Tag: book review

A Year in Books

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IMG_1268I’m excited to announce the start of a new project this year! As a certified bookworm, I will hopefully be reading a lot this year (as a literature student, I probably won’t have much choice). At the end of each month, I’ll pick the book I liked the best, and write a short review of it here.

 Love reading as much as me? Join me in this project, and recommend some books for me to read!

I will also be more active on Goodreads this year. Unfortunately, I’m a slow reader and tend to forget to record when I start/finish books (oops) but I’ll try my best to keep track. Check out my reviews there if you like! My goal is to read 19 books this year, the same as the age I will be turning (50 proved to be too many last year, so I’m taking baby steps). In this, I’m shamelessly copying Carrie Hope Fletcher; take a look at her videos, some of which are book related!

Happy reading 🙂

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Reading Experiences

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Sometimes stepping out of your comfort zone is rewarding.

I recently read two books whose writing styles are quite different from the books I usually read. The first is called The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter, which is a collection of stories. The second is Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi. In the case of the first book, I didn’t have a choice; it was part of my English course. Although the stories themselves are a little difficult for me to understand, and are not really the genre I usually read, I quite like certain aspects of the writing style. Some parts, such as the changing perspectives and tenses, are not ones that I particularly like, although I have to admit that they add to the mood of the stories. On the other hand, some of the imagery and literary devices used are powerful, and effectively add to the reader’s experience of the story.

I still remember one line from one of the stories: “Her hair falls down like tears.” I think that is one of the nicest descriptions I have ever read! In such few words, it makes me imagine hair flowing gracefully like a river, the strands running down like rivulets and falling fluidly along the back. The mention of tears also adds a melancholy to the description, and reveals a bit more about the character, while hiding just enough to keep the reader wondering. It really opened my eyes to the endless possibilities that can be used, when writing, to describe something beautifully and uniquely. There are other examples I could use, but this sentence has stuck with me since I read that particular story. Although I must say that the stories themselves are not quite my taste, the writing style itself is often beautiful, in my opinion.

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