book reviews
Reviews of books by relationship gurus, dating experts, and cautionary tale-tellers.
Book Review: "Jack" by Marilynne Robinson
I think we have all heard enough about the segregational culture of America in the 1950s and though I love 1950s music and film culture, I can definitely say that I was not 'born in the wrong generation' due to the fact that I am brown and happy that I am in a time where that is respected as a positive aspect of my character. However, I understand that the kind of music I listen to and the films I watch from the 1950s had a culture where that was not so and thus, when I read a book from this time or set during this time, I keep that in mind no matter what it is about. There are many books set in this period such as the famous “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee all the way through to the African-American Southern Gothic books of Toni Morrison. But I think that possibly one of the best modern examples in our own day of this is the books of Marilynne Robinson, especially this one entitled “Jack” which explores the more subverted aspect of interracial romance at a time where this only just was not accepted but was condemned outwardly by others.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Humans
The Exploration of the Main Character in Tandolfo the Great
For those of you who have been enjoying my random short story reviews, I'm planning to do more full-on book reviews in the near future since this is the main medium I can use to do that. For now, though, I hope you enjoy yet another short story review.
By Jamie Lammers5 years ago in Humans
The Essential Point of Me vs. Animals: How it Breaks the Typical Essay Format
On the surface, Benjamin Percy’s “Me vs. Animals” feels more like a collection of eight short pieces rather than a complete essay. It tells eight separate occurrences throughout Benjamin’s life of his encounters with various animals, from moose to mice to rattlesnakes. Each of these stories is engaging on its own merit, with writing that is stylized in a way that sounds like Benjamin’s speaking style. However, by the end of the piece, it becomes unavoidably clear that this collection of stories works best when read all at once as an essay, as it threads together a narrative that demonstrates that man is much more dangerous than any animal ever could be.
By Jamie Lammers5 years ago in Humans
Text vs. Subtext in The Paper Menagerie
As an explanation for this and the many other short story reviews I've been posting recently, these are reading reflections that I wrote for a creative writing class I took at the end of last year. These short story reviews allowed me to gain a better appreciation for narrative through writing and for reading in general, and I am super proud of these short reviews.
By Jamie Lammers5 years ago in Humans
Dialogue vs. Subtext in Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?
Joyce Carol Oates uses dialogue and subtext to her advantage to portray the fear of being sexually abused in her short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” Talking first about what is actually said by the primary characters of the story, we see the fifteen-year-old girl Connie trying to ask this strange boy that arrives on her driveway about why he’s there. This boy, who reveals his name as Arnold Friend, reveals how much she has heard about this girl and how interested he is in her. She dodges the fact that her name is Connie and tries to understand where this boy is taking her but doesn’t get any answers from him. Eventually, her anxiety about Arnold escalates so much that she threatens to call the police on him, and he retaliates by saying he will come into her house if she calls the police. By the end of the story, she unsuccessfully tries to call for help but is eventually taken by the young boy.
By Jamie Lammers5 years ago in Humans
Book Review: "The Midnight Library" by Matt Haig
Matt Haig is one of the great writers of our time. His understanding of the human condition is more than incredible and his writing style never fails to touch your very soul. One thing that is incredibly unique about Matt Haig's writing is that there is a quality to it that makes it very easy to read and yet, it gets into some real depth about what the character is going through. I have found him to sort of resonate the writing of Ian McEwan. When I read Ian McEwan's "Nutshell" - though it was easy enough to read, there was some real depth to the character the reader encounters. This is the same with Matt Haig's writing and especially the book "The Midnight Library" - it is something that touches everyone even though not everyone will certainly experience the same thing. From the very beginning in which we see the character when she is about sixteen years’ old and all the way through the book that is set nineteen years’ later when she is thirty-five years’ old - we constantly get reminded about various aspects of uniqueness about this character and thus, we sympathise with the difficult position in which she has found herself in.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Humans
Zona
Zona: The Forbidden Land by Fred G. Baker is about a man named Dr. Grant Taylor who is summoned to Russia after his uncle is presumed dead. When he gets there he finds out things about his uncle that he never knew and falls in love with a beautiful woman named Irina. This book is full of adventure and mystery.
By Tangerinehippiestudios5 years ago in Humans
Desperate Times by Hildred Billings
What’s this book about? Desperate Times is a lesbian romance novel featuring two butches: Tess and Sidney. River Rock is a small town and Tess and Sidney find it hard being the only lesbians in the area. They meet on a dating app, but it does not go well as they look nothing like they do on their profile pictures. It’s almost like a catfish episode without Dev and his team. Despite the bad first date they try to be friends with benefits and like many stories before, it blossoms into romance.
By Chloe Gilholy5 years ago in Humans
Book Review: "Reborn: Early Diaries" by Susan Sontag
Susan Sontag was a great writer and none of us can debate that fact. In her books where she discusses the truths about love and suffering, it hits you hard from the very moment the words enter your mind to long after the book is closed. But these books are all planned philosophical pieces in which she has spent a long time simply crafting the way in which her ideas come across to others. In her book "Reborn", she does none of this. It is not crafted, it is not planned. These are her early diaries from the years 1947 all the way through to 1963 and I have to say that even though it is not a fiction book - we can all see that Sontag has a gift for storytelling. She has a gift with words, using the only the one that fits absolutely with the sentence she is conveying. So instead of reading just her critical pieces, or her fiction - I would highly suggest looking into her nonfiction pieces on her own life. The emotion simply runs off the page, overflowing with a sense of self.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Humans
Book Review: 'A Land Like You' Tobie Nathan
In A Land Like You, published by Seagull Books, author Tobie Nathan takes us to an Egypt that will be unfamiliar to most readers. First the book is told mainly from the perspective of Cairo's Jewish community and secondly the events described take place roughly from the end of WWI to the early years of WWII.
By Richard Marcus5 years ago in Humans
In the Dream House
This next read was another mystery book sent to me via Literati, and I will be totally honest with the fact that I didn’t think I was going to like this book. I am not a huge fan of memoir--unless it is a person that I am really interested in--so I started reading this book with a jaded opinion. However, as I kept reading, I found that I was falling deeper and deeper into the story as the twists, turns, and shocks unfolded right in front of my eyes.
By Kurt Mason5 years ago in Humans
