the heart goes last. margaret atwood. (323)

the heart goes last is the first book of margaret atwood that i have read.  i know as a feminist i should really read the handmaid's tale, and it's been on my to-read list, but haven't made it happen.  i decided to put myself on the wait list for this work, assuming it would be a while before my turn came around, but i got it quickly. 

i wasn't sure what to expect from atwood.  i know she is a sci-fi writer and that isn't a genre i would consider my self a fan of.  however, everyone was excited about it online, so i decided to give it a try.  i was pleasantly surprised by how much i enjoyed this work.  to start, i had no idea what the book was about, from the cover it looked as if it was about prison like in the future we would all be prisoners.  and i guess this could a great one sentence summary.

the heart goes last is set in a distant future in which the economy has collapsed and the middle and lower classes are left to live in their cars and rummage for food and money.  the upper class have not been effected and still have wealth.  the novel is about a married couple, stan and charmaine, tired of living out of their car and scared of the crime that could occur.  they decided to sign up to live in consilience, a project based on the prison system.  since prisons create jobs and help sustain a community (i know i live in a town with two prisons), members of this community live as a prisoner for one month and then live outside as a civilian for next, and alternate back and forth.  they are given jobs both in and out of the prison.  they share homes with alternates that are in prison when they are home and vice versa.  they are not suppose to communicate with their alternates.

however, charmaine had an affair with her alternate and this caused a series of events to unfold because the man's wife was a woman that worked in surveillance and was assistant to the head of the project. using the affair as a cover, she then pressured stan into helping her stop the project by taking information into the outside world.  it turns our that the project originally was an actual prison and they began to kill off prisoners that were disobedient and harvested them for body parts.  this business started to become lucrative business, and so they started killing of people.  in addition to this, their biggest export were sex bots, which then lead to them operating on brains so that the first thing a person saw post-opt they imprinted on and basically became their sex slaves.  stan was to expose all of this, but to get him into the outside world, he had to fake his death by charmaine killing him.  

sounds like an exciting book, yes?  well it was until the end.  there was all this great build up but then it was like atwood wasn't sure how to end it.  there was some mission that took place in vegas which reminded me of ocean's 11.  and the outside world learned of what was occurring but unsure if anything really stopped.  and the head of the project turned into a sex slave due to the operation. charmaine had the same operation and imprinted on stan, only to learn that she never had the operation.

this twist at the end felt odd, and i wondered what atwood wanted us to take from it.  that love is not real but a construct of our minds like everything else in life. that the heart does goes last but not due to love but because it is a muscle and simply is the last to complete its function.  it feels cold for an ending but seems true.  we place all this emphasis on following your heart, but really your heart is guided by your brain, so it's your brain all along!

another lesson could be that of obedience, in which today especially, we so blindly follow what is presented to us that we don't question it and just believe.  so many times i see individuals post articles on facebook, only for me to google and find they are not true.  it reminded me of the study in which people were instructed to shock individuals and though they knew it was wrong, they did it since an authority figure instructed them to do so.  the members of the community worked in this prison and just followed instructions without realizing what they were actually contributing to.  this leads to the usual lesson of futuristic tales to question your government and to not conform.

lastly, since the story centered around prisons it reminded me of the stanford experiment.  that study dealt with the conforming of roles to that of authority and inferior.  though there did not seem to be any abuse of authority within the prison, we did see it from wife in surveillance.  since the prison was set up as a business, i wonder if atwood's critique would be that of how we criminalize individual to sustain this business, which i would counter, i have seen these prisoners after their release and they deserve to be there.  i will say it is horrible the amount of funds that is put into our prison system, especially in california, and if atwood was advocating that i am with her.  i will have to google to see what she says on the matter.

all in all, a great novel with a weak ending but definitely worth reading. 

barbara the slut and other people. lauren holmes. (321)

i decided to read barbara the slut and other people, after seeing it all over instagram. also, i loved that the cover had slut in hot pink sprayed painted across it.  it looked a feminist manifesto!  and since i judge books by a cover, i had high expectations, and sadly this collection of short stories did not meet them.

i hate to be mean because holmes is a published writer and i am just some no name reader, but these stories didn't move me like the blurbs on the books claimed would happen.  i felt as if i was part of some writers workshop (see:  hbo girls season four). in fact, it was as if holmes was hannah, basically just writing her life.  don't get me wrong, i mean i get that all authors use their life as a basis for the life, but at least there seems to be some value other than just the story.  

barbara the slut read like that one co-worker's random life stories, it was interesting to her, but you are wondering as you listen to the recounting, so what is the point of this story?!??  and i know this sounds harsh, but i just felt the stories lacked any real depth.  it really felt like she just took incidents from her life and turned them into stories, which is fine, but just wasn't for me.  i mean i have always thought of doing just that but always figured the stories that no one else would find them interesting. 

i should also say that not all the stories are horrible, i did enjoy two of them.  the title story "barbara the slut" should be required reading for high school girls, though maybe edit out barbara's logic about sleeping with a guy only once to have to not deal with trust issues.  i should add that was a huge issue i had with the story, barbara was intelligent and a compassionate kid (she was helpful with her autistic brother), yet her logic about sex was horrible.  anyway, i did appreciate its lesson on slut shaming, mean girls need to read this and realize they need to stop hating on other girls.  and why can't they get that boys lie?!?! anyway, i felt bad for barbara, but luckily she was heading to college, so wouldn't have to deal with any of the pettiness of high school, though i hope she learned that sex with trust is a real thing.

another story, i was surprised that i really enjoyed was "my humans".  i was surprised, because i do not like dogs, but i loved reading a story from the perspective of a dog.  i thought that was very clever.  way to go, holmes.  i also loved that the dog discovered the cheating first, when jenna came home smelling different.  i have to add once a cheater, always a cheater.

a couple of other thoughts, that kid in "jerks" was a real jerk.  i also hate parents that are in denial about their kids being horrible.  though the mother in that story was a jerk, so its only logical that she was raising one.  i can add another horrible parent was the mom in  "i will crawl to raleigh if i have to", trying to blame her child's stealing on another kid.  really?  i have to add most of these stories had bad mothers, wonder what holmes is trying to say there?

last but not least, i know i should have been all about "desert hearts", a lawyer that gives up the corporate world to work in a sex shop posing as lesbian.  i mean i guess it could have been cool, but really i think the world has revolved enough that straight people can work in LGBT sex shops without it being an issue.  i mean, this would have been a cool story if it was like the early 90s.

i hate to be a hater, but though enjoyable this book wasn't as exciting as it's front cover claimed it would be.

brooklyn. colm tóibín. (320)

i picked up brooklyn because i had seen advertisements for the movie based on it all over goodreads. and given the title and my hipster tendencies, i decided to check it out.  it had to be about williamsburg, right?!?  lol. wrong.

brooklyn tells the story of a young irish girl, eilis that immigrated to america in the early 1950's.  unable to find work in ireland, eilis' sister arranged for her to move to brooklyn and live in a home for irish girls that had immigrated. eilis moved out on her own and dealt with the issues of adjusting to a new country and being on her own.

i really wanted to love this novel, given the setting and that it is historic fiction, but i didn't get completely lost in the story.  i admired eilis for her independence, especially considering it was the 1950s.  she moved to a country on her own, supported herself with a job in retail.  at her job, she did not discriminate against african-americans when the store she worked for being to sell stockings for them.  when she began dating, she dated outside of her ethnic group, dating an italian.  she also did not suppress her sexuality and had premarital sex.  as a feminist, i would name eilis as one of my book sheros, but i wasn't on board for her love story.

her love story goes that she fell in love with an italian boy named tony.  everything was going well when her sister suddenly died due to a heart condition.  upon her returning to ireland to visit her family, she and tony secretly married.  upon her return to ireland, since she had been to america, her status was different.  instead of being a social outcast, everyone was interested in her.  eilis then began to be courted by a man that had previously ignored her, jim.  eilis was then caught in a dilemma, she could stay in ireland, live a comfortable life with jim, and take care of her mother.  or she could return to tony.  in the end, she was confront by a woman she used to work for that was going to expose what she had done and so she returned to brooklyn and tony.

i have to admit i thought she should have stayed in ireland, but to each their own.  i guess she ultimately chose the life with the most freedom.  there is a parallel there.  anyway, though enjoyable the story didn't grip me.  i mean i am not sure why they turned it into a movie.  however, i will see it because nick hornby adapted the screenplay and i love

him!

the thing about jellyfish. ali benjamin. (318)

i picked up ali benjamin's the thing about jellyfish because it is national book finalist in the young adult category.  i wasn't sure what the story was about, but liked the title and figured since it was nominated, it should be good.  and it was.

the thing about jellyfish was the story of a young girl, suzy, that recently lost her best friend.  the lost was sudden, her best friend, franny, died on a beach, her heart just stopped.  as a result, suzy went mute a couple of months after her friend's death.  losing a best friend is difficult at any age, but to have lost your best friend at 12, is even more difficult.   however, age isn't the only factor, as it is slowly revealed, franny and suzy had grown apart.  franny had become one of the "cool" yet mean girls, and their last incident was when suzy froze pee and put it inside franny's locker.  suzy was never able to apologize and this guilt only add to her difficulty to cope.

frozen pee was extreme, but when suzy explained her reasoning for it, it made sense, though it was still awful.  suzy was a socially awkward kid, i actually read her as autistic, but when i googled to see if that was the intent of the author, i can not find anything on it.  i assumed that she was because it was noted when she was younger on a report card that she wasn't adapt at making friends.  also, the way that she fixated on subjects ie jellyfish, i assumed that she was autistic.  however, i mean everyone is awkward at that age, so that could be it as well.

so the thing about jellyfish in this novel is that suzy became fixated on the theory that franny died after being stung by an irukandij jellyfish.  her obsession about the jellyfish fueled by her need to understand what happen to her friend.  the novel (which i absolutely loved) was set up like a science project with the following sections:  purpose, hypothesis, background, variables, procedure, and results, and we see suzy test her theory and ultimately come to terms with the lost of her friend. i have to add that the novel is also very informative, i learned alot about jellyfish and other great facts.  for example, that the average middle school student has about 20 billion atoms from shakespeare, which means that suzy has some of franny's atoms, and we have atoms of any of the people that we lost.  (what a great lesson for kids to learn when dealing with a loss.)

i also loved how in the end, suzy found friends that understood her and didn't think she was "weird".  

this novel is really great and i highly recommend it, especially if you have a young reader.  it is helpful not only with grieving the loss of a love one, but also helpful with those awkward years.  it shows kids that we are all a little weird, and that you will find friends that will love you for who you are. 

nimona. noelle steveson. (319)

i checked out noelle stevenson's nimona after seeing it listed as a national book finalist in the young adult category.  since i liked lumberjanes, i decided to check it out.  

nimona is the story of nimona, a spunky, girl with the ability to shift shapes that becomes the sidekick of the evil villian, ballister blackheart.  ballister was not really looking for a sidekick, and though she proves to be more than he bargained, he grows to love her.  this book is delightful because nimona is witty, always ready with a great one-liner and always up for adventure, though she usually its up destroying more than helping.  though she would argue that her role as a villain calls for her to destroy.

this comic is great because though it started off as a tale of evil vs good, it proves that is not how the world always works.  as it turns out, ballister, the evil side has a higher morale than the good side, the institution.  the institution that is suppose to protect the people is actually working to destroy them and nimona and blackheart inadvertently help save everyone when they seek to destroy the institution.  

in addition to this there is another storyline woven into the mix, blackheart and his archenemy, goldenloin.  at the beginning, they hate each other, but in the end they became friends, possibly lovers, if you read it that way.

i am glad i picked up this book.  first, it has a great female character, which young girls need!  second, it teaches kids the importance of questioning the current systems, we have in place.  third, it demonstrates that not all good is good and not all evil is evil.  fourth, it proves that the most important thing in life is to have good friends and to care for one another.  fifth, if you read it that way, heroes are not just homosexuals.  

a great comic and i look forward to reading more about nimona (i hope stevenson has more in store for her.)  

the witch of blackbird pond. elizabeth george speare. (317)

after seeing the goosebumps movie, i went looking for goosebumps books at the library.  unfortunately, they didn't have any, but fortunately the word witch caught my eye, so i decided to check out the witch of blackbird pond.  though it wasn't exactly the kind of horror show i was looking for halloween, it was a wonderful book!

sadly, i never read the witch of blackbird pond, as a kid, but glad i did as an adult. set in the 17th century, the novel tells the story of a young girl, kit.  after the death of her grandfather, she left barbados to live with her aunt and her family in a colony in connecticut.  in barbados, kit lead a life of luxury, but she must adjust to the spartan life style of the purtians. god and work lead life and kid initially has a difficult time adjusting.

the witch part of the books comes when kit befriended the town's "witch", hannah tupper, who lived by blackbird pond.  hannah was a quaker and since their beliefs did not align with that of the purtians, she and her husbands were branded and sent from their previous town.  the people of kit's colony, regarded her as a witch, and people were forbidden to interact with her.  one day, kit sad about getting her cousin  mercy in trouble, ran out toward the pond crying.  hannah took her in and gave her advice. kit, then began visiting hannah regularly, after learning her friend, nate from her voyage to america, was hannah's friend as well.  

things started to go well for kit, the wealthiest boy in colony, wanted to marry her.  she and mercy continue with their school.  however, it all fell apart when kids began to get sick and die and hannah was blamed. kit helped hannah escape only to end up on trial for being a witch!

in the end, it all worked out because hey, this is a children's novel.  there was even a double wedding kind deal and a third engagement, which i found odd, but it was a different time.

this book is a must read for any and every girl.  kit is a wonderful role model for girls, she goes to the beat of her own drum, regardless of the scrutiny of others.  kit, also, has a heart of gold and demonstrates we should always do what is right versus what religion or society may tells us.

this book also gives an important lesson religious tolerance.  someone may not have the same beliefs as us, but that does not make them evil.  also organized religious can do a lot more harm then good when corrupted by those wanting power.

lastly, this book is a great introduction to the topic of the salem witch trials for kids.  it got me interested in the topic and i plan on reading more about these crazy accusations.  it was shocked with the novels initially introduction of witch like behavior. not seemed so silly for people to freak out because kit can swim.  no one was logical and assumed she could because it was customary in barbados.  furthermore, it was crazy to see the accusations that came up in trial, people accused of bewitching animals?!?! i know it made me grateful to have not been born in that era, because i would have definitely been labelled a witch!  it's sad though to think of the women that were burned at stake or drowned on these false accusations. 

this book is a truly great read and a must for everyone, especially women of all ages!