Book Review: 'On the Road' by Jack Kerouac

Let me start by saying I don't usually read "classic" books unless they really strike me as something I'll enjoy or find interesting. I don't believe in reading a book simply because someone at some point in history deemed it as amazing literature. But if I'm going to be reading a classic, it will most likely be a cult classic. I guess that's just the kind of classics that I'm attracted to. This is how my desire to read Kerouac's On the Road was born.

First of all, I found On the Road really easy to read. I actually read it in one afternoon. I didn't intend to, but I found the prose really easy to speed through and it just kind of happened that way. I was happy to find that the prose and style weren't written in some sort of pretentious tone that I find most classics are written in, and that's why we're supposed to bow down to them. It also wasn't as hard to follow as I expected it to be. I loved The Bell Jar, but it was super hard to follow. The same with Play It As It Lays; super easy to blow through, but hard as hell to follow. On the Road was none of these, and for that I am grateful. But, above all, I feel like the prose isn't exactly writing; it's just words strung together relaying some sort of turn of events. I guess some might classify this as writing, but to me, Kerouac's style was lacking something to make it more interesting. Not that it was boring, but it was just lacking something that I can't exactly put my finger on.

So, my feelings towards On the Road were fairly mixed once I finished it. When this happens, I usually put my faith into the trusty Goodreads to see what other people thought. Let me just say that the Goodreads reviews for this book were by far the funniest I've ever seen. It went from "this book completely changed my life", to "Kerouac and On the Road are a complete narcissistic and paternalistic piece of garbage", to (my personal favorite) "this book gives me anxiety attacks on sleepless nights". Personally, I can't agree with the people who call On the Road a narcissistic and paternalistic piece of garbage. Even though it's about people, beatniks of the Beat generation, "on the road", careless and fancy-free, you have to remember that this took place in the early 1950s. Even those who broke out of social norms were still strained by them, at least from our modern perspective. So, yes, On the Road's narrator, Sal, is at times very ignorant and paternalistic. But hey, it's the 50s and he's a white man; honestly, what were you expecting? I think the book does have a lot of aspects that are clearly outdated, but again, that is kind of the point. You're reading a book that is, essentially, about the origins of the hippie movement. Things are not the same in present day.

I managed to overlook and even chuckle at the outdated social norms in On the Road. But, if I may join the critics who judge it too harshly based on that for just a second, I would have enjoyed it so much more if Sal, the narrator, had recognized his feelings for Dean Moriarty, the beatnik who essentially inspires Sal to go out on the road. The way Sal continuously talks about Dean... I'm sorry. From my modern perspective, there were feelings there. It's a shame it couldn't have happened. This is your modern book critic who tries to make every fictional man gay signing off now. 3.5/5 stars.

(I love this quote, even though it will always remind me of a high school English teacher that I despised who completely overused it.)

Book Review: 'The Widow' by Fiona Barton

Ah, what can I say about The Widow?

Well, if you like a good psychological thriller that will rock your world, keep looking, because this was exceptionally bad.

I know better than to believe a book's back cover when it says, "Perfect for fans of Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train!" I know that's entirely a marketing scheme by publishers to sell books. That's not why I bought The Widow. I bought it because it sounded interesting and I thought it would give an interesting and thrilling voice and story to the woman behind a man who did something terrible. I'm now learning that not only do publishers compare their latest novel to other bestsellers to sell books, but they also word their back-cover premises to sell books and, as a result, completely mislead the story. The Widow offers you none of what the back cover promises, trust me.

This thriller is supposed to be about a woman, Jean Taylor, whose husband dies unexpectedly when he is hit by a bus. Not only that, but her husband, Glen Taylor, was certainly a man of interest in the years before his death, suspected of kidnapping and murdering a young girl who went missing four years prior. So when he dies, you expect Jean to shed her layer of anti-feminist compliance and become a badass or something, right?

Wrong. She stays exactly the same. She changes nothing. She is still a scared and emotionally immature widow who stood behind her husband when he really didn't deserve it. That's not to say she stood behind him out of shear human decency, no. She merely stood behind him because she didn't know any better.

The Widow does not offer a particularly liberating view of women, nor a portrait of a marriage. I may need to quickly go check a calendar, but it is 2016, right? Not 1956? In what universe are readers supposed to be intrigued by a woman who passively agrees to every eyebrow-raising thing her husband does, from losing jobs to explaining away his habit to watch online pornography? Does the lady who wrote this book really expect her readers to be riveted by a woman standing behind her husband, just because he's her husband and that's what she "has to do"? C'mon.

But the thing that bothers me most about The Widow is that it completely fails as a character study, which was one thing that it could have particularly excelled at. Let me accept for a minute that Jean Taylor is not the feministic thriller heroine I enjoy. I'll accept that, for argument's sake. I'm willing to accept any kind of character if their testimony is convincing enough, and that's just the problem here. In a novel whose title and back-cover description promise an intriguing delve into the mind of a woman who kept her husband's secrets for too long, testimony and revelations on Jean's part are shockingly infrequent in The Widow. I don't feel I know Jean Taylor any better than she knows herself. This is a clear sign of weak characters and plot, not to mention the fact that the majority of the novel is from the perspectives of boring, commonplace police detectives trying to figure out what happened to a little girl. Just...don't read this. 2/5 stars.

Book Reviews: 'Leaving Time' by Jodi Picoult and 'Say What You Will' by Cammie McGovern

1. Leaving Time, by Jodi Picoult:
I honestly expected to like this as much as the other Jodi Picoult novels I've read. But this was just terrible. It's been about 4 years since I've read Picoult. I wasn't over the moon for her books, but I enjoyed their emotional powerful-ness enough to read more than one. So, I picked up Leaving Time last weekend after getting it as a gift about 2 years ago (when it came out) expecting the same kind of reading experience. But what I found was something very different. Leaving Time's characters feel very generic and commonplace, which is not something I expect from Picoult. Her characters aren't insanely unique, but they're definitely not generic. The characters became less and less believable as I read, and I was getting really bored with the story. So, I decided to give the book a chance until a certain page number and if I wasn't feeling it anymore, I would set it aside. Well, I did set it aside, but not before finding out a major plot twist that completely changes everything. Not only does it change everything, but it's completely ridiculous. One of those twists where you look up from your book, make a face and then close it, because it makes the book a complete disaster and waste of time. Leaving Time? Waste of Time. 1/5 stars.

2. Say What You Will, by Cammie McGovern;
This book started off strong, but slowly and then quickly went downhill. I knew right away it wouldn't be a 5-star book, because none of the characters, even with their disorders or quirks, seemed particularly memorable to me. I was also intrigued by the exploration of the male protagonist, Matthew, struggling with OCD, but a lot of the things Amy (the female protagonist who has cerebral palsy) tried to get him to do were really not tasks that you should give someone struggling with OCD. This is when the book started going quickly downhill for me. When you really have that disorder, it's not something that can just be overcome. It takes time, treatment and, depending on the case, finding balance with medication. Not just getting yourself out of your comfort zone, like this book tries to suggest as creative ways to deal with OCD. It was kind of insulting after awhile, honestly. I also just don't find this to be a realistic portrayal of a girl with cerebral palsy. I don't personally know anyone with it, but it felt distinctively unrealistic to me. That grappled with my taking issue with the portrayal of OCD really ruined this book for me, and I really had no motivation to finish it. 2/5 stars.

Book Reviews: 'Where'd You Go, Bernadette' by Maria Semple and 'The Carnival at Bray' by Jessie Ann Foley

1. Where'd You Go, Bernadette, by Maria Semple:
This book is...interesting, to say the least. It really doesn't follow the conventional contemporary novel's structure, and that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Honestly, I really did enjoy it. Its writing style is one I particularly enjoy (stories told through letters, emails, instant messages, etc.) But I can understand why some people hated it, because the storyline is very all over the place and not as coherent as it could be. Where'd You Go, Bernadette follows the life of Bernadette Fox as told through the eyes of her teenage daughter, Bee. Bernadette isn't your typical wife and mother; she struggles with social anxiety and is possibly borderline agoraphobic, and everyone judges her for it. Through the testimonies of her family, friends and neighbors, we learn who Bernadette is and how a planned family trip to Antarctica might be the thing to push her over the edge. One thing I did take issue with is that I think the writing style, in this case, impedes on the characters' development at times. I felt like I could have known these characters a little better, but I didn't, because all I had most of the time was letters and emails to go on. There were a few little things that were mentioned by different characters that I figured would become something bigger later, but they didn't. The book is also supposed to be about Bernadette, but I found there were a lot of times where it was focusing too heavily on characters that didn't really need that level of focus. There were a few parts where it was like, "This is really interesting interpersonal stuff, but why am I supposed to care again? How does this pertain to the story?" But, despite its faults, I did enjoy it. It's just certainly not a book for everyone, and I think it's important to keep that in mind. 4/5 stars.

2. The Carnival at Bray, by Jessie Ann Foley:
This is an exceptional and underrated book. It reminds me so much of Tell the Wolves I'm Home by Carol Rifka Brunt, which I also loved. It follows 16-year-old Maggie in 1993 as she moves from big city Chicago to Bray, a village in Ireland, where her single mother has decided to move the family so she can marry and live with her Irish boyfriend, Colm. This story felt so...real. Like no teenage fluff that a lot YA books fall into. Raw, emotional and real. The best part of the story was Maggie's relationship with her uncle Kevin, who is portrayed as a wannabe Kurt Cobain who plays in a garage band. Not only that, no one has faith in him, especially not Maggie's mother Laura nor Colm. But let me just say that I had such a huge crush on Uncle Kevin while reading this. While living in Ireland, Maggie experiences coming-of-age like no one before, and she learns the one thing Uncle Kevin told her was important: to seize the moment and live. I really love this brand of YA books and wish there were more of them. Highly recommend. 5/5 stars.

Book Review: 'Everything, Everything' by Nicola Yoon

I'll tell you one thing: this started off promising. It really did. When I started Everything, Everything, I got the feeling that it would destroy me emotionally and leave me in a book hangover. But, as a lot of contemporary YA books do, it soon fell into cliché, overly cheesy and sometimes completely unrealistic territory.

Everything, Everything follows 18-year-old Madeline, who is sick with a rare illness in which she is essentially allergic to everything, and going outside is too big a risk. So, she stays inside her house all day every day, going to school online and the only interaction she has is with her mother and Carla, her nurse. Her love for reading is just as big as her desire to live a normal life. But then, oh then, a boy moves in next door, Olly, whose got family problems of his own. You see where this is going.

While the premise sounds like a thousand other YA books, I'll admit that the premise of Madeline's illness sounded interesting to me. It didn't quite sound like she was going to die (which she doesn't; that isn't really a spoiler), so I was intrigued to see where this book was going to go. But as it went on, it slowly lost its pzazz. A lot of chapters had barely any dialogue; just Madeline obsessing over anything. Having never been able to leave the house, I kind of understood her overthinking of things at first, but then I stopped giving her the time of day. She was just being "typical teenage girl" melodramatic after awhile. Not only that, the entire prose became melodramatic. Maybe I would have been into it if the story hadn't started to lose me, but even then, it did. But, at the same time, I just couldn't figure out where the story was going to go, so I still had motivation to continue reading.

Toppled with stereotypical teen melodrama, Everything, Everything just becomes unrealistic. At one point, Madeline just gets the urge to run outside and protect Olly during a family spat, surprising everyone. Okay, no. You expect us to believe a girl who has supposedly never left the house just gets the urge to run outside? Does she even know how to do that? All for her precious Olly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Nothing special to see here. Madeline then somehow applies for a credit card and seems to get one, no questions asked, and book a trip to Hawaii. At this point, I was just laughing and rolling my eyes while reading. I know there are some readers who would buy this in a YA book, but I'm not one of them.

Olly's story wasn't anything particularly special, either. His father is abusive and became so after losing his job, yadda yadda yadda. It seems the author put zero effort in making that story unique in any way; bland as bland could be. Father becomes abusive because he lost his job has been seen many other times. At this point, Everything, Everything started to remind me of All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven, except in that book, more is left up to the imagination about the male character's home life, which I thought was much more effective.

So, the ending? Well, I will not spoil it, but it is ridiculous. I have never seen an ending like it before in YA, but that does not mean it is a good thing. I think the author thought she was being unique and trying to surprise teenage readers who, again, would buy it in a story, but I like to think I'm a little too advanced of a reader to buy it. Would I recommend Everything, Everything? Depends; if you like any cheesy YA book ever, I think you'll like it. If you're like me and like to read YA looking for new approaches/additions to the genre, nope. Skip it. 3/5 stars.

Thoughts I Had While Watching 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame' For the First Time

I color myself somewhat of a self-proclaimed Disney enthusiast, but there are a few movies that I've never seen. Being a 90s child, it could've just been that I didn't own the ones I've never seen, or I never had any interest in them. In any event, I realized a few months ago that I'd never seen The Hunchback of Notre Dame; not only that, it was the only movie from the Renaissance Disney period that I'd never seen. So, I borrowed it from my aunt (Walt Disney Masterpiece Collection VHS copy, of course), and today, I was in the mood for a Disney flick, so I watched it. And I do have some thoughts that need expressing.

First of all, I was not aware or prepared for how dark The Hunchback of Notre Dame is, and after a Google search, I saw that it considered one of the darkest Disney animated features, so at least I'm not alone on that one. Up until the part where spectators in Notre Dame have tied ropes around Quasimodo and start throwing food at him while laughing where I wanted to shout, "This is BRUTAL!", I think I only thought it was quite different and out-of-touch with other stories Disney has adapted, which wasn't necessarily a bad thing. I was a bit taken aback by how it was just so apparent to everyone that the baby in the beginning (Quasimodo, the "Hunchback"), was hideous. I grew up in a world where Disney played with the emotions of children with themes that they could understand to a certain extent. So, to see a Disney cartoon where a child is deemed hideous and hidden away to ring bells in Notre Dame simply because he is deformed and perceived as unattractive, was quite a shock to me. I know; things like this have obviously happened in real life; much worse things have happened. I know how people throughout history have treated minority groups, no matter what they are. I've read The Diary of Anne Frank. I was just not prepared to see such a story handled in a Disney cartoon that came out 20 years ago.

I'm a little ambiguous to decide whether or not the fact that Disney chose to adapt such a story into an animated feature is a good thing. On the one hand, one could argue that The Hunchback of Notre Dame teaches people that beauty is not skin-deep and they can rise above people who mistreat them. In that regard, this movie reminds me of one of my all-time favorite Disney movies, Beauty and the Beast (I told you already, I'm a 90s child). The key difference between these two movies, however, is that Beauty and the Beast is adapted from a fairy tale in which a cocky prince has a spell placed on him so he can learn the value of treating people, no matter their appearance, with respect. He's also a whimsical animal-like character who is shown to have a soft side and it's all good after awhile and he transforms back into his beautiful, rugged self at the end. The Hunchback of Notre Dame is more real; it's a man who is physically deformed and, in the 1800s, people obviously didn't take nicely to that. People today still don't necessarily take nice to that. Not only that, but the female lead of the movie, Esmeralda, a gypsy, is persecuted because Judge Frollo is bigoted towards gypsies and wants to rid Notre Dame of these "creatures". This is when the movie lost me in terms of as a Disney that is somewhat geared towards children. If I had watched this as a child, I would not have known what a gypsy was, let alone why Frollo was so insistent on having her killed. Most children of a certain age, thankfully, don't understand the concept of discrimination, so this would be absolutely foreign to them. Then Esmeralda breaks out into a song titled "God Help the Outcasts", which is catchy of course, as it was composed by the genius minds that composed all the songs of Renaissance Disney, but I was just sitting there thinking, "This is so different from every Disney movie I've ever seen, ever. I would not have liked this as a kid, most probably because I would have for sure not have understood it."

I did some research after watching it (I couldn't just sit back and believe that this movie was commercially successful as all movies of its kind and time and that it received "largely positive reviews" as Google was telling me). I found out that some critics brought up the fact that some of its themes, including infanticide, damnation, sin and genocide, were not in fact appropriate for an audience geared, in part, towards children. There was also a study done on children in audiences shortly after the movie's release, which found that kids were "unaffected" by The Hunchback of Notre Dame's mature themes and enjoyed it. You wanna know why they were "unaffected" by these mature themes? Because they would not have even understood them! What 6-year-old has a grasp on why the mean old white guy wants to kill the black gypsy just for being herself? I barely have a grasp on it as an adult, because it's ridiculous. Even a legendary Disney feminist film like Mulan is easier for kids to grasp in that it's obvious to anyone, even kids, that women do not have a huge part in the army, let alone in China. I watched Mulan as a kid and fully understood by the context that women were not allowed to join the army. That was that. Would I have understood why everyone was being so mean to Quasimodo just because he was "ugly"? I can guarantee you I would not, because I don't really understand it now; why would you adapt a story with a theme like that and introduce it to kids? Yes, that's the world we live in; pretty people are favored above all and maybe you can praise the movie for introducing that to a younger audience, but I do not think kids should have to concern themselves with that. They will grow up and learn it way too soon enough that the world is a harsh place to live, let them enjoy a Disney movie where they don't have to see people tying up an ugly person and throwing food at him, all with laughter and smiles. Yes, Quasimodo gets revenge and Frollo dies in the end, but is he really all that liberated? I actually thought that The Hunchback of Notre Dame might not follow the typical heteronormative romance plot, but then Esmeralda gets with Phoebus, the brooding, handsome hero of the movie when they basically didn't even know each other all that well. But hey, that was the only option for her, right? She couldn't exactly get with Quasimodo, who clearly loved her, because he's ugly! Her man has to be pretty and strong and handsome, with broad shoulders.

And so concludes my rant about watching The Hunchback of Notre Dame, most definitely the darkest Disney film in history, for the first time. I honestly do not recommend watching this with your kids. And you know something? Maybe there's another reason I never saw this movie growing up: because someone told someone that I shouldn't watch it. Thank you to whoever that was. I'm glad my childhood didn't have The Hunchback of Notre Dame in it.

Book Review: 'I Know What I'm Doing—And Other Lies I Tell Myself' by Jen Kirkman // Other Recent Reads

Jen Kirkman's I Know What I'm Doing—And Other Lies I Tell Myself might go down as one of my favorite memoirs I've ever read. It's just so...relevant. At least it was to me, and I think if you really sit and think about the topics she subtly tackles through her own real life stories, you'll come to agree with me. Let me just get this out of the way and say: I highly, highly recommend it, even if you have absolutely no idea who Jen Kirkman is. That will not matter.

I didn't know a whole lot about Jen Kirkman before reading her book. I knew she's a comedian, her tweets are funny, and she's wrote another book before this one about how she can barely take care of herself, how could she have a child? (I'm just inferring from the title. It's literally called I Can Barely Take Care of Myself: Tales From a Happy Life Without Kids.) Anyway. That's enough for me to at least want to read her book, because she seems funny and the premise of her memoir really caught my eye. It sounded like the kind of book that I could pick up when I was feeling down about myself for whatever reason and lose myself in her stories about anything and everything, and somehow it will make me feel better (the last memoir to do this to me was Drew Barrymore's Wildflower.) So, I marked it as "want to read" on Goodreads, thinking that it might not be a book I'd ever get to, but certainly wanted to. Then, one hot day in July, I found myself at the bookstore with a prioritized list of books that I was going to buy. I only ended up finding one of those books in stock, and while looking for that book, I came across I Know What I'm Doing—And Other Lies I Tell Myself and said to myself, "OMG! I have to buy this because it's here now and I'm here now and it sounds amazing."

A couple months passed before I picked it up for real and started reading it, and I'm so glad I did. Kirkman tackles, through her own stories, the ridiculousness that society forces upon us sometimes. She got married and it didn't work out, like countless marriages, so she got divorced. Her eye-opening accounts of how, in this decade, divorced women are treated by other women who are even close to them, is important. At one point, she even had to switch doctors because her former doctor was treating her like a hippie and judging her, all because she'd had 2 partners since getting divorced! It was just one of those books that talks about things that are there; they've always been there, but only when reading a book about them do you truly realize how much they're there. Society forces some stupid shit on us for no apparent reason other than it's what other people have deemed respectable, especially for women, and it's great to read about someone who basically gives the finger to that stuff. Among my favorites in Kirkman's book were the first time she traveled alone since divorcing, and how people were "worried" for her to be traveling alone without a man (yet this convention doesn't seem to exist for the opposite sex), and her hilarious account of staying in on New Year's Eve in 2013 because she was sick of being forced to go out and have fun just because it's New Year's Eve. But, above all, my favorite part of the book was chapter 10, titled, "I'm Okay, You're Okay", in which Kirkman lists out things that it's okay to do despite the fact that other people make you think it's wrong. For example, "It's okay to not want monogamy for some periods of your life", or "It's okay to drop your old friends from grade school", or "It's okay to talk honestly about sex". The chapter also contains my favorite quote from the entire book, which is:

"You want the life someone else has? That's because you can only see their outside and you're comparing it with your inside."

To repeat, I highly recommend I Know What I'm Doing—And Other Lies I Tell Myself to anyone living on Planet Earth. It's for sure one of the best memoirs I've ever read and also one of if not the best feminist book I've ever read. 5/5 stars.

I've also read some other books that I am choosing not to review in full, because I really didn't like them all that much. I read My Grandmother Sends Her Regards and Apologises by Fredrik Backman, which I totally expected to love, but I totally really did not. It tells the story of 7-year-old Elsa grappling with a world that no longer contains her Granny, and it really sounded like one of those diamond in the rough books that is underrated, but it's not, at least for me. It was a little too out there for my tastes, and the ending was entirely lame and underwhelming. 2 out of 5 stars from me. I also picked up Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, a celebrated classic, which I also did not enjoy. There are definitely some classic books that transcend the amount of time since they were published, but Frankenstein is not one of them. It was written in 1816 and you can definitely tell that it was, and the story itself doesn't seem all that special all these years later. I appreciate Frankenstein for its contribution to popular culture, but I am not a fan of the novel itself. Nopety nope nope. Another 2 out of 5 stars.

Book Reviews: 'My Salinger Year' by Joanna Rakoff and 'Dear Emma' by Katie Heaney

1. My Salinger Year, by Joanna Rakoff:
This was a simple, fun and, for the most part, entertaining read. Rakoff tells the story of the year she worked at a literary agency in New York City as an editor's assistant who was later put in charge of answering the one and only J.D. Salinger's fan mail. Salinger, who didn't want to receive any fan mail or any mail whatsoever, asked the agency to send out a form letter saying that they were not permitted to send on the person's letter to him. Rakoff, however, finds herself emotionally invested in some of the letters and begins sending back her own personalized replies explaining how Salinger doesn't want any mail but at the same time tries to offer them advice. At times, My Salinger Year read not like a memoir, but like a dated contemporary novel, which was nice sometimes and not so nice at others. While it was interesting to read about the goings-on of a lit agency in NYC in the late 90s when the world was on the cusp of going completely digital, Rakoff's story seems...somewhat useless at times. I'm not discrediting what working for the agency and Salinger did for her and her career, but there were parts in the book where I just felt like the dust jacket description was over-selling it. It's just Rakoff telling her story of becoming an adult, facing the harsh real world and the year she worked for the lit agency that represented J.D. Salinger. Yes, there were parts where she talks about responding to the fan mail, but I wouldn't describe that as the central part of her story like the dust jacket seems to. There were times where I wanted to scream at her, asking her why she was doing that or why she was insistent on dating and living with a complete and total ass who she didn't even like most of the time, but alas, Joanna did not listen to me. My Salinger Year is definitely a story worth telling and is very interesting and relatable in parts, but in others I found it a tad underwhelming. Maybe that's just me, but I felt like Rakoff could have tried a little harder to justify some of her life choices and career goals in something she's called a memoir. 4/5 stars. 

2. Dear Emma, by Katie Heaney:
How shall I describe Dear Emma? It was...okay. Heaney is one of my favorite BuzzFeed writers; I've loved every non-fiction piece I've come across of hers on there, so when I heard that she was coming out with her fiction debut about a college girl who runs an advice column for her school's paper, I thought it sounds just like the book for me. And it was. It just...could have been better. Harriet is the woman behind Dear Emma, an advice column for a Midwestern college newspaper. When Harriet starts going out with Keith, who she really likes, she thinks she's finally found someone, but then he completely blows her off and starts going out with Remy, who works at the campus library with Harriet. It was cute and original in parts where it sheds light on Facebook stalking and dating in the iPhone and social media age, but I think Dear Emma could have been a cute, easy and better book if the writing style wasn't so juvenile and more than half the story wasn't just Harriet interacting with her two best friends and roommates, Mel and Logan. There were times like I felt I was standing in a women's locker room listening to some white-bred, straight twentysomething girls over-analyze a text message. I'm all for cute contemporaries where girls overthink things like social interactions and text messages, but the writing style was just way too juvenile for me at times. Please God, never use more than one exclamation point or question mark in a piece of writing that you're going to show to people and have it count for something. I don't care what it is, just never do it. Like, honestly, Dear Emma isn't even about the Dear Emma column very much. It's just Harriet, her sometimes annoying friends, the guy who blows her off, the unfortunate soul who falls for him next and a bunch of jumbled conversations. It definitely had parts that I enjoyed, and parts where it felt like I was having teeth pulled just to finish the chapter. A lot of the interactions between the characters really had absolutely nothing to do with the point of the story or its outcome. And the point of the story promised on the back cover? It only actually starts happening more than halfway through the book. It's not all bad, but definitely not great. I should probably rate it lower, but I'm trying to focus on the book's positive attributes. 3.5/5 stars.

Book Review: 'Let's Get Lost' by Adi Alsaid // Summer Book Wrap-Up

I'll start by saying this: Let's Get Lost is a cute, easy read. And that's exactly what I expected it to be. It was just a little too cute at times for my taste, if you feel me.

The book follows the stories of four strangers completely unrelated to each other; Hudson, Bree, Elliot and Sonia, and their encounters with one lone girl who drives into their lives when they need her most: Leila. Honestly, that little description I just came up with on the spot makes the book sound better than it actually is. But like I said, it's a cute book, just a little too cute at times. And when I say too cute, I mean in an unrealistic, picture-perfect, bubblegum pop kind of way. All the stories have a happy ending. And yeah, sometimes reading stories with happy endings is nice and refreshes your outlook on humanity. But Let's Get Lost isn't one of those books. It's one of those books that could use a touch of reality every now and then. We're supposed to believe that Leila just drives up into these people's lives and they accept her immediately into helping them figure out their "problems"? Puh-leaze.

Maybe I'm just too cynical to enjoy Let's Get Lost wholeheartedly. Don't get me wrong, I kind of enjoyed it when I first started. But there's only so much of tired stereotypical teen drama and overused cheesy passages that I can take. The premise is also asking a lot of the reader; we're supposed to read all of these people's stories and their encounters with a girl named Leila, all while having minimal information on Leila herself? I was eager to get to the last 40 pages, where we finally get some insight into her background. Let's just say it was soooo underwhelming. I actually put the book down and stared into the distance, rolling my eyes, because it was just so fitting with the rest of the book: nothing particularly special.

So many critics have compared Let's Get Lost to John Green's Paper Towns, and let me just say that the only thing that the two have in common are maybe their overuse of cheesy phrases. Other than that, Paper Towns at least has elements of mystery. Any elements of mystery in Let's Get Lost, if we want to call them that, are disappointing and, as already said, quite underwhelming. If you're looking for a cute, quick, easy read that's just like a thousand other YA books, this one is for you. 3/5 stars.

And so this concludes my summer of reading! I cannot tell you the last time I read as many books as I read this summer. Last summer I only made it through a measly 2 books. This summer has been the complete opposite. Here's my summer book wrap-up:

1. Paper Towns, by John Green: 5/5 stars.
2. Sister, by Rosamund Lupton: 2/5 stars.
3. Reconstructing Amelia, by Kimberly McCreight: 5/5 stars.
4. To the Lighthouse, by Virginia Woolf: 3/5 stars.
5. It's Kind of a Funny Story, by Ned Vizzini: 4/5 stars.
6. The BFG, by Roald Dahl (reread): 4/5 stars.
7. The Lake House, by Kate Morton: 2/5 stars.
8. The Lover's Dictionary, by David Levithan: 5/5 stars.
9. Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by John Green & David Levithan: 3.5/5 stars.
10. The Anatomical Shape of a Heart, by Jenn Bennett: 5/5 stars.
11. Finding Audrey, by Sophie Kinsella: 3/5 stars.
12. Shine, by Lauren Myracle: 5/5 stars.
13. I'll Give You the Sun, by Jandy Nelson: 4.5/5 stars.
14. Yes Please (audiobook), by Amy Poehler: 4/5 stars.
15. Naked, by David Sedaris: 2.5/5 stars.
16. Frances and Bernard, by Carlene Bauer: 5/5 stars.
17. Let's Get Lost, by Adi Alsaid: 3/5 stars.

17 books. Wow. Not gonna lie, I'm kind of proud of myself.

Book Review: 'Frances and Bernard' by Carlene Bauer

Let me start by saying this: Frances and Bernard is a beautifully written story and a precious gem of a book. Anyone who likes a good love story should read it. In other words, it gave me ALL THE FEELS.

I came across it on a BuzzFeed list of 49 underrated books you need to read and, having found myself in the throws of a reading slump last week, I decided to give it a try. I did not regret it, and BuzzFeed was right; I did love it.

Frances and Bernard, written entirely in letters spanning from 1957 to 1968, tells the story of Frances Reardon and Bernard Eliot, two writers who meet at an artist's colony and begin writing each other over the course of a few years. Frances eventually makes her way to New York, where she has a book published. Bernard follows soon after, only for their true story to begin. That's all I can really say about the story without spoiling it. I'm not sure if Frances and Bernard falls into the historical fiction genre, but I definitely believe that it should. No other decades in history stick out as so monumental in terms of social norms and the true definition of oneself. Frances, even though she sees herself as different from her younger sister and relatives who got married and thought it unthinkable to have a career of any kind, is very religious in tone and in her values, which to me points out that even though Frances is a modern woman with liberal aspirations and dreams, she was quite conservative. Everyone seemed to be.

I've seen so many publications describe the 1950s as a period of "rampant conservatism". I think that even though Frances defined herself as not like other women, she was still conserving herself, in a sense, to a norm that society had led her to believe was correct. Sure, conservatives in the 50s and 60s didn't think it was right for a woman not to marry and have a career, but at the same time, women who didn't get married and chose a career also limited themselves to only that, much like Frances. She is so dead set against letting herself fall in love because she believes, even though it is never explicitly said, that she can only have one or the other. A job, career and no man, or a man, no job and no career. That's what norms in those decades taught women to believe was right, and it's all the more sad to read a book like Frances and Bernard and see how limited women were led to believe they were when, in all that time, they could have done so much more. That's not to say Frances didn't do anything, she did lots as a writer, which borders on revolutionary in a time like that, but that was her choice. She didn't want to let herself fall in love because she had to uphold her choice, and ultimately, she lost a lot because of it. Frances wasn't the only character to be historically accurate in terms of social norms, either. Even though Bernard is cute, damaged and really loves Frances, he is a bit of an asshole at times, like I presume most men were in those days. At its core, the book is a beautiful piece of historical fiction showing how much social and cultural norms in those decades influenced people's lives.

Frances and Bernard was barely 200 pages yet I felt like I'd read a 400-page novel when I finished it. Carlene Bauer's writing is beautifully done; I felt as if the letters I was reading had actually been written in the 50s and 60s, which is exactly what I assume the author wanted the reader to feel. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys historical fiction as well as anyone who enjoys a good love story once in awhile, like me. 5/5 stars.

Book Reviews: 'Yes Please' by Amy Poehler and 'Naked' by David Sedaris

1. Yes Please, by Amy Poehler (a.k.a. My First [And Probably Last] Audiobook Experience):
I listened the audiobook of Yes Please, having found it at my library and deciding to finally try listening to one after a long period of curiosity. Here were my 5 stages of listening to an audiobook:

1) Huh, this is kind of interesting. *listens intently*
2) *discretely yawns while trying to stay focused*
3) I'm BORED.
4) I wanna jump ship. LET ME JUMP SHIP.
5) Alright, I'm gonna finish it just to say that I did.

Yeah. So I guess you could say audiobooks aren't for me. It was definitely an interesting experience to have Poehler read her memoir to me through my radio, but after awhile I just had trouble retaining any of the information. It's like that friend who just rambles on and you secretly tune out while nodding along with commonplace comments. The book itself was enjoyable. Poehler talks a lot about her family and her outlook on life, work and how to manage the two without driving a wedge between yourself and the things you care about, which was uplifting to hear. There were parts that I could have taken or left, like where she talks about her experiences with different comedy groups she toured with before joining Saturday Night Live in 2001. I just didn't find them to have anything interesting other than the fact that they happened and now she's telling us about them. There were a few parts that made me laugh out loud, like how her water broke moments before Saturday Night Live went live and she had to be rushed to the hospital, or her descriptions of the shady apartment building where she lived in the East Village in the late 90s. Yes Please is as good a memoir as anyone who has enough of a comedic voice to make us laugh. We see their movies, we stay up on Saturdays to see them be nutty, and we watch their television shows (well, some do, I haven't watched Parks and Recreation so I did feel quite disconnected from the chapters where she talks about the show, but that one's on me). If you like Amy Poehler and her work, there's a high chance you'll enjoy Yes Please. It was just one of those books that I wanted to check out but because I'm not overly in love with Poehler or the premise of her memoir, I knew it would also become one of those books I would never get to. Hence why I checked out the audiobook, so I could kill two birds with one stone. The medium isn't for me, but hey, at least I can say I tried it. 4/5 stars.

2. Naked, by David Sedaris:
I read a personal essay by Sedaris in a few of my college classes which I thoroughly enjoyed; "Go Carolina", from one of his other books. So when I found Naked at a used book sale a few months back, I figured I'd check it out (it was also $1, so I wasn't too worried about spending money on a book I might not like). It has a few interesting stories that I enjoyed more or less, but I failed to feel any emotional investment in them whatsoever, which is rare for me when I'm reading a memoir or collection of essays/stories. However, my issue with Naked is that I fail to see the moral or general point of literally any of Sedaris' stories, You tell a story because it needs to be told for a wide range of possible reasons, right? I finished every story saying, "Okay, cool. Why am I supposed to care again?" I just didn't see a point to any of his stories in this book, but I felt like I was supposed to, which bothers me even more. Sedaris, you are a mystery to me, and I think your work is written in such a way that you want me to think that. 2.5/5 stars.

Book Review: 'I'll Give You the Sun' by Jandy Nelson

This book was recommended to me by several people, and I am happy to report that it did not disappoint. But I can also say it was nothing like I thought it would be, in any regard.

I'll Give You the Sun follows two separate stories told by Noah and Jude, twin brother and sister. Noah's chapters are told when he and Jude were 13 and 14, meanwhile Jude's chapters take place when the twins are 16. Much has happened in the three-ish years between the narratives, and that is immediately evident. Noah and Jude are both artists, but as Jude points out on countless occasions, art was always more of Noah's thing. While they appear to be somewhat of a typical family, I'll Give You the Sun covers several topics you don't typically see in a YA contemporary novel. In this story, we hear the other side of being a family; animosity that grows between siblings, no less twins. In this case, we learn a lot about the Sweetwine family; things we normally wouldn't say out loud. Things like you secretly hate your father. Things like taking actual measures to sabotage the people you love. Things like you secretly resent your sibling because they get more love from one of your parents, even if that parent would never admit it.

I'll Give You the Sun just seems like a really refreshing take on the bonds between brother and sister, as well as our feelings toward our family as we try to figure out who we are during a very formative time of adolescence. I saw a few critics criticize the repeated artistic metaphors used in the narratives, which a lot of times can indeed be perceived as cheesy or cliché, but in this case, they just worked. You know when you read something you know is just so goddamn corny, but you just can't help holding a hand to your heart? That's the best way I can describe the metaphors and relationships in I'll Give You the Sun. In my opinion, there's no way to deny there are many things in this book that are so poignantly used. It's written in a very sophisticated tone, almost above the characters' age brackets.

I don't want to openly criticize this book, because I want to appreciate it for what it is (which is a very touching, remarkable story), but I did have a few issues with it while reading. I found the beginning, which starts with 13-year-old Noah, to be a bit slow. I really couldn't figure out where the story was going to go. There were a lot of things about how it was written that I didn't understand, but I powered through, because I was intrigued to learn about the things in the plot I didn't quite grasp (I think all of them were explained by the end). Also, the chapters were too long. I ended up blowing through the book faster than expected because I kept telling myself to read until the next chapter; then it was 90+ pages later. But the main thing that became a bit of a drag while reading I'll Give You the Sun was the writing style. It was a bit annoying at times. Both Noah and Jude have their own quirks which only their own mind can really comprehend, like Noah's Invisible Museum or the fact that Jude talks to her dead grandmother, who has a bible of strange virtues. It just got to be a bit much, and there were times where I wasn't completely sure what was happening; I don't think I'll Give You the Sun is the type of story that warrants the type of writing style where sometimes we struggle to decipher what's going on, so that's why it was a bit of a bother at times. But like I said, I'm going to appreciate this book for what it is and forgive its trespasses, because, underneath it all, it did have parts that destroyed me emotionally and I believe it to be a story that deserves to be read. 4.5/5 stars.

Book Reviews: 'Finding Audrey' by Sophie Kinsella and 'Shine' by Lauren Myracle

1. Finding Audrey, by Sophie Kinsella:

This started off really well for me, but then went drastically downhill and was a bit of a letdown by the end. Finding Audrey follows 14-year-old Audrey as she learns to deal with a newfound diagnosis with social anxiety disorder. She finds most social situations impossible to maneuver and does not even attend school anymore; she stays home with her quirky family and wears big dark sunglasses even in the house because eye contact has become so unbearable for her. It has some great insight on anxiety and how situations that seem effortless to some are unthinkable to others. Audrey eventually takes a liking to Linus, her older brother Frank's video gaming partner, who makes her feel the most normal she has felt in awhile. However, Finding Audrey's main problem lies within; it doesn't really know what it wants to be about. Does it want to be about Audrey finding herself in the daunting sea of anxiety that is life, like the title suggests, or does it want to be about her, her problems and her incredibly annoying family? I call her family annoying because they take up a large chunk of the book for no good reason at all. A lot of chapters revolve around Audrey and Frank's close-minded mother yelling at him to get off the computer, which started off a little relatable at first but then just became so goddamn annoying I wanted to skip them altogether. Audrey's character also takes a weird turn about halfway through, and I figured it would be resolved by the end, but it wasn't. Audrey also alludes to what gave her this social anxiety; an incident at school that we only learn bits and pieces about, which seemed open-ended and not fully disclosed when the reader had a right to have it fully disclosed. In all honesty, Finding Audrey is good in theory, just not in execution. The story, as a whole, just goes nowhere. The book itself isn't really a story, it's just a series of events that happen with much potential but don't really link to each other whatsoever by the end, which left me feeling a bit like I wasted valuable reading time on it. 3/5 stars.

2. Shine, by Lauren Myracle:
It is difficult for me to formulate words about how much I love Shine. It has been quite a long time since I have suffered such emotional trauma at the hands of a hardcover. I was legitimately sad when it ended. I wanted to finish it, yet I didn't want it to end; the eternal book nerd struggle. Shine follows the story behind a hate-crime against a gay teenager, Patrick, in the backwoods small town of Black Creek, North Carolina. The story is narrated by Cat, once Patrick's best friend, who feels that she owes it to him and to herself to find out who attacked him. The descriptions just paint such a picture; it's so atmospheric, I feel like I know the American South like the back of my hand and I am not Southern nor have I ever even been there. A community riddled with conservatism, conformity and religion, and the intolerant values that go along with it. Underneath that, drugs, alcoholism and domestic violence are explored among the "rednecks" of Black Creek. Cat is just such an amazing character and narrator. Everyone told her to leave it alone and stop asking questions about who attacked Patrick, but she didn't. She powered through, and she learned a helluva lot of life lessons while doing it. Shine is a mystery, but at its core, it's a coming-of-age story. The loss of innocence and the barrier between kid and adult, all while trapped in the devastatingly scary place that is Black Creek. I have to admit, I was a little disappointed when I first read the resolution to the mystery; my mind had gone other places, but I think that's because I had begun to think of the storyline as a thriller; Shine is not a thriller. It's a tragic, heart-wrenching, character-driven mystery, and once I considered that, I found a new appreciation for the resolution to the mystery. Honestly, I don't really know what else to say about it other than it's officially one of my all-time favorite books that I will treasure, recommend and maybe even revisit if the opportunity presents itself. Stop what you're doing and go read it; I'll just stay here and cry about it forever. 5/5 stars. (Side note: I went to take Shine out of my library only to be told the book had been discarded and must've been misplaced back on the shelves when it really belonged on the shelf of used books for sale. Short story shorter, I bought the hardcover copy in great condition for a dollar, so now it's mine to gaze at on my shelf for ever and ever.)

Book Review: 'The Anatomical Shape of a Heart' by Jenn Bennett

Contemporary YA books like this one that usually follow the same baseline premise (girl and a guy, girl falls for guy, guy falls for girl, yadda yadda) are usually a hit or miss. Well, let me tell you, The Anatomical Shape of a Heart is definitely a hit. At least it was for me.

There's really nothing that sets the book apart from other books of its kind if you read the dust jacket description. But what drew me to it was the setting; urban San Francisco. I've read so many books with mundane suburban settings, so it was nice to read about characters taking metro trains and buses and living that city life. That's how Beatrix meets Jack, on a late night bus. I really liked how Beatrix, who has a bit of a shattered family life, clearly liked Jack when she first met him based on her narration, but on the outside, she didn't let him in at first. I found that very realistic. I also liked how Jack's appearance and the fact that he's an earthy Buddhist sets up an image that makes him seem like he could be a homeless youth or something, but that is so not the case, and that just goes to show that everyone is fighting different battles that you don't know the half of. To know someone is to be invited into their life, and lots of time what we don't share outwardly are the biggest parts of our lives. Beatrix's life goal was also unique and interesting; she likes drawing anatomy and wants to illustrate bodies for textbook diagrams and such. It's one of those professions that you don't really think about until you do; someone has to do that, so who does?

Another thing I loved about The Anatomical Shape of a Heart was how the author, Jenn Bennett, included a gay character that was in no way influenced by heteronormativity, Beatrix's older brother Heath. If you can write gay characters that are just people without making them seem like aliens compared to straight people, I immediately love you. I don't think it was ever said that Heath "is gay", he has a boyfriend named Noah and came home from a club with glitter stuck to him (LOL). Bennett's writing just made it seem so normal and commonplace and for that I commend her, because this is how it should be in real life; no heteronormativity, just life. I also find it kind of like an oxymoron; because 95% of contemporary YA books are about cliché teenage straight couples, so for a book with a baseline premise we've seen a thousand other times to include a strong, normal gay character like Heath is bordering on groundbreaking, if you ask me.

I blew through The Anatomical Shape of a Heart quicker than I thought it would, so it's an easy, breezy, enjoyable read. Another good thing about it is that it portrays sex in a really open and honest way; most parents would like to believe that their children don't fantasize about sex or begin to develop sexual desires, but they do, and this book really hits the mark on that. If you're a contemporary YA fan, I definitely recommend. 5/5 stars.

Book Reviews: 'The Lover's Dictionary' by David Levithan and 'Will Grayson, Will Grayson' by John Green & David Levithan

1. The Lover's Dictionary, by David Levithan:
I really enjoyed this one. It is the story of a couple told entirely through dictionary entries, with different words expressing different experiences, both good and bad. It's also my first official David Levithan book, as I've only read short stories and other little tidbits of things that he's written. I blew through it rather quickly, as some pages only have one or two sentences on it. It's always a risky move when authors choose to tell a story in a different way, like dictionary entries, but The Lover's Dictionary was definitely done right. I would even consider reading it again because there were some lovely passages that warrant being read more than once. 5/5 stars.

2. Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by John Green & David Levithan:
There's only one way for me to describe this book: it has some really great parts, but they really aren't working together. Also, am I the only one who went into Will Grayson, Will Grayson expecting a romance between two guys named Will Grayson? Or is that just me? Because, let me tell you, I spent the first 150 pages waiting for it to happen. I kept coming up with ideas in my head of how the two main characters, both coincidentally named Will Grayson, would end up together. But nope, it never happens, so don't go into this book thinking that's what it's about because, trust me, it's not. The chapters alternate between authors and the Will Graysons' perspectives, with John Green writing the first Will Grayson, and David Levithan writing the second. I kept thinking Green's Will Grayson would suddenly realize he's bisexual or something and it wouldn't be a big deal or some painful coming out story, but nope, he's what I like to call tragically straight (i.e. it's a shame he's straight, because I'd like him to be gay). Green's Will Grayson also seems to want some sort of medal for putting up with having a flamboyantly gay best friend, Tiny Cooper, who is well-loved among readers according to the Internet. Well, I wasn't a big fan. He's not a bad character, but the story starts to revolve around him more than anything after a certain point, and I didn't like him enough to enjoy those parts. Like I said, Will Grayson, Will Grayson has some great parts, but they're just not working together to make one good story as a whole. I think I would have enjoyed it much more if it was just written entirely by David Levithan, because I didn't pick this book up thinking, "Oh, let me read another cliché romance about a straight guy and a straight girl," because that's what John Green's parts ended up becoming. Boring. I didn't hate it, but I didn't exactly love it either. It could have been much better and based on the authors' separate works, it definitely could have been, which makes it all the more disappointing that it's not. 3.5/5 stars.

Book Review: 'The Lake House' by Kate Morton

Sigh.

I admit defeat. I could not get through this book. Believe me, I tried. But I could not. And I'll let you in on why.

There was a time where Kate Morton was one if not my only favorite author. The way she weaved through time periods, with family secrets spilling over onto future generations, it was just super entertaining and the kind of books I enjoyed getting lost in. Her first three novels, The House at Riverton, The Forgotten Garden and The Distant Hours, are my favorites. If I had to pick one novel as my absolute favorite, it would definitely be The Forgotten Garden. One of my all-time favorite books,

But around her fourth book, I started having a hard time getting through it. It could be entirely on me; maybe I just don't have the attention span or the patience or the diligence to read a story that's 400+ pages and shifts through different time periods. It sounds exhausting to read when I put it that way, but I never once felt like that when reading, say, The Forgotten Garden. Sure, it wasn't a book that I blew threw in a week, it took time to get through and fully appreciate and there's nothing wrong with that. But Morton's fourth book, The Secret Keeper, was very hard for me to get through. Took me months. But I guess I could say it was worth it, because I absolutely loved the ending (among Morton's best, I think) and I think it makes up for all the slow-moving parts in the middle. So, when I started to encounter some of those parts in The Lake House, I told myself to keep powering through, it has to get better. It's Kate Morton, after all. But I just couldn't.

The Lake House's premise is quite different from Morton's previous novels. Sure, it has the same formula; a mysterious family from the 1900s, an idyllic house, and something that went hidden for decades. But the key difference between The Lake House and Morton's other books is that the person trying to figure out the mystery, a police detective named Sadie Sparrow, has no relation to the family whatsoever. She's just a cop, in turmoil from a recent case, who decides she has to find out what happened. Okay, but that wasn't the dealbreaker. What made me dislike The Lake House more and more was the plotting. The mystery goes that the baby of the Edevane family, Theo, went missing at the family's Midsummer party at their estate, Loeanneth; the case went cold and the house went abandoned. All we have is this incessant foreshadowing that one of Theo's sisters, Alice, might have had something to do with it. In a typical Morton novel, the chapters range from one time period to the next. All we seem to have in The Lake House is chapters that go back to the parents' meeting, or to the night or days leading up to Theo's disappearance. It just got so boring. There was no multi-faceted cast of characters, just the family whose baby brother went missing and some cop who becomes invested in the story. The Lake House did not remind me of the Kate Morton I fell in love with.

To compare, let's take my favorite, The Forgotten Garden. In that story, it follows a granddaughter trying to find out where her grandmother, Nell, came from after her death. Meanwhile, several chapters are written from Nell's perspective as she tries to discover where she came from decades prior when she was alive. We see two generations uncovering a mystery at different stages in life, meanwhile, a very interesting mystery developing itself through other characters in a different time period. The Lake House has none of that and seems like an unoriginal mystery in comparison. I also noticed a lot of similarities in character details from other previous Morton novels, which to me just seems recycled and tragically uncreative.

So, I didn't get through The Lake House. Maybe I'll return to it some day to find out what happened to that baby, maybe I won't. Maybe I'll just stare at the cover, which is very aesthetically pleasing, and pretend its pages hold a different mystery that is much better than the one that actually lies within. 2/5 stars.

Book Reviews: 'It's Kind of a Funny Story' by Ned Vizzini and 'The BFG' by Roald Dahl

1. It's Kind of a Funny Story, by Ned Vizzini:
I can say that I enjoyed this book. It brings some great insight to adolescent mental health issues as well as shedding light on the pressure a lot of kids put on themselves to succeed in life, despite the fact that they're still trying to figure out what it means to succeed. I enjoyed the chapters where the main protagonist, Craig Gilner, spends time in a psychiatric ward and his interactions with the wacky yet lovable characters there, especially his relationship with Noelle, a girl his age. Yet, even though It's Kind of a Funny Story has several positive attributes to consider, there was just something about it that I didn't like that I still can't exactly put my finger on. Mental health issues are still a very sensitive subject, so bringing awareness to it can happen in many different ways, but Craig's narration bothered me a little. Maybe it was because I could see what he was doing to himself in the beginning and I wanted to yell at him to stop, or the fact that he thought smoking weed was a solution to his problems. I can definitely say Craig's "friends" were the absolute worst, especially Nia, who I'm still angry he gave the time of day to. I didn't like how these friends suddenly were realizing their own issues just because one of their own went to a hospital for help, but I suppose you could call that realistic. In any event, I think the main problem I have with It's Kind of a Funny Story, despite the fact that I enjoyed the majority of it, was the plotting. It's basically just told from beginning to end through Craig's retelling of it, which is also realistic, but it seems sloppy and tedious to read even though I know for sure it was not intended that way. I think if it was told in a more condensed, well-plotted way, it would be half as long (444 pages) and be more sophisticated in tone, if you will. But don't get me wrong, I really did enjoy the book. 4/5 stars. (It's also worth mentioning that I watched the film adaption, and it was plotted out much better, which I found much more enjoyable. But, at the end of the day, I do kind of appreciate how the story is told in the book.)

2. The BFG, by Roald Dahl:
This was a reread, but given the fact that it was the first time I've read it since elementary school, I'd take the opportunity to express my thoughts! The BFG was just as odd, zany and fun as I remembered. It features a series of insightful, unique, mystical characters who all bring something to the story. It's definitely something I'd recommend as a bedtime story to imaginative children, just as I was. I reread it so the story would be fresh in my mind as I went to see the film adaption, which came out a few weeks ago, and oh how I enjoyed it. It was such a great feeling to see a childhood favorite brought to life with such magic and effects, not to mention Disney magic. Steven Spielberg does an amazing job, as he is known to do. Love, love, love. A childhood without Roald Dahl seems empty to me, so please read it to your children or, better yet, buy his books for them and wait for them to discover the books themselves. 4/5 stars.

Why 'Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt' Should Be Considered Dark Comedy

Last month, I started watching Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, a sitcom created by Tina Fey that streams on Netflix (which I don't have, so thanks to the random website where I found the first season).

So given the fact that I don't have Netflix, this is my first Netflix series. I've listened to literally everyone on my social media timelines and my friends in real life gush about Orange is the New Black and how everyone should watch it and blah blah blah. Honestly, the premise of that show does not intrigue me at all, so I'll probably never watch it. But, I had been hearing some nice things about Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, which stars Ellie Kemper from Bridesmaids, The Office and Identity Thief and was created by Tina Fey, so I figured I'd give it a try.

The series is...different, to say the least. The premise is quite different, and a lot of the dialogue is very risque, both socially and culturally. Kemper plays the titular role, Kimmy Schmidt, who is rescued from a "doomsday cult" in Indiana, where she had been held captive in a bunker by a priest for the past 15 years. In other words, she was kidnapped 15 years ago and has been rescued, having been convinced that the world had ended and she and her bunker mates were the only survivors. If we throw away the doomsday cult weirdness for a second, what does this bring to mind? Off the top of my head, the Jaycee Lee Dugard story, or better yet, the Ariel Castro kidnappings in Cleveland. Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is essentially making light of something like being kidnapped and held captive for an extensive period of time. If you ask me, something like that should definitely not be funny. And yet, somehow, it is.

The series is quirky. It follows Kimmy as she chooses to move to New York City and start a new life, having only a seventh grade education and no experiences with the real world. She responds to a roommate ad from Titus Andromedon (Tituss Burgess), a flamboyantly gay black man who is an aspiring actor and singer. Their landlord is Lillian (Carol Kane), who is odd and zany as only Kane could play. Kimmy miraculously finds a job as a nanny for a rich white socialite, Jacqueline (Jane Krakowski), who is equally as funny and enjoyable. At first, she tells Jacqueline her name is Kimmy Smith, as the whole point of Kimmy moving to New York was for her to be seen no longer as a victim, but a person with a positive attitude. And that's what makes Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt work, in my opinion. But there are still some factors that need to be considered.

The series should definitely be in the dark comedy genre, but from what I can find, it's not. Like I said, making light and comedic zingers out of topics like kidnappings and rescues decades later, which we have seen happen in real life too many times along with the victims' painful memoirs, should not be funny, but it is. So that right there should make the series dark comedy. Among the scenes that stick out in my brain from the first season was when Kimmy was talking to a rich handsome man at a party of Jacqueline's and she said she needed to excuse herself to go use the "filth bucket... err, bathroom." That creates quite an image that shouldn't be funny, and yet again, it somehow is.

But from my research, the kidnapping and rescue premise didn't seem to catch critics' attention as much as Jacqueline's backstory. Early in the first season, it is revealed that Jacqueline is in fact not white by descent, she was raised on a Lakota Native American reserve in North Dakota, her real name is Jackie Lynn and she left her home and her parents to move to New York (where she would dye her hair blonde and pass for white) so she could have a chance at a better life. This, of course, can definitely be seen as racially insensitive as this has happened in the past; First Nations women dying their hair and changing their identity, so this tidbit in the storyline could definitely make them feel uncomfortable. Not to mention the fact that Jacqueline's backstory seemed to only be introduced for comedic effect, which also extends the insensitivity issue. Another racial issue the series brought about was a Vietnamese character named Dong, who Kimmy meets in her adult ed class. His character focuses heavily on racial stereotypes and brings to mind other racially insensitive characters in history, like Mr. Yunioshi in Breakfast at Tiffany's or Long Duck Don in Sixteen Candles. It seems as though the world has risen above characters like these, yet Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt has now made one of their own again. Dong as well as Jacqueline's backstory have led several critics to declare that the series has a race problem, and after considering it, I think they might be onto something there.

But don't get me wrong, I like Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. I thoroughly enjoy the comedic one-liners and how the premise of a woman being rescued from a bunker in Indiana shouldn't work comedically and yet it does. I like how the series promotes being your own person, being endlessly positive when there are a thousand reasons not to be and how you shouldn't let life's crap hold you down. I also love the theme song. But my real issue with Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is not the dark comedy, nor the race issues. It's how this Netflix series, which is definitely not for everyone, has been garnering Primetime Emmy Award nominations. You heard me say it, I like the show, but I do not think it deserves Emmy consideration. Yes, the writing is on point and the cast really functions with it, but there are several other comedy series that deserve consideration before this one (Canadian sitcom Schitt's Creek if I may, but yeah I know I'm dreaming there). I continue to really not understand the barrier between streaming services and broadcast television: why is it that basically every series produced by a streaming service gets Emmy consideration? Why is it that more and more broadcast television series are being overlooked? Sure, you could argue that the streaming service series are just better, but I've seen bits and pieces of a few series produced by streaming services. They are out there. That is not to say that's a bad thing, but can we not just hand out Emmy nominations to every new show made by Netflix or Amazon? It's also worth mentioning that Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt was initially supposed to air on NBC but they dropped it last minute. Hmm, I wonder why; because they knew making light of kidnapping and other factors brought about would not fly on network TV. CBS pulled Jane Lynch's new sitcom Angel from Hell earlier this year after it received harsh criticism from Christian groups, could you imagine what other groups would do to this series? So yes, maybe streaming services give people more creative freedom beyond the restrictions of broadcast TV, but that is not to say that one is necessarily better than the other.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt has two seasons currently streaming on Netflix (or, if you're like me and don't have that luxury, you can browse the Internet for it).

Book Reviews: 'Reconstructing Amelia' by Kimberly McCreight and 'To the Lighthouse' by Virginia Woolf

1. Reconstructing Amelia, by Kimberly McCreight:

I loved this book. And I really wasn't expecting that. It's like Gossip Girl meets Gilmore Girls meets Desperate Housewives. It's also what would happen if Jodi Picoult ever wrote a psychological thriller, because McCreight's writing style reminds me so much of Picoult's. I wouldn't really describe Reconstructing Amelia as a psychological thriller, but it's definitely a thriller of some sort. It follows the story behind Amelia Baron, who dies one day of an apparent suicide from jumping off the roof of her prestigious Brooklyn private school. Her mother Kate soon receives an anonymous text saying only three words, "Amelia didn't jump." This leads into an investigation of who Amelia really was in the months leading up to her death, and what was going on in her devastatingly stressful life. I've never gone to private school, but I feel like this book hits the mark on what it's like to go to one. Nothing is what it seems, and it really just goes to show that sometimes we have to take a closer look, because sometimes people we thought were perfect were doing things we never could have imagined them doing. It's also a little sad, given that Amelia dies in the first chapter and we begin to learn what led her to that point, so you know it's not going to end with a pretty happy ending, but it was still worth reading. Reconstructing Amelia pulled me in from the first page and didn't let me go; I finished it in under a week. McCreight makes excellent use of her characters; literally all of them have a purpose and you quickly find out no one, absolutely no one, can be trusted. Highly recommend. I also need a television movie or miniseries based off of this starring Lauren Graham as Kate. 5/5 stars.

2. To the Lighthouse, by Virginia Woolf:
Have you ever read something that you think is really beautifully written, but you have no idea what the hell it's about? That's what I felt the entire time I was reading To the Lighthouse. It has some lovely passages with poignantly used words, but most of the time, I had no idea what it pertained to in terms of the story. I know it's one of Woolf's most challenging works as well as the most autobiographical of her stories, but I still found it quite difficult to read, despite the beautiful writing. I've already read Woolf's collection of autobiographical writings, Moments of Being, so I could see which fictional characters in To the Lighthouse could have been based off of real people. However, I'm glad I read it and I might revisit it sometime in the future to see if I can understand it better. A teacher also recommended Mrs. Dalloway to me and said it was better than To the Lighthouse, so I think I'll read that first. (I also read To the Lighthouse now because Woolf was Amelia's favorite author in Reconstructing Amelia). 3/5 stars.

Book Review: 'Sister' by Rosamund Lupton

Ugh. What a disappointment this was.

Sister sounded like a really good psychological thriller when I came across it on Goodreads, so I made a point of taking it out of my library as soon as I could get the chance, because thrillers generally aren't boring. But Lord, oh Lord, Sister was boring. Among other things.

The novel follows Beatrice trying to solve the mystery behind her younger sister's death, Tess, who the police believe killed herself. Sounds interesting, right? I'm fascinated by suicide in fiction. I think it can be really interesting to explore the motives behind a character's decision to end their life. It's definitely one of my favorite plot points to include in a story. But the suicide aspect of Sister wasn't that interesting or unique or anything else of the sort. It was just a contrived plotline. Not only that, but the dust jacket really makes the book sound like it's about, at its core, the bonds between sisters and that's why Beatrice feels she owes it to her sister to find out the truth. But I really was not feeling this bond that was being described. I really didn't feel like Beatrice knew her sister anymore than the reader did, which obviously was not the intention of the author. I felt Beatrice knew Tess when they were kids, but all she's done since they've been adults is criticize her liberal and open-minded lifestyle, and resent her for not taking her advice. I don't think she knew who her sister was at all, really. I think Lupton spent too much time devising and plotting how the story would be resolved that she didn't focus enough time on developing her characters into actual people. Yes, we get to read and find out all these "interesting" details about the late Tess' life, but that was about all I felt I knew about her when I think, for the sake of her and the story itself, I should have known more. The same goes for Beatrice, but it's even worse in her case. I felt like I didn't know her at all other than the fact that she became ridiculously obsessed over finding out what happened to her sister.

Also, what was so boring about Sister was that it spent a lot of time exploring the living characters' grief, which is a plot point that is glossed over in a lot of other thrillers. And there's a reason why it's glossed over in a lot of other stories: because it's dead boring. It's not interesting. I'm supposed to care about Beatrice's plight to find out what happened to her sister, but after 200 pages, I just really didn't. I think I realized the character and storyline were beyond redemption when I started to sympathize with the people who were telling Beatrice that she was crazy and she should let it go.

And, honestly, the ending is just plain bad and implausible. I'll keep this review spoiler-free, but I will say that they introduced the plotline that would end up being the resolution to the story way too late in the book. And by that point, I'd given up hope on the characters or the story, so. But, I suppose Sister did have some somewhat okay parts. The writing style was kind of interesting and unique, but the fact that the story is told from Beatrice's perspective became a drag by the end, because she became so annoying. This book was recommended to me on Goodreads because I read The Girl on the Train, which is one of my favorite thrillers. So if you also read that and Goodreads recommends Sister to you, my suggestion is to just keep scrolling. 2.5/5 stars.