oomilyreads's reviews
163 reviews

“They say it's good to let your grudges go, but I don't know, I'm quite fond of my grudge. I tend it like a little pet.”

This is a brilliant contemporary mystery that has both drama and dark comedy. Moriarty seamlessly weaves between light and dark pulling the reader in. She does not shy away from kindergarten politics, merging of modern families, domestic violence, rape and murder. What will drive a person to do such a thing and who is willing to protect those involved at all costs?

There are 3 female leads: Madeline who is hilarious, rash and fiercely loyal. She wears her heart on her sleeve. Her internal dialogue and the conversations between her and her husband have made me laugh out loud. Celeste, the picture perfect beautiful wife, mother and former lawyer. Yet there is definitely more than meets the eye as she battles her own demons. Jane who is a single mother and seems to be running away from something sinister in her past. She is very protective of her son. All three women have their own secrets…and the power those secrets have on them.

I love this author’s writing style. This novel is intriguing, engaging and you can’t help but guess over and over who the murdered and murderer might be.

Big Little Lies was deliciously good. I want to read it all over again.

Cathy Hong’s unapologetic criticism of how Asian Americans are presented in America and the complex “minor feelings” that arise when the portrayal betrays a person’s own reality. Her collection of essays are like a stream of consciousness, part memoir blended with Asian American History. There’s more Asian history in this book than was taught in my high school history. She gives voice to the invisibility that many Asian Americans feel. Asians are both victims and perpetrators of racism. The model minority is a myth and it depicts Asian Americans as living the American Dream. We should be GRATEFUL and never raise questions. In reality, “belonging is always promised but just out of reach so we behave”. We are constantly gaslighted.

Minor Feelings is provocative, tense, intimate dive into her psyche exposing questions about family, female friendships, and her own identity. She reflects on her own family’s history which is many sense many other Asian Americans can related to. I highly recommend this book.

This was difficult & frustrating. Only good part was the last 10% of the book. Cleo McDougal is not likeable. She’s not gracious. And she’s not unrelatable. After the book, I STILL don’t like her. She’s not even a good person for most of her life and admits to this. She’s cutthroat, ruthless and doesn’t even have a sense of humor. I really wished she had a sense of humor. She’s literally a mood killer and doesn’t laugh at anything and corrects people often. She kills me. She has no understanding or real relationship with her teenage son. She’s so socially awkward. Get off your high horse lady! She often says she did everything by herself, always on her own and never giving anyone credit. She finally realizes that she only had to ask and be vulnerable but lets be real here, she DIDN’T do it all on her own. Emily, Gaby, her sister Georgie helped her. She didn’t give them enough credit. Maybe if she spent more time on caring for her son and raising him into a decent young man, she wouldn’t be chasing after him trying to tell him to change.

She is terrible to her sister who seems to only be nothing but good to her and she never makes up for it. She even mentions several times her sister was a disaster to her parents and their family dynamics. That it was really just the three of them (mother, father & her) and pretty much wanted nothing to do with her sister. As if she’s a nuisance/outcast and she was gladly to do it even after their death. I wish the author had her address how horrible she was to her sister all those years. The reason I gave this 3 stars is because I liked the 10% and I did like some of the themes in the book. It’s true that women are scrutinized, ridiculed and torn apart when they go publicly about their sexual predators.

She often says her own equal is Gaby. Does that mean you are often looking down on others? That’s what it sounds like to me. What kind of feminist are you anyway? If you have to keep proving to others you are better than them, then it takes away from who you are. Just do what you need to do and stop talking. She also never apologizes and gets mad when anyone does. She became a “feminist” by tearing down other women.

PS for the LOVE of books, please stop it with the run-on sentences. I obviously write run-on sentences but I’m not an author. This author has run-on sentence after run-on sentence. Sometimes for whole paragraphs! CAN WE GET A PERIOD IN HERE SOMEWHERE?

This is poetry written in a novel form. It is literary fiction and magical realism. There’s elements of southern gothicsm. This is culture in the deep south. It is a beautifully written and takes you into the deep bayou of the south.

I loved Jojo. I love his relationship with Pop (maternal GF) and kayla (little sister). He was very protective of, Kayla, Pop, and Mam (maternal GM). He no longer considered his birth mama his mother but called her Leonie and his father, Michael. It started when she left him both physically and emotionally and he cut himself on a can. This symbolized her disconnect with him as a mother. She always put herself first, even when her children were hungry, she buys herself food and a drink and keeps the chain. The father is just the same, as destructive and unable to be a father. Neither of them stand up for Jojo when he got handcuffed and the gun was out pointed at his 13 year old head. He was just a child and no one stood up for him. The kids are always an afterthought.

The story became too lyrical for me. You can’t but submerge yourself in her imagery but it could get a bit much. Especially towards the end when something is happening with one of the characters, it just would not stop. There were words upon words and I got distracted by everything but the book and found myself skimming. I really needed her to get to the point.

I did not relate to Leonie but I didn’t hate her. I sympathized with her and like Jojo, ther were times I would think “this is it, she’s going to show them love and compassion…” but in the end even Mam said it “She ain’t never going to feed you.” I was disappointed by her character development. First of all, it was unbelievable that a drug addict that acts like a child with a temper and impatience can have such beautiful well articulated thoughts in her mind but when she spits out her words, she sounds so cruel and unappealing. In the end, when I was still rooting for her…she failed me. And seems like everyone else has failed her too.

3 POVs. I would have preferred if it was POV of Jojo, Leonie and another person such as Pop. It was really difficult to follow the ghosts perspective with so much imagery, and the descriptionso would go on and on.

It was anticlimactic although there were some devastating answers to some questions. The book does not end with healing but leaves the some wounds wide open. This must be what the author is trying to convey what life can be like in the deep Mississippi ,that it doesn’t always get better. There’s not always answers and you just go on with life…..

“Sometimes, the world don’t give you what you need, no matter how hard you look. Sometimes, it withholds.”

I read this for #womenintranslation for #WITMonth ! The atmospheric writing is a surreal, quiet and haunting. The Memory Police rounds up everyone who have not lost their memories, the rest of the inhabitants and the main character lose their memories slowly. Eventually, the people start losing themselves body part by body part…. Until there’s nothing left.

Memory has many intricate layers. When you think of an object, more layers can be peeled away with the thoughts that it conjures. When you pick up an item, a rush of times it was used, or who has given it to you or other memories arises. This is what happens when you’ve had a severe traumatic brain injury, dementia or stroke or psychological illness. As a physician, I’ve had many patients who lose the ability to physically use their limbs or have neglect where they are unable to be aware of items to one side of space. Sometimes they pick up items like a toothbrush and try to brush their hair with it. Or use a pen to comb their hair. They forget what these items are for. Sometimes they have somatoparaphrenia in which they don’t know that the arm attached to them is theirs. This is what happens to the inhabitants of this island. The people become “hallowed out” and they fade as people. Maybe that’s how people feel when they have had these types of injuries to their brain.

I find the ending sad, discouraging and feels like someone dying quietly without a fight… In today’s world, we hope that we can retrain our brains to accommodate and rewire to be able to adapt and function again. I would hope this dystopian does not relate to our real life.

This book started off the trilogy series for me and half way through, I knew I had to read the other 2 books. It reminded me so much of my own high school and college days. Lara Jean is 16, never had a boyfriend but had many “loves”. When she realizes nothing will happen, she’ll write them a “love letter”, seal it and put it in her hat box. But suddenly, the boys start receiving her letters and one of them is to her sister’s first love and recent ex-boyfriend. It sounds horrible, except it’s not because we follow the fake dating troupe of her and her first crush/kiss Peter K.

I really liked her relationship with her 2 sisters and widowed dad. Who they all still call “daddy”. They are half Korean/half white and Lara Jean describes Margot as “ she belongs to herself” as in she knows herself, confident and a leader, Kitty their youngest sister as “she belongs to no one” – strong willed and confident. She said of herself, “I believe to my sisters and my dad”. And you can see that she’s the sweetest, nostalgic of all 3 sisters.

So you want to talk about race by Ijeoma Oluo, narrated by Bahni Turpin

It was definitely easy to listen to on audiobook. The topics she touches upon are important and complex.

Her chapters on School to Prison Pipeline and Model Minority were really interesting and made several good points. Now I can't stop imagining how young black children are viewed in kindergarten compared to their peers. It angers me.

Oluo's work is important but delivery at times has fallen short. I'm not sure if it's because the audiobook wasn't narrated by her or just her style of writing. (I love Bahni Turpin in other works, one of my favorite narrators). The pros are it’s easy to listen to, read and is conversational. There are points she has in every chapter that can be done in everyday conversation. It’s not enough just to educate yourself. You must speak up and act.

She addressed her white audience in the last chapter. I am not white but I listened anyway. I think it would have been better if she pointed out that all of us are and can be and have been racist in some form or another. We ALL have bias. I know plenty of Vietnamese people who are and it's incredibly hard to talk to them about this topic and #blm. I need to read a book on how to have a conversation with them.