Celebrate the love for books
Wow. That was something. Besides the Queen’s funeral last year, I’ve largely ignored any news surrounding the monarchy. And so, Spare by Prince Harry wasn’t exactly on my radar. That is, until I saw the audiobook pop up on Libby and noticed that Prince Harry himself was the narrator. Quick glance at the holds queue told me I would be third. Alright, I figured, might as well find out what all the controversy is about.
The first time I heard the term “retelling,” I expected it to refer to reimagined fairytales. I didn’t exactly expect these to be simply be stories inspired by fairytales. Stepsister, however, is exactly that which I had originally expected of a retelling. It builds upon the well-loved fairytale of Ashputtel, blood and all. It was entertaining with its dark humour as it continued to tell the story of how it might have continued. Stepsister was more detailed since it’s a novel rather than a short story but stylistically, it still very much read like a fairytale.
Depending on how you look at it, quarter- and midlife crises books can add to the disillusion or be rather cathartic. Personally, I thought How to Find Love in the Little Things tended towards the cathartic.
I was pretty excited when my hold on the audiobook of Summer Bird Blue came through on Overdrive. I knew that the main character was biracial, and since I am too, I’m constantly seeking out out such identities in book.
I Want to Go Home is a little different from most non-fiction books because the same material was used to produce a companion documentary with the same title. I’ve not watched the documentary but I did view the trailer. Based on the synopsis and the trailer, I expected the subject of I Want to Go Home to be Mr Takamatsu. As I read the book, however, I found this not to be the case.
