Court

Will add to quotes:
Forgiveness can be used to break the cycle of revenge, as it prevents survivors from using their victimhood to victimize others.


This book, published in 2018, uses an example of a Palestinian suicide bomber and I can't help but wonder what its opinion or example would be now.

Read at: https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/culture/49876/what-of-this-goldfish-would-you-wish

“People would give their answers, and Yoni would edit them down and make clips of the more surprising responses. Before every set of answers, you'd see the person standing stock-still in the entrance to his house. Onto this shot he'd superimpose the subject's name, family situation, monthly income, and maybe even the party he'd voted for in the last election. All that, combined with the three wishes, and maybe he'd end up with a poignant piece of social commentary, a testament to the massive rift between our dreams and the often compromised reality in which we live.”

The characters were great, especially the fish.

This was great. I teared up at Heather running into a mother that used to be in her son's football team and she tells them the other boy should have passed more often to her son. Grief can be a beast, especially the loss of a child (or a twin). And I thought it was written.


I'll probably seek out the show at some point.

Loved the art, the following of the seasons, and the main character

Fantastic message of it's cool to be kind

I just didn't understand why the other beans in the “cool” clique were... I guess hot and cold with the main character. It seemed all of a sudden that the group that had kinda excluded him were kind to him on what could have been an awful day and then are intermittently friendly with him.

So what I got was “friendship can be kinda random and inconsistent” which is true, but also an odd message for a kids book.

I also think that I'm not a huge fan of Jory John.

I don't know how well this book will age as seemed to encapsulate a very specific time period of Boris Johnson during COVID. It is of course a parody of [b:The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse 43708884 The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse Charlie Mackesy https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1579017235l/43708884.SX50.jpg 68017220], which I enjoyed and have looked at other parodies of. The homeschooling refers to school via zoom, not what I was expecting, but it made sense. I was kinda confused about the parents, they seemed homeless but not? Not sure, but I love penguins and laughed at the dog on wheels.

Finally got around to reading this, here: https://talesofmytery.blogspot.com/2013/11/ray-bradbury-scythe.html#google_vignette

Fantastic atmosphere and lovey description.

A weak 3
This was a little heavy on the young adult for my taste.

Break down of the rating of each story, I skipped the last one

Starsong 3.5
Afterbirth 2.75
Heart in her hands 3
Death in the Sawtooths 3
Truth about Queenie 3
Moon Apple 3
Stone Mary 2.5
The One Who Stayed 2
Divine are the Stars 3.25
Daughters of Baba Yaga almost good 2.75
The Well Witch 3
Beware of Girls with Crocked Mouths 3 the ending :/
Love Spell 3.25
The Gherin Girls 3.5
Why They Watch Us Burn n/a

Archaia continues to deliver high quality stories.

I'm a sucker for working dogs, especially guide dogs and I love that the character Meg says “For the record we say ‘Guide Dogs.' ‘Seeing eye' is a brand name of a training school in New Jersey.”

Bear has heart, his love and loyalty is undeniable.

I teared up, both at Bear's unwavering devotion and when it mentioned the Randolph–Sheppard Act (it's real) — Patrick is capable of doing this job, his right to have a job should not be impeded.

Again, I'm not sure if I read the synopsis and then forgot it. It is entirely possible that I just saw [a:T. Kingfisher 7367300 T. Kingfisher https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1642281799p2/7367300.jpg] and added to my tbr.This weaves great thematic elements, emotional atmosphere, and social commentary (what it's like to be a woman, a soldier, of a particular class, nationality, etc.).

One of my learners requested to read a book about electronic stores and this is one of the results that Epic Books provided. It's not terrible, but it didn't seem terribly useful either.

Read in two sittings which I think helped as someone else mentioned that it became tedious for them.

I liked the brain & heart dinos as well as the depression and anxiety representations.
I thought the capitalization commentary was a little funny.

I wasn't sure about this but then I felt that it touched on some classic science fiction and literary ideas: class struggle, how to deal with large problems and what solutions are acceptable, ‘traditions' should be questioned, etc.I also got [b:The Giver 3636 The Giver (The Giver, #1) Lois Lowry https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1342493368l/3636.SY75.jpg 2543234] elements, but not in a bad way.

3.5

A little jumpy at times, had me thinking how did we get here?, an annoying ‘3rd act break up/fight' cliche, and there's only one sword fight lesson. But also yay for the art, the heart, and the queer representation.

I couldn't find [b:The Panda, the Cat and the Dreadful Teddy: The enormously funny parody of Charlie Mackesy's The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse 57810959 The Panda, the Cat and the Dreadful Teddy The enormously funny parody of Charlie Mackesy's The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse Paul Magrs https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1631754949l/57810959.SX50.jpg 90559656] so I found this on Hoopla. It's closer to a 2, but I do like the art and the main message that positivity for positivity's sake is nonsense. I rather like [a:Beatrix Potter 11593 Beatrix Potter https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1560035067p2/11593.jpg] which cuts both ways for this volume.

Was a little confused as I thought Kylie had stood up for Huda each and every time, but maybe Huda felt that it wasn't enough, which is valid. I still thought that part was super well done.

I read, hmmm maybe skimmed or perhaps read and then forgot, the synopsis of this book.So even though I read the synopsis I was expecting something different. I was expecting a curation of awesome stories with a smattering of ‘advice' or analysis of why the story is so good. Sigh. Girl, it's in the title: ‘how to' and ‘essential guide'. It's heavy on the ‘advice' and light on the fantastic stories. The stories seem truncated, and when you shrink an already short story they feel like fragments; it's unsatisfactory. I understand that they're supposed to be a guide rather than a collection of stories. I tried to shift my expectations, but I disliked the way that the book is organized and it's tone. It feels like: Braggy tone (The Moth is so renown, yeah but I've never heard of you), obvious point, repetitiveness, and then unclear examples (what did that exemplify, was that a complete story, is the example section at the beginning or the end of a story, was that a snippet of the story or the quote etc.).It felt like a lot of telling (although in a haphazard way because there's a lot of voices, like when five people try to explain something rather than just one), when I'd prefer to be shown first and then have the well crafted, full example broken down. I also got irritated in that I felt that it was harped upon that the stories have to be true and then they used MADE UP examples. WHY?! I understand why they used the story of Little Red Riding Hood as an example, but when she talked about the made up example of a person going to law school when their parents owned a clown school I was confused and pissed. At least one of the people who worked on this is a curator, so why are there fake examples?Maybe I'm not the audience for this, things might be obvious to me because I've taken a creative writing class and a poetry class, a lot of it sounds Theatre speak and like drama class exercises (also familiar), for part of a job I sat in a children's creative writing after school program, had decent English teachers, and read widely.I adore Neil Gaiman (and especially love hearing his voice), [a:Malcolm Gladwell 1439 Malcolm Gladwell https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1564001739p2/1439.jpg], [a:Mike Birbiglia 3390625 Mike Birbiglia https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] and [a:Hannah Gadsby 18140595 Hannah Gadsby https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]. [a:David Litt 16253547 David Litt https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1585159414p2/16253547.jpg] also shares a moment of handing Obama tangled headphones. Parts of this were great, but it was always the stories. Guess I should just seek those out.

Sometimes I appreciate a subtle villain but then again this antagonist is one you love to hate.

Kingfisher continues to be awesome.

Will add more review soon.

I choked a little when the giant, now reformed, finds the child now wounded and guides him to paradise.

While reading it I thought of Toxicity by System of a Down and about how in North Korea there's only so many government approved haircuts. There's a lot that can be said about hair as expression and part of identity, fun to think of that and other forms of self expression and the freedoms and limits on exercising that expression.

Other fun ideas to mull over:
Chaos in not synonymous with evil, it can be neutral/natural or luck
Order however is only so natural and usually has an agenda, for bees it's to make honey
Order/conformity
Chaos, the unknown, the other, fear, energy


I would happily reread this again

http://www.nonsenselit.org/Lear/ll/dln.html

I started it and then recalled that I didn't really enjoy Sir Edward Lear, oh how Edward Gorey's aesthetic can suck me in. Gonna mark it as abandoned so I can either avoid or come back to it.

I usually love LA Theatre Works, but I didn't love the musical interludes, some were out there and I checked to see if the recording had been interrupted.

Not bad, but the physical copy might be better. Some pages were difficult to read because it was white text on cream or pale yellow.

I've been wanting to read this for years, and I think that this is one of those instances that something just happens at the right time.

It was occasionally annoying to read Cain and Hettie's dialogue.

Neil Gaiman is listed as the consultant. I'm not sure how much input he gave, but I feel that they got the emotional weather and characters right.

I rather enjoyed the characters of Eve, Abel, Cain and Tempto whom I though was somewhat of a clever twist.
Oh the Fair Folk and Shakespeare references made me smile.

Listened to the audiobook and it reminded me of a ‘how it's made' episode.

Liked the White Elephant tidbit