A fierce and lyrical collection of poetry celebrating the moments of triumph and beauty in our lives, as well as the moments of despair—recasting them as opportunities for growth.
In this never-before-published collection, poet Upile Chisala grapples with themes of love, loss, and desire. Throughout this third book, she explores her identity as a black Malawian woman, offering intimate reflections on her life and experiences, imparting a stirring, universal message of empowerment and self-love.
Anyone who reads my reviews knows that modern poetry can be hit or miss with me but as of late I’ve been really enjoying the titles I’ve been picking up. Though this collection did contain some of the super short poems that I don’t really love in modern poetry, the language and message make up for my dislike of that format (plus there aren’t a ton of super short ones, just a few).
Chisala’s use of language and imagery is truly beautiful and her journey through this collection feels cathartic in a lot of ways. She details not only her struggles, but struggles and feelings that are experienced by a number of people in their lives, which make many of the poems very relateable.
This challenge was created by Caffeinated Fae in an effort to reduce the number of physically owned but unread books in her collection. Make sure to head over to her post (linked above) to check it out.
I have no where near the stats that she has in her post, I keep meaning to get some together but I have been busy with other things, but I can say that my number of unread books is definitely a couple hundred. Last year I did make good progress in removing some backlist from my shelves, but more progress is needed. I figured each month I could do posts of what I intended or hoped to read and then do an update at the end of the month to see how I did.
So if you read my TBR, you would know the physical books I pulled, but here’s a refresher:
I’m not sure now if I’ll get to The Cheerleaders, as my audio book from the library expired. I’m back on the hold list, but I don’t know if I’ll get it back in time. A good number of the backlist books are consumed via audio book just because a lot of my physical reading time is used towards reading review copies. I do still have an audio book for Night Music. The others I am planning on reading physically.
This stunning anthology of favorite poems visually interpreted by comic artist Julian Peters breathes new life into some of the greatest English-language poets of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
These are poems that can change the way we see the world, and encountering them in graphic form promises to change the way we read the poems. In an age of increasingly visual communication, this format helps unlock the world of poetry and literature for a new generation of reluctant readers and visual learners.
Grouping unexpected pairings of poems around themes such as family, identity, creativity, time, mortality, and nature, Poems to See By will also help young readers see themselves differently. A valuable teaching aid appropriate for middle school, high school, and college use, the collection includes favorites from the Western canon already taught in countless English classes.
I didn’t know what to expect with this title, but I ended up absolutely loving it. Julian Peters has taken a number of classic poems and put them to art. Each poem has a distinct art style that fits it perfectly and tells the story of it. I was a little bummed that the eARC didn’t have all the artwork yet since I would have loved to see the art that went with the rest of the poems. It’s also nice that each poem is printed separately after the poem with artwork so that you can absorb the poem with or without the art.
When bookshop owner Sarah Smith is offered the opportunity for a job exchange with her Parisian friend Sophie, saying yes is a no-brainer—after all, what kind of romantic would turn down six months in Paris? Sarah is sure she’s in for the experience of a lifetime—days spent surrounded by literature in a gorgeous bookshop, and the chance to watch the snow fall on the Eiffel Tower. Plus, now she can meet up with her journalist boyfriend, Ridge, when his job takes him around the globe.
But her expectations cool faster than her café au lait soon after she lands in the City of Light—she’s a fish out of water in Paris. The customers are rude, her new coworkers suspicious and her relationship with Ridge has been reduced to a long-distance game of phone tag, leaving Sarah to wonder if he’ll ever put her first over his busy career. As Christmas approaches, Sarah is determined to get the shop—and her life—back in order…and make her dreams of a Parisian happily-ever-after come true.
I loved the premise of this book, book shop owner in the U.S. swapping placed with a bookshop owner in Paris and growing during the process. While the romance does play an integral part to the story, I wouldn’t necessarily describe it as a romance. It’s more about Sarah, the main character, finding her voice and learning who she is and what she wants in her life. She does go through a lot of struggles that include miscommunication, insecurities, trouble fitting in and more. While the romance does play a large part in some of her struggles it’s not necessarily the main topic.
I loved the descriptions of Paris and especially how Paris was seen through Sarah’s eyes. Each of the people who became her friends and showed her what they loved about Paris had such unique personalities that were fleshed out and fit into the little family that worked in Once Upon a Time. The different conflicts and issues that each character had were also well thought out and complimented the story.
There were parts of the story which were a little predictable, but in a warm story such as this that’s totally fine. If you like heartwarming stories about coming into your own, definitely check this out.
Rebecca Raisin is the author of several novels, including the beloved Little Paris series and the Gingerbread Café trilogy, and her short stories have been published in various anthologies and fiction magazines. You can follow Rebecca on Facebook, and at http://www.rebeccaraisin.com
I’ve already posted about my reading goals for the year, as loose as they are, but I haven’t really addressed my writing goals. As we know I failed at Nano this past year, but that happens. My muse has been a little absent as of late.
So what do I plan to do about that in 2020? Well, I’m not entirely sure, but maybe the first place to start is to set aside a certain amount of time per day or week that I am writing.
I have a number of different projects, none of them fully finished, so I think I’ll need to pick only a couple of them to concentrate on because maybe there’s just too much vying for my attention.
I have a number of notebooks with notes and scenes in them but they are scattered, so again I think I need to get them all in one place and get them all organized. This might help my focus once I have everything together.
I’m hoping that getting more organized and focused will help my writing so that I can get back in the groove. Depending on how it goes I may do regular updates, but we will have to wait and see.
Everything Is Beautiful, and I’m Not Afraid perfectly captures the feelings of a young sojourner in America as she explores the nuances in searching for a place to belong. Baopu is a monthly serialized comic on Autostraddle, and this book includes beloved fan favorites plus new, never-before-seen comics.
This one-of-a-kind graphic novel explores the poetics of searching for connection, belonging, and identity through the fictional life of a young, queer immigrant. Inspired by the creator’s own experiences as a queer, China-born illustrator living in the United States, Everything Is Beautiful, and I’m Not Afraid has an undeniable memoir quality to its recollection and thought-provoking accounts of what it’s like to navigate the complexities of seeking belonging—mentally and geographically.
I didn’t know what to expect going into this one, but the description made me want to pick it up. When I first dug into it I worried that the art style was too simple compared to the messages within, but I was happily surprised. The art and messages mix and blend perfectly and communicate what the author is expressing perfectly. There’s a number of subjects discussed, in many ways centering around self acceptance but also touching on immigration issues, cultural acceptance, racism and more.
Though the comics are brief they are very poignant and thoughtful. They provide a window to a perspective of someone going through the issues presented. I would definitely recommend checking it out.
I was very interested in doing the math and figuring out some of my stats for 2019. Thankfully the reading journal I kept really helped me in figuring out these stats, so let’s get into it.
In 2019 I read a total of 301 books. Now, this was amazing, but I need to add a caveat that a large reason I was able to read this many books is because I’m able to listen to audiobooks at work. If I was not able to do this I would not be able to get any where close to this number.
I do have a break down of how many per month, you can definitely see where I had reading slumps:
This year I also kept track how many books I was bringing in, how many were review books/backlist/etc. and how many I unhauled. This was because I had a goal for myself to read more than I brought in as well as tackle some of my backlist titles.
I added 151 physical books to my library this year. This is a large number, but I’m happy that it is about half when compared to how much I read. Of the books I read, 61 of them were physical books that I was able to move off my TBR and four of those I unhauled (not a ton, but it means I really enjoyed most of them).
I read a total of 49 review books this year, mostly from NetGalley and authors that reached out to me. I’m hoping to up my game even more in 2020.
I did the math and overall I read an average of approximately 166 pages per day. I think this is a great number and would like to keep this level or increase it.
All in all I was really happy with the way 2019 worked out and my fingers are crossed that 2020 is just as good or better.
Perched atop a hill in the tiny town of Marchburg, Virginia, The Goode School is a prestigious prep school known as a Silent Ivy. The boarding school of choice for daughters of the rich and influential, it accepts only the best and the brightest. Its elite status, long-held traditions and honor code are ideal for preparing exceptional young women for brilliant futures at Ivy League universities and beyond. But a stranger has come to Goode, and this ivy has turned poisonous.
In a world where appearances are everything, as long as students pretend to follow the rules, no one questions the cruelties of the secret societies or the dubious behavior of the privileged young women who expect to get away with murder. But when a popular student is found dead, the truth cannot be ignored. Rumors suggest she was struggling with a secret that drove her to suicide.
But look closely…because there are truths and there are lies, and then there is everything that really happened.
Good Girls Lie is set at an all girls boarding school, which already has me taking interest. Boarding school stories, especially those with secret societies or similar aspects are typically must reads for me. This one did not disappoint. It had a lot of twists and turns, some that I predicted but also some that threw me for a loop.
I did really enjoy the format with the flashbacks that suitably built up the backstory. It was like puzzle pieces falling into place as each different perspective and scene was revealed. The suspense and pacing of this book was also really good as it was a relatively fast read for me.
This was definitely a win when it came to suspense and creepiness, a lot of the time you are left wondering just who certain people are and what they have as motivations. And there are definitely moments of misdirection that I loved.
J.T. Ellison is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than 20 novels, and the EMMY-award winning co-host of A WORD ON WORDS, Nashville’s premier literary show. With millions of books in print, her work has won critical acclaim, prestigious awards, and has been published in 26 countries. Ellison lives in Nashville with her husband and twin kittens.
It’s 2020 already and I’m hoping to hit the ground running. For the most part I’m planning to tackle more review books that I have since I’m trying to get caught up after my slump, but I’ve also pulled some of my physical books that I would like to get off my TBR this month as well.
The Cheerleaders and Night Music are books I currently have audio books for so those should be easy to knock out. I’m already half way done with Robots Vs. Fairies and the other two books are pretty short. So I’m fairly confident I can knock these ones out – my hope is that this happens and that I’m also able to pull additional books from my shelves. We shall see what happens in that regard.
There’s also always random books that I may pick up on my kindle or via audio books as the mood strikes me. Also, there are monthly challenges I want to participate in that I haven’t been able to check out yet, so this may have additions or changes based on that.
I cannot believe December (and 2019) is already over, it went by so fast! I know a huge part of that was because of all the planning and prep I had to do for my vacation, and then the vacation itself. While I didn’t get back up to my usual reading pace, I do feel like I broke the slump and that I am getting back on track.
In total I read 18 books this month, including one on my kindle, 3 print books that were on my shelves (though one of them was a book I received for review) and 14 other review books which were either in eArc or audiobook format. While I was stoked to tackle so many review books, I was a little bummed that more print books weren’t taken care of.
For books that I acquired in December, there were a total of 11 – which is awesome for December. December and April tend to be my highest months so having less this December was a win. I got two from Book of the Month, three as Christmas gifts and the rest I purchased for myself mostly with gift cards that I received for Christmas. I also picked up the second Crowns of Croswald book from the author’s website as after reading the first one that I received directly from the author for review, I definitely wanted to pick up the next book in the series.
So that’s about it for December! I’ll be doing a full year wrap up in the next couple days to cover how many books total I read (301!) and how many books I added to my library as well as some other stats, but that’s going to take a little time since I have to organize my data.
Here’s hoping that January and beyond will see me getting even more on track with my reading (begone slump!) and get me back to my happy place. Fingers crossed for 2020 being a good year.
