I know I'm not the only one that got caught up in the gaudy madness that is the Crazy Rich Asians movie adaptation. It isn't an exaggeration when I say at one point I watched this movie a couple times a week. If I couldn't decide on something to turn on before bed or use for background noise, Crazy Rich Asians became the default. I'm going to say something that you won't hear from me often...the movie was better than the book.
Let me set this up for you. When Rachel Chu's boyfriend, Nicholas Young, asks her to spend the summer with him in Singapore, she imagines a laid back vacation full of sight seeing and eventually meeting the family of the man she loves. What Rachel didn't bargain for, and what Nick neglected to tell her, is that his family is among the richest of the rich in Asia. Rachel is thrown headfirst into a world she doesn't understand, where Nick's relatives and their friends swarm like sharks, waiting to tear her apart. While Rachel struggles to keep her head above water, the rest of Nick's relatives face their own struggles in order to keep up with appearances, and keep up with each other. I'm going to begin with my overall impression of the book. I can't deny it was entertaining, and at times ridiculously funny. I never cease to be amazed by how consumed wealthy people are with protecting their image, even if it comes at the expense of being a terrible person. Kevin Kwan really went all out to illustrate the lengths rich socialites are willing to go to in order to cement their status among others and stick to the status quo. There was plenty of glitz and glamor, but beneath the gossamer sheen of wealth lies a persistent sadness, the result of working tirelessly to maintain a façade of perfection. I was most disappointed by the shift in focus from Rachel and Nick to a growing group of characters caught up in the madness of high society. Kwan sets us up to believe Rachel and Nick's relationship will be the main narrative of this story, the thing we will become invested in by the conclusion, yet I never found myself genuinely rooting for them. They got lost among the lengthy descriptions of opulent shopping sprees, drama between other characters, and explanations of how Singapore developed over centuries (mostly relating to economic prosperity). The characters weren't fleshed out enough to connect with, except for Rachel, though there were moments I felt sympathetic to their personal struggles. Kwan was working with a few storylines that collided instead of coming together to tell a complicated story of how familial expectations and societal rules can affect individual and their relationships. What the movie got right was putting Rachel and Nick at the center of everything, placing emphasis on their development while subtly including bits of other characters' stories. Less time could have been dedicated to the fine details of how the crazy rich spend their money, which made a lot of them unlikable almost by default. It functioned in the most basic sense to show us all the ways in which the characters were attempting to live up to the expectations of others. Their faults and sins were exposed as a product of the environment they were brought up in, painting them as both victims and inadvertent perpetrators. Maybe I'm being a little harsh because I tend to lean toward character driven stories, and I wouldn't consider this one of those by any means. A lot of the first half of this book read like filler to set up the events in the second half, when the plot picks up considerably. That being said, there still weren't many moments later in the book that stuck out to me or made it anything extraordinary. My final verdict for this one is a 3/5. I didn't hate it and I didn't love it; this is the kind of book you can pick up on a vacation and devour fairly quickly, but probably won't think of much after. Go watch the movie if the premise of this book interests you because it captures the glamor, drama, and relationships in this story the way I hoped the book would.
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When life gets crazy I find there are usually two groups of people:
1. Those who turn to old comforts, fully embracing them and the joy they get out of doing what they love 2. The people like me, who get overwhelmed by everything and find it difficult to focus, let alone find time for old comforts I can't remember a time in my life when I wasn't reading at all, but back in March of last year my depression hit a low it hasn't seen in almost 8 years. It became difficult not to compare everything to pre-pandemic life, and that way of thinking pushed me further away from the little joys I normally find in shitty situations. I'm not going to put it lightly or nicely, this pandemic has been absolutely shit in a lot of ways. My boyfriend was facing the cancellation of a tour with his band that was meant to last almost three months, and I was finding new ways to give myself anxiety almost daily. Before the pandemic, life felt like absolute bliss; I was attending book club every month at one of my favorite local bookshops, experiencing the high of live music, and hanging out with friends almost every week. Those parts of my life have always been enough to keep me satisfied, then it was all ripped away in what felt like an instant, but was really more of a slow burn toward the inevitable. I moved back in with my mom, my job shifted to a work from home format, and the world felt like it stopped moving for a while. I spent a good five months or so doing pretty much nothing. I tried to get into a writing project started online to help people cope with the feelings of isolation, but it felt too much like a school assignment at times and I didn't connect with it after a couple weeks of trying. One night I sat in my room staring at my bookshelf packed full of unread books and just picked one. For three months I struggled to get back into reading, an activity I love more than a lot of things, but these are some methods that helped me get out of my pandemic reading slump. Read an old favorite I didn't exactly do this, but I did pick up the Among the Hidden series, which I somehow managed to miss reading when I was younger. My brother was never a big reader, but he loved the series as a kid, and it has become what I would consider a precursor to some of the dystopian fiction we all know today. Sometimes we need to read books that aren't challenging or heavily thought-provoking, and I find that books written for younger people can be a bit easier to read (not to say that they aren't amazingly written or interesting). Take a look at the stack of books you've read and loved or grab a book written for younger readers–don't think about it too much and just start reading. Forget marathon reading and set attainable daily reading goals When I sit down to read I don't generally have a time in mind when I'm going to stop. I'll read for hours if I have the day off, and on rare occasions I'll even start and finish a book on the same day. This can also be the biggest problem for readers who want to devour as many books as humanly possible. There's always a little pang of disappointment when you don't get to read as much as you hoped. Help yourself get back into a reading routine first by setting small goals like reading for 30 minutes everyday or reading a few chapters. Meeting smaller and more attainable goals feels better than being hard on yourself because you didn't finish 4 books in a month. Fit reading time into your schedule where it makes sense for you. Join a virtual book club The book club I was meeting with before the pandemic was able to go virtual by hosting monthly meetings on Zoom and staying in touch with a Facebook group for members only. A lot of independent bookstores have started virtual book clubs to stay in touch and provide a sense of a community from a distance. If you read one book a month that will be 12 books for the year and a great accomplishment! This leaves a lot of room for any reads you want to add in if you finish a book quickly or don't love the book selected some months. Not to mention, when the book club is able to resume in person you will meet others who love reading as much as you and maybe even make a few new friends. This is also your sign to go support a local bookstore and quit giving Amazon more of your money, they don't need it. Find a short book to read or a collection of works Shorter books can be more digestible than long novels, and they make reading feel less like a chore when you're struggling to get into it again. Reading a 30 page essay or short story is much less intimidating than deciding to take on a novel totaling more than 300 pages. If you like nonfiction then look for a collection of essays by a writer you admire (my personal suggestion is anything by Samantha Irby) and if fiction is more your thing there are plenty of short story collections out there. A library card really comes in handy when you're indecisive or simply looking for one book to finally stick. You can check out multiple books for free and return what you didn't like. Download the Libby app for free audiobooks I've been visiting the library since elementary school and just recently found out about the Libby app. If you have a valid library card you can use the app to check out audiobooks and e-books for free! It took me a while to get into listening to books, and I know it isn't for everyone, but it provides the flexibility of listening when you can't be physically reading. It's a great resource that offers a lot of newer releases and popular titles. If you don't have a lot of free time to sit down with a book then listening might be a better option. It doesn't hurt that using the app is free, especially when a lot of us don't have disposable income right now. I'm here to tell you that you will get out of the reading slump you're in right now, and to remind you not to compare your reading goals or habits to anyone else. I'm guilty of doing that and it doesn't do any good, trust me. My first read of 2021, The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker, was oddly fitting given the global pandemic we're facing. I had some previous knowledge about the book going in, but wasn't prepared for the eery similarities between the events in the story and the ongoing crisis we're all facing right now.
When a mysterious sleeping sickness appears in the small town of Santa Lora, the community is thrown into a state of fear and chaos. The outbreak begins at a local college, where a freshman slumps into her bed after a night out, and drifts off into a sleep from which she never wakes. In the beginning, no one knows what to believe when they hear the reports of students being carted out of dorms on stretchers, plagued by an unknown illness. The community thinks maybe it's an exaggeration, or maybe it won't reach them in the comfort of their own homes. The only information infectious disease experts are able to work out is that the sleepers are dreaming, and their brain function is higher than ever recorded. As all hell breaks loose in the California town, we hear the course of the epidemic from multiple perspectives; each character with their own theories and emotional turmoil in response to the unknown. I think speculative fiction is a genre I need to explore more. This book hits a bit close to home at the moment, but I was fully invested in the story of this fictional virus. The strength of this narrative comes from the structure of being told from multiple perspectives, which is generally hit or miss for me. The story follows an academic couple with a newborn baby, a single father with two daughters left to fend for themselves after he falls ill, two college students thrown together with opposing views of the world, an aging college professor, and a psychiatrist quarantined miles away from her young daughter. I enjoyed the glimpses into the personal lives of each character and how their stories overlapped subtly on a larger scale. Being able to see what's going on inside everyone's heads made it easy to form an emotional connection, and I started wondering what I would do if I were in the situations they were faced with. Mysterious illnesses aren't a new trope in fiction, but there's something especially freaky about falling asleep and never waking up, or even falling asleep for a prolonged amount of time. It doesn't sound threatening at first, but to me the thought became terrifying. When some of the dreamers begin to wake up there are more questions raised than answered, especially when a select few are convinced their dreams are premonitions of the future. This revelation causes some characters to question what is reality and what they've only dreamed (it's a bit of a mind fuck at times). Where this hit close to home was the slow burn of fear as news trickles in about the dreamers, and it very much mirrored what we saw happening across the world last spring: hoarding supplies, self-isolation, and placing personal needs over the needs of others. Walker did a great job showing how an epidemic affects people in big and small ways, especially psychologically and emotionally. If you're not a fan of unresolved endings, then The Dreamers might not be for you, because by the end there are still a lot of unanswered questions. Nothing is wrapped up in a neat little bow, and there's never an explanation of how the virus swept across the town or why it induced a deep sleep. In this way I think the story mirrors our reality, because there is so much we will never know or understand about how and why things happen, both in our own lives and in the world as a whole. We never really get to know what happens to everyone when the the sickness seems to vanish, but maybe the ambiguity of the ending is simply a reflection of the way life is sometimes. I highly recommend this book for anyone a little afraid to dive into classic science fiction, mystery lovers, and those who like pondering big questions about the universe. The Dreamers earns a well-deserved 5/5 stars from me! It's hard to believe there was a year where I read over 50 books, granted I didn't have a full-time job at that point in my life and I was also on a break from school. There was a part of me that believed I could be so ambitious as to shoot for 40 books this year, but the pandemic had other plans, like making me question everything in my life multiple times a week. Bouts of depression can seriously curb my appetite for reading, and it was frustrating to lose interest in something I love. Despite the struggle, books continue to be something I can turn to when I need comfort with a healthy dose of distraction from the real world.
As it stands now, I will round out the year just shy of my 30 book reading goal, having read mostly books written by female authors as well as exploring genres I'm not as familiar with (I'm looking at you science fiction). There were hits and misses for me this year, along with a selection of books I felt very meh about. Without further ado, here are my favorite reads of 2020. The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett If you're looking for a beautifully written, complex story about family, identity, and race, then The Vanishing Half is exactly what you need. The multigenerational narrative follows The Vignes twins, Stella and Desiree, as they grow up in a small, black community called Mallard, struggling with who they are expected to be versus who they want to become. At 16, stifled by the weight of societal and familial expectations, the twins decide to run away from everything they know to start over. Then, Stella suddenly disappears one night, leaving her twin sister without a clue as to where she's gone. Years after fleeing Mallard, Desiree returns home with her black daughter after escaping an abusive marriage, while Stella leads a new life secretly passing as a white woman with a family of her own that knows nothing of her past. The twin's divergent paths go on to shape not only their lives, but the lives of their daughters as well. This book left me emotionally and mentally drained in the best way possible. Bennett crafts a powerful story spanning decades about the way family, expectation, and desire can shape the future, as the Vignes twins face unique challenges related to the paths they've chosen to take. The Vanishing Half explores what can motivate someone to leave behind who they are in order to become someone else, what they sacrifice in the process, and the history of what it means to be passing. The ways race and identity intertwine are much more complicated than they seem, and the story takes care in illustrating how those two ideas intersect. There is so much rich characterization in this story to the point where it's impossible not to feel a connection to the main cast of characters and what they're going through. Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia I'm not well versed in the horror or thriller genres, but Mexican Gothic has me interested in what else they have to offer. This book ticked all of the boxes for me: female protagonist, creepy house, mysterious family, and a touch of the grotesque. When Noemí receives a disturbing letter from her cousin, Catalina, accusing her own husband of attempting to poison her, Noemí sets out to investigate. Leaving behind her glamorous life in Mexico City, her journey leads to a dilapidated home called High Place; the residence of Catalina, her husband Virgil, and his unusual family, the Doyles. The longer Noemí extends her stay in search of clues to explain what is happening to her cousin, the more she is pulled into the macabre mystery of the Doyle family. When she begins to have strange nightmares, it gets more difficult to tell what's real and what isn't. This was a slow burn for a good 3/4 of the story, but it's worth it. Moreno-Garcia gives away just enough information as the mystery unravels to keep you interested without handing over the clues needed to solve the puzzle. There is a subtle, underlying sense of dread building up while Noemí stays with the Doyles that crescendos to a shocking reveal at the end of the novel. I found this incarnation of the classic gothic novel refreshing and unique. Mexican Gothic handles horror in its many forms; from a house that seems to have a life of its own to what it means to be a woman whose value is tethered almost entirely to her relation to men.I recommend this to anyone who likes an underrated feminist read, thrillers with a unique edge, and those not easily grossed out. The Two Lives of Lydia Bird by Josie Silver It's rare to find a book that can accurately capture what it's like to grieve the loss of a loved one without dipping too heavily into the cliché, but The Two Lives of Lydia Bird does a great job showing the highs and lows of mourning. Lydia was convinced she would spend the rest of her life with her fiancé Freddie, but on her 28th birthday she learns the love of her life has died in a tragic car accident. Faced with the reality of losing Freddie, Lydia pulls away from her friends and family, slipping into the clutches of depression. Then, one night when she drifts off to sleep, Lydia enters a world where Freddie is still alive and well. Lydia begins to exist between the real world and the dream world where seemingly nothing has changed, but each time she goes to sleep it hurts a bit more to wake up. Josie Silver's writing is earnest and humorous, tugging at your heart strings and making you laugh all in the same sentence. There's no one way to process your grief that works, and this book takes you on a journey of healing as Lydia tries to find a way to start moving on from the loss of Freddie. She will do things that downright frustrate you, but you will never stop rooting for her. There are so many complicated feelings attached to loss that Silver is able to explore in an authentic way, like impulsivity, extreme highs and lows, and resistance to change. This book isn't your typical romance, it goes beyond that in showing the many forms love can take throughout your life, including falling back in love with living again. We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby I enjoy the occasional non-fiction read when it's something that particularly strikes my fancy, and this collection of essays by Samantha Irby had me laughing so hard I cried. Irby knows how to poke fun at herself in a way that isn't entirely self-deprecating, so you're laughing with her, and occasionally at her, as she reflects on some particularly interesting parts of her life. Her sense of humor is unique, the kind of humor to make you double over because you're laughing so hard you think you're going to throw up...but in a good way, you know? If subjects that are weird, gross, or immature can make you chuckle, then please go buy this book. There is seriously a moment in an essay where Irby recounts frantically convincing her friend to pull the car over so she can relieve herself on the side of the road in a moment of desperation. I loved watching her grow and transform into someone so completely comfortable with herself, flaws and all. Reading this collection felt like a much needed ranting session with a close friend where there is no such thing as over-sharing and no subject is off limits. Emotional memories and complicated family relationships are peppered throughout a few essays, bringing a deeply vulnerable aspect to the otherwise goofy subject matter. It's Irby's success in weaving all of these moments together that makes this collection memorable. Circe by Madeline Miller Circe was not born with the power of her father, or the beauty of her mother, but in time comes to possess a strength of her own: witchcraft. Once considered weak and mocked by the gods, Circe must find her own way when she is banished to a deserted island by Zeus, who is threatened by the potential of her newfound power. This is the story of a woman who learns to rely on herself; an outcast standing alone to face the evils of the world. She forges ahead to create a new life for herself, one where she serves no master but herself and men tremble before her. The theme of my reading this year, and nearly every other year, has obviously been women. I appreciated the way Madeline Miller took the Greek myths we're familiar with and incorporated them into Circe's character arc. Not once did these side quests distract from her personal journey. She is the main character of this story, and Miller is careful in her retelling to flesh out Circe in a way that allows us to connect with her pain and progression as she transforms into a force to be reckoned with. She is the hero of this complicated, beautifully written story. The rich details in the scene setting and descriptive characterization brought this mythological world to life. It took a little while for me to get into the story in the beginning, but as soon as Circe begins her lifelong sentence of isolation, the book begins to hit its stride. To be honest, most of this year I've been in a major reading slump. Attending virtual book club has been the one thing keeping me even slightly on track to reach my 30 book reading goal for the year. So, thank you Female Authors Book Club, you have been one of the few bright spots from the past nine months.
Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia was our most recent book club selection, and it didn't disappoint. The story is an updated take on a classic gothic novel, drawing inspiration from the dreary English novels preceding it, and unfolding into a unique horror-thriller standing on its own. When Noemi receives a disturbing letter from her cousin, Catalina, accusing her own husband of attempting to poison her, Noemi sets out to investigate. Leaving behind her glamorous life in Mexico City, her journey leads to a dilapidated home called High Place; the residence of Catalina, her husband Virgil, and his unusual family, the Doyles. The longer Noemi extends her stay in search of clues to explain what is happening to her cousin, the more she is pulled into the macabre mystery of the Doyle family. And when she begins to have strange dreams, it gets more difficult to tell what's real and what isn't. Noemi is a witty, intelligent, and complex character I couldn't help but be charmed by–she's a powerhouse. She is sure of herself and completely trusts her instincts while attempting to uncover the truth about what is really ailing Catalina, refusing to let the Doyles distract or derail her with their odd rules and expectations. Everything Noemi is and believes goes against the Doyles; considering their interest in eugenics, viewing women as inferior, and taking advantage of native people for their own gain, this story has more than a few layers of conflict at its core. Moreno-Garcia deftly crafts a story handling horror in its many forms, from a house that seems to have a life of its own to what it means to be a woman whose value is tethered almost entirely to her relation to men. The first 3/4 of this book was a slow burn, and I don't think I fully appreciated this aspect of the story until after I finished reading it. The slow pace added to the sense of discomfort Noemi feels while staying at High Place, and kept me wondering when something big might happen. Moreno-Garcia knows how to reveal just enough information to keep the reader interested without giving them the ability to put the pieces of the puzzle together prematurely. Despite this, my one complaint about Mexican Gothic is how long it took for the big reveal. I can see how drawing out the days leading to the most shocking moment of the book contributed to the creepy, unsettling atmosphere, but there were a few lulls toward the middle where I skirted the edge of boredom briefly. The twist reveal at the end was *chefs kiss* for me, because while there were plenty of moments that pointed in that direction I was never able to guess exactly what was going on. I give extra points to Garcia-Moreno for originality and creep factor. I can't believe it took months for me to pick this one up for book club, but I'm happy to have this book rounding out my 2020 reading list. Overall, this one gets a 4.5/5 stars, with only a half star deduction because of the very slow pace toward the second half. I recommend this for anyone who likes an underrated feminist read, thrillers with a unique edge, and for those who aren't afraid of a bit of the grotesque. |
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