Welcome to Litsy!

#12Booksof2024

I read a lot in December due to time off work. Most of my favorites I‘ve already posted about for challenges. I want to highlight this title because I love Kunzru as an author. It didn‘t delve into the fantastical like others from him but it‘s still a crazy story. I appreciated Kunzru‘s intelligence and questioning of reality-why we value what we value. In large part, it‘s about art; what isn‘t art; how society commodifies art.

My second to last #10BeforetheEnd book. I think I might make it!

This was an interesting look at art, capitalism, privilege, racism, etc. A lot of big ideas but Kunzru pulls it off, IMO. Jay was a performance artist who disappeared at the height of his career. Now, delivering groceries during the Covid pandemic, he encounters former friends from his art school days. We flash back to their friendship and then catch up to their uneasy present.

@ShyBookOwl Here‘s the “geode” simile done better!

The skyline's changed. The two rectangular towers in the photo are gone, replaced by one glittering tower with a pointy top pricking the sky.

Students can explore themes of perseverance, empathy, and shared history as they follow Deja on her quest to learn about 9/11 and its impact on her family and community. This book helps with talks about how historical events impact individual lives and the world around us. Students who engage with Deja's story can have a greater understanding of the connections between history and their own lives.

Jewell Parker Rhodes' Towers Falling expertly combines fact and fiction, mixing 9/11 history with a contemporary, emotionally charged narrative. Rhodes brings history to life in a personal and sympathetic way by following Deja, a fifth-grader who is investigating the tragedy's impact on her family and neighborhood. The detailed descriptions of New York City's skyline, both past and present, give the story a strong sense of place and loss.

While I am glad they were able to spend more time together, I can‘t imagine the risks they ran or how much pain her husband was in at the beginning of each walk. Sometimes the tone felt very incongruous to the situation. I completely understood why people backed off in many cases when they learned the couple were homeless. No one likes to be reminded of how close we are to being homeless ourselves or of our mortality.

'Excited, afraid, homeless, fat, dying, but at least if we made that first step we had somewhere to go, we had a purpose. And we really didn't have anything better to do at half past three on a Thursday afternoon than to start a 630-mile walk.'