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At first, Hargen's Curse seems like a lighthearted read, but as the story develops, it becomes darker, a struggle for power between those that want to hold onto it and those that want (and can) make a change. While I cannot say how historically accurate the town is, the twist of how they almost worship baked goods is interesting, well-woven into the story, showing how it affects life here and there, and essential to the plot. Hagen itself felt alive.

The characters are well-developed and round, read like real people with their own flaws and difficulties. However, it's hard to sympathize with them - Anika and Jonathan's relationship, while essential to the plot, was not one I cheered on for, and I'd find it refreshing if they had simply stayed friends. Taking the part of the main villain, Hans's thirst to keep the power he had achieved through his family line makes him go to great lengths that twist him beyond recognition of his self past.

Secondary characters feel real in their own way, and they read like the protagonists of their own history. Their actions seem to be motivated by their own goals instead of having everything to do with the main characters. While they aren't really likeable people either, support the narrative in meaningful ways, making each of them seem essential.

There's one scene of nudity that feels gratuitous. It kickstarts Jon's actions, but there were other ways to approach that. There's some back and forth between current situations and flashbacks that can be hard to follow sometimes. Nevertheless, the plot is developed and tied together.

Surprisingly, due to the book's lightheaded start, the ending is bleak and harsh. Still, it often portrays the reality of the world we live in, and it fits the narrative well.

All in all, it's worth the read. It has some different elements that make it enjoyable - mainly how the love for food influences the town's life. While the characters aren't people I would want to meet, they are well developed, add to the story, and give the plot life.

"[...] what effect do you think it will have on the people of Hagen if they come to believe that achievement has nothing to do with one's blood?"

Habits are something that permeates our lives, and learning how they work and how to change them can make an enormous difference. A lot of what we do in our daily lives can be broken down into habits, and if you know how to change it, you can exchange harmful patterns to healthy ones. That's why this book had so much potential in my eyes.

It delivered in many aspects, as I did learn quite a bit about habits and how they are formed, which is, in the end, what the book proposes to do, but it was also lacking in others: some chapters felt dragged, and some stories were entertaining to read but didn't add much to the point being made.

The biggest problem I had with this book was that it felt purposeful too long. The anecdotes and researches were fun to read, but often one would suffice to illustrate a point and, instead of moving on, another anecdote would start to be told. And so on and on and on.

It seemed like, as the book went on, less and less from each chapter would be interesting. Everything after chapter four seemed more about reinforcing the points made in earlier chapters or simply showcasing more anecdotes and stories of habit change. As I read on, I found myself skimming more and more, just kind of eager to get to the end.

While the book did deliver in telling how to change a habit, forming a new one from scratch was left a bit on the wayside.

However, the writing was entertaining - the anecdotes were told very well, the talk about researches was actually fun to read, and the book has an easy and fluid language that even laypeople will understand. It's easy to follow the argument along, even with the constant interruptions of one story to tell the other.

The anecdotes chosen were pertinent to the point being made and helped illustrate well what was being talked about. It was easy to understand what the author was saying, and also how to apply that to your own life. The first part, where habits are explained, was the best part of the book, with the chapter on keystones habits on the second part following close behind.

The appendix on how to use the ideas explained was great and helpful - more than the rest, I'd say, but at the same time, reading the whole book is essential to really understand what is in the appendix, unless you're already familiar with habits and their mechanisms.

All in all, I found this book to be helpful. It's not a magical formula, and should never be seen as such, but it can offer some insight on how to make changing habits a bit easier - or at least, doable. Still, if you're interested in understanding how habits work, and how you can tweak them to your advantage if you have the strength and will to put in the task, this is definitely an entertaining and worthwhile read.

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“Willpower isn’t just a skill. It’s a muscle, like the muscles in your arms or legs, and it gets tired as it works harder, so there’s less power left over for other things.”

The Ocean at the End of the Lane is a powerful story - about childhood, about memory, about being human. It's a beautiful book, in its own right - a story told through the eyes of a child, that managed to capture the essence of childhood so perfectly well, that I find it surprising that it was written by an adult.

The main character was simple - he is a young child, after all - but, to me, that was part of the beauty of it. As simple as the character was, he was actually relatable. How he saw the world around him, how he saw the adults of his life, all brought back memories of my own childhood, making me remember how I saw the world around me and my parents - and, in a way, how I still see them.

The other characters were interesting, mystical, and yet, very real. In many passages, I saw my grandmother in Lettie's grandmother, while in others, she was something else entirely. I saw in the protagonist's parents my own parents' struggles and hardships, how they tried their best, but were sometimes influenced by anger and emotion and all their own flaws.

While the setting of the book is very mystical, with multiple dimensions, universes and beings, it felt somehow very real. A lot is left to be explained, that is for sure, but our own universe is filled with unexplained mysteries and unanswered questions. What the protagonist knows is what we know, and a child definitely doesn't know that many facts.

The book was real. It felt very real, and it spoke to me deeply. Memory is something so very precious to me, and this book definitely sparked memories of my childhood - happy and sad ones. A book that manages to speak so close to the heart is a book worth reading.

“Nothing's ever the same," she said. "Be it a second later or a hundred years. It's always churning and roiling. And people change as much as oceans.”

Often in life we might feel like we can only accomplish success by the 'common-sense' definition of it: a high-paying career, in a respected field, and being recognized as such by others. We might set concrete goals without much direction or reason to do something, only because it seems like the right thing to do, that might or might not help us achieve our goal.

It's interesting - and important - to shift our perspective and understand our own definition of success. What do we truly desire, and what we think we do because people expect us to?

This book is about reaching deep within ourselves, and figuring out what those desires are. And once we know for sure, we can better align our actions to complete goals that will allow us to reach those feelings. As a workbook that proposes to do just it, the Desire Map is an interesting resource to guide in this journey. I certainly took a lot from it.

However, it's important to be careful, as not all strategies work for everyone, and the work to reach deep inside ourselves and understand our core desires is still entirely ours - no one else can do it for you. Can you do it without the help of the book? Certainly. Is the book a useful tool to help you there if you're stuck and need the help? I'd say it is.

If one is willing to put on the work - really do it, without trying to reach the end and work around shortcuts -, it's a very interesting and might be a very powerful tool of introspection and self-knowledge, that can definitely lead to self-improvement. But the work is totally personal, and the book should never been seen as a magical solution.

“You can’t always choose what happens to you, but you can always choose how you feel about it.”