Ahhhh este libro me ha llenado de una profunda nostalgia por algo que no he tenido, o que he atisbado, o a lo que aspiro, o que quizás no sé alcanzar, o qué sé yo.
Este libro es el arraigo personificado, la familia, la tierra, y la profunda relación que se forma con ambos. Ana Iris Simón consigue hablar de miembros de su familia (y de sus historias) como pura mitología, y en realidad qué es la historia sino mitología.
Como ser que sufre de un desarraigo profundo este libro me ha parecido terriblemente entrañable, me ha tocado profundamente, y me ha dejado soñando en futuros de comunidad, arraigo, lazos, historias, y cuidados.
Un tema que merece que se explore desde muchos ángulos y perspectivas diferentes, tal y como hace este libro.
Varios personajes en varias relaciones de (pseudo)maternidad que te llevan con ellos en sus pensamientos y emociones más complejas, difíciles, y contradictorias.
Edwin St. Andrew is eighteen years old when he crosses the Atlantic by steamship, exiled …
Review of 'Sea of Tranquility' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
A nice and easy read, came in knowing NOTHING and I do recommend to go in blank if u wanna dabble. Not a lot of depth in characters, I think that's what made me feel a bit disconnected throughout.
I must say though, this book is kind of insane cuz it connected me with the ACTUAL longevity of the human race and that is bonkers innit? There were girlies like me living, feeling, and thinking in 1844? And there will be others humans, in flesh and bone, living, feeling, and thinking in 2440? What will societies look like in 2440? Where will we be? What trials and tribulations will humans persist? And what wonders will we discover about the vast and magical natural world we have found ourselves in?
I'm but a speck of consciousness in infinite time and space !!!! SAD !!!!
Will I ever really understand economics? Haha of course not!
This book was great though! It's the socialist economic proposition I need to learn by heart to spit at my neoliberal father - all weaved beautifully through the history of one family across the 20th and 21st centuries. And there are pretty drawings :-)
Review of 'Seven Moons of Maali Almeida' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
Just wrote a whole review and deleted it by accident with my stupid thumb so here's the tl;dr
- a great!! "after life" genre piece. I kind of love the genre actually (the good place anyone?) and this was such an interesting exploration of an underworld full of ghosts, shadows, trauma, and moral ambiguity (now thats what I call a fun Friday evening amirite?)
- heartbreaking and uber cynical (almost absurdist) account of the civil war in Sri Lanka. I think very nuanced approach, far from hegemonic narratives that usually explain it. A take where everyone is a bit evil and everyone is so very human
- petty closing statement: haaaate the main character, loooove the sidekick (team jaki 4ever)
In twenty short books, Penguin brings you the classics of the environmental movement.
In The …
Review of 'Democracy of Species' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
I shit you not when I tell you this has become my Bible. My sacred text. I'm so moved. Dare I say spiritually shook.
This is a collection of 3 essays that show different ways in which indigenous language, knowledge, and wisdom allow humans to form a gratitude-, reciprocity-based relationship to the more-than-human. The author is a scientist herself and, while acknowledging the scientific language as a helpful tool, urges us to interact with the world in this intuitive way that we experience when truly immersed in nature. Urges us to see nature not as "it" but as a complex web of life buzzing with wisdom that must be respected and honored. Urges us to take mindfully, and to find the ways in which we can give back.
Honestly I find it hard to put into words how beautiful this worldview is, how much it spoke to me, how I …
I shit you not when I tell you this has become my Bible. My sacred text. I'm so moved. Dare I say spiritually shook.
This is a collection of 3 essays that show different ways in which indigenous language, knowledge, and wisdom allow humans to form a gratitude-, reciprocity-based relationship to the more-than-human. The author is a scientist herself and, while acknowledging the scientific language as a helpful tool, urges us to interact with the world in this intuitive way that we experience when truly immersed in nature. Urges us to see nature not as "it" but as a complex web of life buzzing with wisdom that must be respected and honored. Urges us to take mindfully, and to find the ways in which we can give back.
Honestly I find it hard to put into words how beautiful this worldview is, how much it spoke to me, how I want to embody this, spread the word (truly I sound like a convert!!). Like this book features the rules of the Honorable Harvest and I swear this will become my Our Father. As a secular late-stage capitalism girlie I feel like this is the kind of stories and narratives of the world that fill my spirit with meaning, gives me a sense of communion and belonging, inspire me, give me direction. This truly IS my Bible, fight me!!!!!!
Una joven fotógrafa se pone en contacto con una escritora veinte años mayor para tomarle …
Review of 'La seducción' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
A ver... Nunca no me va a gustar un texto sobre bolleras intensas siendo bolleras intensas. Y el libro es una buena reflexión sobre las formas diferentes en las que se vive el deseo, la relación intimísima e inseparable entre desear a la otra y percibirte a tí misma, y por supuesto, la (potencialmente confusa) interacción y aproximación de dos seres deseantes: la seducción.
Pero debo decir que me costó conectar con la prosa poética que forman los pensamientos de la protagonista, o con la historia. No sé, quizás había mucha poesía-ensayo y poca tensión? Y aún así las partes de poesía-ensayo no incitaron mucha respuesta emocional en mí, no sé por qué. Lo que más me movió fue quizás las partes en las que se deja ver los momentos de pésimo autoestima de la protagonista, lol (we can all relate!)
Pero bueno, sigue siendo una historia de bolleras intensas …
A ver... Nunca no me va a gustar un texto sobre bolleras intensas siendo bolleras intensas. Y el libro es una buena reflexión sobre las formas diferentes en las que se vive el deseo, la relación intimísima e inseparable entre desear a la otra y percibirte a tí misma, y por supuesto, la (potencialmente confusa) interacción y aproximación de dos seres deseantes: la seducción.
Pero debo decir que me costó conectar con la prosa poética que forman los pensamientos de la protagonista, o con la historia. No sé, quizás había mucha poesía-ensayo y poca tensión? Y aún así las partes de poesía-ensayo no incitaron mucha respuesta emocional en mí, no sé por qué. Lo que más me movió fue quizás las partes en las que se deja ver los momentos de pésimo autoestima de la protagonista, lol (we can all relate!)
Pero bueno, sigue siendo una historia de bolleras intensas viviendo en un paraíso mediterráneo sin trabajo ni precariedad; un buen acto de escapismo y un must para la mitología e historia lésbica española!
A collection of short stories by a millenial girlie whose main characters are mostly middle aged men (daddy?). Precisely many stories showcase, directly or indirectly, the estranged relationship between millenial kids and their boomer parents, but indeed from the father perspective (daddy????)
Here are some notes I made at the end of a couple of stories: "suggestive" "the banality of evil" "the eerie in mediocre lives" "all of us"
Very very impressed by the beautiful writing in this book. An often heartbreaking, often inspiring, revision of hegemonic interpretations of the Quran to enrich them with new perspectives that consider queerness, womanhood, and overall the "other" that has been forgotten, e.g. women in the Quran that are mentioned just in passing.
It's beautiful to see the Quran, a text that is open to being reinterpreted over and over again, being looked at from the perspective of a queer Muslim woman. What is beautiful is that now queer Muslim women are starting to have a voice, a platform; they're starting to emerge from the darkness of oppressive history. Slowly, they are allowed to exist - enough to give their own interpretation of their sacred text, to reconcile their being and their faith. More of this please!!!
Last and also least... (white woman voice) As a white woman,,,,,, it is ALWAYS good …
Very very impressed by the beautiful writing in this book. An often heartbreaking, often inspiring, revision of hegemonic interpretations of the Quran to enrich them with new perspectives that consider queerness, womanhood, and overall the "other" that has been forgotten, e.g. women in the Quran that are mentioned just in passing.
It's beautiful to see the Quran, a text that is open to being reinterpreted over and over again, being looked at from the perspective of a queer Muslim woman. What is beautiful is that now queer Muslim women are starting to have a voice, a platform; they're starting to emerge from the darkness of oppressive history. Slowly, they are allowed to exist - enough to give their own interpretation of their sacred text, to reconcile their being and their faith. More of this please!!!
Last and also least... (white woman voice) As a white woman,,,,,, it is ALWAYS good to hear voices of other, less privileged women. This story is a humble reminder that my activism and solidarity must extend to "the other", that my experience doesn't equate to the experience of other (queer) women. I am in fact NOT every woman, Chaka Khan!!!
Un libro donde realmente... no pasa nada. Lo único que pasa en este libro es que Eulalia empieza unas prácticas de profe en un colegio de monjas. Punto. Pero el tiempo que he pasado con Lali ha sido como toda una vida <3
Supongo que en general el libro es the ultimate coming of age tale, un cuento sobre hacerse mayor mientras la protagonista reflexiona sobre el hacerse mayor de les peques a los que cuida - hacerse mayor entendido como marchitarse, pasar por el tubo, tener que amoldarse a una sociedad rota, con exigencias arbitrarias pero terriblemente dañinas.
Y además ves el proceso paralelo de marchitamiento de Lali, el vapuleamiento al que se ha visto sometida en su corta vida. Aún teniendo relaciones cercanas muy sanas (he apreciado la falta de trauma materno la verdad), sigue habitando un mundo hostil del que se siente alienada y que todavía está …
Un libro donde realmente... no pasa nada. Lo único que pasa en este libro es que Eulalia empieza unas prácticas de profe en un colegio de monjas. Punto. Pero el tiempo que he pasado con Lali ha sido como toda una vida <3
Supongo que en general el libro es the ultimate coming of age tale, un cuento sobre hacerse mayor mientras la protagonista reflexiona sobre el hacerse mayor de les peques a los que cuida - hacerse mayor entendido como marchitarse, pasar por el tubo, tener que amoldarse a una sociedad rota, con exigencias arbitrarias pero terriblemente dañinas.
Y además ves el proceso paralelo de marchitamiento de Lali, el vapuleamiento al que se ha visto sometida en su corta vida. Aún teniendo relaciones cercanas muy sanas (he apreciado la falta de trauma materno la verdad), sigue habitando un mundo hostil del que se siente alienada y que todavía está aprendiendo a navegar, al igual que sus peques. Mundo hostil, léase, ONVRES, poder, instituciones, precariedad, el status quo, por decir algunos.
Ha sido una verdadera delicia adentrarse en la mente de Lali, ver lo puro y bello y también lo oscuro y embarazoso; lo transcendental y también lo mundano. Un detalle que me ha parecido gracioso ha sido el contraste entre la profundidad y complejidad que Lali puede tener cuando estás en su mente versus lo que expresa en diálogo: corto, ambiguo, inexpresivo. Es esta la condición adolescente? Tener una mente en pleno proceso de florecimiento y expansión, y sin embargo expresar una versión llana y predecible? Quizás sí.
Conclusión: una delicia de libro, 13/10, o más bien 5/5.
So I went in knowing only that a) it was dystopian sci-fi and b) nothing else, tbh this is more than enough to get me to read a book.
Context: this book was written in 1996, right when Taiwan ended its martial law, leaving the country exposed to the rest of the world (aka capitalism) (but also other nice things like (queer) ideas!!).
The presented dystopia: ozone layer is gone, UV radiation is so strong that humans need to make Atlantis-like replicas of countries, occupying ocean beds of the planet. Clearly a critique on growthism and techno optimism, and almost literally where we're heading lol (if you substitute the ocean for Mars) (somebody stop Elon Musk pls lol im scared)
In any case, crazy plot and plot twist and, once you look into the context, it makes much more sense - as with …
Holy shit what did I just read?
So I went in knowing only that a) it was dystopian sci-fi and b) nothing else, tbh this is more than enough to get me to read a book.
Context: this book was written in 1996, right when Taiwan ended its martial law, leaving the country exposed to the rest of the world (aka capitalism) (but also other nice things like (queer) ideas!!).
The presented dystopia: ozone layer is gone, UV radiation is so strong that humans need to make Atlantis-like replicas of countries, occupying ocean beds of the planet. Clearly a critique on growthism and techno optimism, and almost literally where we're heading lol (if you substitute the ocean for Mars) (somebody stop Elon Musk pls lol im scared)
In any case, crazy plot and plot twist and, once you look into the context, it makes much more sense - as with any dystopia, this is a piece that unveils the turmoil and anxieties of its time by projecting onto a certain future. In this case, this future presents ubiquitous commodification, mass surveillance, omnipotent corporations (this is getting too real....) but also adding many queer elements (hooray!).
Quite a mind-boggling short read, and a cool way to peep into 90s Taiwan through queer sci-fi!
@Foskea this goes out to you cuz I'm reading this after you clicked "Want to Read" on this very website! And also today is your bday what a coinkindink! Happy bday Fossie xxxx
