Adam rated The Age of Insecurity: 4 stars
The Age of Insecurity by Astra Taylor
Writer, filmmaker, and organizer Astra Taylor takes a curious, critical, and ultimately hopeful look at the uniquely modern concept of …
I mostly read and re-read childrens books, but here are the adult books I also read when I get the chance.
This link opens in a pop-up window
Writer, filmmaker, and organizer Astra Taylor takes a curious, critical, and ultimately hopeful look at the uniquely modern concept of …
The first few chapters I thought the writing style was pretty contrived...but it ends up really working the more you get to know Maria. Other than that, wow, it's amazing, it's great. I will probably read it again.
Paradise Estate picks up a few years down the road (and on the other side of the peak COVID pandemic years) from where The Magpie Wing left off, following Helen as she endures some major life events in addition to the shitshow that is renting and sharing an anywhere-near-affordable house in a major Australian city.
So many of the characters are looking for genuine connection with each other, if they could only get past their own vices, preoccupations, insecure and unsatisfying work, and inhospitable living conditions.
All the Paradise Estate housemates share a common dissatisfaction with the world at large and have a real desire to make change, which is tempered by their own personal histories of injury and loss, vanity (in Nathan's case), and the jadedness and exhaustion that comes with precarious living and working well into their 30s and beyond.
I've spent most of my adult years in …
Paradise Estate picks up a few years down the road (and on the other side of the peak COVID pandemic years) from where The Magpie Wing left off, following Helen as she endures some major life events in addition to the shitshow that is renting and sharing an anywhere-near-affordable house in a major Australian city.
So many of the characters are looking for genuine connection with each other, if they could only get past their own vices, preoccupations, insecure and unsatisfying work, and inhospitable living conditions.
All the Paradise Estate housemates share a common dissatisfaction with the world at large and have a real desire to make change, which is tempered by their own personal histories of injury and loss, vanity (in Nathan's case), and the jadedness and exhaustion that comes with precarious living and working well into their 30s and beyond.
I've spent most of my adult years in the kind of world these characters inhabit, so to say I found the book relatable is an understatement. I share Rugby League playing laborer/anarchist Rocco's frustration with the typical Australian arms-length friendship and aversion to direct action. I probably also share(d) his idealism of restlessly moving and looking for the ideal place to be and community to be in, (which of course will never work out if you don't stick around and learn to accept where you are and the people around you).
Like The Magpie Wing, you'll get a little extra juice out of knowing the places, names and bus routes in this book, but the universality of getting older and feeling you're not fucking getting anywhere is the real story, which Paradise Estate evokes so well.
Convenience Store Woman (Japanese: コンビニ人間, Hepburn: Konbini Ningen) is a 2016 novel by Japanese author Sayaka Murata. It captures the …
The classic work on debt, now is a special tenth anniversary edition with a new introduction by Thomas Piketty
Before …
The classic work on debt, now is a special tenth anniversary edition with a new introduction by Thomas Piketty
Before …
Readers of all ages and walks of life have drawn inspiration and empowerment from Elizabeth Gilbert’s books for years. Now …
Shaun Prescott has a knack for eerie mundanity — or should it be mundane eeriness? Like The Town, Bon and Lesley is set in a disappearing central western NSW town, but instead of the town literally disappearing, the town of Newnes is being vacated, abandoned and burned as a result of a widespread end-of-times scenario.
Bon and Lesley are two train passengers who become stranded in Newnes and form a makeshift family with local brothers Steven and Jack while trying to be better versions of their city selves and Lesley, at least, attempts to construct something to attach her hopes to in a futureless world.
I don't feel like recounting the plot really does justice to the way Prescott ilustrates the absolute averageness of his characters and their inner monologues (so unremarkable as to be quite strange, but so relatable in how they feebly navigate the non-negotiables of life) while …
Shaun Prescott has a knack for eerie mundanity — or should it be mundane eeriness? Like The Town, Bon and Lesley is set in a disappearing central western NSW town, but instead of the town literally disappearing, the town of Newnes is being vacated, abandoned and burned as a result of a widespread end-of-times scenario.
Bon and Lesley are two train passengers who become stranded in Newnes and form a makeshift family with local brothers Steven and Jack while trying to be better versions of their city selves and Lesley, at least, attempts to construct something to attach her hopes to in a futureless world.
I don't feel like recounting the plot really does justice to the way Prescott ilustrates the absolute averageness of his characters and their inner monologues (so unremarkable as to be quite strange, but so relatable in how they feebly navigate the non-negotiables of life) while creating a kind of ashen, deadened magic that circulates in the forgotten country towns he builds in his stories.
No other books leave me with the feeling that Prescott's do. Might go and re-read The Town now to keep it hanging around.