Book Review: OPPOSITE OF ALWAYS by Justin A. Reynolds

Title: Opposite of Always
Author: Justin A. Reynolds
Publication year: 2019
Rating: ★

Jack Ellison King. King of Almost.

He almost made valedictorian.

He almost made varsity.

He almost got the girl…

When Jack and Kate meet at a party, bonding until sunrise over their mutual love of Froot Loops and their favorite flicks, Jack knows he’s falling—hard. Soon she’s meeting his best friends, Jillian and Franny, and Kate wins them over as easily as she did Jack. Jack’s curse of almost is finally over.

But this love story is…complicated. It is an almost happily ever after. Because Kate dies. And their story should end there. Yet Kate’s death sends Jack back to the beginning, the moment they first meet, and Kate’s there again. Beautiful, radiant Kate. Healthy, happy, and charming as ever. Jack isn’t sure if he’s losing his mind. Still, if he has a chance to prevent Kate’s death, he’ll take it. Even if that means believing in time travel. However, Jack will learn that his actions are not without consequences. And when one choice turns deadly for someone else close to him, he has to figure out what he’s willing to do—and let go—to save the people he loves.

I don’t often read fluffy, young adult romance novels—in fact, I tend to avoid them like the plague—but something drew me to Opposite of Always, so much so that it was one of my most anticipated releases of 2019. Perhaps it’s because it promises a wider scope of what YA can offer for marginalised groups, specifically black kids: that yes, while books like The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas and Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds are an important and necessary part of the literary landscape, there should and can also be space in the market for more brevity, lightness and plain old fun for black protagonists.

In many ways, Opposite of Always delivers on that promise. It’s a story about a high school senior called Jack King who lives his life in a perpetual state of second best until he meets Kate, a college freshman with whom he immediately hits it off. But just as life finally seems to be giving Jack what he wants, Kate dies, trapping Jack in a time loop to relive their romance and potentially save her life. I’m sure that for many lovers of YA romance, this will be a great read—but unfortunately, it has only added to my personal conviction that this genre is not for me.

VIDEO: Why You Should Read MONSTER by Walter Dean Myers

Title: Monster
Author: Walter Dean Myers
Publication year: 1999
Rating: ★★★★

Sixteen-year-old Steve Harmon is on trial for murder. A Harlem drugstore owner was shot and killed in his store, and the word is that Steve served as the lookout.

Guilty or innocent, Steve becomes a pawn in the hands of “the system,” cluttered with cynical authority figures and unscrupulous inmates, who will turn in anyone to shorten their own sentences. For the first time, Steve is forced to think about who he is as he faces prison, where he may spend all the tomorrows of his life.

As a way of coping with the horrific events that entangle him, Steve, an amateur filmmaker, decides to transcribe his trial into a script, just like in the movies. He writes it all down, scene by scene, the story of how his whole life was turned around in an instant. But despite his efforts, reality is blurred and his vision obscured until he can no longer tell who he is or what is the truth. This compelling novel is Walter Dean Myers’s writing at its best.

Book Review: GO TELL IT ON THE MOUNTAIN by James Baldwin

Title: Go Tell It on the Mountain
Author: James Baldwin
Publication year: 1953
Rating: ★½

Go Tell It on the Mountain, first published in 1953, is Baldwin’s first major work, a semi-autobiographical novel that has established itself as an American classic. With lyrical precision, psychological directness, resonating symbolic power, and a rage that is at once unrelenting and compassionate, Baldwin chronicles a fourteen-year-old boy’s discovery of the terms of his identity as the stepson of the minister of a storefront Pentecostal church in Harlem one Saturday in March of 1935. Baldwin’s rendering of his protagonist’s spiritual, sexual, and moral struggle of self-invention opened new possibilities in the American language and in the way Americans understand themselves.

I’ve been wanting to read James Baldwin for a number of years, but I’ve always struggled with figuring out what to read first. Baldwin’s bibliography is large and far-reaching: he wrote novels, essays, plays, short stories and poems, and with a body of work so varied, it can be intimidating to sift through it all and find a place to start. However, I was immediately drawn to Go Tell It on the Mountain, Baldwin’s semi-autobiographical debut novel that promised an intimate look at the religious world and the role Christianity plays in the African American community.

Book Review: WHEN I HIT YOU by Meena Kandasamy

Note: This book contains depictions of domestic abuse and rape.

Title: When I Hit You
Author: Meena Kandasamy
Publication year: 2017
Rating: ★★★½

Seduced by politics and poetry, the unnamed narrator falls in love with a university professor and agrees to be his wife, but what for her is a contract of love is for him a contract of ownership. As he sets about reducing her to his idealised version of a kept woman, bullying her out of her life as an academic and writer in the process, she attempts to push back – a resistance he resolves to break with violence and rape. 

Smart, fierce and courageous, When I Hit You is a dissection of what love meant, means and will come to mean when trust is undermined by violence; a brilliant, throat-tightening feminist discourse on battered faces and bruised male egos; and a scathing portrait of traditional wedlock in modern India.

Recently, I’ve read two books that I’ve found difficult to talk about after having finished them. Earlier this month, I read Jane Eyre, a book so iconic and beloved that it doesn’t really warrant any more reviews, especially one that would only add to the endless amounts of praise it’s already received (though I did still film a goofy and slightly incoherent video review/discussion for it, if you’re interested in checking that out). By contrast, When I Hit You is a book for which I find myself in the painful minority of people who weren’t quite as sold on it as everyone else seems to have been. This will be my best attempt to describe why.

Book Review: THE LONG WAY TO A SMALL, ANGRY PLANET by Becky Chambers

Title: The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet
Series: Wayfarers, #1
Author: Becky Chambers
Publication year: 2015
Rating: ★★

Follow a motley crew on an exciting journey through space—and one adventurous young explorer who discovers the meaning of family in the far reaches of the universe—in this light-hearted debut space opera from a rising sci-fi star.

Rosemary Harper doesn’t expect much when she joins the crew of the aging Wayfarer. While the patched-up ship has seen better days, it offers her a bed, a chance to explore the far-off corners of the galaxy, and most importantly, some distance from her past. An introspective young woman who learned early to keep to herself, she’s never met anyone remotely like the ship’s diverse crew, including Sissix, the exotic reptilian pilot, chatty engineers Kizzy and Jenks who keep the ship running, and Ashby, their noble captain.

Life aboard the Wayfarer is chaotic and crazy—exactly what Rosemary wants. It’s also about to get extremely dangerous when the crew is offered the job of a lifetime. Tunneling wormholes through space to a distant planet is definitely lucrative and will keep them comfortable for years. But risking her life wasn’t part of the plan. In the far reaches of deep space, the tiny Wayfarer crew will confront a host of unexpected mishaps and thrilling adventures that force them to depend on each other. To survive, Rosemary’s got to learn how to rely on this assortment of oddballs—an experience that teaches her about love and trust, and that having a family isn’t necessarily the worst thing in the universe.

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet came to me highly recommended, both by members of the online book community and by several of my friends in the offline world. The pitch seemed perfect: an upbeat, character-driven space opera that doesn’t get too bogged down in the science. That sounds perfect for me! …Right?

Unfortunately, wrong. I’m sure this book will work for many others and clearly already has, but I was personally underwhelmed. Call me a grouch, but in my opinion, The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet is too happy and optimistic for its own good.

Book Review: THE OBELISK GATE by N. K. Jemisin

Note: This review contains spoilers for The Fifth Season, my review of which you can find here.

Title: The Obelisk Gate
Series: The Broken Earth, #2
Author: N. K. Jemisin
Publication year: 2016
Rating: ★★

The season of endings grows darker as civilization fades into the long cold night. Alabaster Tenring – madman, world-crusher, savior – has returned with a mission: to train his successor, Essun, and thus seal the fate of the Stillness forever.

It continues with a lost daughter, found by the enemy.

It continues with the obelisks, and an ancient mystery converging on answers at last.

The Stillness is the wall which stands against the flow of tradition, the spark of hope long buried under the thickening ashfall. And it will not be broken.

Book Review: ROSENCRANTZ AND GUILDENSTERN ARE DEAD by Tom Stoppard

Title: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
Author: Tom Stoppard
Publication year: 1967
Rating: ★★★★

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is a play which, as it were, takes place in the wings of Hamlet, and finds both humour and poignancy in the situation of the ill-fated attendant lords.

The National Theatre production in April 1967 made Tom Stoppard’s reputation virtually overnight. Its wit, stagecraft and verbal verve remain as exhilarating as they were then and the play has become a contemporary classic.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is my first official read of 2019, and I’m beyond grateful that I picked up this book in the midst of suffering through The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers. I really needed something to assure me that it is still possible for me to enjoy reading. And by “enjoy reading”, I really do mean just enjoy it, on the most basic level. Sometimes, all you need from a read is a good time, and that much Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead certainly delivers.

Reading Highlights of 2018

Hello, friends, and welcome to 2019! I hope this upcoming year brings you lots of good books to read.

This might be coming on a little late compared to when most bookish blogs do this, but I thought I’d take the time to reflect on my 2018 reading year. While it’s always interesting to read top ten lists counting down the standout reads of the year, I thought I’d do this reflective post a little differently. Instead of simply listing my top picks of the year, I thought I’d base this list off of the Academy Awards. Instead of a numbered list or even a division of books by category, I thought I’d use categories highlighting stong writing style, engaging plots and even great covers. Of course, no Oscars-inspired list would be complete without equivalents to Best Picture and Best Director; in this case, Read of the Year and Author of the Year.

I had a super fun time putting this post together, so I hope you enjoy and get something out of it—maybe some books to look out for in 2019?

Book Review: BRIDGE OF CLAY by Markus Zusak

Title: Bridge of Clay
Author: Markus Zusak
Publication year: 2018
Rating: ★

Five Dunbar brothers are living – fighting, loving, grieving – in the perfect chaos of a house without grown-ups. Today, the father who left them has just walked right back in. He has a surprising request: Who will build a bridge with him?

It is Clay, a boy tormented by a long-buried secret, who accepts. But why is Clay so broken? And why must he fulfil this extraordinary challenge?

Bridge of Clay is about a boy caught in a current, a boy intent on destroying everything he has in order to become everything he needs to be. Ahead of him lies the bridge, the vision that will save both his family and himself.

It will be a miracle and nothing less.

At once an existential riddle and a search for redemption, this tale of five brothers coming of age in a house with no rules brims with energy, joy and pathos. Written in Markus Zusak’s distinctive style, it is a tour de force from a master storyteller of the heart.

Look. I tried. I really did.

I desperately wanted to love this book. After all, Markus Zusak is one of my most trusted authors. In 2013, The Book Thief reignited my love of reading. Two years later, I was worried that an earlier Zusak release, I Am the Messenger, would fail to impress—and then it subsequently became one of my two favourite reads of that year. Time and time again, Zusak has blown me away. So even though the vague plot descriptions that circulated years before the book’s official publication date was announced did nothing to inspire me and the exclusive excerpt released earlier this year left me feeling underwhelmed, I still ached to have this book in my life.

Even now, it feels weird speaking negatively about this book. I’ve tracked its progress for too long, I think. I’ve read and watched interviews of Zusak discussing this book and all the toil that went into writing it. I’m very well aware that this book is more than a decade’s worth of labour, and I respect all the work that’s gone into it even though I can only imagine a slither of it. But in the end, I have to be honest with myself: Bridge of Clay is one of my least favourite reads of 2018.

Book Review: AND THE OCEAN WAS OUR SKY by Patrick Ness

Title: And the Ocean Was Our Sky
Author: Patrick Ness
Illustrator: Rovina Cai
Publication year: 2018
Rating: ★★★½

With harpoons strapped to their backs, the proud whales of Bathsheba’s pod live for the hunt, fighting in the ongoing war against the world of men. When they attack a ship bobbing on the surface of the Abyss, they expect to find easy prey. Instead, they find the trail of a myth, a monster, perhaps the devil himself…

As their relentless Captain leads the chase, they embark on a final, vengeful hunt, one that will forever change the worlds of both whales and men.

Quick disclosure: Patrick Ness is my favourite author. I was introduced to the man’s work with the Chaos Walking trilogy, a series I still hail as my favourite series of all time despite never having worked up the courage to reread it in fear of having it break my heart all over again. Next, I read A Monster Calls, a hauntingly beautiful tale of a young person coming to grips with the death of a loved one that revealed to me Ness’s depth of skill as a writer: not only was he capable of writing a fast-paced, action-filled YA, but he could also go slower, more introspective, more poetic if need be.

I’ve read all of Ness’s work for younger audiences: Release, which has the lives of me and my friends sprinkled over every page (and which I discuss at more length here); The Rest of Us Just Live Here, which, though it wasn’t to my tastes, explored what it’s like when it feels as though you’re the background character in someone else’s story; and More Than This, a book I could talk about for hours on end but, restraining myself, will just say fundamentally changed my life. Patrick Ness is an author I hold near and dear to my heart and always will.

So believe me when I say that Patrick Ness, above everything else, is bold. Sometimes it works out (see More Than This). Sometimes it doesn’t (see The Rest of Us Just Live Here). And sometimes, like now, it falls somewhere in between. Because, really, when you think about it, who wants to pick up a book about whales? I’m sure nobody wanted it when Moby-Dick came out, and nobody wants it now. And yet Patrick Ness did it anyway, and then had the balls to sell the book to teens.

He’s ridiculous. And I love it.