I know a lot of people who put this book on the short list of their favorites, and personally I don't get it. It's not a bad story, and it's written well, but it's not all that interesting. Part of my distaste for this book might have to do with my lack of interests in circuses, and the poor treatment of people and animals they are notorious for. I remember when I watched the movie I thought it was a more boring version of "Big Fish", where I would rather just wash "Big Fish". I felt pretty much the same after reading this, it was a well told story but it was mostly sad and pretty predictable. There was only a few twists at the end that took me by surprise. I'm giving this book three stars because it is not a book I'd read twice, and I don't see myself recommending it to anyone else.
"Even out of costume they [the performers] are glamorous. The drab workmen scuttle all around, occupying the same universe but seemingly on a different dimension."
"And so I leave, although every bone in my body screams against it."
Sunday, February 26, 2017
Sunday, February 12, 2017
Sam Reviews "My Sister's Keeper" by Jodi Picoult
I really did enjoy this book. I think the only reason it took me a while to finish is because I had seen the move first so parts of the story weren't surprises. I put off reading this book for a long time because people told me it was "hard to read" but, personally, I didn't find the content any more difficult to read than any other book where a character is sick or dying. I regret not reading this book sooner. I do think it's kind of a one time read, for me at least, but it was a worthwhile one.
"In the end, though, I did not kill my sister. She did it all on her own. Or at least that is what I tell myself."
"I sometimes wonder if it is just me, or if there are other women who figure out where they are supposed to be by going nowhere."
"... seeing her sitting there unresponsive makes me realize that silence has a sound."
"It is so easy to think that the world revolves around you, but all you have to do is stare up at the sky to realize it isn't that way at all."
"I don't have expectations, and this way she beats them all."
"Supernovas, they're brighter than the brightest galaxies. They die but everyone watches them go."
"She slaps my face hard enough to make my head snap backward. She leaves a print that stains me long after it's faded. Just so you know: shame is five fingered."
"A real friend isn't capeable of feeling sorry for you."
"There's nothing worse than silence, strung like heavy beads on too delicate a conversation."
"Reason number 106 why dogs are smarter than humans: once you leave the litter, you server contact with your mothers".
"Love has all the lasting performance of a rainbow - beautiful while it's there, and just as likely to have disappeared by the time you blink."
"Growing up, Izzy was the Goody-Two-Shoes and I was the one who came up fighting - swinging my fists or shaving my head to get a rise out of my parents or wearing combat boots with my high school uniform. Yet now that we're thirty-two, I'm a card-carrying member of the Rat Race; while Izzy is a lesbian who builds jewelry out of paper clips and bolts. Go figure."
"Nothing is worth having so much as something unattainable."
"Timelines bracket her mouth, parentheses around a lifetime of words I was not around to hear."
"'I used to have pink hair.' I told Seven.
"'I used to have a real job,' he answered.
"'What happened?'
"He shrugged. 'I dyed my hair pink. What happened to you?'
"'I let mine grow out.' I answered.
"'Nobody ever wants what they've got,' he said."
"We're unnaturally quiet, as if they've taken all possible words with them and left us with nothing."
"'How do you get along with hem [your sisters]?'
"'They survive me, like everyone else.'"
"No one in this family ever covers up their mistakes."
"From that point of view, I realized that my hole was not miles deep after all. My father, in fact, could stand on the bottom and it only reached up to his chest. Darkness, you know, is relative."
"They [children] outgrow us so much faster than we outgrow them."
"The human capacity for burden is ... far more flexible than you'd ever believe at first glance."
"Shooting stars are not stars at all. They're just rocks that enter the atmosphere and catch fire under friction. What we wish on when we see one, is only a trail of debris."
"Do all the wonderful things happen when we are not aware of them?"
"There are some nights when you just want to know there's someone else besides you in this wide world."
"The Pawnee Indians say the star deities populated the world: Evening Star and Morning Star honed up and gave birth to the first female. The first boy came from the Sun and the Moon. Humans rode in on the back of a tornado."
"The really amazing thing about all this is no matter what you believe, it took some doing to get from a point where there was nothing, to a point where all the right neurons fire and pop so that we can make decisions. More amazing is how even though that's become second nature, we all still manage to screw it up."
"Kids think with their brains cracked wide open; becoming an adult, I've decided, is only a slow sewing shut."
"I can't answer a single one of these [questions], which is how I know that whether I'm ready or not, I'm growing up."
"Even if we win, we don't."
"The people you love can surprise you every day. That maybe who we are isn't so much about what we do, but rather what we're capable of when we least expect it."
"Time is an optical illusion - never quite as solid or strong as we think it is."
"I cannot begin to tell you the words I use; none of them are big enough to bear the weight behind them."
"Kate as a toddler being tossed into the air by Brian, her hair flying behind her, her arms and legs starfish-splayed, certain beyond a doubt that when she fell to earth again, there would be a safe landing, sure that she deserved nothing less."
"It doesn't take a whole long life to realize that what we deserve to have, we rarely get."
"This is not how I thought our lives would go; and maybe we cannot find our way out of this alley. But there is no one I'd rather be lost with."
"Life sometimes gets so bogged down in the details, you forget you are living it. There is always another appointment to be met, another bill to pay, another symptom presenting, another uneventful day to be notched onto the wooden wall. We have synchronized our watches, studied our calendars, existed in minutes, and completely forgotten to step back and see what we've accomplished."
"There are just as many stories to be told in the dark spots as there are in the bright ones."
"There are stars in the night sky that look brighter than the others, and when you look at them through a telescope you realize you are looking at twins. ... the first one shines so bright, by the time you notice the second one, it's really to late."
"As her heart stops beating beneath my palm - that tiny loss of rhythm, that hollow calm, that utter loss."
--
This book was published in 2004, what kind if question is "What kind of person can afford a cell phone but not their own washer and dryer?" Even then, those two items were very different prices.
"In the end, though, I did not kill my sister. She did it all on her own. Or at least that is what I tell myself."
"I sometimes wonder if it is just me, or if there are other women who figure out where they are supposed to be by going nowhere."
"... seeing her sitting there unresponsive makes me realize that silence has a sound."
"It is so easy to think that the world revolves around you, but all you have to do is stare up at the sky to realize it isn't that way at all."
"I don't have expectations, and this way she beats them all."
"Supernovas, they're brighter than the brightest galaxies. They die but everyone watches them go."
"She slaps my face hard enough to make my head snap backward. She leaves a print that stains me long after it's faded. Just so you know: shame is five fingered."
"A real friend isn't capeable of feeling sorry for you."
"There's nothing worse than silence, strung like heavy beads on too delicate a conversation."
"Reason number 106 why dogs are smarter than humans: once you leave the litter, you server contact with your mothers".
"Love has all the lasting performance of a rainbow - beautiful while it's there, and just as likely to have disappeared by the time you blink."
"Growing up, Izzy was the Goody-Two-Shoes and I was the one who came up fighting - swinging my fists or shaving my head to get a rise out of my parents or wearing combat boots with my high school uniform. Yet now that we're thirty-two, I'm a card-carrying member of the Rat Race; while Izzy is a lesbian who builds jewelry out of paper clips and bolts. Go figure."
"Nothing is worth having so much as something unattainable."
"Timelines bracket her mouth, parentheses around a lifetime of words I was not around to hear."
"'I used to have pink hair.' I told Seven.
"'I used to have a real job,' he answered.
"'What happened?'
"He shrugged. 'I dyed my hair pink. What happened to you?'
"'I let mine grow out.' I answered.
"'Nobody ever wants what they've got,' he said."
"We're unnaturally quiet, as if they've taken all possible words with them and left us with nothing."
"'How do you get along with hem [your sisters]?'
"'They survive me, like everyone else.'"
"No one in this family ever covers up their mistakes."
"From that point of view, I realized that my hole was not miles deep after all. My father, in fact, could stand on the bottom and it only reached up to his chest. Darkness, you know, is relative."
"They [children] outgrow us so much faster than we outgrow them."
"The human capacity for burden is ... far more flexible than you'd ever believe at first glance."
"Shooting stars are not stars at all. They're just rocks that enter the atmosphere and catch fire under friction. What we wish on when we see one, is only a trail of debris."
"Do all the wonderful things happen when we are not aware of them?"
"There are some nights when you just want to know there's someone else besides you in this wide world."
"The Pawnee Indians say the star deities populated the world: Evening Star and Morning Star honed up and gave birth to the first female. The first boy came from the Sun and the Moon. Humans rode in on the back of a tornado."
"The really amazing thing about all this is no matter what you believe, it took some doing to get from a point where there was nothing, to a point where all the right neurons fire and pop so that we can make decisions. More amazing is how even though that's become second nature, we all still manage to screw it up."
"Kids think with their brains cracked wide open; becoming an adult, I've decided, is only a slow sewing shut."
"I can't answer a single one of these [questions], which is how I know that whether I'm ready or not, I'm growing up."
"Even if we win, we don't."
"The people you love can surprise you every day. That maybe who we are isn't so much about what we do, but rather what we're capable of when we least expect it."
"Time is an optical illusion - never quite as solid or strong as we think it is."
"I cannot begin to tell you the words I use; none of them are big enough to bear the weight behind them."
"Kate as a toddler being tossed into the air by Brian, her hair flying behind her, her arms and legs starfish-splayed, certain beyond a doubt that when she fell to earth again, there would be a safe landing, sure that she deserved nothing less."
"It doesn't take a whole long life to realize that what we deserve to have, we rarely get."
"This is not how I thought our lives would go; and maybe we cannot find our way out of this alley. But there is no one I'd rather be lost with."
"Life sometimes gets so bogged down in the details, you forget you are living it. There is always another appointment to be met, another bill to pay, another symptom presenting, another uneventful day to be notched onto the wooden wall. We have synchronized our watches, studied our calendars, existed in minutes, and completely forgotten to step back and see what we've accomplished."
"There are just as many stories to be told in the dark spots as there are in the bright ones."
"There are stars in the night sky that look brighter than the others, and when you look at them through a telescope you realize you are looking at twins. ... the first one shines so bright, by the time you notice the second one, it's really to late."
"As her heart stops beating beneath my palm - that tiny loss of rhythm, that hollow calm, that utter loss."
--
This book was published in 2004, what kind if question is "What kind of person can afford a cell phone but not their own washer and dryer?" Even then, those two items were very different prices.
Thursday, January 12, 2017
Sam Reviews "Wedding Wipeout" by Jacob M. Appel
I found this book surprisingly enjoyable. I'm not typically a fan of "whodunnit" style books, but this one was exceptionally well written. The story was interesting and unpredictable. The main characters were witty and enjoyable. I think that if you're interested in mystery or whodunnit books, you will enjoy this one (and maybe even if that isn't your style you'll enjoy this one). It was extraordinarily graphic or brutal (which is good for a wide audience), and overall it was just a fun story that I'm glad I took the turn to read.
This is not a book that you're going to find a whole lot of page stopping quotes in. But for a free book, it could have been a lot worse. (Look into Goodreads Giveaways if you don't already!)
"There's no telling what a person will convince herself of to get through the day."
"Death doesn't seem as real in fiction as it does in life."
This is not a book that you're going to find a whole lot of page stopping quotes in. But for a free book, it could have been a lot worse. (Look into Goodreads Giveaways if you don't already!)
"There's no telling what a person will convince herself of to get through the day."
"Death doesn't seem as real in fiction as it does in life."
Friday, December 30, 2016
Sam Reviews "Letting Ana Go" by Anonymous
Trigger warning! At least for me. I'm not anorexic in the slightest but I do get bad anxiety whenever I think too long about food, weight, calories, carbs etc., so it was a roller coaster getting through this book. Overall I did think this was a good book, it didn't feel real and talked about the real nitty gritty dangers of anorexic / bulimic behavior. Worth reading if you've enjoyed any of the other "Anonymous" style books.
"Jack is the kind of guy I never had to worry about. This is the boy who wants me to come in and talk to his mom. He's the boy who wants to show me the moon."
"I've been trying to remember a time when my dad arrived at the door with flowers for my mom or me and I simply can't. Typically, when he showed up with a surprise, it was a car of some kind. As I stared at Jack's blue eyes, twinkling over the tops of the roses, I decided that flowers were better than a SUV any day."
^Yeah okay wtf ever
So bizarre that this book references when "The Perks of Being a Wallflower"was in theaters considering when I was in high school there weren't even rumors of a movie. This book was published in 2013.
"'I love you just the way you are. Doesn't that count for anything?'
"All I could do was shrug. He shook his head and took a step backward.
"'I don't understand how that doesn't make everything better. I keep thinking if I love you hard enough, or well enough, that you'll learn how to love yourself the way I do.'"
"Jack is the kind of guy I never had to worry about. This is the boy who wants me to come in and talk to his mom. He's the boy who wants to show me the moon."
"I've been trying to remember a time when my dad arrived at the door with flowers for my mom or me and I simply can't. Typically, when he showed up with a surprise, it was a car of some kind. As I stared at Jack's blue eyes, twinkling over the tops of the roses, I decided that flowers were better than a SUV any day."
^Yeah okay wtf ever
So bizarre that this book references when "The Perks of Being a Wallflower"was in theaters considering when I was in high school there weren't even rumors of a movie. This book was published in 2013.
"'I love you just the way you are. Doesn't that count for anything?'
"All I could do was shrug. He shook his head and took a step backward.
"'I don't understand how that doesn't make everything better. I keep thinking if I love you hard enough, or well enough, that you'll learn how to love yourself the way I do.'"
Sunday, December 25, 2016
Sam Reviews "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" by Anonymous (aka Amy Reed)
I feel like this a poor comparison to the book "Go Ask Alice". Granted, it has been some time since I read that book, I know this book was meant to be "inspired by" Alice, and I feel it feel extremely short. This book didn't read like the true diary of a 17 year old girl who fell into the wrong crowd. Honestly, this book read like novel written by the creators of D.A.R.E. Had I read this in middle school, I probably would have bought it more, but reading it as an adult with similar experiences (nothing stronger than weed), I feel like this book made it seem like doing weed is an instantaneous gateway to pills, cocaine, and shooting up meth and heroin, which makes the story seem ridiculously unrealistic.
In addition to the unrealistically addictive weed the main character was smoking, there was a decent amount of careless remarks about 9/11, especially considering this book was only written a year after the incident happened.
There was also a scene near the end in a public restroom that was super fucking gross, and extremely ridiculous considering the character development up to that point.
"It's so weird sharing a birthday with your county. Always fireworks: never for you."
"I feel like smoking pot used to be this thing that I was like TOTALLY AGAINST because of all the stuff that everybody tells you and because of the people who you see at school do it. ...now I'm different. Probably because I'm making the decision to do what I want. I never realized how much I let everyone else decide what I'm going to do."
"It felt so good to be there with them, to feel like I was a part of something special. "
"You could have knocked me over with a text message." Wtf is that even supposed to mean?!
"There's something about being up in the air like this and seeing the whole city laid out below me that never gets old. It looks beautiful from so far away, like somebody lined up perfect strands of red and white holiday lights in a grid and then plugged in the whole city. When you're driving around down in it, there's so much light, and noise and honking and screaming and laughter and music, but up in the hills, it looks so peaceful and everything is so quiet."
"I just can't. I don't have the energy. I don't need a date. I need a nap."
"I've always thought that the invisible and the imaginary are the same thing."
In addition to the unrealistically addictive weed the main character was smoking, there was a decent amount of careless remarks about 9/11, especially considering this book was only written a year after the incident happened.
There was also a scene near the end in a public restroom that was super fucking gross, and extremely ridiculous considering the character development up to that point.
"It's so weird sharing a birthday with your county. Always fireworks: never for you."
"I feel like smoking pot used to be this thing that I was like TOTALLY AGAINST because of all the stuff that everybody tells you and because of the people who you see at school do it. ...now I'm different. Probably because I'm making the decision to do what I want. I never realized how much I let everyone else decide what I'm going to do."
"It felt so good to be there with them, to feel like I was a part of something special. "
"You could have knocked me over with a text message." Wtf is that even supposed to mean?!
"There's something about being up in the air like this and seeing the whole city laid out below me that never gets old. It looks beautiful from so far away, like somebody lined up perfect strands of red and white holiday lights in a grid and then plugged in the whole city. When you're driving around down in it, there's so much light, and noise and honking and screaming and laughter and music, but up in the hills, it looks so peaceful and everything is so quiet."
"I just can't. I don't have the energy. I don't need a date. I need a nap."
"I've always thought that the invisible and the imaginary are the same thing."
Sunday, December 18, 2016
Sam Reviews "The Lace Reader" by Brunonia Barry
It isn't a bad story, but I had a hard time getting over the feeling that not a whole lot was happening in the first half of the book, which makes it difficult to sit down and commit to story. After the 75% point things took an active turn. I really did love the ending, but I can't see myself re-reading this book because of it's slow build up.
"...one time, we broke into a house and actually cleaned it. That's the kind of thing only a girl would do. Outlaw certainly, but homemaker, too."
"...she is attached to him, as usual. He compensates for it, like someone with a disability does, learning to move with her, forgetting after a while that this isn't the way he has always walked."
"I see people stealing glances at us when they think we're not looking. Maybe that always happens at funerals, those looks, maybe they happen all the time, but families never notice because they're facing forward, looking at the coffin and not the congregation."
"[The witches] are the only ones who are not treating this as a solemn occasion. They talk quietly among themselves, greeting others as they come in. Death isn't the same for the witches ... because they don't attach the prospect of eternal damnation to it."
"People are defined, finally, by the good works they do."
"I realize the selfishness of children. We love them, and we revolve around their universes, but they don't revolve around ours."
"Friendly fire, as if there is any such thing."
"Even three thousand miles away in California, as far as I can get without falling off the edge of the earth, I can still see May's light."
"In this moment he understood the draw of redemption. He understood why people wanted to be born again. Accept Jesus and you get a free ticket to heaven. No matter what you did in the past or would do in the future. When you were saved, you were saved. No penance. No Hail Marys, no moral inventories, no ninth-step amends. The Calvinists preached fire and brimstone, but only to the unsaved: the Catholics, the Jews, the Wiccans. The insiders were protected. A few indulgences and some tithing bought you an insurance policy. Who the hell wouldn't want to join a religion like that?"
"It's bad luck to watch people until they are out of sight."
"You aren't supposed to swim if you fall into 50 degree or colder water. You are supposed to just stay there, using as little energy as possible and wait until someone recuses you. If you start to swim, you'll force all your blood to you extremities and away from your vital organs. You'll die a hell of a lot faster that way."
"Her hair was blowing, and so was the gown. She looked like a goddess from some Greek myth. A wave of jealousy hit me hard. Not just because she was standing there so beautiful, with Jack looking up at her like that, but because the entire scenario seemed so completely staged. She must have been standing there for a while just waiting for us to see her ... it was so calculated it was ludicrous, and I couldn't believe Jack would actually be stupid enough to fall for it."
"'This island doesn't have a name. That sandbar over there has a name - they even named that, but they never named this place. It slipped through the cracks.'
"'Maybe it doesn't really exist. Maybe we're the ones who have slipped through the cracks.'"
"You're an interesting woman. You walk that line. The one between the real world and the world of the possible."
"Sometimes running away was exactly what you should do. Sometimes the only thing you could do was run away and never look back."
"...one time, we broke into a house and actually cleaned it. That's the kind of thing only a girl would do. Outlaw certainly, but homemaker, too."
"...she is attached to him, as usual. He compensates for it, like someone with a disability does, learning to move with her, forgetting after a while that this isn't the way he has always walked."
"I see people stealing glances at us when they think we're not looking. Maybe that always happens at funerals, those looks, maybe they happen all the time, but families never notice because they're facing forward, looking at the coffin and not the congregation."
"[The witches] are the only ones who are not treating this as a solemn occasion. They talk quietly among themselves, greeting others as they come in. Death isn't the same for the witches ... because they don't attach the prospect of eternal damnation to it."
"People are defined, finally, by the good works they do."
"I realize the selfishness of children. We love them, and we revolve around their universes, but they don't revolve around ours."
"Friendly fire, as if there is any such thing."
"Even three thousand miles away in California, as far as I can get without falling off the edge of the earth, I can still see May's light."
"In this moment he understood the draw of redemption. He understood why people wanted to be born again. Accept Jesus and you get a free ticket to heaven. No matter what you did in the past or would do in the future. When you were saved, you were saved. No penance. No Hail Marys, no moral inventories, no ninth-step amends. The Calvinists preached fire and brimstone, but only to the unsaved: the Catholics, the Jews, the Wiccans. The insiders were protected. A few indulgences and some tithing bought you an insurance policy. Who the hell wouldn't want to join a religion like that?"
"It's bad luck to watch people until they are out of sight."
"You aren't supposed to swim if you fall into 50 degree or colder water. You are supposed to just stay there, using as little energy as possible and wait until someone recuses you. If you start to swim, you'll force all your blood to you extremities and away from your vital organs. You'll die a hell of a lot faster that way."
"Her hair was blowing, and so was the gown. She looked like a goddess from some Greek myth. A wave of jealousy hit me hard. Not just because she was standing there so beautiful, with Jack looking up at her like that, but because the entire scenario seemed so completely staged. She must have been standing there for a while just waiting for us to see her ... it was so calculated it was ludicrous, and I couldn't believe Jack would actually be stupid enough to fall for it."
"'This island doesn't have a name. That sandbar over there has a name - they even named that, but they never named this place. It slipped through the cracks.'
"'Maybe it doesn't really exist. Maybe we're the ones who have slipped through the cracks.'"
"You're an interesting woman. You walk that line. The one between the real world and the world of the possible."
"Sometimes running away was exactly what you should do. Sometimes the only thing you could do was run away and never look back."
Monday, November 28, 2016
Sam Reviews "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" by Maya Angelou
Memoirs are hard to rate because some stories are better than others, but overall this was a very nice read. Maya lead a very interesting life even before she turned 18 and I was never bored reading her stories. I'm a little disappointed that my high school never made me read this book, so I experienced it for the first time at 23, but I'm glad I did. I'd recommend this to anyone who already knows they like memoirs, but also to people who are just starting to get into them (like me!).
"I hadn't so much forgotten as I couldn't bring myself to remember. Other things were more important."
"[The town] closed in around us, as a real mother embraces a stranger's child. Warmly, but not too familiarly."
"I could feel the evilness flowing through my body and waiting, pent up, to rush off my tongue if I tried to open my mouth. I clamped my teeth shut, I'd hold it in. If it escaped, wouldn't it flood the world and all the innocent people?"
"I have never known if Momma sent for us, or if the St.Louis family got fed up with my grim presence. There is nothing more appalling than a constantly morose child."
"I was liked, and what a difference it made. ... Childhood's logic never asks to be proved (all conclusions are absolute). I didn't question why Mrs. Flowers had singled me out for attention."
"For a few seconds it was a tossup over whether I would laugh (imagine being named Hallelujah) or cry (imagine letting some white woman rename you [Glory] for her convenience."
"Children's talent to endure stems from their ignorance of alternatives."
"She was our mother and belonged to us. She was never mentioned to anyone because we simply didn't have enough of her to share."
"Bailey was talking so fast he forgot to stutter."
"What child can resist a mother who laughs freely and often?"
"Through food we learned that there were other people in the world."
"I concerned myself less about everything and everyone. I often thought of the tedium of life once one had seen all its surprises."
"I had known all along the inevitable outcome and that I dared not poke into his knapsack of misery, even with the offer to help him carry it."
"My tears were ... for the hopelessness of all mortals who live on the sufferance of Life. In order to avoid this bitter end, we would all have to be born again, and born with the knowledge of alternatives. Even then?"
"Nat King Cole warned the world to "straighten up and fly right." As if they could, as if human beings could make a choice."
"Even as the scene was being enacted I realized the imbalance in his values. He thought I was giving him something, and the fact of the matter was that it was my intention to take something from him. His good looks and popularity had made him so inordinately conceited that they blinded him to that possibility."
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