One last review from my September reads. This was the first time in a long time I read an entire book in less than 24 hours, I was so entertained beginning to end. Certainly not everyone's cup of tea but if you're familiar with Haddish and her kind of humor and you're not easily offended and looking for a quick read to make you laugh, I highly recommend this 🦄🌈💕

The tagged book was between a pick and a so-so for me, because I initially felt like a lot of these poems lacked depth. But after reading the other 2 books I learned that haiku, by style, aren't usually complete statements, but are curated with the hope in mind that the readers adds to it with their own meanings. This made me appreciate Kerouac's haiku even more, so it's a pick. These were my most recent reads so I'm finally caught up on my posts!

I got this book as a birthday gift (along with some Bad Bunny stuff because he's my current obsession 🥰) I finished it in a couple days - I was so hooked! This is a very entertaining graphic novel that follows the story of a Mexican American woman and her misguided year living in Mexico City. It's mostly written in English but I'm counting this as my 6th #Spanishbook because of how much (and how interestingly) the language is used throughout 🇲🇽

This was my 5th #spanishbook so far. My first time reading Neruda, but not the last! My only complaint is that the english and spanish versions weren't side by side, but all of the English translations were in the front with the poems in their original Spanish in the back. I had to flip back and forth a lot but still worth the read because I learned a lot of new spanish words. Lots of Neruda's handwritten notes are included.

This was an interesting read. Hard to describe, and sometimes very strange but very entertaining. Even though it's written in English there were a lot of Spanish words throughout, and I learned a bit about Cuba. One of my favorite quotes "Painting is its own language...translations just confuse it, dilute it, like words going from Spanish to English. I envy my mother her Spanish curses sometimes. They make my English collapse in a heap."

The stories in this were a bit hard to follow sometimes because they kept jumping back in forth between timeliness and different narrators, but it was undeniably entertaining. There's a lot going on here with appearances from Namor, Iron Man, Kilmonger, and Storm, to name a few. Wakanda Forever 🖤

This had a bit more of a complex storyline than the last one (probably because it was written by Ta-Nehisi Coates 😏) but not overly so. The illustrations were absolutely beautiful and it was good to get a bit of a backstory for Aneka, a character who will be played by the lovely Michaela Cole in the upcoming movie 🥰

After reading some Impound comics, and seeing the trailer for the New Black Panther movie, I was in the mood to dust off a few comics that have been sitting on my shelves for a while. This collection was very old school, with straightforward and easy to follow storylines. Also included a surprise at the end, a short comic starring a little know MCU character who happens to be a disabled African woman with the powers of Venom and Black Panther!

These comics aren't in the litsy database, but shout out to author BRENT TRAYCE SANDS because he works hard, and not only has a line of several original comics but an actual brick and mortar store where he sells them and related merch. I've read all 3 of these and my only complaint is that they're too short! Not a typical hero, Impound is a single black dad in Sacramento who ends up getting powers which he uses for revenge. Check out his website⬇️

This was another read from April (still lots more catch up posts left). I got this as an ARC years ago and I can't believe I waited until this year to finally read it. WORTH ??THE ??HYPE?? If you liked "The Hate U Give" you'll love this. I finished in just a few days, it was so good. Would make a good audiobook because of all the music throughout. Fun fact: the movie adaption will be available on Hulu tomorrow?! ? Can't wait to watch!

Read this back in April. This was the 4th #Spanishbook I've read so far. It wasn't completely new to me though because I read the English version a couple years ago, and loved it so much that I gave it away, but continued to collect more from Thich Nhat Hanh's 'How To' series. Full of simple but very helpful insights on the role that anger plays in our lives, and how we can transform it to be happier. Good for readers interested in mindfulness 😌

Read this back in March. One of the strangest books I‘ve ever come across, and I mean that in a good way. It was written by a local Sacramento artist, so I was lucky to find it in a little free library. Trippy, weird, funny, sad. Good for fans of the absurd and drug addled stream of consciousness writing. The highlighted section from his bio says "Unfortunately, Karlos Rene Ayala currently lives in Sacramento, California" ?

Read this back in February. I've seen it described as a time capsule of 2020 and I agree. Gorman captures and explores many themes that dominated that year. Covid deaths, masks, race riots, etc. Although she's young, her poetry didn't seem like a bunch of tweets, but a well thought out, heavily researched, creative collection of mini-essays written by a much older person who's seen and observed a lot of this world. Highly recommend to everyone!

Hey Litsy! Long time no see. Somehow I've been away for 6 months?! 😱 lots to catch up on. Aside from my busy work schedule, I've been immersing myself in spanish and socializing and traveling a bit more, so I've been distracted. But now that we've entered the slow season at work I'll have plenty more time for litsy again. I'll post some reviews of what I've been reading lately over the next few days. Pictured above are some cool LFLs I found 😎

Gorgeous cover for a gorgeous book 😍 I thought this was very original so it's hard to compare it to any one thing, but it reminded me of John Green's Turtles All the Way Down, Black Swan, and the Perks of being a Wallflower, with some zombies and Van Gogh art thrown in 🤪🧟‍♂️ this is a book about grief, loss, anxiety, love, heartbreak, and I highly recommend it to all YA readers. Happy to review this in exchange for the ARC from Netgalley 🤗

I watched the show 1st then read the book and I like them both equally which is rare! The show was quiet and slow, not a lot of dialogue, focused more on character development, which I love. Reading the book afterwards, I was surprised at how close the adaption was, and was happy to see more of the characters thoughts, which filled in a few blanks left out in the show. Not for everyone but it's worth the hype in my opinion. Glad I finally read it!

¡Por fin! Yo terminé este libro desdes unos meses y me encanta! 🥰😍 In addition to the poems, there's also a very informative intro, and some of Lorca's letters to his family from the time he wrote the poems, so it's like reading 3 books in one! Despite this being a bilingual edition, I still found myself looking up several words on each page that didn't quite 'match' the translation, and made lots of notes and learned a lot of new vocabulary.

✅ Kim's Convenience ✅ stunt man✅ Shang-Chi
✅ SNL host ✅sesame street guest
✅ multilingual ✅ musician ✅ hot ones champ
✅ PUBLISHED AUTHOR
Simu Liu has done it all! So excited to read his book! Comes out 5-3-22 😍😍😍😍😍

Post 4 /4. My first read of the new year...was the most depressing book I've ever read. This first hand perspective of Auschwitz is a unique one. Wiesel packs years of horror, history, and his own personal development into a little over 100 pages, telling his story in a blunt, brutal, but eloquent way. An important book everyone should read.

Post 3/4. Like the blurb on the front cover says, this book was "F***ING OUTSTANDING"!! I had to resist the urge to highlight and underline every sentence, I was so enraptured from start to finish ? I loved that there's spanish slang throughout. I loved that the main character is a round, brown, "queer Puerto Rican babe" and I love that it takes place mostly in Portland, one of my favorite cities.

Post 2 /4. My first Rumi ?? I enjoyed it enough to want to read more. One of my favorite lines: "Journeys bring power and love back into you. If you can't go somewhere, move in the passageways of the self" ??

Time to play catchup! Post 1 of 4. I found most of the stories in here to be pretty dry but I connected with a few of them, especially the ones that included several spanish words throughout. And I just found out from NPR the other day that the Toni Morrison short story in here (Recitatif) is considered "rare" and will soon be getting republished for the first time in a long time, so I'm glad to have a copy already ?

I gobbled this up in a few days and it was delicious 😋 I didn't find the 'love interest' to be very likeable and even though the main character was kind of a dick sometimes, I found their interactions to be incredibly entertaining. I love how diverse the characters were and how many pop culture references were packed into each page. Lots of laugh out loud lines and an ending that wasn't quite a cliffhanger but left me wanting more.

Spanish books #1 and #2. I preferred the tagged book to Making out in Spanish because it was hilarious and included a lot more slang. Both titles are a bit misleading because they are mostly common phrases with just a few pages dedicated to dating/sex. I found helpful phrases and facts in both and will definitely refer back to them along my #Spanish journey moving forward. Estoy lista para mas!

After reading the Binti trilogy I was craving another space adventure with black characters. This one hit the spot but it is completey different from Binti. I loved how original this story and the characters were. I've never met anyone like Aster before and I found her so strange but relatable in some ways. Very unique, engaging story. I want to read everything by Rivers Solomon now!

This wasn't as mind blowing and life changing as I was expecting it to be, but I get the hype and do believe it's worth the read. One of my favorite quotes:
"There is one great truth on this planet: whoever you are, or whatever it is that you do, when you really want something, it's because that desire originated in the soul of the universe. It's your mission on earth."

Some belated birthday gifts from a couple of friends who know me well 🤗 I've read Their Eyes were Watching God before, but I didn't own this beautiful version 😍 and I've never even heard of Dreaming in Cuban but I'm all about everything Spanish these days so it's right up my alley! 🇨🇺

I have not posted on here in a while but I have been reading! Time to play catch up. Pictured are the books I found today in a little free library. I'm most excited about the spanish grammar even though it's old. I've heard great things about Murakami and Ferrante but have never read anything by them 🙈so I'm looking forward to those as well.

A close up of the books I'm most excited about from Powell's. I've been practicing Spanish daily since last May and keep finding ways to immerse myself into the language with music, TV, movies, etc., But I haven't read any Spanish books yet. ¡Estoy muy emocionada! 🤗

I turned 30 today! And I celebrated in a very bookish way. I set out to get 30(ish) books from Powells, and after a 13 hour drive to get there, mission accomplished 😬 I also got a bunch of cool postcards I can't wait to use for my #litsylove

Another quick little mindfulness read to cleanse my pallete before diving into my next couple of books. Pictured with my Mala beads, which I've been incorporating into my meditation practice, as well as a few other books from the series. I highly recommend these books if you want something quick and simple, but full of positivity and tips on how to live a more mindful life ✌🏾😌✌🏾

Quick and interesting little read. I'm not sure I would pay to go to a silent retreat, but I did like reading about what it's like. And it did give me the idea to try a silent retreat at home. Which on the surface sounds very easy, but considering how much time I spend staring at my phone and watching TV, I think it would be difficult to go without them for a few days 🤔

I didn't connect with as many of these poems as I would have liked. But it contains one of my all time favorites (Do not go gentle into that good night), and I found several lines throughout that I liked. "And from the first declension of the flesh/I learnt man's tongue, to twist the shapes of thoughts/Into the stony idiom of the brain/To shade and knit anew the patch of words/Left by the dead who, in their moonless acre/need no words warmth." ?

I loved this book and would highly recommend it to any and all sci-fi/fantasy fans! Major black panther vibes with the technologically advanced African civilizations. I can't wait to see the hulu adaption! A quote from the book that I feel perfectly sums up the main character: "Binti was change, she was revolution, she was heroism" ????????

This was between a so-so and a pick, because none of the characters were likeable and nothing really happened. I'm going with a pick because despite how annoying the main character was, I found myself relating to her in some ways, and overall I found it entertaining...but I wouldn't exactly recommend it 😆 I added it to my TBR a while ago after loving the authors first book, and I'm glad I was finally able to cross it off my list 🤗

Good read for summer vibes 🌞

Thanks so much @Blerdgal_Fenix for the lovely care package! I've been MIA from litsy for a little while. Works been busy and I've been distracted with some things. But I have been reading and slowly catching up on some #litsylove. I will start posting again soon, in the meantime just stopping by to say hi to you all and thanks to everyone's who written recently. Happy reading! 🤗

I'm slowly but surely sending out some masks along with my #litsylove responses. Some of you have already gotten some - thanks @CoffeeNBooks and @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks for posting pics of yours - some of you have some on the way! If anyone's interested in Harry Potter, Dr. Suess, or other bookish themed masks handmade by my sister-in-law, feel free to check out her online store here ⬇️
https://m.facebook.com/cottonhugsbylui/

I've been in a YA kinda mood lately to distract myself and escape. This cute, quick read hit the spot. I don't usually care for love at first sight stories so I'm surprised I enjoyed it as much as I did. Loved that the interracial romance of the author and her husband was reflected. Felt compelled to watch the movie right after and was not disappointed 🥰

This is one of those books that, had I read it at a different time in my life, I probably wouldn't have liked it. But because I read it at this current point in my life, where I'm on a path of self love and self development, I really connected with it. I highlighted a lot and I really do believe that honoring the 4 agreements will make life easier and more enjoyable. Not for everyone, but a good read for an open mind 😌

Wow thanks so much @Lovesbooks87 for the lovely surprise! I'm looking forward to this one 🥰

🌼 Paperbacks
🌼 I used to love reading in my bedroom closet, or cupboard under the stairs (thanks to Harry Potter) as a kid!
🌼 I'm very grateful for my penpals. The #litsylove folks of course, but I recently joined another penpal group within my online yoga community so I've recently gained some new penpals. Getting snail mail always puts a smile on my face 🥰
Thanks for the tag @Crazeedi and I tag anyone who wants to play!

What can I say about this book that hasn't already been said? It's amazing! A must read for everyone! This should be required reading for high school! A coming of age story from a refreshingly different perspective, filled with life lessons ranging from racism and religion to hustling and heartbreak. Noah is absolutely hilarious and a very talented writer. This book was unlike any other memoir I've ever read and I hope he writes another soon!

A mere 2 days after her book was published 😔 Atleast she had a long life 🖤🌹

This was released today! I only know Cicely from a few small roles but I look forward to reading more about her life (she's 96) and her career which has spanned over 60 years! What a woman 😍

This is the funniest book I've read since How to Archer, another book written solely for super fans of the show its based off of. I highly recommend if you're in need of a laugh, but only to other fans of the show. If you read it and you're not familiar with the gang's banter then you'll probably be very confused and slightly offended 🙃

A collection of letters written by celebrities to their younger selves. Not a bad book but the letters were too short in my opinion, not a lot of depth but there were some encouraging words. It was a perfectly short and sweet read to jumpstart the new year though. I'm going to try to read 4 books a month so here's the rest of the stack I hope to get through for January 🤞🏾🤞🏾

Late post - this was my final read of 2020. It was very fitting, considering that I live by myself and went the entirety of December without seeing anyone to reduce my risk of getting/spreading covid. I hope our restrictions ease up and the numbers go down soon because it has been a lonely month 😔 but this book made me feel a bit better about my situation. Sarton writes about solitude in a very empowering way. I hope to read more of her work!

This was a quick read. A short collection of holiday centered stories that take place throughout the authors life. This was a re-read for me so I knew exactly what to expect going into it. I would recommend this to fellow fans of Burroughs, or someone with a dark sense of humor, but would NOT recommend to people looking for a light and fluffy holly jolly Christmas story 😏

1. I probably won't finish it but I'm really looking forward to starting Barack Obama's new book in January! (Tagged)
2. I regret not reaching my goal of 50 books for the year but it's been a hell of a year for everyone so moving on!

I invite anyone who wants to share, to play along 🤗
@TheSpineView thanks for the tag @Read-y_Picker