Mini Reviews: speed round!
Wow, it's been a month since I last posted. My bad! While I've been busy posting life updates in Facebook and daily photos in Instagram and rating books on Goodreads as I finish them, my blog has been sadly neglected. Even sadder, I've neglected to be "social" in the blog circle :(
Quick life updates:
- went to Brazil! Ate all the good foods, checked out cool bookstores, ended up at the Iguacu Falls, ended up on top of Sugarloaf mountain, ended up on the shore of Ipanema, ended up taking a selfie with Christ the Redeemer, nbd.
- enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving break with my family in Chicago. Again, ate all the good foods, played cards (Uno and Phase Ten) with my sisters and cousins, and doted on my niece and nephew.
- ... and then poured myself into work when I got back. I read books at night to escape from the stress and still drained after finishing them, couldn't bring myself to review them.
The busiest season of work is coming to a close (only the calm before the next storm) so now I have a little more energy to reinvigorate my love for books!
Mini reviews: speed round!
Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn: Read the book before, watched the movie, and now I've listened to the audiobook. I loved the reading and how it featured both male and female readers rather than one voice actor valiantly (and awkwardly) narrating the alternate POV. Amy's chilling, guiltless voice toward the end was so well executed that I looked around to make sure that Amy wasn't behind my back!
A Thousand Pieces of You, by Claudia Gray: Just LOOK at how beautiful this book is. The cover is just GORGEOUS. "Don't judge a book..." and all that, but I fell in love. Unfortunately, love fell flat. In true YA fashion, this is part of a series, so the ending was weird. It's a creative premise: Marguerite travels through parallel universes to avenge her dead physicist father. She travels by using her father's invention, The Firebird,which she fashions into a necklace. Sounds awesome, right? Time and space traveler with a cool necklace who runs around does some butt-kicking. Nope! Just a lot of moping and grieving and love triangles with the men that maaay have betrayed her father. NOPE.
Moby Dick; or, The Whale, by Herman Melville: I tried to stick it out for my fellow readalongers, especially our fearless leader Hanna. However, I have no idea why this book is even considered a classic, It's long-winded and we don't get to even see The Whale until that last bit of the book, and even then, there's really no resolution. To quote wise poet Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park, "I tried so hard and got so far but in the end it doesn't even matterfor Ishmael, nor Etudesque". That is all.
The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern, read by Jim Dale: Already read the book, but needed something to listen to on my drive to Chicago and back. This book is already so magical, but Jim Dale's voice makes everything 10000x more magical. While the book may bore inattentive readers with tons and tons of descriptions, it translated well as an audiobook since there was the patient Jim Dale taking you from tent to tent, telling you all about the costumes and textiles and delicious smell of food. I just wasn't a fan of his depiction of the "exotic" Tsukiko - an uncomfortable caricature of what you've unfortunately come to expect from a demure and quiet Asian woman, exaggerated accent and all.
The Residence, by Kate Anderson Brower: A fascinating look into the White House as a Downton Abbey-like residence, described from the viewpoint of the bakers, maids, butlers, florists, and chefs that keep the household day-to-day. However, unlike Downton Abbey, this book serves to compare Presidents and the First Families to tenants just passing through, while the staff are more of a permanent fixture. So - who were the "bad tenants"? LBJ had staffers wash his feet and trim his toenails. Maids had to tidy up the bongs left by Carter's sons. Nancy Reagan had butlers count the silverware after every dinner to make sure her guests didn't take home any "souvenirs", so take your pick. On the other hand, the Bushes (both Presidents and their families) where kind and compassionate, the Kennedys liked to party it up, and while kind, the Obamas were initially standoffish because they weren't used to having so many staffers to wait on them. A quick and entertaining read, but nothing substantial.
Quick life updates:
- went to Brazil! Ate all the good foods, checked out cool bookstores, ended up at the Iguacu Falls, ended up on top of Sugarloaf mountain, ended up on the shore of Ipanema, ended up taking a selfie with Christ the Redeemer, nbd.
- enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving break with my family in Chicago. Again, ate all the good foods, played cards (Uno and Phase Ten) with my sisters and cousins, and doted on my niece and nephew.
- ... and then poured myself into work when I got back. I read books at night to escape from the stress and still drained after finishing them, couldn't bring myself to review them.
The busiest season of work is coming to a close (only the calm before the next storm) so now I have a little more energy to reinvigorate my love for books!
Mini reviews: speed round!
Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn: Read the book before, watched the movie, and now I've listened to the audiobook. I loved the reading and how it featured both male and female readers rather than one voice actor valiantly (and awkwardly) narrating the alternate POV. Amy's chilling, guiltless voice toward the end was so well executed that I looked around to make sure that Amy wasn't behind my back!A Thousand Pieces of You, by Claudia Gray: Just LOOK at how beautiful this book is. The cover is just GORGEOUS. "Don't judge a book..." and all that, but I fell in love. Unfortunately, love fell flat. In true YA fashion, this is part of a series, so the ending was weird. It's a creative premise: Marguerite travels through parallel universes to avenge her dead physicist father. She travels by using her father's invention, The Firebird,which she fashions into a necklace. Sounds awesome, right? Time and space traveler with a cool necklace who runs around does some butt-kicking. Nope! Just a lot of moping and grieving and love triangles with the men that maaay have betrayed her father. NOPE.
Moby Dick; or, The Whale, by Herman Melville: I tried to stick it out for my fellow readalongers, especially our fearless leader Hanna. However, I have no idea why this book is even considered a classic, It's long-winded and we don't get to even see The Whale until that last bit of the book, and even then, there's really no resolution. To quote wise poet Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park, "I tried so hard and got so far but in the end it doesn't even matter
The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern, read by Jim Dale: Already read the book, but needed something to listen to on my drive to Chicago and back. This book is already so magical, but Jim Dale's voice makes everything 10000x more magical. While the book may bore inattentive readers with tons and tons of descriptions, it translated well as an audiobook since there was the patient Jim Dale taking you from tent to tent, telling you all about the costumes and textiles and delicious smell of food. I just wasn't a fan of his depiction of the "exotic" Tsukiko - an uncomfortable caricature of what you've unfortunately come to expect from a demure and quiet Asian woman, exaggerated accent and all.
The Residence, by Kate Anderson Brower: A fascinating look into the White House as a Downton Abbey-like residence, described from the viewpoint of the bakers, maids, butlers, florists, and chefs that keep the household day-to-day. However, unlike Downton Abbey, this book serves to compare Presidents and the First Families to tenants just passing through, while the staff are more of a permanent fixture. So - who were the "bad tenants"? LBJ had staffers wash his feet and trim his toenails. Maids had to tidy up the bongs left by Carter's sons. Nancy Reagan had butlers count the silverware after every dinner to make sure her guests didn't take home any "souvenirs", so take your pick. On the other hand, the Bushes (both Presidents and their families) where kind and compassionate, the Kennedys liked to party it up, and while kind, the Obamas were initially standoffish because they weren't used to having so many staffers to wait on them. A quick and entertaining read, but nothing substantial.
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