#cbr9

It’s been a long time since a book I’ve read doubled as a personal journal, but my copy of Rebecca Solnit’s Men Explain Things to Me is about as marked up as my high school copy of Emerson/Thoreau’s Nature/Walking.

The book, a collection of essays about the individual and shared experiences of womanhood and issues of gender, power, and feminism, takes its name from the lead essay in which Solnit narrates an infuriating experience of an older gentleman oldwhitemansplaining one of her own books to her… a book that he didn’t even read! She springboards from this experience into the broader concept of silencing women, sometimes with deadly consequences.

It's time to vote for the June selection in Cannonball Read's    #CannonBookClub! 

Up Next: Non-Fiction, Hollywood style. Choose between Hadley Freeman's book about how 80s movies changed movie-making forever, Peter Biskind's Rise of Independent Film about Miramax and sundance, William J. Mann's book on 1920s Hollywood scandals, and a book about Breakfast at Tiffany's and its influence on American culture. Choose one by 4/19 for the June discussion. Then read up, and get ready to join in on June 14.

This book continues my trend of giving 5 stars to books I hated. Why, you might ask, would you give 5 stars to a book you swore heavily at and threw across the room upon completion? Because I hated it for all the right reasons:

Eggers is a manipulative writer. He wants me to be uncomfortable, to think long and hard about the echoing ramifications of this plot. It made me feel things; they weren’t pleasant things, but the book went above and beyond its job description, showcasing Eggers talented craft.

So what caused my 5-star disgust?

Renthal Front Sprocket 16 Tooth HONDA CB1000R 2011-2015,CBR1000RR 2004-2015,CBR9

Renthal Front Sprocket 16 Tooth HONDA CB1000R 2011-2015,CBR1000RR 2004-2015,CBR9 -

The Hate U Give

★★★★★

I have been trying to figure out what I want to say about this book for literally months now, and I just can’t do it. I give up. The amount of things I want to say are all swirling around in my brain and getting mixed up with each other, and everything is coming out all garbled whenever I try, so I give up and am now officially half-assing this review in a stream of consciousness manner with no regards for structure, and I am no longer going to worry about trying to say everything I want to. Dill with it.

Almost Midnight

★★★★☆

Rainbow Rowell is a CBR treasure so naturally I had to seek out Almost Midnight, two short stories published together in the UK, by cleverly giving it to my sister for her birthday and then borrowing it. I had already read “Kindred Spirits” but I had not read “Midnights” before.

Bet Me

★☆☆☆☆

This is the story of Min and Cal, a contemporary romance that has a lot of parallels to historical romance, in my mind.  It’s the spinster bluestoking and the rake with a heart of gold, updated to current models.

First we have Minerva Dobbs – she’s single and doesn’t have much luck with relationships.  I don’t know if she’s a virgin, that point isn’t mentioned, but overall she doesn’t have much experience.   She’s been dumped by her latest boyfriend and is reluctant to try again, planning to get a cat and remain alone.  She has a pretty older sister that is engaged, and a mother who is absolutely horrible.  You see, Min is also chubby and is trying to lose weight, a situation not helped by her mother’s harping on the fact.  She wears unflattering clothes and keeps her hair up in a bun because it frizzes otherwise; all she needs is a pair of spectacles to complete the frump factor.  Much like the historical bluestoking, Min is outspoken and smart.  She has a job as an actuarial, but the job is never really expanded on, just mentioned from time to time.

Much Ado About Nothing

★★★★☆

Claudio and Hero love each other and want to get married. Beatrice and Benedick….well that’s what the play is about. 

 Look this play makes no fucking sense what-so-ever. I mean, why is Hero wooed by someone else, in a mask? Why the fuck does Dogberry stumble around? And Claudio is dickweasel numero uno for believing Don John whatshisface…who meddles to actually give the play a plot. But then again, this is much ado about nothing so it does make sense that literally nothing of consequence happens.