Becca
I am not usually a celebrity memoir type. But after multiple friends told me “You would love this book. It's about child labor, misogyny, and Mormonism,” I realized two things. First, I have to reevaluate my special interests so that I will continue to have any friends to recommend me anything. And second, I must read this celebrity memoir.
One might assume Jennette McCurdy is lucky. Luckier than most, even, and by a wide margin. She's rich. She's famous. She's young. She's pretty. She has adoring fans who grew up idolizing her. And come to think of it, it's kind of sad she stopped acting. What lost potential, to fade into obscurity and let Hollywood slip away.
In reality, Jennette McCurdy's childhood was hell. It was also not a childhood. Jennette's mom always badly wanted to act, and decided to live out her dream through Jennette. And that she did, in such a disturbing and exploitative manner it made me hate a cancer survivor.
It's hard to condense my thoughts on this, but here are some various things it made me ponder—spoiled to shorten this review a tad —How Jennette's best acting was always done when the cameras weren't rolling. How desperate kids are to please their parents and other adults, even and perhaps especially when the love they receive is conditional. How child stars simultaneously grow up too fast, yet never get to grow up. How much havoc one adult can wreak when none of the surrounding adults bother to jerk out of passivity and intervene. How violently we reject help if it incites too much contact with reality before we're ready to face it. How recovery is never, ever linear. The way food can make us feel like our life is either wholly in control or wholly out of control. The way some parents respond to their children's growth and independence as a threat and betrayal. The way abuse settles into our hearts and bones, making it difficult to identify and escape even after someone is truly and finally gone..
I could go on for days, and I really doubted this would live up to the hype. I kept trying to take a break because it gets heavy, but I couldn't because it was too good. Jennette is not only brave and candid about her many struggles, but also a strong writer. She is an excellent storyteller. She read the audiobook, and her narration was great. I'd recommend this to fans of [b:Educated|35133922|Educated|Tara Westover|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1506026635l/35133922.SY75.jpg|53814228] or [b:The Glass Castle|7445|The Glass Castle|Jeannette Walls|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1523542886l/7445.SY75.jpg|2944133]. Content warning for...pretty much everything. But especially eating disorders.
TL;DR—I'm glad, too.
As someone who grew up in a culture that really impressed upon girls and women the need to create and nurture life, I thought this book would be a fitting note to start the year on. Only problem is, I hate self-help books. And I am correct.
There were some good kernels. Namely:
• The idea that being assertive or simply voicing your needs detracts from femininity. That because our ideas of femininity hinge on accommodating others, when we don't do that, others may react to our speaking up as unattractive, undesirable, and unfeminine.
• How you don't have to wait to accept yourself until you've achieved some imaginary metric you insist is a prerequisite. It's okay to take care of yourself as is, instead of withholding grace in perpetuity because you struggle to meet the unattainable standards you set for yourself.
• The self-care industry (I'm referring to band-aid solutions like sheet masks and bath bombs) doesn't get at the root of exhaustion and burnout, and in fact contributes to it. If you are overwhelmed by life, and are told that you need to make time to take more bubble baths, that's just one more thing on your plate (plus it often involves paying a company money). Instead of looking at how your workload is unattainable, self-care can put even more pressure on you to find the time, funds, and energy to fix feeling stretched thin.
Now for my qualms:
• As the title may suggest, this is a pretty binary book. Now, don't get me wrong; I understand girls and women are socialized in specific ways, as are boys and men. And to Colier's credit, she does mention how cultural attitudes about gender identity are shifting, and there is an anecdote about a woman dating a woman. But the book is pretty much all “THIS IS HOW IT IS FOR WOMEN.” It doesn't feel untrue or exclusionary, per se, but it is limited in scope.
• Speaking of limited, and I don't really know how to explain this well, but this is a white lady book if ever I read one. There are very brief mentions of race and class, but a lot of it feels like “This middle-aged marathon running JD mom of three feels exhausted! But she is the perfect modern woman, the picture of success. What gives?” This segues right into the next qualm, which is—
• Individual focus instead of awareness of systemic forces. This is an issue I have with the self-help genre as a whole. It's always about being courageous enough to finally make a change. The facade of this is empowering, but it's divorced from a lived reality for many people confined by discrimination and circumstances that are impossible to opt out of and rise above. At one point Colier lists how some are born into advantages, but steers away from how our identities factor into the quality of our education, food, healthcare, housing, etc. I just find analysis that doesn't level with broader institutional inequities boring and superficial.
• I liked that the book was short, but I kept waiting for the actual advice to start. And then it ended. It was basically a string of anecdotes (so many; those were the bulk of the text) all ending with “But you have to actually voice what you need.” Okay, so how do I do that? You can't just say “get curious about who you are” and expect everything else to fall into place.
It could have been worse, but it also could have been better, but also, maybe it is just bad to me because of who I am, but also, Nancy told me to accept myself as I am so this review is valid.
We All Play is a calming book about environmental stewardship, caring for animals, and how lots of species play, not just humans. Including a glossary in the back and a website to help with Cree pronunciation are bonuses. Flett's inspiration from her father is another sweet addition. There is a specific word choice that I clocked as a double entendre, but I worry that may be a me problem and mentioning it is more self-incriminating than helpful.
“Everybody knows what a hug means, and all people speak the language of laughter. So, no one had a problem understanding what the other meant.”
What a gorgeous book in every sense. The illustrations, the message, the connections between refugees displaced long ago and those displaced now. This is a quietly powerful yet resolute story about the responsibility people have to welcome others when they have nowhere else to go. It is a new favorite of mine.
A heart-wrenching tale of two turtles finding and loving the same hat. At no point does it cross their minds to share the hat. They would never even consider it. This was really funny, and I liked it more than [b:This Is Not My Hat,|13531024|This Is Not My Hat|Jon Klassen|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1360096324l/13531024.SX50.jpg|19092692] but [b:I Want My Hat Back|11233988|I Want My Hat Back|Jon Klassen|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327888784l/11233988.SX50.jpg|16160067] is something special.
A joyous, colorful, multicultural book about a little boy in desperate search of paletas on a hot summer day. He sprints past adults selling tamales, Korean BBQ, and a bike repairman. Finally he finds the man selling cool refreshing treats. A lively and dynamic rendering of community with a sweet (pun intended) lesson at the end about how it pays to be kind. And there's a boppy song to go with it.
“That isn't how it's always been done.”“Then we'll just change how it's done.”
This is an easy way to explain marriage equality and gender expression to kids, without it being too in your face or heavy. It didn't blow me away, but it's fun and I see how it could help adults answer questions children have.
Orion is very scared of the dark, until one day he faces his fear and meets The Dark. He learns not only that there's nothing to be afraid of, but that there's a lot of things to explore, fun to be had, and memories to make. This is a beautifully illustrated lesson about how much good can come from braving the unknown. I can imagine this being fun for storytime, maybe especially an evening one.
I think the concept of this book is important and the illustrations and cover are both really nice. I also liked [b:I Love You, Baby Burrito,|52516002|I Love You, Baby Burrito|Angela Dominguez|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1589256377l/52516002.SX50.jpg|78067465] which is by the same author.
I just struggled with the execution. It feels like a book about family and love—fun, food, traditions, making memories, telling stories. Then you turn a page and it's like, “You know what I don't care for, though? Bigotry.” It feels very much like that “knock it off” Cody Ko song, if anyone knows what I'm talking about.
I considered that maybe this was the point—that xenophobia and racist crop up suddenly, sometimes robbing us of joy in ordinary or even celebratory moments. I just think that it's introduced in a way that feels jarring in terms of the writing itself, not the underlying message. I expected and wanted to love this, but I think it could have gotten the same points across in a way that felt more impactful. Hopefully it lands with others more than it did me.
I remember reading this book when my youngest sibling was a baby and coming to my mom absolutely distraught that they would in fact grow up. I reread it today for the first time in forever and I am sorry to report that I do not love this book forever. In retrospect, creepy and scary. We can't be breaking into peoples' homes to pick them up while they're sleeping. We can't be doing that.
I am pretty squeamish and recently exclaimed to a doctor at an urgent care visit, “I hate having a body!” so this was a gamble for me. But this is a joyful, colorful, affirming journey showing children how much variety there is amongst humans, and not to make moral value judgments based on physical differences. It is super inclusive, thoughtful, and encouraging.
A funny existential book with scarce words that somehow covers a lot: how experience limits knowledge, how little minds come up with big questions, the bravery and determination it takes to face the unknown, and chicks pipping. Very cute illustrations, too. I enjoyed this far more than I thought I would, and I think kids would too.
