Thought Train to Pusan

“This is my problem. I want other people to tell me how they feel. But I’m not so sure I want to return the favor.” (Bruh, did I write this? Because this sounds exactly like me. Get out of my head). Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe is a book full of lines that dig right into your heart. A book full of kindness and kind characters. Of feelings and phrases that seem almost too profound to be coming from such a young character, and yet it doesn’t feel as inorganic as many young-adult novels with characters who don’t feel organically young, just an image or distorted memory of what being young was like. This book may tread on some familiar ground, and perhaps not all that much “happens” in terms of plot. And yet… so much happens. And every time the young protagonist drives to the middle of the desert to look at the stars I can’t help but think that that is exactly what this book feels like. Staring at the immeasurable sky above, with nothing but space t...

I really don’t know when and how I ended up with multiple novels by Pat Barker on my kindle, but here we are. And knowing that a few of them belonged to a series, I opted to read Border Crossing , a book dealing with child offenders of serious crimes, and examining the idea of people changing and finding redemption years later. Or is evil an inherent trait that can be found in children as well as adults? Honestly, the whole thing sounded kind of like that Andrew Garfield movie , Boy A , except in comparison, I found the whole thing rather bland. Or, maybe “bland” is not the right word… I guess it’s just that I felt like I needed more: more of everything. Some interesting topics and themes were brought up, but I never felt like we really got to the depth of them, or even to the depth of the character of Danny and his manipulative personality, which I found to be super intriguing and the strongest force in the story. Yet, I was left with a sense of just gliding through the whole t...

Miranda July is an interesting case, isn’t she? Sometimes I don’t know what to make of her and her work, and I find that she can be pretty divisive. There are some that find her to be gentle, profound, unique, and have a strong voice, while others may find her to be too whimsical, awkward, etc. And I happen to be right in the middle. I absolutely adore some of her work, but other times I just can’t connect with it and think, “Okay… that’s enough of you for a while.” And while the collection of stories in No One Belongs Here More Than You had a few short stories that really struck me, overall there were more misses than hits, and I couldn’t help but feel like everything in it was slowly dragging me down. It is true that July has a distinct voice, and there is a skill to capturing small, single moments in a way that make you see them as so significant. In many instances, however, these moments in July’s stories center around her character’s sensuality or instances of sexual intim...

Gillian Flynn’s Dark Places indeed deals with some dark issues, all centered on a character, Libby, who comes across as abrasive and unlikeable, yet she is still understandable and I was able to develop some empathy for her throughout the novel. I also personally enjoyed how the story was told as a series of present-day versus past event chapters, that alternated with one another to reveal different information from the viewpoint of different characters in a more staggered manner. This made the pacing interesting but not too straight-forward, and let me try and come up with my own theories along the way before the ultimate conclusion. Though at some points, I would get so interested in the past events of a chapter that I wouldn’t want to switch back to Libby in the present day just at that moment.  Dark Places focuses on the life of Libby Day, 25 years after her brother, Ben, was charged with the murder of Libby’s mother and two older sisters when they we...

Let’s be real, I had no idea what this book was about before I started reading it. I wasn’t even aware that it was the beginning of a series! I just noticed the title when I was at the used book store, picking up some mysteries for my mum. And then I took a peek at the cover and thought, “why not!?” It looked like a medieval-ish adventure tale, and that is exactly what I got! And it was slightly confusing at times, perhaps due to the main character being just as out-of-the-loop and trying to figure things out as the reader is, but I still enjoyed the pace it clipped along at, with varying degrees of action and more stand-still or explanatory sections regarding this new fantasy world that the Abhorsen series presents. Sabriel is a young woman, in the latter half of her teenage years, attending a private school in what I assume is our normal world, yet still being taught a variety of different courses in Charter magic, as she and a number of other students are Charter Mages. Or, ...

I have this problem. The problem is that I always want to get into more comic books but never know where to start (bruh, you know people who can probably help you with this). But I saw that this edition of Daredevil said “Volume 1” on it so thought that hey, maybe that would be a good place to start. What I realize is that this was the first run of Frank Miller at the helm for the character (the first half of the volume being predominantly in the drawing, the second half with more of Miller’s writing). From what I understand, many believe that the character of Daredevil really came into his own when Miller began working with him, so at this point of me jumping into the series, Matt Murdock was already established as Daredevil and had some history that required me to fill in some blanks along the way with what I already knew about Daredevil (from the show, other conversations, etc), or to try and come to other conclusions regarding his relationships with certain characters based on t...

Another one from the pile my friend handed to me when I asked for book recommendations! And a pretty enjoyable read, too, given how much I like werewolves these days (*cough* Teen Wolf). But I once again fall into this problem that I’ve been having lately in regards to protagonists: they just aren’t connecting with me. That is not to say that I like nothing about Elena, the main character in Bitten . But, she just seems to flip flop a bit to the point where I’m not sure if certain things are in fact out of character or if I just don’t truly understand her in some ways and am therefore seeing them as such. That’s my problem, though, and I don’t think everyone would feel the same as me. Bitten is about a woman named Elena, who is the only female werewolf in the world (special snowflake sirens screech in the distance!! she’s a hot commodity, y’all!). But let’s not get caught up in what initially made me roll my eyes. Elena has been living a pretty decent human life as a wolf witho...