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coolfoolmoon's Reviews (357)

Forest of Noise: Poems

3.75

emotional reflective tense fast-paced

I backlog my reviews because I'm lazy, but I don't remember how I felt about this one. It's been two months now. I put in my notes that I liked many of the poems. Maybe it's worth a reread in the future.

Content Warnings

Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion

Bushra Rehman

4.25

emotional reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Not to compare every immigrant / first gen story but it made me think of The House on Mango Street. I loved it so much! Except the ending was so rushed. If it was based on real life okay that's fine but it was too fast. I would've liked an epilogue a year, five years, ten years in the future or another look at the neighborhood. Something!

Content Warnings

The Mighty Red

Louise Erdrich

2.75

tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

The best character is also the worst character. The writing is interesting. I don't wanna say it's bad but it felt unclear half the time. I loved the elements with Kismet’s family and their history, wasn't so sympathetic to her husband or his family or their plight with the farm or the fact that they made her their personal slave / magical Indian. I’m sure the author knew what she was doing with that. Maybe worth a reread in five years.

Content Warnings

Zong!

M. NourbeSe Philip

DID NOT FINISH: 40%

I just can't with the formatting.

Content Warnings

The Secret Lives of Church Ladies

Deesha Philyaw

4.0

emotional medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Peach cobbler was a 5 star story to me. Otherwise this may have been a 3.5 rating. Not as much church and not as much secrets as you would expect. I mean there wasn't a single church scene! This could've just as easily been called "A Snapshot of Random People's Lives and Experiences"

Content Warnings

Mooncakes

Suzanne Walker

3.5

funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

cute but not so impactful? like i feel like i forgot it already. disabled character loved that. just cute and fun. but for some people isn't that enough? does all art have to be impactful to be justified or is it justified for the sake that someone took the time to create it? me tryna justify giving it a somewhat negative review. its good. it was just okay. i appreciate that the villain was evil but not so evil as to misgender the nonbinary main character. bonus points for that.

Content Warnings

They Called Me a Lioness: A Palestinian Girl's Fight for Freedom

Dena Takruri, Ahed Tamimi

4.5

emotional hopeful informative medium-paced

5 stars for Tamimi's story and storytelling. That was beautiful and it flowed really well, probably with the help of Takruri too of course. Reading this post 2023 is very heartbreaking because it really did go from worst to worster.

A comment on the society of the region: Tamimi uses Palestinians and Jews as different people groups, to which I was like what about Palestinian Jews? How are they viewed in society? But then I realized that might be an issue with the society of Israel, telling their citizens and telling Palestine that you can't be both, but to me as a Black American all I see is in their society telling the masses that Jew is equal to white and they only make white equal / respected citizens. And I wonder if Tamimi and the rest of Palestine has made this connection too.

Content Warnings

Outdrawn

Deanna Grey

3.75

adventurous medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

No offense to the girlies but I didn't like the voice actresses. I just don't think they fit for the characters.

This is my first book with sex scenes and can I just say, yall are fweaks!

Negative points for

the romance. It's really rushed. They loathe each other and don't have a moment of changing their minds / seeing their mindset is wrong and changing. It's actually just forced romance. Not "I liked her years ago but she slighted me so I hate her forever" just "I don't know why I invited her to something after dinner, why do I wanna draw her" like ??? It's conflicting clashing storytelling.

Since this is my first I understand this might be a feature of the genre or something but I didn't like it and its my review so I'm gonna say something because I can.

Content Warnings

And Other Mistakes

Erika Turner

3.75

hopeful tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Oh to be a black gay teenage girl again... You couldn't pay me to do it but those were the days!

I'm being very generous with my rating. Too many pop culture references. Story feels like it was watered down. It's good and relatable to the kids especially my gen, pre covid gen z, but it feels like there was supposed to be more. Maybe it was supposed to be a darker story and the publisher was like nope change it. Who knows. Maybe I just wanted more.

Content Warnings

Gwen and Art Are Not in Love

Lex Croucher

4.0

adventurous medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Book so good it made me wanna read classics. It really made me think, "Wow! I should read a some classic English literature next!" A great feat, I must say.

Content Warnings

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