the rich socialite main character, I was kind of expecting something really shallow.
I actually loved this!! And that ending? Stop it! I was in a reading slump before Christmas so I didn't finish it until the new year, but I'm so glad I did! I would recommend it to anyone looking for a fun, modern Dickensian, heartwarming Christmas read.
So, little PSA here: a dog dies in this book. I know this counts as a spoiler, but I would have appreciated a trigger warning, so I really don't care. If you're going to read this book, brace yourself.
With that out of the way, I actually found this book to be pretty good, up until that ending. I couldn't get through it fast enough, because it was really tense and suspenseful, and at times, pretty creepy. And it IS well-written.
But that ending... I zipped through the pages and cried over a dog tearing itself apart for THAT ENDING? Quite frankly I feel cheated and let down and honestly, a little angry. We're left with no explanation of wtf happened to the world, no final answers about the “creatures”, no nothing! Those open endings where absolutely nothing gets explained feels like such a cop-out for authors who want to write suspense/horror but don't know how to finish it. You at least owe your readers an explanation if you're gonna kill off a fur baby. The whole book was a fairly decent build-up... But it builds you up FOR NOTHING. Biggest let-down.
Let me just start by saying that whatever you think this book is, it probably won't be what you think. That being said, I don't think folk horror is for me. It just came off as a little bizarre (which was obviously the intention, but it was a miss on me), and aside from the creepy bits, I actually found it a little too slow. It took me a few days to read it. However, the descriptions of some things were satisfyingly unsettling, and I'll probably be afraid to walk in the woods alone for a while, so mission accomplished there.
Honestly, I picked this one up because I had to read a book written in the 1920s for one of my reading challenges, and I liked the movie. I get that this is meant to be funny and a bit satirical, but I mean, I just couldn't be bothered to appreciate it. The scenes involving Lulu made me cringe (and I get the book is a product of its time, but still), Lorelei is a shallow, empty-headed young girl (but that doesn't matter because she's pretty) who's always backstabbing her much-cooler friend Dorothy, they meets lots of men, and men are easy to manipulate. The end.
An early attempt at chick lit, which I would appreciate, but I don't even like modern chick-lit, so factor in the ideas that didn't age well and the humour that's now too outdated to see as funny, and it wasn't really a hit for me.
Honestly, I've tried taking a “If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all” approach to books I didn't like, because they're someone's brainchild and I don't want to be mean. BUT... I feel compelled to say something about this book. I didn't like de la Cruz's Blue Bloods series, but I like witches, so the first book in this trilogy was interesting and fun, and I set out to finish it. The second was weaker, but I was like “meh, that's okay, it'll probably finish a bit stronger.” OH MAN! I don't know how anyone read it and was like, “yep, this is a fleshed out, complete story, and a perfect conclusion to a trilogy, let's publish it.” To say the least, this book was a freaking mess from start to finish.