#lesreads on IG
published: 2018
pages: 311
heard / read: 5/12-14/2019
book: 38 in 2019
MY THOUGHTS
who wasn't crushed by the end of Broad City?
if i think about it i get a bit sad because what a good show!
but also, what an even better ending!
anyway, i picked up this book at Target at the beginning of the year but like always, i put it off.
I was able to get it as a loan from my library's audio section so i heard/read along and that was probably the best way for me to read this book.
it just details her thoughts, and lists, and questions and concerns while she goes on this road trip.
she also talks about her lost card project and i thought that was pretty cool. she reunited a lost letter with the owners children who didn't really see their father as the man who had written the letter many years ago. and off of this, she created an even bigger project where now all sorts of strangers are reuniting lost things with their owners.
she also goes into a bunch of other things that were pretty cool to learn about.
like for example: i did not know that she was in a long term relationship with a woman.
NOT that that matters in anyway whatsoever but because i was so used to her as Abby in broad city, i just never thought of her like that (trust me...I DO NOT MEAN ANYTHING BAD BY THIS!) so in season 5 when they introduce Leslie (HAAAAY!!!!) as Abby's doctor and later on love interest, i was shocked because i was so used to her being all about dudes. NOT KNOWING that in her real life, this was a journey she had taken. i know the show played a lot on their real life.....it's just that as the human that I am, i NEVER delve into a celeb's life cause i personally do not care what they had for breakfast August 12, 1938, ya know...their personal life is none of my bidness. if i HAVE to search for it, i already don't care.
all that to say that it was nice to learn more about Abby as a human vs Abby as Abby in BC.
this is a pretty cool listen to, so I'm glad i got around to it like that.
....uh, there's really not much to say about it since its a) been so long but b) its also just a long ramble about everything so yea.
if you can get this as an audio listen, i definitely recommend it.
if you can get a copy of the book, i recommend that too since there are drawings everywhere.
anyway, thanks for reading!
pages: 291
read: 5/10/2019
rating: Y E S ! ! !
book: 37 in 2019
Annika (rhymes with Monica) Rose is an English major at the University of Illinois. Anxious in social situations where she finds most people's behavior confusing, she'd rather be surrounded by the order and discipline of books or the quiet solitude of playing chess.
Jonathan Hoffman joined the chess club and lost his first game—and his heart—to the shy and awkward, yet brilliant and beautiful Annika. He admires her ability to be true to herself, quirks and all, and accepts the challenges involved in pursuing a relationship with her. Jonathan and Annika bring out the best in each other, finding the confidence and courage within themselves to plan a future together. What follows is a tumultuous yet tender love affair that withstands everything except the unforeseen tragedy that forces them apart, shattering their connection and leaving them to navigate their lives alone.
Now, a decade later, fate reunites Annika and Jonathan in Chicago. She's living the life she wanted as a librarian. He's a Wall Street whiz, recovering from a divorce and seeking a fresh start. The attraction and strong feelings they once shared are instantly rekindled, but until they confront the fears and anxieties that drove them apart, their second chance will end before it truly begins.
MY THOUGHTS
RAMBLES:
i still cannot believe that i read this book in about 5-6 hours. i mean, WHAT!!??
and I'm even more shocked that I'm shocked because it is doable, i've read books in a day before. i guess its because i devoured it on the airplane ride back from Mexico.
i found this book through IG and it had great reviews and although that's bit me in the ass before i still went for it and luckily my library got it to me before i took off and for that i am super thankful.
i took this book along with Chelsea's with me on my vacation to Mexico hoping to read them both while i was out there. (they're both fairly small with them being under 300 pages.) i was crazy to think that i would get 2 books read out there considering that i KNEW there was going to be no downtime but i was still optimistic.
i finished Chelsea at like 130 am on my last night out there. and i wanted to get this started so that i could finish on the flight or get close to finishing as much as possible.
we get on the plane; i start reading.
we're delayed like an hr and a half.
i find that they have the Addams Family movie and i want to see it so i tell myself "make it to page 100 and then put it away and watch the movie."
i got to page 100... and i kept going.
I COULD NOT PUT THIS BOOK DOWN!!!!
i did not want to stop reading this story!
before the story starts, you have the author's acknowledgements so you find out right away that Annika has Autism (if ya didn't read it, sorry for the minor spoiler!).
and it is.
100% it is.
in the beginning its basically an introductory period. you're in the present but every other chapter as takes you into the past (i love books like this!).
you get to see how their relationship started and developed and eventually what broke it. but the good thing is that from the beginning you also see the way it starts to get repaired. both with Annika & Jonathan as well as just Annika herself. even though she still has ways to go now that she has Jonathan back in her life.
in the beginning its just that, the beginning. there wasn't too much about it that has you super preoccupied with where the story is going. you're just going with the flow.
THEN!
then you hit a point that makes this story so much more!
so.much.more.
you learn the reason why it ended.
of course they talk it out and its good.
AND THEN!!!!!
oh man.
that final twist it took.
i did not expect that.
i maybe would have seen it coming had i read the titles of the chapters but lets be honest, i still would not have seen that ending coming. (it's just who i am as a human.)
holy smokes.
i did not expect that and it made the story that much more for me.
maybe most caught it but i didn't. but what the author did with this story made my heart burst and my love for this book bloom like no other!
this is the first time that I've been ridiculously bummed that i finished a book in 1 sitting.
i have now experienced my very first book hangover. if i ever thought i had ever had one, i hadn't; this was my first.
such a good book.
ill definitely be buying this one to add to my library!
jump over for spoilers!
thanks for reading.
#lesreads on IG
published: 2019
pages: 340
read: 5/5-9/2019
book: 36 in 2019
In a haze of vape smoke on a rare windy night in L.A. in the fall of 2016, Chelsea Handler daydreams about what life will be like with a woman in the White House. And then Donald Trump happens. In a torpor of despair, she decides that she’s had enough of the privileged bubble she’s lived in—a bubble within a bubble—and that it’s time to make some changes, both in her personal life and in the world at large.
At home, she embarks on a year of self-sufficiency—learning how to work the remote, how to pick up dog shit, where to find the toaster. She meets her match in an earnest, brainy psychiatrist and enters into therapy, prepared to do the heavy lifting required to look within and make sense of a childhood marked by love and loss and to figure out why people are afraid of her. She becomes politically active—finding her voice as an advocate for change, having difficult conversations, and energizing her base. In the process, she develops a healthy fixation on Special Counsel Robert Mueller and, through unflinching self-reflection and psychological excavation, unearths some glittering truths that light up the road ahead.
Thrillingly honest, insightful, and deeply, darkly funny, Chelsea Handler’s memoir keeps readers laughing, even as it inspires us to look within and ask ourselves what really matters in our own lives.
At home, she embarks on a year of self-sufficiency—learning how to work the remote, how to pick up dog shit, where to find the toaster. She meets her match in an earnest, brainy psychiatrist and enters into therapy, prepared to do the heavy lifting required to look within and make sense of a childhood marked by love and loss and to figure out why people are afraid of her. She becomes politically active—finding her voice as an advocate for change, having difficult conversations, and energizing her base. In the process, she develops a healthy fixation on Special Counsel Robert Mueller and, through unflinching self-reflection and psychological excavation, unearths some glittering truths that light up the road ahead.
Thrillingly honest, insightful, and deeply, darkly funny, Chelsea Handler’s memoir keeps readers laughing, even as it inspires us to look within and ask ourselves what really matters in our own lives.
MY THOUGHTS
I'm hitting a slump where i don't really want to read let alone blog even though half of the following posts have already been typed up for foooorrreeeevvveeerrr.
all i want to do is read harry potter but i keep checking out books at the library.
AHHHHH!!!!
anyway, since there's really no spoilers here i guess ill make it quick.
i LOVE Chelsea Handler!
she's by far the only celebrity i have fangirl'd over. (i got to meet her when i worked Khloe Kardashian's wedding.)
i love all of her books!
i love her stories.
i love her openness. i just love her.
this was no different. if only, its maybe her best book yet.
i love how open she is about everything here.
its one thing to write books about haha stories to then write a book where she talks about how she discovers who she is meant to be / do.
i love how open she is with everything and how she finally excepts therapy in to her life and how she realizes that her brothers' death and her father's handling of that shaped her into who she has / had been her whole life.
i had a blast reading this while on vacation by the beach. so glad i waited to read this til then.
if you come across it, i definitely recommend you read this.
if anything, your vocabulary will grow exponentially. ....and maybe, you'll even learn a few things about yourself.
thanks for reading!
#lesreads on IG
published: 2018
pages: 485
heard / read: 4/30 to 5/3/2019
book: 35 in 2019
Set in a dangerous near future world, The Book of M tells the captivating story of a group of ordinary people caught in an extraordinary catastrophe who risk everything to save the ones they love. It is a sweeping debut that illuminates the power that memories have not only on the heart, but on the world itself.
and i'm glad i did because i really ended up liking this story.
One afternoon at an outdoor market in India, a man’s shadow disappears—an occurrence science cannot explain. He is only the first. The phenomenon spreads like a plague, and while those afflicted gain a strange new power, it comes at a horrible price: the loss of all their memories.
Ory and his wife Max have escaped the Forgetting so far by hiding in an abandoned hotel deep in the woods. Their new life feels almost normal, until one day Max’s shadow disappears too.
Knowing that the more she forgets, the more dangerous she will become to Ory, Max runs away. But Ory refuses to give up the time they have left together. Desperate to find Max before her memory disappears completely, he follows her trail across a perilous, unrecognizable world, braving the threat of roaming bandits, the call to a new war being waged on the ruins of the capital, and the rise of a sinister cult that worships the shadowless.
As they journey, each searches for answers: for Ory, about love, about survival, about hope; and for Max, about a new force growing in the south that may hold the cure.
MY THOUGHTS
SHORT VERSION
Ask and the universe delivers.
Finally!, a dystopian read that I did not hate.
LONG
VERSION
as i have mentioned before, i
get emails for eBooks on sale and this was one of them but i tend to avoid
buying them now because i rarely use my e reader (not to say that there isn't a
huge chunk to read on my nook and on the kindle app!), Its just that books are my
priority right now because my library is hooking me up! but i saw this and it
was the cover that caught my attention. (isn’t it always though?)
...then i read the synopsis and
i was like crap! 😫...because you already know
that station 11 wasn’t my favorite and
neither were any of the dystopian stories that have come after it. but i was
like screw it let me see if my library has it.
and they did!
both audio and physical so i got both.
both audio and physical so i got both.
and i'm glad i did because i really ended up liking this story.
finally, a dystopian story that
isn't so…, dreadful. That isn’t dragging and iduno…. boring. As far off as
it is, it isn’t…nothing. at the end of it all, it has something to offer to me that none of the other have been able to do.
i will admit that for most of the book, i was
kind of lost because it’s kind of all over the place in regards to reality and
fantasy but once i got the hang of it, i was okay with it.
what made this book for me was the end.
it was so sad.
to get so far, to be so close, so hopeful just for it to end the way it did for Ory.
but that was the beauty in it. I don’t think I would have liked it as much as I did if it had all “worked out” in the end.
it was so sad.
to get so far, to be so close, so hopeful just for it to end the way it did for Ory.
but that was the beauty in it. I don’t think I would have liked it as much as I did if it had all “worked out” in the end.
i loved Max's parts in the book. the way you
got to see it evolving from her point of view even when she is slowly but
surely losing her memories while Ory is seeing it all unravel and fall
apart while moving forward on his end.
what a beauty that she has her memories in the
recorder (although, wouldn't she eventually forget how to even use it?) to help
her navigate what is to come in the upcoming years. and i find it so clever
that the author was able to use the recorder for and against Max & Ory. i feel like that recorder played a huge part in all the decisions that were made by Max. and how Ory's fear played a huge part in the story as well. (I wont
spoil it here)
this book involves weird magic
bits, fear of the "end of the world", heartbreak, loss, discovery,
courage, rage, love....just a bit of everything. and it all ties it up nicely, but i will admit that it is also a little out there. its all over the place but its done so good (IMHO) that I'm not questioning the validity of any part of this story no matter how far fetched it may seem just because its something I'm not used to reading.
i ended up liking this book so
much that i did end up buying it for my nook. this is a book that i will
re-read sometime in the future and i just know that every time i do read it, it
will teach me something new. i think i will always end up catching something that i previously missed.
HERE is a review that i went off of when i first started this book. like always, i cheated and looked up spoilers and she was the only one that provided them. also, she goes a bit more into it than i do here and it looks like she's not a huge fan of the book, at least not as much as i am and i think its good to see two sides to this book.
overall, i'm glad i read this and i'm even more ecstatic that i found a dystopian novel that i ended up liking and not regretting like i have all others.
overall, i'm glad i read this and i'm even more ecstatic that i found a dystopian novel that i ended up liking and not regretting like i have all others.
as always, spoilers coming up!
thanks for reading!
#lesreads on IG
EDIT: after writing out spoilers, I'm realizing that a) i either really didn't pay THAT MUCH attention or there really are a lot of things that were just left to your interpretation. either way, still really liked this book.
published: 2019
pages: 256
heard/read: 4/16-23/2019
rating: ...huh.
book: 34 in 2019
In the quiet haven of Clearing, Oregon, four neighbors find their lives upended when they begin to see themselves in parallel realities. Ginny, a devoted surgeon whose work often takes precedence over her family, has a baffling vision of a beautiful co-worker in Ginny’s own bed and begins to doubt the solidity of her marriage. Ginny’s husband, Mark, a wildlife scientist, sees a vision that suggests impending devastation and grows increasingly paranoid, threatening the safety of his wife and son. Samara, a young woman desperately mourning the recent death of her mother and questioning why her father seems to be coping with such ease, witnesses an apparition of her mother healthy and vibrant and wonders about the secrets her parents may have kept from her. Cass, a brilliant scholar struggling with the demands of new motherhood, catches a glimpse of herself pregnant again, just as she’s on the brink of returning to the project that could define her career.
At first the visions are relatively benign, but they grow increasingly disturbing—and, in some cases, frightening. When a natural disaster threatens Clearing, it becomes obvious that the visions were not what they first seemed and that the town will never be the same.
At first the visions are relatively benign, but they grow increasingly disturbing—and, in some cases, frightening. When a natural disaster threatens Clearing, it becomes obvious that the visions were not what they first seemed and that the town will never be the same.
MY THOUGHTS
SHORT VERSION
huh.
kinda like when you scratch your chin and you're like "okay, i see it." and also like when you scratch your head and you're all "what in the fuck?"
LONG VERSION
you know when you read a book and you're like "yes BUT maybe a little less"?
when i read DARK MATTER (never did a post because i was over it during this period) my first thought after finishing it was "yes. but maybe less Jason's."
the universe listens y'all cause same subject and only 1 other set.
now, universe, if you want to listen to me again because i know you're busy being you and universalizing the world! (did i use that right? is that a legit word?), "yes. just like this. only please let it make enough sense that i rave about it because i loved it so much."
thanks!
you the best! *winky face*
if you read The Dreamers, or Dark Matter or eeeeeven Station 11 (not sure why this book gives me S11 vibes) and you liked them, then you'll like this one too.
if you're like me and are apparently all about being a glutton for punishment, well then, you might not. and depending on how much more similar we are, you'll either let it go or force yourself to drop it. (i wanted to drop it. the only reason i pushed it was because i wanted to take a picture of that damn cover just to be able to say I DID IT! I READ THE DAMN THING! which i guess is only a feat if ya didn't like the book but stuck it out anyway. ..which is really not. there are TOO many books out there to stick it out just to prove a point...I'm off topic! sorry!)
its not that i don't like it.
its just that what the fuck did i just read?
this book is only 256 pages.
256
pages.
i don't want to be that bitch but i can read 256 pages in one sitting and this took me like 13 days....granted there were several days that i didn't pick it up. (wait. my math is off. it was only 8 days...but it still felt like 13).
its not that its a bad book because its not.
its just that, just like The Dreamers, this is about things and it has potential and then...it just ends.
there is closure-ish to all the characters but like, what was the whole point of 2 sets for Cass & Mark & Ginny? in the end, didn't they get what they "wanted"? and well, what!?
the sets cross so now, i don't even know who, what, when, where or why or whatever is real. who was the "real" set? am i real? are you real?
what!?
how did she mix 1 fake with a bunch of reals and what happened to the 1 fake that was with the reals after everything settled?
how did she mix 1 fake with a bunch of reals and what happened to the 1 fake that was with the reals after everything settled?
to me as the reader, my take away is that the real ones were: Cass with Leah because she was connected to Rob who was her teacher. who was then connected to Samara who was then connected to Ginny because of her mother and Ginny was well, always real because she was dealing with her marriage with Mark and then her feelings with Edith.
why was there another Cass? to prove her and Rob's theory?
why did the other Cass get to go in to the shelter with the rest of the gang vs the "real" Cass? and how did no one question that "hey, Cass already had a daughter. how is this home girl pregnant and having a boy? where da real one at!?" and when all that shit went down....where was Cass and Leah? did she survive simply because her house was in a sort of "safe zone"?
was Cass a lie!?
because she had Samara's parents help with Leah and house stuff. and well, Ashmina is well, dead. and Cass was the only one that saw her aside from Samara but that's a whole ass other thing.
was this all Cass being in another universe and....ahhhh!!!!!!
i don't know.
i don't think a book is supposed to leave you with this many questions....i have more floating around but what's the point? I'm not going to get answers.
admittedly, there were times where i was reading to read and i wasn't really into what i was reading so there is a lot that i could have not grasped because i wasn't fully committed but overall I'm not a fan of this book because it left too many open questions and honestly, I'm not sure if i even know what i read.
and to be completely honest, at about page 100 i wanted to give up. but then i was at page 152 and i was like well there's only 104 pages left.
overall, everyone in this story ultimately gets what they wanted. what they "if, then" themselves.
i think the only punk in this story is Ginny cause she finally gets what she wants and she's still "omg, what if." about it.
this book should have been called what if instead.
whatever.
don't hate that i read it (because its a library boook! had i bought it, i'da been pissed)
will i think about it in the future? i can honestly say no.
will i re-read this? nope.
i could have done without this book.
and honestly, i can do without whatever genre this is.
I've come to realize that i hate books that have all this build just to end like....nothing.
what was the point of all of that?
all of this!
all for THE TOE!? (theory of everything book that Cass was working on)
OH! and Samara!
girl, you trippin'. that secret was not that big a deal.
and honestly,
THEY
ARE
YOUR
PARENTS
they don't owe you any type of explanation. in any aspect of their lives.
consult you? maybe. but das about it.
and ya know what else:
i would have liked this book if it turned out to be that Cass had some sort of mental thing and she had made this all up in her head and none of this story was even remotely real.
anyway, spoilers up next.
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