alisarae's Reviews (1.65k)

Pretty cute steampunk story about a girl who is sent to a finishing school that trains young ladies in the arts of etiquette and espionage. I probably would have enjoyed this book when I was 10, but as an adult listening to it, there were a lot of missing parts to the puzzle. The main mystery, "where is the secret prototype" is not developed well at all. For example:
- Why does the main character have this as her quest? To get other people's approval.
- What does the prototype do? Something with a communication machine? Never fully explained.
- Why did the school have the prototype? Why is it valuable enough to be stolen? Why, at the end, does the British government, the badguys, another special interest group, and the school all want their hands on it?
- Who does the school work for? I mean, who commissions the girls are being trained to be spies? Not answered.

Not going to finish the series.

Man, Scientology is cray-zay. One thing that surprised me about Jenna's life growing up in Scientology with nearly zero contact with people from outside of the church, is that Scientology itself is so crazy that it made her decide to leave...and she didn't even learn about the alien parts until after she left and watched the famous South Park episode about Scientology! Of course she speaks highly of online communities for ex-Sci members and all of the activities of Anonymous. Another insightful thing was all of the ways the church tried to control, threaten, and brainwash people into submission, just for the lust of power. This was revealing to me because while these techniques were systematized and openly taught within the church of Scientology, they are often subconsciously taught and modeled to MANY mainstream churches and religious youth organizations. I've heard some of the specific wording given to Jenna firsthand at Christian youth camps and other such events. Maybe people who spearhead these types of pointless moral witch hunts know what they are doing and do it intentionally, just for personal pleasure of controlling other people's lives and emotions. Jenna's uncle and head of Scientology, David Miscavige, certainly does.

To reviewers who said it was boring: Jenna does go into great detail about various punishments and types of auditing sessions she has to go through, and it does get repetitive. But I think she wanted to stress just how insane the whole system is. No wonder she finally snapped, and so many others did too! If you think these parts of the book are useless, imagine spending 20 years of your life in that environment, like Jenna did. Regardless, I think it's important that these experiences are documented.

The audio narration of this book is great and the reader's voice fit the character perfectly.

Pretty funny but if you have ever used Facebook you have probably seen most of these comics already.

Way funnier than the first Sarah's Scribbles, Adulthood is a Myth, because this has a few narrative essays in it that are new material. Also, narrative essays are funnier than stand-alone strips.

Great book for language learners because there are SO many photos. Vocabulary could be a stretch depending on the level, but all of the pictures show exactly what the words say.

Such a beautiful book about sisterhood, inspired by Virginia Woolf and her sister, the artist Vanessa Bell. Virginia wakes up feeling wolfish (depressed), and Vanessa paints an imaginary world to cheer her up. The illustrations are amazing, and the story could be a good tool to help kids understand depression.

LOVE the adorable story of poodles and Frenchies set in Paris. The story is kind of disjointed at the end (Antoinette goes from being a puppy to having a family and a career as a policedog in one page?), but the illustrations are what make this really stand out.

This book was ok. Still a huge fan of the author and I highly recommend Tale for the Time Being. But this book is very preachy about the problems of non-organic farming, and that frequently overwhelmed the place the story was headed. Has some heartwarming characters, and though more than one of them felt like an elaborated charicature, that didn't bother me. The audio narrator was pretty okay.

Good but basic advice to keep in mind when teaching and modeling how to treat others with dignity and respect. Too bad there is no society that has got this down.

1. Be a full person - have hobbies, work, interests etc outside of the home
2. Do it together - both father and mother sharing tasks equally. If one of you feels resentment, that's a sign that it isn't equal.
3. Gender roles are nonsense
4. Be wary of "feminism light" -- "He is the head but she is the neck" and similar things. If you wouldn't say the reverse, what are you actually saying?
5. Teach your child to read (read a lot, not only to be literate)-- pay them if necessary.
6. Question language -- what are the implications of calling your daughter princess (she needs to wait for men to be the active agents in her story)? Maybe think of a different honoring nickname. "She is a *lady* mechanic" etc
7. Don't treat marriage as an achievement. If your child wants to get married, that's great! But why do women go from Miss to Mrs but men go from Mr to... Mr?
8. Reject likeability -- cultivate kindness and respectfulness towards ALL.
9. Give your child a sense of identity -- what things are really great about your culture and family background?
10. Be deliberate about appearance -- femininity is not bad. Maybe dont worry so much about how their hair looks. Point out that beauty comes in all forms.
11. Question biology when used as a reason why -- men don't need to be praised for cooking. Cooking is a learned skill.
12. Start the conversation about sex early.
13. Romance will happen, so be on board.
14. When teaching about oppression, be careful not to turn the oppressed into saints. Saintliness is not a pre-req for dignitiy; that is, people who are unkind are still human.
15. Make difference ordinary. -- "I don't know why, but they just do it differently than our family."

Longer review to come, but the short one is: interesting idea, I'm sure this book has a market, but I believe it could have used one more round of structural editing.

e-ARC via NetGalley