“Brightness is not in your skin, my love. Brightness is just who you are.”

I don’t think I have read a picture book since I was actually the age for reading picture books. But one of the prompts (#4) for The Reading Women Challenge 2020 is to read a Picture Book by a BIPOC Author, so here was my chance to try something “new.” I had legitimately no idea where to start or how to pick a “good” book from this genre, so I did a little searching. And I’ll be honest, it seems like there are so many really awesome and diverse new stories for kids out there than there were when I read children’s picture books! So that’s an uplifting move in the right direction. Anyways, I have to say that I chose this one because of name recognition. That’s maybe not always the best reason for something, but in this case, it got me. Plus, if the cover was any indication of the quality of illustration, I figured it would be, at the very least, a beautiful visual choice.

Sulwe is a young girl whose skin is darker than the rest of her family, and everyone else in her class, and she’s very self-conscious about it. She tries lots of ways to make her skin lighter, but none of them work. Then one night she has a dream, in which a shooting star (Sulwe’s name means star), tells her a story about two sisters, Day and Night. And the moral of this story helps Sulwe realize that she has her own, special beauty, both inside and outside, and she wakes up proud of and happy with who she is.

This was a really sweet and uplifting story. The message about beauty being deeper than your physical looks is important and universal. And in this case Nyong’o took it a wonderful step further by showing young, “night-shaded skin” girls like herself, MCs that look just like them. (Read her Author’s Note, it’s very touching.) I really enjoyed the fable-like story about Day and Night. The meaning of the story, that even though people usually say more nice things about Day than Night, both are necessary and important for their own reasons and loved in their own ways. In particular, the visualization of them coming back together, with “a little bit of Night returned to Day in the form of shadows. And a little bit of Day returned to Night in the form of moonlight,” was one of my favorite parts. Also, I was completely right about the illustrations – Harrison’s pictures are gorgeous and I was visually blown away by the graphics on every single page. Ugh, stunning.

I don’t think I’m going to suddenly start reading lots of picture books, but what I can say is that I truly appreciate this chance to try reading something completely out of my norm. It’s a lovely story, with beautiful graphics, and a very essential message. If I had kids, I would definitely read this to them.

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

This recently released collection of essays was getting a lot of praise from bookstagrammers and reviewers my age. It seemed like Tolentino’s writing was doing a great job capturing the frustrating and ridiculous parts of the millennial reality and, as a millennial myself (actually, I’m the same age as Tolentino), I was super curious to see what she had to say. Plus, I have read a few of her articles and I’ve always appreciated the quality of her writing.

I usually start my reviews with a quick synopsis of the book/plot, but that doesn’t really apply in the case of a collection of essays. Especially since I kind of already did that in my little opener…whoops. Anyways, I suppose that means I get to jump right in.

This review is probably going to jump all over the place, because my feelings about this collection are all over the place. Tolentino’s ability to see and analyze and, for lack of a better phrase, call out the inconsistencies and (also for lack of a better word) bullshit of today is eagle-eyed. But the thing that I liked most about it was the way she was open and willing to share about how she too is “guilty” of many of the cultural aspects she was calling America/current generations out on – it made her insights and indictments more authentic and me, as a reader, more likely to listen. It would have been easy to fall into the “holier than thou” perspective, as the writer exploring these issues, and not admit her own complicity. And I’ll be honest, in this case in particular, that would have really turned me off – because I wasn’t as sold on this book as everyone else seems to have been. I am struggling a lot with how to explain this, because I deeply appreciated and identified with many of her points (I highlighted so may passages), both the ones I had already considered and the ones that opened my mind to new angles. And at the same time, there was something about the overall tone and presentation of the essays that sort of rubbed me the wrong way. I legitimately cannot figure out what it was – I have never been so at a loss while writing a review before. But even though I nodded and agreed and was into the majority of what Tolentino was saying, my overall feelings after finishing this are lukewarm. I am sorry that I can’t give you any better insight than that. And I would definitely not let my vague feelings on this front overly influence your decision on whether or not to read this collection, I just feel like it would be disingenuous not to mention my truthful reaction.

I do want to take a moment here to highlight a few of the essays and topics that I thought were Tolentino’s best. The first two chapters, about the internet (The I in Internet) and reality tv (Reality TV Me), were fascinating to me. I was fairly sheltered as a kid, so my intro to both the internet and tv of any kind other than sports came pretty late – at the very least, late enough that I missed those original iterations that Tolentino was involved in and talks about. So it was cool to hear about where many of the social media and tv phenomenon of today started, and how they become the monstrosities (both in the sense of their scope and the general “good,” or lack thereof, that they do) that they currently are. And the exploration of the dichotomy between who one really is versus how one “performs” for the world, and which of those personas is actually more true and/or more influential as far as our actions, was so nicely done. That concept is actually one that is carried through many of the other chapters as well, like how we “optimize” ourselves/our bodies/our time (Always be Optimizing), the concepts versus realities of the so-called “cult of the difficult women” (The Cult of Difficult Women) and more. Although some of those chapters weren’t my favorites, I loved the way this theme stayed constant throughout.

My favorite essay by far was The Story of a Generation in Seven Scams, looking at some of the biggest scams of our time (both one-offs, like the Fyre Festival, and ongoing ones like student debt, social media and the idea of girl bosses). To be honest, there were so many unique and insightful passages and comments in this section and, as far as the way I experience the word we live in, it was so unbelievably relatable. I learned a lot, now see some things from completely new perspectives, and really feel good about not being alone in my interpretation of others. My least favorite essays were the ones about UVA (We Come From Old Virginia) and marriage (I Thee Dread and, in part, Pure Heroines). The Virginia one was especially frustrating because overall, I support the POV that she clearly takes (and think the issue of sexual assault on college campuses absolutely demands more outrage and action against it), and to a large extent I agree with her perspectives in the marriage chapter as well. But for both, they came across more as lists of facts and data, with less actual analysis or vision, that the rest of the collection. In addition, they struck me as particularly self-indulgent in a way that just didn’t sit as well.

Overall, even after writing all this out (and taking days to do so), I am not any closer to being able to clearly articulate my feelings. I liked it and I didn’t like it. I felt seen by it, but also called out and condescended-to by it. I thought Tolentino’s writing was phenomenal and her insights piercing, but I also felt like, sometimes, there weren’t any insights at all, just kind of an information dump. I want to encourage so many people my age to read this because it is the contradictions of our generation (and to others, outside my generation, to get an idea of the experiences that we’re living) and yet I’m not sure I feel confident enough about it’s great-ness (I guess that’s how I’d put it) to do so. And I thought she both did a pretty good job calling out the lack of diversity in her many examples/essays, yet cannot then understand why she didn’t try to fix that by adding in more perspectives there (specifically the sections that included data, etc.). Like I said at the beginning, my feelings about this collection were all over the place when I finished…and they remain so still. Basically, if you made it this far in the review, I’m sorry I couldn’t be clear about my recommendation to read it or not. However, I don’t regret my time with it, so if it seems interesting to you, then I’d say go for it and see for yourself! And then please come back and tell me your thoughts!

A selection (yes that’s right this is not ALL of them) of the passages I highlighted while reading:

a “trick mirror that carries the illusion of flawlessness as well as the self-flagellating option of constantly finding fault.” (A line she wrote for another article, but that became the inspiration for this title – super cutting.)

“In part out of a desire to preserve what’s worthwhile from the decay that surrounds it, I’ve been thinking about five intersecting problems: first, how the internet is built to distend our sense of identity; second, how it encourages us to overvalue our opinions; third, how it maximizes our sense of opposition; fourth, how it cheapens our understanding of solidarity; and, finally, how it destroys our sense of scale.”

“You don’t need to have directly suffered at the hands of some injustice in order to be invested in bringing that injustice to an end.”

“When you are a woman, the things you like get used against you. Or, alternatively, the things that get used against you have all been prefigured as things you should like. Sexual availability falls into this category. So does basic kindness, and generosity. Wanting to look good—taking pleasure in trying to look good—does, too. I like trying to look good, but it’s hard to say how much you can genuinely, independently like what amounts to a mandate.”

“The default assumption tends to be that it is politically important to designate everyone as beautiful, that it is a meaningful project to make sure that everyone can become, and feel, increasingly beautiful. We have hardly tried to imagine what it might look like if our culture could do the opposite—de-escalate the situation, make beauty matter less.”

“There is an exaggerated binary fatalism to these stories, in which women are either successes or failures, always one or the other—and a sense of inescapability that rings more true to life. If you can’t escape the market, why stop working on its terms? Women are genuinely trapped at the intersection of capitalism and patriarchy—two systems that, at their extremes, ensure that individual success comes at the expense of collective morality. And yet there is enormous pleasure in individual success. It can feel like license and agency to approach an ideal, to find yourself—in a good picture, on your wedding day, in a flash of identical movement—exemplifying a prototype. There are rewards for succeeding under capitalism and patriarchy; there are rewards even for being willing to work on its terms. There are nothing but rewards, at the surface level. The trap looks beautiful. It’s well-lit. It welcomes you in.”

“If the childhood heroine accepts the future from a comfortable distance, and if the adolescent is blindly thrust toward it by forces beyond her control, the adult heroine lives within this long-anticipated future and finds it dismal, bitter, and disappointing. Her situation is generally one of premature and artificial finality, in which getting married and having children has prevented her from living the life she wants.”

“The fear of sin often seemed to conjure and perpetuate it: abstinence education led to abortions, for rich people, and for poor people to children who would be loved and supported until the day they were born. There was so much beatific kindness, and it was so often undergirded by brittle cruelty.” (THIS is the crux of so much of my master’s education and feminist ideals and it was put so perfectly that I just couldn’t pass this by without calling it out and highlight it.)

“The con is in the DNA of this country, which was founded on the idea that it is good, important, and even noble to see an opportunity to profit and take whatever you can. The story is as old as the first Thanksgiving.” (OMG THIS – it’s from my favorite essay and just, OMG.)

“Our social potential is compressed to our ability to command public attention, which is then made inextricable from economic survival. Instead of fair wages and benefits, we have our personalities and stories and relationships, and we’d better learn to package them well for the internet in case we ever get in an accident while uninsured.”

“And here one of the most soul-crushing things about the Trump era reveals itself: to get through it with any psychological stability—to get through it without routinely descending into an emotional abyss—a person’s best strategy is to think mostly of himself, herself. As wealth continues to flow upward, as Americans are increasingly shut out of their own democracy, as political action is constrained into online spectacle, I have felt so many times that the choice of this era is to be destroyed or to morally compromise ourselves in order to be functional—to be wrecked, or to be functional for reasons that contribute to the wreck.” (AND THIS – I felt this TO MY CORE.)

“But the choice is not always between being sincere and untruthful. It’s possible to be both: it’s possible to be sincere and deluded. It’s possible—it’s very easy, in some cases—to believe a statement, a story, that’s a lie.”

“Every woman faces backlash and criticism. Extraordinary women face a lot of it. And that criticism always exists in the context of sexism, just like everything else in a woman’s life. These three facts have collapsed into one another, creating the idea that harsh criticism of a woman is itself always sexist, and furthermore, more subtly, that receiving sexist criticism is in itself an indication of a woman’s worth.”

“Rewriting a woman’s story inevitably means engaging with the male rules that previously defined it. To argue against an ideology, you have to acknowledge and articulate it. In the process, you might inadvertently ventriloquize your opposition.”

“If I object to the wife’s diminishment for the same reason that I object to the bride’s glorification, maybe this reason is much simpler and more obvious than I’ve imagined: I don’t want to be diminished, and I do want to be glorified—not in one shining moment, but whenever I want.”

I. Love. This. Book. A macabre "retelling" of one of my most favorite classics of all time. But it's even more than that, because the author/narrator is a self-proclaimed fan of Jane Eyre, has read it tons of times herself, and fancies that she can see the parallels between her story and the fictional Jane's. Parallels that, by the way, were well done - similar enough, but not to the point where the retelling became too predictable. And the snark! The way the author was able to bring the cadence and tone of classic British literature to life with some creative vocabulary and sass of the present day was fantastic. And I just really loved Jane Steele. She had many of the typical feelings towards herself, as a female, that were characteristic of Jane Eyre's time period, but with some extra spunk, murderous spunk. And I loved every second of it. It was by turns over the top (every time a man was a problem - BAM, murdered) and a sobering commentary on there being few other options for women to get out from under a man's thumb. But truly, the snark and the gothic satire really took the day. The adventure Jane has with Sardar, Sam Quillfeather (who by the way was the second best character in this story), Sahjara, and of course Mr. Thornfield (and OF COURSE their happy ending) was everything I wanted out of this book and more. So much fun. So well done. Damn.

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

So obviously the first thing that drew me to this book was the title. It’s awesome! Plus, I was born in January and it turns out that means I have a soft spot for that name/month (who knew?). But then the cover is also gorgeous and the description sounded great too. Ever since getting really into the Every Heart a Doorway series (by Seanan McGuire), I’ve had an increased interest in other door/portal-based fantasies. Anyways, the library waitlist for this one was long, but I finally got to read it.

January Scaller has been raised for years in the home of a wealthy benefactor, Mr. Locke, who employs her father to travel the globe “collecting” rare treasures/specimens to add to Locke’s collection. As a child, January was precocious and, as she heard herself called, temerarious. At age 17, she finds a strange book, one that tells a story all about secret doors, an inter-world love story, adventure and, just maybe, holds information about her own family history. So, January sets off on a journey (well, at least to start, she’s sort of forced into said journey) to find that spirit she had as a child and face danger, truth and multiple worlds. But, in the process, she’ll also find friendship, freedom, family and, just maybe, her own love story.

Alright, I had some really mixed feelings about this one. Which, to be honest, is a bit sad because the premise was so great. But let me try to explain. First, and importantly, the premise remains great. The idea of doors as portals to other worlds, the way that Harrow creates a fairy-tale-like story around them, how she uses them as plot devices and for general development, the way they tie each characters’ story together from start to finish and woven throughout…it was all handled so magnificently. And although some of the “twists” in the story were fairly predictable and formulaic for YA-ish fantasy, I enjoyed reading them all the same (it’s a genre a love for a reason). The sense of adventure was strong all the way through and made for, overall, a really fun reading experience. There were echoes of “speculative history”/scholarship similar to The Philosopher’s Flight and feels of riotous and irreverent escapades similar to Jane Steele (my favorite Jane Eyre retelling and one of my favorite books of all time), all of which I was really into. Plus, the pacing kept things going really nicely as far as page-turning and movement. But there were definitely some plot holes, especially once January started to realize her own power (in all the senses of that word) and the “danger” parts of the story really ramp up, that nagged at me, but I’ve always been good at overlooking small things in favor of the whole, so that wasn’t as big of a deal for me as it might have been. The biggest thing this book had going for it, in my opinion was the fantastically personable voice of the narrator (January herself) and the tone of complete veneration, awe and wonder used to describe stories and their importance, power and reach (it resonated with me deeply). In addition, the tale of searching for love that January finds in the “strange” book is the perfect sort of fairy-tale-esque “meant to be” and “love will find a way” story and my heart couldn’t help but melt for it. Plus, the ending left be with a bubbling, anticipatory, “promises to be fulfilled,” sort of feeling that felt just right for this novel.

On the other hand, there were also some parts that rang discordantly to me. I already mentioned a few of the plot holes (at least, I saw them as holes, perhaps others read them differently). But, primarily, it is an issue of the author’s treatment of January’s skin color. At first, I read it as she was, sort of reddish, and it was weird, but unique. But then as the story progressed, she was referred to as “colored” (this book took place in the early 1900s, so the vocabulary was time period appropriate). And while I get that the casual observer would put her in a category that best fits what they know, I just didn’t feel that Harrow handled the change, and the descriptions of reactions/treatment, and January’s subsequent experience(s) moving through the world like that on her own, quite appropriately. I don’t know exactly what was wrong, I can’t pinpoint it, but it felt off to me. Similarly, she did seem to act younger than the 17 years she was purported to be. I’m willing to accept a little naivete considering the sheltered way she was raised and the general treatment/position of women for the time period, but still…she seemed much younger than 17. And last, I can’t really say why, but I felt a little distant as I read this. It may have just been the mental state I was in when I picked it up, you never know. But I didn’t feel as pulled into this novel as I wanted to be. It was good, I was invested, I got emotional at the end, but something just was missing for me, that big tug that would have made me fall headfirst into things. I just never disappeared into the pages.

Overall, this was definitely entertaining. I enjoyed the premise, loved the writing, and was invested enough to want to finish and see how things went. But some of the small things about the story made it fall slightly short of my (albeit quite high) expectations. I would still recommend it as a fast-paced YA fantasy adventure, a distinctive take on an historical time period infused with magic, and for fans of portal fantasies and readers who love books that love books, as Harrow did a fantastic job with those aspects.

“Sometimes I feel there are doors lurking in the creases of every sentence, with periods for knobs and verbs for hinges.”

“Those of you who are more than casually familiar with books -- those of you who spend your free afternoons in fusty bookshops, who offer furtive, kindly strokes along the spines of familiar titles -- understand that page riffling is an essential element in the process of introducing oneself to a new book. It isn't about reading the words; it's about reading the smell, which wafts from the pages in a cloud of dust and wood pulp. It might smell expensive and well bound, or it might smell of tissue-thin paper and blurred two-colour prints, or of fifty years unread in the home of a tobacco-smoking old man. Books can smell of cheap thrills or painstaking scholarship, or literary weight or unsolved mysteries.”

“I happen to believe every story is a love story if you catch it at the right moment, slantwise in the light of dusk.”

“She accumulated the dust of other worlds on her skin like ten thousand perfumes, and left constellations of wistful men and impossible tales in her wake.”

“You people are always trying to invent reasons for things. Monsters only come for bad children, for loose women, for impious men. The truth is that the powerful come for the weak, whenever and wherever they like. Always have, always will.”

“It felt like donning a suit of armor or sprouting wings, extending past the boundaries of myself; it felt an awful lot like love.”

“The will to be polite, to maintain civility and normalcy, is fearfully strong. I wonder sometimes how much evil is permitted to run unchecked simply because it would be rude to interrupt it.”

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

“People really can change one another.”

This book is up for a couple of awards this year. And I remember from a year or so ago, her first novel got a lot of similar praise and great reviews. It still wasn’t necessarily high on my TBR, overall, but for some reason, when I was looking for a new book to start, my mood yelled out for this one. And I’m a heavy mood reader and have learned, after years, to just go with it, because it makes the reading experience so much better.

Connell and Marianne pretend not to know each other at school, even though they often see each other after school when Connell picks up his mother from her job cleaning Marianne’s family’s house. Connell is popular and a star soccer player, while Marianne is a bit of a loner, considered weird. Despite their differences though, a connection grows between them and they being a new, though secret, type of relationship. A year later, they reconnect while they are both studying at Trinity college in Dublin. Over the following years, they each try new things, date different people, and struggle to come to terms with who they are and what they want out of life, while being almost magnetically drawn back together over and over again.

From that description, you can almost see why I wasn’t sure about this book. Honestly, it just seems like almost nothing happens. What is there to read about? And to be honest, that impression was fairly spot on. There is no big twist, surprise, bombshell or any other crazy plot device. Marianne and Connell are literally, as the title says, two normal people, making decisions and living their lives the best way they can figure out. There’s nothing particularly noteworthy about either of them, and so much of what they experience feels familiar to the point of mundanity, honestly. I mean, it’s not like I personally identify with all of it, but I do with enough of it, and know people for whom the rest of it (more or less) is recognizable, that I can objectively say, with confidence, that none of what happens to either of them is really unique. So why then was this novel so freaking compelling??

The first thing that comes to mind, really, is that the writing is just absolutely stunning. The flow, tone, pacing and dialogue all approach literary perfection, smooth and effortless and intelligently unassuming. (And I listened to the audiobook, which has spot on narration). Really, I have nothing else that I can say about it other than to emphasize how wonderful it was.

But then, at base, it all comes down to Connell and Marianne. Without exaggeration, I have rarely ever been so deeply and genuinely emotionally invested in characters, both separately and together. (I know it happened with Kellen and Wavy in All the Ugly and Wonderful Things, and Circe in Circe.) Rooney had me hanging on, with a white-tipped grip, to every little interaction and change and vibration between the two, from beginning to end. Their patterns were so heartbreaking, so realistically rendered, that my poor heart was twisted every which way by the end, as I followed their years of dancing back and forth and around each other, their assumptions and misinterpretations and insecurities and unconditional support and love all mixed up in an untangle-able (for both good and bad) way. Their relationship was so layered and nuanced – every single moment that Rooney chose to write for each of them had a deeper meaning or more long-term consequence that added to the complexity. And while she develops Connell and Marianne, she also works in explorations of class, family, expectations of self and society, and the complications of first love in a way that is so subtle you almost don’t even notice it’s happening until you finish and are bowled over by the quiet brilliance and humanity of it all.

This may be one of the shortest reviews I’ve written this year, but I have nothing but praise for this gorgeous novel. It touches that place of darkness and loneliness in us all, but in a way that is tender and understanding. There’s really only so many ways to say that Rooney made something truly extraordinary out of the ordinary. It’s absolutely going to make my list of favorites this year. Just…go read it!

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

To be honest, I originally was interested in this book because the title made me think of Doctor Who. #nerdalert But even after I realized what it was actually about (completely unrelated to Doctor Who, for the record), I was very interested in it. And then it got chosen as the January book for my in-person book club, which prompted me to pick it up faster than I would have otherwise, and OMG I am so glad, because I LOVED it.

But first, a quick synopsis. Red and Blue are agents from opposing factions in the “time war.” Red, working for the Commandant and a sort of android type being, starts to exchange “letters” with Blue, who works under Garden and is a more plant-based (if you will) genetically modified being. And this exchange, which begins as boasts and taunts from one side to the other, morphs into something deeper, more meaningful, and creates a connection that holds the potential to change the course of the war forever.

Oh my goodness this book was just exquisite from start to finish. There’s absolutely a bit of a steep learning curve to start, as it dumps you right into the midst of this time war and jumps around from period to period and world thread to world thread, with a world-building that is provided minimally, slowly unfolds over the length of the novel, and even then remains fairly ephemeral, without much boundary or clarity. It’s not for the faint of heart, or the reader looking for an easy story to follow, but it is completely worth the effort. Because the vagueness comes from the constant jumps in the timestream and world strands – there simply isn’t time to fully flesh out each location. And yet, the glimpses we get are fascinating both for their exoticness (like in the far future) and their recognizability (like alternate versions of our own known history). Each snippet is given as a bit of context for Red’s or Blue’s location/mission when they come upon the next letter from the other. And here is one of my favorite parts – the delivery methods of the letters. From tea leaves to knots in boat ropes to animal entrails to seeds to a bee’s stinger and more, Red and Blue find ever more creative ways to deliver their secret and ever-more-compromising letters to each other. And as these two isolated souls begin to pour their time, effort and emotions into this communication, a connection grows between them that begins to overshadow their greater missions, their side’s goals in the time war. Culminating in some mutual time-traveling/genetically-modified/futuristic-nature-and-tech based life-saving feats, this book ended with such an important message about the nature and reality of war: that those on opposing sides have more in common than they think, and working together could bring an end to the violence faster than either individual side winning ever could. It’s a profound message, and not immediately obvious, but the slow way that it seeps into your bones lines up perfectly with the style and unfolding of the novel itself. And I couldn’t have loved it more or felt it more deeply.

There are so many other small notes that I made while reading this, and really they’re a bit all over the place as far as my reactions and feelings, so I think what I’ll do is just say them all here, now, in a paragraph that probably won’t be very cohesive, but will, at least, express accurately how I felt about this little, extraordinarily unique, epistolary novel. The presentation style is such an original mix of philosophical and experimental, which I’m not sure one can say about sci-fi, cause that’s basically what it is at base anyways, but it was unlike anything else I’ve read, so I’m saying it anyways. The breadth of imagination and historical knowledge/reference in the different times and settings and methods of letter delivery are astounding and awesome (in the “it completely awed me” sense of the word). All the different names for red and blue that Red and Blue used for each other were fun to read and, in many cases, had me googling to see what they referred to/where they came from. I really enjoyed the messages throughout about how real, meaningful change and connection develop slowly, but are worth the wait. The writing is simply stunning – compelling and poetic and intelligent and just lovely. THE ENDING. Both plot-wise and the words in the last three lines, the way things came together and the way it all came back to the title of the novel…it was legitimately perfect. Such a distinct love story – with a focus on time investment and emotional connection that I felt deeply. With a book this short, there is every chance it could seem like it happened to quickly, but if you consider, as a reader, how much time passed for Red and Blue in between communications and the amount of care and effort they had to put into each letter they wrote, plus their individual histories of isolation and lack of companionship…it makes that level of commitment, and their (self-unrecognized) openness to it that much more understandable and believable.

I legit cannot understand how this book has gone so under the radar. I am so impressed by what the authors were able to create in such a short time. Truly, this novel is something special. Everyone should go read it!

As I mentioned, the writing was so beautiful. And I marked SO many quotes and passages. Here’re some:

“But hunger is a many-splendoured thing; it needn’t be conceived only in limbic terms, in biology. Hunger, Red – to sate a hunger or to stoke it, to feel hunger as a furnace, to trace its edges like teeth – is this a thing you, singly, know? Have you ever had a hunger that whetted itself on what you fed it, sharpened so keen and bright that it might split you open, break a new thing out?”

“Adventure works in any strand – it calls to those who care more for living than for their lives.”

“So in this letter I am yours. Not Garden’s, not your mission’s, but yours, alone. I am yours in other ways as well: yours as I watch the world for your signs, apophenic as a haruspex; your as I debate methods, motives, chances of delivery; yours as I review your words by their sequence, their sound, smell, taste, taking care no one memory of them becomes too worn. Yours.”

“Red rarely sleeps, but when she does, she lies still, eyes closed in the dark, and lets herself see lapis, taste iris petals and ice, hear a blue jay’s shriek. She collects blues and keeps them.”

“She lays grass over grass over grass and studies, not only the geometrics of green, but the calculus of scent and heat, the thermodynamics of understory, the velocity of birdsong.”

“Myth and legend give way to history, which gives way again to myth, like curtains parting and meeting again on either side of a performance.”

“…[it] relies too much too much on tricking time, evading it, skimming across it like stones, dipping in distasteful toes, thinking to divert its currents by rippling its surface. You must dwell […] within time to shift it in lasting ways; play a slow game, but win.”

“But when I think of you, I want to be alone together. I want to strive against and for. I want to live in contact. I want to be a context for you, and you for me. I love you, and I love you, and I want to find out what that means together.”

“Some days Blue wonders why anyone ever bothered making numbers so small; other days she supposes even infinity needs to start somewhere.”

“…I want to scorch the thousand earths between us to see what blooms from the ash, so we can discover it hand in hand, content within context, intelligible only to each other. I want to meet you in every place I have loved.”

“Listen to me – I am your echo. I would rather break the world than lose you.”

“I love you and I love you and I love you, on battlefields, in shadows, in fading ink, on cold ice splashed with the blood of seals. In the rings of trees. In the wreckage of a planet crumbling to space. In bubbling water. In bee stings and dragonfly wings, in stars. In the depths of lonely woods where I wandered in my youth, staring up…”

“Red may be mad, but to die for madness is to die for something.”

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

This debut novel received quite a bit of press when it was published last year. I saw many, many reviews from readers who both loved it and found it heart-breaking. And I knew that I wanted to read it, that one day I would read it. But the thing is, knowing how intense of a reading experience it was going to be, I also wanted to wait until the right time. I am, heavily, a mood reader, and how I feel before starting a book does really influence my reactions to it. A few weeks ago, I felt like it was, finally, almost time, so I added myself to the library waitlist for the audiobook (a year post-publication and there is still a waitlist – definitely a sign for me that the hype was pretty real). And here we are.

This novel is told from three different perspectives, from three different generations of women from the same Arab-American (Palestinian) family that had immigrated to Brooklyn, NY. There is Deya, a 15-year-old girl of the youngest generation, whose voice speaks from the “present” day (2008). There is Isra, who was born and raised in Palestine but was brought to Brooklyn to as a wife to Adam; she is Deya’s mother and her voice speaks from the 1990s. And then we have Fareeda (Adam’s mother, Isra’s mother-in-law, and Deya’s grandmother), who speaks from both Isra and Deya’s timelines, as well as in memories of her time living in a refugee camp in Palestine before her immigration with her husband and sons to America.

This intergenerational family story (I would say saga, but it didn’t seem quite sweeping enough for that term) elucidates in detail the family structures and expectations and daily life of conservative Muslims, with particular focus on the women’s perspective and experience (obviously). There is quite a bit to unpack, as far as the cultural and traditional insights that Rum details. And I don’t want to try to spell it out here in too much detail, because I don’t want to water down the intensity and nuance of what her novel provides. But I will say a few impressions that I had. First, major trigger warning for physical and emotional abuse – of all three narrators in different ways – that is pervasive throughout the novel. I have read a few interviews that the author has given in regards to her choice to portray conservative Muslim-Arab families in this way and I appreciate her commentary on the challenge between bringing light/awareness to an under-voiced population while simultaneously not wanting to perpetuate stereotypes that could be used to justify anti-Arab/Muslim sentiment in America (which is, as we know, a serious issue). However, others ignorance should not be a reason to avoid telling your own story or voicing your own concerns and I applaud Rum’s strength in both overcoming that and potential backlash from her own community for “airing private business.” Although this novel is just one story, one perspective, and should not be taken as a voice for a whole, it’s also telling a story that has been suppressed and accepted for generations and must be reckoned with.

To that end, I thought she did a phenomenal job in representing how intergenerational cycles of cultural expectations and norms exist…and how hard breaking out of the “that’s just the way it’s done” mindset can be. This is particularly clear in the case of Fareeda, who by the end even comes to question the unfair/unsafe positions that she herself was in, and then put her daughter and daughter-in-law in, and yet, still struggles to break from those traditions when it comes to raising her grand-daughters. It’s written in a way that really shows all the shades of grey and levels of complication that, while they don’t excuse the behavior and condoning of domestic violence, help the reader to understand how the situation persists. Relatedly, seeing the complex and unreasonable expectations, culturally and familial-ly, that Adam was under helps make him a more human character. It helps the reader to see that there is, objectively, no such thing as a monster or singular bad guy in the story, just individuals coping with trauma and stress in whatever way they best can – and in this family, traditional acceptance opened the door for domestic abuse as one coping mechanism for the men.

I also appreciated the way things changed over the three generations of voices…and the various dissenting or objecting voices in each individual generation. Although Fareeda and Isra lived fully within the confines of accepting marrying young, having children, caring for the home, lack of education and, yes, domestic abuse as the norm, there were also many characters who did not accept that at face value. Fareeda’s own daughter made a very bold choice to escape the limited options life presented her. And her other daughter-in-law and second son chose to create a very different type of family/relationship than Isra and Adam had. In Deya’s story, we see how she learns about all these different types of choices that were made by her female predecessor’s, how those decisions played out for them, and struggles with all she has learned and feels to try and find the right path forward for her. As a note of hope in what is otherwise an incredibly heart-breaking novel, the generational change from Fareeda to Deya, while not necessarily as much as might be ideal, is nevertheless a clear indication of the needle moving the right direction, as far as independence and freedom for the women of the family.

I haven’t really talked about anything other than the cultural insight so far. And really that is the highlight of this novel. But I do want to mention a few other things as well. First, the writing is very good – smooth and flowing, with realistic dialogue and wonderful pacing. As far as the plot itself, the unfolding stories of Isra’s life and Deya’s growing understanding of the reality of that life is, as I said, very well paced out, unfolding-ing together in a way that was very compelling to read. Plus, there were a few little “mysteries” and secrets sprinkled throughout that kept my “just one more page” interest quite high. Plus, as a reader, I found myself dreading what I thought was coming for Isra and cheering with feeling for Deya’s decisions about her own future and that investment in the characters made the story much more impactful and is a sign of Rum’s skill as a writer. Similarly, my emotional reactions to Fareeda, and her actions, throughout the novel were super strong (and jumped all over the place), which, again, I credit to Rum’s fantastic character development.

All in all, this portrayal of impossible cultural standards for women (and some for men), the suffocating realities of insular communities, the dangers of internalization of traditions and norms, had my heart aching from beginning to end. At one point, Rum says of Fareeda: “the shame of her gender was engraved on her bones,” and that shattering and poignant quote really, for me, summed up much of the message of this novel. Although it is an extreme representation, this novel encompasses many of the contradictions we all feel over the desire to belong to a whole/family/culture (and the fear of branching away from that) with the knowledge that “the way it is” is not healthy or good. It shines a probing light on the cycle of oppression of women endemic to many cultures (to different levels), yet does so with gentleness for the women who are complicit in the continuation of that cycle, because “what choice is there?” and “what power do women have to change that?” An affecting and emotional rendering of the fact that change is incremental and slow, but hopefully with time, it will come.

I see why this book still has a library waitlist, and I encourage readers to pick it up (when they’re emotionally ready for it). But also, as the author said (here’s the interview I’m referring to, if you want to read more: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/cultural-complications-a-q-and-a-with-etaf-rum-on-a-woman-is-no-man/), remember that this is a single voice, a single part of the story, and that Arab-American families are so much more than this one novel, this one representation. These cases may be the ones that most need a voice (and that is so important, both for Arab women themselves and for those of us from other backgrounds who are just here to learn), but are far from the only cases whose voices are under-heard. I myself plan to remember this by finding and reading books by other Arab/Arab-American authors and urge other readers to do the same.

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

“Hyping your product to get funding while concealing your true progress and hoping that reality will eventually catch up to the hype continues to be tolerated in the tech industry. But it’s crucial to bear in mind that Theranos wasn’t a tech company in the traditional sense. It was first and foremost a health-care company.”

Even though this scandal happened very recently, and on a very large scale, I have to say that I ready had no awareness of it in real time. To be fair, I was in grad school on the other side of the country, so it does make sense that my general knowledge of Silicon Valley start-ups, no matter how scandalous, was minimal. And then I saw all the great reviews this books god when it was published – lots of reviewers that I trust were talking about how interesting and unbelievable the story was, but I, personally, just wasn’t super interested in picking it up. So, I didn’t. It wasn’t until I recently read Jia Tolentino’s collection Trick Mirror that I really got a full, if overview-level, introduction to this story. One of her essays (in fact, one of my favorites of the whole collection) was about how the millennial generation is partially defined by the idea of great cons as success stories, and she went on to list a few that stood out to her and why, including the infamous Fyre Festival and this one, the story of Theranos. And that peaked my interest enough that, as I was browsing for a new audiobook, this one caught my eye and I decided to go for it.

Just in case you know about as much as I used about this story, let me give a quick overview. Theranos was a Silicon Valley tech/health start-up founded by Stanford drop-out Elizabeth Holmes when she was 19. Holmes had a vision of a new way to test blood, using minimal amounts of blood (and therefore avoiding a full needle-draw) and using ground-breaking technology that would be able to test for hundreds of things simultaneously in a device small enough and easy enough to use that it could be placed directly in patient’s homes. It’ s phenomenal vision, and would have been truly revolutionary, except the technology didn’t exist and Holmes spent years using secrecy, sleight-of-hand and eventually straight lies to deceive investors, partners and the public, not just in raising funds and finding financial support, but eventually using faulty equipment to test blood on actual patients (causing untold numbers of unnecessary medical complications and mental/emotional strain). Concerns from employees and doctors using the equipment were silenced with impunity, until eventually things reached a critical mass, culminating in a Wall Street Journal expose article on the overall falsity of the company. That first article was the start of an investigative journalistic series that eventually became the basis for this book.

First and foremost, this is a nonfiction piece written by a journalist. So, of course, bear that in mind with the writing. For me, that meant a couple things. First, I was very glad I chose to consume this as an audiobook. The writing was smooth and intelligent and exactly what it needed to be, but, at least for me, that’s just not my favorite style to read. So having the audio helped move things forward. Similarly, I was interested in the overall story, and less so in the individual names and exact sciences behind everything. I think, had I been reading a physical copy, the sheer amount of details would have gotten me bogged down. So again, for flow reasons, audio was a great choice. (All these “issues” are very personal, as I felt similarly about Moore’s The Radium Girls, a similar investigative-journalism-style nonfiction novel). Other than that, this entire situation was fascinating to read about. Carryrou’s investigating/reporting is incredibly thorough and he did a fantastic job getting it all down in a linear way, considering how many different aspects were in play at any given time. Despite the amount of detail and names and specifics, I definitely never felt like I got lost in the story. And the unfolding drama and step-by-step intensification of secrecy and misleading from Holmes had me hanging on tight waiting for the next reveal. I feel like this is about as “thriller” as one could make a nonfiction account/investigative report.

As far as my personal reactions to the story itself, I was emotionally all over the place. Which, at least for me, marks a great author and “plot.” Let me just go ahead and “stream of conscious” list out some reactions. Hopefully this doesn’t get too long or confusing. First, my honest to goodness first reactions to the ridiculously toxic work environment situation (and how it was possible that no word got out about it for so long) made me so angry. Like, come on employees, speak up at least to each other and to potential new hires about how bad it is! But then I took a step back and calmed down and realized that I was mad on their behalf because I’ve been there – in a very toxic workplace environment that didn’t even have all the legal NDA stuff to scare me out of talking – and for many reasons I haven’t said anything more internally or publicly about it. If someone asked me, I would be very clear that I think they should apply to work elsewhere, but that’s kind of it. And there’s no way my workplace has the same resources to come after me as Theranos did. So actually, I get it, I really get it and I think more than anything else, I was just mad for all of us that there aren’t more options for what to do. Also, things seemed to intensify/happen in the “frog in boiling water” way – so we can ignore little signs over time and by the time we realize something is deeply wrong, maybe it’s too late.

I respect, to start, Holmes’ level of passion and persistence. All the biggest inventions and discoveries are pushed forwards by visionaries who, often, are deemed “crazy” at the time because they continue on through myriad failures, etc. – it’s a popular truism. And it’s clear to me that she started that way, because her charisma and passion are what allowed her to get so many major names/backers (I mean seriously, Henry Kissinger, General Mattis, the Obama administration, Walgreens, Rupert Murdoch, to name just a few…) and keep going for so long. However, it’s also clear that, at some point, the fame and recognition started to mean more than the product/service itself…and the actual benefit she could give to real people/patients was ignored in favor of her own reputation. At that point, her charisma and product-hyping took a turn into manipulation and lies. We’ll never know exactly what happened (and maybe neither does Holmes)… Perhaps she truly had some sociopathic tendencies? Perhaps she got in over her head and wasn’t quite sure how to get out? Perhaps, though this does seem unlikely to me, she was strong-armed into certain things by her business partner/boyfriend? Regardless, the lies were told, the laws were broken, the harm was done to people, patients, investors, companies and that cannot be undone. On a tangential note, I would like to have as much money as many of the Venture Capitalist groups and individuals that invested so much financially into Theranos and were held of so long from actually seeing the product(s) in action – I mean, if it were my money, I would want some damn better proof than they ever got before handing it over. How Holmes managed to fend off so many requests for so long, in such creative ways, is astounding and, in a terrible way, impressive in its own right. (Maybe the fact that that’s considered impressive at all, not just awful, is, in fact, the issue Tolentino was referring to in her millennials-as-a-con-based-generation essay).

Final thought: zealotry is dangerous. Holmes had it in spades (to a point where she was able to self-delude to an incredible degree) and was able to pass it on to so, so many others. The way this start-up snowballed over the years is fascinating and scary and honestly, made for a great read. I feel like the moral I’m taking from this entire situation is “when you’re in a hole, stop digging.” Also, I feel like this demonstrates the separation between those working on a macro-level versus a micro-level to a frightening degree, and that the long-term/big-picture goals/successes justify some smaller/individual-based “sacrifices” along the way. That speaks in direct contrast to my public-health-heart (I do work from both levels every day and I see the dangers being stuck in one mindset completely can pose) and it was hard to read.

This genre or topic will definitely never be my favorite, but I have really enjoyed the few accounts that I’ve read over the past few years and plan to continue to sprinkle them into my reading. These types of stories are such visceral examples of how sometimes real life is crazier than fiction. And Carryrou did a great job breaking everything down and walking the reader through it in an understandable and interesting (even though it leaned long and very detailed) way. So just know what you’re getting into when you pick it up. But if that’s what you’re looking for, get ready for a wild ride!

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

“No one knows the worst thing they’re capable of until they do it.”

As I was looking for a book that would fit The Reading Women Challenge 2020 prompt #1, an author from Caribbean or India, I remembered this novel that a few of the Caribbean-based bookstagrammers I follow (particularly Cindy at @bookofcinz) had talked about last year when it came out. It sounded pretty interesting and really not like anything I’d read before, so I decided it would be the one!

This story, obviously, centers around Frannie Langton. Born a slave on the island of Jamaica, she is brought to England by her master after a fire of his estate (and failing health) causes a drastic change in his Jamaican-based fortunes. Once there, despite the fact that the trade has been abolished on the continent, Frannie is “gifted” to a scientist friend of her master’s. In that household, she begins a complex relationship with her employers, George and Marguerite Benham. When we, as readers, meet Frannie, she is imprisoned and on trial for the Benham’s deaths. And although she claims she cannot remember anything from that night, she does have a story to tell, her own story: her experiences on that Jamaican plantation, immoral scientific practices, illicit relationships, and more.

There was a lot that happened in this novel, a lot, and it’s delivered in a really interesting way. Frannie’s narration of her own life, her “confessions,” if you will, is as flawed as you’d expect anyone’s to be, speaking from memory and with all one’s own internal biases. But in that way, it is also much more compelling that a third-person narration of this story would have been. Allowing Frannie to have her own voice in how the reader sees her makes her experiences feel more personal that I think they otherwise would have. It also allows the author to use certain writing techniques to draw out the suspense and lack of clarity for many events, as Frannie struggles with the pain of remembering and her own, as she sees them, sins. I liked the style in a general sense, though there were definitely times with her internal musings and distractions were so much that they caused the plot to drag just a bit. In addition, some of the vagaries about Frannie’s “understandings” and “realizations” as plot points unfolded bordered on being so opaque as to not be follow-able. I reread a number of parts trying to figure out what pieces Frannie had connected that I had missed and, though I think by the end I had a reasonable handle on most of them, it was still not quite as clear as I’d wanted. I appreciate that we weren’t, proverbially, hit over the head with the twists/revelations, but still, I would have appreciated slightly more pointedness.

In any case, the sheer number of dramatic turns did, at the very least, keep me engaged in the story and wanting to keep turning pages. From the unethical (horrific and horrible) scientific experiments Frannie was forced to assist with in Jamaica and at Benham’s hands, to the general mistreatment her person and mind endured as a slave/maid/black woman, to the complexities of her relationship with Marguerite, and finally to her time in prison and under trial, Frannie’s life is one of great suffering on many levels. And it gives such remarkable insight into a time period and setting that I haven’t read much about (at the very least from this perspective). Slavery in the Caribbean is a topic that I’ve read much less on in relation to slavery in the Americas. And I’m not sure I’ve ever really explored literature focusing on the post-slave trade period of time in England, which technically would have meant Frannie was “free” when arriving in London, and yet the continued racial, gender and class-based inequities, mistreatments, judgements, etc. didn’t not allow for any truly meaningful change in her circumstances. Plus, there was a fantastic examination of the white abolitionist movement, the savior complex and trauma voyeurism that was rampant in the movement – an incredibly important and oft overlooked historical theme (I’m looking at you, high school history classes).
This novel, though it’s framed as an exploration of Frannie’s role in the murder of her employers, and there is every chance her own testimony will seal her fate on that front, its larger messages/themes present a searing indictment of all of English society at the time. Also, I had really no knowledge of the “scientific” work of the period that focused on “proving” whether or not black people were human or not. Many of the descriptions Frannie provides of these “studies,” though mostly vague (until a short section towards the end), ring similar to the Nazi experiments on concentration camp prisoners during WWII. I was completely unaware of this particular historical detail and it’s simply gruesome. I appreciate Collins for bringing it to light/attention to a wider public with this novel. As a side-note, the sort of random plot them of opium use (laudanum) for the time period, and the nascent study of its affects, was interesting from a medical and legal perspective for sure. It felt like a bit of a “hanger-on” as far as topics in this novel go, but still, interesting.

This was, as I had hoped, a novel unlike any I have read before. Some of the details are still a little fuzzy for me (plot-wise), which made it harder for me to connect with the story than I would have wanted. But Collin’s writing was polished, the gothic tone was perfect for the topic/time period, Frannie’s voice rang sincere (which is incredibly important for a novel written in this format), the study of Frannie’s own character, feelings and actions was complex and fully dimensional, and the historical context was well described and developed. Overall, I wanted a little more out of this book than I got, but regardless, I definitely appreciate my time with.

This review originally appeared on the book review blog: Just One More Pa(i)ge.

There's a monster in our wood
She'll get you if you're not good
Drag you under leaves and sticks
Punish you for all your tricks
A nest of hair and gnawed bone
You are never, ever coming...home.

I have had “read something by Holly Black” on my TBR for years. I have a huge soft spot for fairies in fantasy and that seems to be her sweet spot. I actually have had The Cruel Prince on my shelf since it was published, but I get weird about trilogies and have kinda been waiting so I can binge the whole thing at one time. Anyways, the fact is that I was, therefore, psyched to vote for this book as my long-distance book club choice for this month.

Hazel and her older brother, Ben, live in Fairfold, where the Folk and humans live side-by-side. When one day the horned boy that has been asleep in a glass tomb in the woods near their town for generations is broken out and awoken, everything in Fairfold gets even more magical. Ben has to face down his fear of his own gifts, Hazel must become the knight she once dreamed of being, and both learn to be brave in love.

Well, this was the first book in a long time that I have picked up and finished in one day. It was a super-fast story, and such a great adventure. I love the real world and fairy world side-by-side setting. It’s definitely one of my favorite fantasy settings. And human-fae love stories, which we got a couple of here, are the best (the things my personal dreams are made of, to be honest). Both Ben and Hazel get really sweetly fulfilling romances throughout this novel. To be fair, neither are particularly deep (as this is more of a “for fun” that “for depth” novel – written with typical fairy-tale cadence and development), but they were cute and fit the story and developed over the length of the novel in a way that felt well-paced and, by the end, my heart was filled with the happy fuzzies when they both worked out. I also enjoyed the relationship between Ben and Hazel themselves, as it felt pretty realistic – each of them feeling jealous/protective of the other in different ways and for different reasons – but in the end it meant that they kept a lot of secrets from each other that perhaps cause more harm than they thought they were saving the other. The focus on guilt from each is definitely something that I recognize in a more general sense as well, especially in this case where they spent much of their childhoods fending for themselves (due to sub-optimal parenting), which forced them both into those protective perspectives earlier than they should ever have felt that pressure. Plus, I did like the overall gender-role reversal of the two – it is perhaps less unique for me in the genre now than it would have been if I had read this when it was originally published – but I’ll never say no to a soft-hearted, romantic boy and a scrappy, strong female.

As far as the plot, I overall liked it. Like I said, this was a quick read, with fantastic page-turning pacing from start to finish. There were a few twists that I thought were well done, in particular, the true nature of the monster at the heart of the forest). And the references to traditional fairy tales, from a variety of cultures, was great. I always enjoy trying to spot the “loopholes” in deals with fae, since their inability to lie/abiding by the strict letter of the deal is a very popular point in most fairy tales, and this story was no exception. I had to reread the section about Hazel’s deal (once it comes to light how it’s being paid) and Ben’s realization about the clues she’s been leaving herself, because I was confused the first time. But to be fair, there’s a chance that by then I was reading too fast for my own good, as far as comprehension, and less because it was written unclearly or wasn’t as shocking as one might hope for.

This was what great YA escapist-enchantment fantasy is made of. It was thrilling and fast and cheesy and a bit twisty, without ever crossing a line into too dark or hard to follow or sappy. (In fact, I do think it’s sold as a more darkly atmospheric book than it actually was – like the first season of a YA fantasy show, that is dark but still YA and light in many ways, but hasn’t reached the real sinister intensity of later seasons.) Anyways, it was still, for me, an exciting first foray into Black’s work and, knowing what I’ve heard about her The Folk of the Air series being a bit more intense, has got me primed for and highly anticipating starting that sooner rather than later.