watson_my_shelf's reviews
504 reviews

 

“I think you’ll find your real ending once you stop looking for it.” 

I’m going to be honest: it took me a minute to get into this. But once I did, I was into it. 

Martyr! Follows Cyrus as he tries to find the point of living and a reason to live, after becoming sober. Cyrus’s mother was in a plane that was shot down when he was just a baby and his father left shortly after Cyrus went to college. Poetry, different POVs, and past memories are mixed in throughout the book, providing a good background for how Cyrus got to where he is.

Cyrus’s feelings of loss, grief, and aimlessness will be relatable to many people. The way the author portrays grief in this book is so unique, yet so accurate. We see grief in Cyrus and other characters in different ways throughout the book, and it’s amazing to me how the author could do that. 

This is a book you should really know very little about going into. Know that it is a little weird, there is a lot of talk about death and martyrdom, and it is so gripping once you get into it. It seems like there is no plot at first, but it reveals itself in a beautifully-written way.

 

 TL;DR is that the book spoke to my inner teenager soul and gave her a big hug. I love this book. If you enjoy YA, read it. If you enjoy queer stories, read it. 

“I just want who I am to make sense.” yes, Imogen, yes. 

This book follows when Imogen goes to visit her pansexual BFF at college and to hang with her mostly-queer friend group. Imogen can’t put a finger on why she is so nervous, but as the weekend unravels, she has a little bit of an awakening. 

This story was fun and so sweet, with some fun hijinks and college life mixed in. The story focuses on finding our true selves independent of those around us. I love how the author built this amazing support system around the main character, but was also able to show a not so great friend and why it’s OK to let go of people we once loved as we change. 

While I am not bi, I feel (and reviews have corroborated this) that Albertalli did a great job of showing casual and overt bi-phobia. And how the characters respond and work through that is just amazing. 

I highly highly recommend reading this. And gifting it to a teen in your life!  

 

 From the first chapter, I was mesmerized by the beautiful writing style of this book. The words were almost musical. This book has such an interesting plot and, while I did like it, I didn’t love it. The plot was a little slow paced and I felt like nothing was happening at times, then too much was happening at others.

The symbolism the author uses with the mother and daughter passing by changing the colors of the skin to represent race was brilliant. This story is about the struggles of familial ties and finding yourself, how music can be transformative, and exploration. It really is well written!

I’ll be reading more from this author. 

If I didn’t know before going into this, I would have guessed there were multiple authors to each of these short stories. Each one has its own unique voice, but they all flow so well together. This book felt like eavesdropping on a group of ladies in the restaurant after Sunday church. The stories contain themes of love, family, hate, religion, and loyalty.

The ladies in each story are so different. Across 4 generations, there’s married women and single women. Queer and straight. In love and anti love. One common theme was infidelity. It was especially interesting to see how infidelity appeared to be common in the church circles. I really appreciated how the author’s tone was not judging or condemning, just telling stories.

Even though I don’t usually reach for short stories, I really enjoyed this book. While I did want more from some of the stories, I felt content once I finished the book.

The audiobook is so well narrated! 

 

Fight Night is written as a letter from 9-year-old Swiv to her dad, who left the family without saying goodbye. The story follows three generations of women: Swiv, her mom, and her grandma. They are all living in a house together while Swiv’s mom is pregnant, with the unborn child they affectionately call Gord. Swiv has been expelled/suspended from school, so her Grandma gives her education from everyday activities. Math lessons are counting grandma’s pills. Writing a family newspaper is journalism. I really loved how the grandma takes the opportunity to teach her granddaughter and also show her that life isn’t always easy.

This book is hilarious! But it’s also a little heart wrenching. It was so fun to read from a child’s point of view. The author did such a good job keeping the story interesting and entertaining while tugging on your heartstrings. 

As someone who was close to her grandma, I loved this story. It was lovely to read about a strong grandmother-granddaughter relationship.

 

Yoke has been on my to-read list since it came out. I would do yoga occasionally for the last few years, but established a routine yoga practice in the past year. I decided it was time to finally read this!

In Yoke, Jessamyn uses her autobiographical tales to explain how to approach yoga, doing it for the right reasons, and how America has culturally appropriated yoga. Jessamyn is so raw and honest throughout this entire book. She gives her personal experiences with racism, fatphobia, and capitalism. This book made me laugh out loud but also really made me think. 

As a fat yogi, I really related to Jessamyn’s stories and reflections. And her experiences that I did not personally relate to gave me a new perspective and challenged me to challenge my thoughts. 

It’s hard to put into words how good this book is & how much I appreciate it. Just know it’s thought provoking, healing, and inspirational. You don’t even have to be practicing yoga to appreciate this book. 

A fun rich people crime book!

The Color of Law sets out to show that America’s cities were racially segregated based on de jure segregation (laws and policies) and not by de facto segregation (e.g., institutions and real estate agencies), as many assume. 

I learned so much from this book. This book does a great job of digging into the racist roots of modern-day America. Rothstein clearly spent a lot of time researching and presenting all of the information to portray how racism and anti-Black laws still have an impact on society today. This book serves as a reminder that, to end systemic racism, we have to make changes to our laws and policies, not just the way people think. 

Highly recommend to any of my fellow white Americans. This book may take a while to get through, but it has so much good information. You will be shocked (or maybe not) at some of the things that got us to where we are today.

I read this for book club, so naturally I did not read the description before I started it. But after about 10 pages I was very confused and had to go read the description. This book is set in the times of Jesus roaming the earth and is from the POV of his wife, Ana. 

Much to my surprise, I loved this book! The writing is beeeeautiful. And the story just flows so well. I have never read a book set in a time period this far back, so this was really interesting. The story is such a unique take on the well-known story of Jesus. 

Someone at our book club discussion said that this is a girl’s story, and I couldn’t agree more. This book takes a time where women were very much erased from history, and focuses on the strengths and lives of some very strong women. 

I never would have guessed I enjoyed a book about Jesus’s wife, but I did!! 

The miscommunications all throughout this book are maddening. The characters were a little flat, but I guess that’s just smut! Too many steamy scenes for me.