L I F E
A Twitch update but I reached 300 followers! This has been a goal of mine for a while now on Twitch and we recently reach the goal last week! Thank you to anyone who decided that hearing me ramble about books while I play games badly was entertaining enough for a follow!
B O O K S
In August, I read 6 books!
For transparency, books marked with an asterisk (*) signify books I received through work at PRH.
We Are Not Numbers*
We Are Not Numbers is a project established in 2015 to provide English language writing workshops for young Palestinians in Gaza. This is a collection of their works over the last ten years. An unparalleled look into the lives of the youths of Gaza. Some pieces are heartful and hopeful while others are sombre on their future. A brilliant collection of the current lives of Palestinian youths, some who are still in Gaza, some displaced and others who are no longer here to tell their stories. As Motaz Aziza said: this is Gaza as it truly is, written by those who live it every day.
A Resistance of Witches*
When young witch Lydia Polk discovers that Hitler is raising his own army of witches who infiltrate the Royal Academy of Witches, she is forced to search for an ancient book without the help of her peers. On her own in Occupied France, Lydia finds her companions in Rebecca, a French resistance fighter, and Henry, a Haitian-American art historian. With the Nazi and their witches hot on her tail, Lydia is running out of time.
You ever find a book and read its synopsis and think, “now did someone even think of a plot like this?….. I have to read it.” This is it for me. I had a lot of fun reading this! I do think Morgan Ryan really missed out on not expanding on the different forms of witchcraft and magic. We discover that Henry is also magically inclined as well and small lore drop we learn about him is SO interesting and it’s disappointing that we just move on from that information. There is a part of the story where we don’t follow Lydia for a few chapters and I genuinely think that removing her POV from those few chapters really ruined the good pacing that the story starts out with.
Bookworm*
A love letter to childhood books! Lucy Mangan revisits her childhood readings and relives the the tales and lives of the characters from our childhood from authors such as Dahl, C. S. Lewis, Judy Blume and J.R.R. Tolkien. A lovely ode to the books that we love and cherish in our childhood. I actually used this book’s concept to write my own version Bookworm which I’ll post on the blog soon!
The Man Who Planted Trees*
I actually read this when I was mostly delirious from sickness. I picked this up from the shelves at work and I realised I watched the animated film but never actually read the original tale. A short story about a man who meets a shepherd as she begins to plant acorns across the wilderness. Ten years later, he returns to see the forest that has grown. An allegorical tale of a modern fable to highlight thought into action.
Of Monsters and Mainframes
I actually DNF’d this at 80%. I usually don’t include DNF books but since I was so close to finishing, I felt like I had to mention it here. Demeter is a shuttle ship designed to take humans from Earth to Alpha Centauri. But her passengers keep dying and she doesn’t know why. She joins forces with her past visitors to take down Dracula before he can harm anymore people.
A fun weird and quirky plot but it felt like the author was trying to shove so much into one book that even the synopsis felt confusing. It’s actually incredible how much happens in this book but it felt SO boring. Almost gave me the same vibes as the Murderbot diaries but none of the cast are remotely interesting enough to care about. (Except for one.) Severely lacking in anything that is memorable. I decided to DNF because I realised as I was reading, it felt like I was skipping most of the scenes until I got to the one character I actually liked. I don’t think I could actually tell you what was happening outside of their chapters.
What Happens in Amsterdam*
When Dani accepts a job that takes her from L.A to Amsterdam, she’s desperate to make this move a fresh start. Newly dumped and fired, her first week in the Netherlands goes from bad to worse when she crashes into her old ex-boyfriend, Wouter, the exchange student who lived with her family ten years ago. When Dani’s job falls apart and her visa is at risk, she accepts Wouter’s plan to become his partner so he could inherit his family home.
I only read this book because it was set in Amsterdam and I showed the book to my Dutch friend who was not impressed by the plot. I’ll be honest, the only thing that impressed me was that the author made marriage of convenience boring. How did you even do that?
That’s it for this month! Tell me what went on in YOUR life this month! What sort of things was important for you this month? New obsessions? New TV shows? Or book? Any new song recs (I’m always open to new music!)? Best books you read this month?
as told by zaheerah 