![]() ![]() ![]() Drawing on the black feminist tradition, including Audre Lourde's invitation to use the erotic as power and Toni Cade Bambara's exhortation that we make the revolution irresistible, the contributors to this volume take up the challenge to rethink the ground rules of activism. ![]() How do we make social justice the most pleasurable human experience? How can we awaken within ourselves desires that make it impossible to settle for anything less than a fulfilling life? Editor adrienne maree brown finds the answer in something she calls "Pleasure Activism," a politics of healing and happiness that explodes the dour myth that changing the world is just another form of work. ![]()
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![]() ![]() At the same time, though, I was leery of the title. On one hand, pirates! The blurb on the cover promised me a female Captain Jack Sparrow, and that struck me as a fun idea. ![]() I wasn’t entirely sure what to think of Daughter of the Pirate King before I began it. ![]() For the most part they’re vague or obvious or both, but still. However, there is something-or rather, some one-she did not count on: Riden, the first mate who seems able to see through her deceptions and who she finds unexpectedly charming. Alosa is stronger and more skilled than any other pirate, so she is confident in her ability to accomplish her mission quickly and easily. Alosa is the daughter of the pirate king, and she has gotten herself intentionally kidnapped by the son of powerful pirate lord so that she can steal a valuable map fragment that will lead her father to a hidden island guarded by sirens and home to untold treasures. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() It’s a time of great cultural upheaval in America it’s an equally seismic period for the Hilderbrandt family, whose six members suffer the consequences of various individual bad decisions, and misdirected faith. ![]() It’ll come as no surprise that Jonathan Franzen’s latest ― my first sampling of his work ― ranks among these.Ĭrossroads is the first in an intended trilogy: a great, sweeping family epic that begins here in Christmas 1971, in the small town of New Prospect, Illinois. I’ve done it a few times this year ― namely The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon and more recently Hanya Yanagihara’s 2022 literary epic To Paradise. There’s nothing better than sinking into a big book knowing from the start you’re in the hands of a master. ![]() ![]() Should best friends get married? Will my past affect our relationship? Are my horrible dreams a warning? Will I ever find a dress? Could his sexiness be clouding my judgment? Am I going to ruin everything? Or is it just a case of cold feet? And then I have to decide. Jillian Dodd, quote from That Wedding I want you both to remember this moment forever. Which totally freaks me out and makes me question everything I know. And forever starts to sound like a really long time. My best friend says I'm going to ruin everything. ![]() An old boyfriend asks me to run away with him. His parents say I haven’t dealt with my past. But then our pastor starts asking lots of questions. ![]() I feel so sparkly, glittery, and full of promise, because I absolutely know he's that boy. The gorgeous engagement ring on my finger mimics my happiness. ![]() ![]() It is possible to read his fiction simply for the story and still be satisfied, but I think you're missing the point. Non-fiction, literary criticism, memoir, children's literature, science fiction, myth-he wrote it all and he wrote it all well. A man of soaring intellect and a man of deep faith, he wrote in a way that challenges the mind. Lewis was, and still is, a towering figure. Maybe I'll begin reading with only my eyes and forget all that this book has given me.Ĭ.S. How do explain what this book does for me, heart, soul, and mind? How do I explain that I have other favorites that I will turn to like familiar friends, but I avoid reading Till We Have Faces often? I'm not afraid that familiarity will breed contempt, but, perhaps, complacency. I have a favorite ice cream, a favorite color, but books-particularly this book-are so much more to me. Even the word “favorite” does it a disservice. And yet, anything I say to explain it falls short. Lewis is a favorite author of mine, and Till We Have Faces is, bar none, the best book I've ever read. We read my favorite book of all time for book club, and how could I do it justice? C.S. ![]() ![]() Last month, I faced what I believed to be an impossible task. ![]() ![]() ![]() The project begins with the problematic text Stiya: A Carlisle Indian Girl at Home, a text that pretends to represent truth and reality, then the dissertation moves on into the 21st century to an examination of Native American story practitioners in two non-academic fields: stand-up comedy and web design, and then concludes with a review of helping students use rhetorical sovereignty in a basic composition class to learn more about their own stories and understand their own truths and realities from a new perspective. ![]() All of the texts used in this dissertation exist in contact zones and are either true nonfiction experiential tales or pretend to be, and all of these texts have the potential to alter the recipient‘s perception of reality and truth. "In this dissertation, I introduce and define my new term, story(ality), which requires refocused attention on the truths available through nonfiction stories told, written, and performed in a contact zone, which is a social space where cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other. ![]() ![]() ![]() In addition to the eight main titles of the Bridgerton series, Quinn has also published four companion titles and the four-book spin-off Rokesby series. Set in the Regency era and spanning more than 14 years, the Bridgerton novels trace the ups and downs in the romantic lives of eight siblings: the sons and daughters of the late Edmund Bridgerton, Viscount Bridgerton, and his wife, Violet. ![]() Major spoilers for Netflix’s Bridgerton and Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton series follow. ![]() But who marries whom in Bridgerton? If you just can’t wait to see rest of the Bridgerton kids to get hitched on the show, keep scrolling for all the details on their marriages and families as laid out in the books. The first season of Bridgerton saw doe-eyed eldest daughter Daphne marry the smoldering Duke of Hastings, and Season 2 features more fun with Lord Anthony Bridgerton and a pair of sisters. And almost immediately after the Shondaland adaptation premiered on Netflix in late 2020, romance-loving TV audiences were hooked as well. Ever since romance readers first met this Regency-era family in Julia Quinn’s 2000 novel, The Duke and I, they haven’t been able to get enough. ![]() ![]() ![]() Backman’s writing in A Man Called Ove was impeccable-he takes that vocabulary and skill and applies it to a harsher topic in Beartown. None of the other books I’ve finished recently really lent themselves to being reviewed (or, I didn’t really want to review some of them), and so this seemed like a good time to pull Beartown back out.īeartown is one of those books that sits with you-it’s impactful as you’re reading it, as you finish, and even months later. I finished Beartown shortly before I started this blog and I always meant to go back and review it. When one of their own rapes a classmate right before the game that could change the fortunes of the dying town, the question becomes –who and what does Beartown love most?Īdmittedly, this is the longest distance between the date I’ve read a book and reviewed a book. In the forest, there’s a town that loves hockey, whose identify is defined by the cuts of skates on ice, the check of bodies on the boards. Late one evening toward the end of March, a teenager picked up a double-barreled shotgun, walked into the forest, put the gun to someone else’s forehead, and pulled the trigger. ![]() ![]() What motivates people to constantly move and migrate? What makes us want to wander – moving towards and away from parts of our lives? There are plenty of odes to that bustling mecca of travel – the airport. Instead, the reader is plunged into the depths of the psychology behind travel. Although this isn’t just another boring novel about a traveller undergoing a personal awakening. This quirky, darkly funny and insightful book combines compelling short stories of wanderers and voyagers, with personal anecdotes and philosophical forays. ![]() In other words, I am what I look at.” ― Olga Tokarczuk, Flights “ In essence, one becomes what one participates in. ![]() Tokarczuk is a thrilling and exhilarating writer who effortlessly criss-crosses genres and conventions, Flight is part essay, creative non fiction, travel novel and much more. Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk won the Man Booker International Prize for this novel in 2018 along with a Nike Award, Poland’s highest literary honour. Genre: Fiction, essay, creative non-fiction, travel. ![]() ![]() ![]() Perhaps all of her novels have that quality, I cannot say. What I’m trying to say is that there was something very ethereal about Sarah Addison Allen’s writing style in Other Birds. I swear I’m not just trying to make a ghost joke! That was mostly just a happy coincidence. This story is so fluid and sometimes feels so real it’s borderline haunting. Ohhh, they hit the nail on the head when they called this book enchanting, didn’t they? Though, if I’m being honest, I didn’t know what to expect when I picked up Other Birds. I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather be an other bird rather than just the same old thing.” “There are birds, and then there are other birds. Now, with her future waiting patiently, Zoey will follow in her footsteps, moving into her mother’s old home and making it a place just for her. Mallow Island is also home to many interesting and unique people.įor example, Zoey’s mother once lived on Mallow Island. ![]() As the name may suggest, this island is famous for the confectionery sweets that originated here – marshmallows. Mallow Island is just off the coast of South Carolina. This novel promises a blend of magical realism and love. One such novel is Other Birds, written by Sarah Addison Allen. ![]() Every now and then, I get really lucky with my BOTM picks, and I grab something I would otherwise have completely missed out on. ![]() |