Rating: ⭐️⭐️☆☆☆
Title: What Would Cleopatra Do?: Life Lessons from 50 of History’s Most Extraordinary Women
Author: Elizabeth Foley
Genre: History, Nonfiction, Biography
Continue reading “Book review: What Would Cleopatra Do? by Elizabeth Foley”
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Title: The Romanovs (1613-1918)
Author: Simon Sebag Montefiore
Genre: Biography, History, Non fiction
Continue reading “Book review: The Romanovs (1613-1918), by Simon Sebag Montefiore”
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️☆☆
Title: Black Klansman: Race, Hate, and the Undercover Investigation of a Lifetime
Author: Ron Stallworth
Genre: Biography, History, Non Fiction
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Title: A River in Darkness
Author: Masaji Ishikawa
Genre: Non Fiction, Memoir, Biography, History
Continue reading “Book review: A River in Darkness, by Masaji Ishikawa”
“I just wanted to thank you,” he said.
“For what?” I asked.
“For coming,” he said. “And for giving me hope.
Catherine de’ Medici was a ruthless pragmatist and powerbroker who dominated the throne for thirty years. Her youngest daughter Marguerite, the glamorous “Queen Margot,” was a passionate free spirit, the only adversary whom her mother could neither intimidate nor control.
When Catherine forces the Catholic Marguerite to marry her Protestant cousin Henry of Navarre against her will, and then uses her opulent Parisian wedding as a means of luring his followers to their deaths, she creates not only savage conflict within France but also a potent rival within her own family. Goodreads. Continue reading “Book review: The Rival Queens: Catherine de’Medici, Her Daughter Marguerite de Valois, and the Betrayal That Ignited a Kingdom, by Nancy Goldstone”
I forgot to do another Accidentally judgemental (again!). Blame it on my ICJ presentation, my thesis defence, and my lack of priorities. Heads up! I will have my thesis defence this Thursday, so if ever by accident you have stumbled upon this post, I would really appreciate it if you can wish me a huge of luck and smartness to survive the defence. Thanks in advance.
Now, without further ado, here’s to me judging books based on its cover only.
Obviously I would never picked this book up if ever I saw it in a bookstore. A book with someone’s face plastered on it (not to mention that it takes the whole entire cover) is something that screams ‘read me, read me, read me‘; most of the time, books like that are a disaster waiting to happen. Not only that the cover is not interesting on so many levels because of the photo itself, the font is obviously felt too bland. Nothing about this book screams interesting, not even the title (especially the title!).
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Title: Testament of Youth
Author: Vera Brittain
Synopsis on goodreads
Genre: Nonfiction, History, Memoir, Biography
What I think:
This was definitely a roller coaster ride for me, and I have never actually came to that conclusion when it comes to reading a biography/memoir; it’s hard to think that these events were anything but a real-life events, not because it seems like a fabricated truth, but because Vera Brittain wrote it in words that were weaved with love, pain, and struggle that you can’t help but feel those emotions streaming through the words. At times the story can feel like it’s moving in an alarming speed but then at times, Vera seems to stall something as if she herself feels like the longer she holds the climax, the lesser the pain it brings.
I think it was a good decision for me to read this book at 27, because everything that seems to be the struggle of Vera and her contemporaries were still relevant to this day, even though this was something that people went through years ago. Without trying to sound pretentious or obnoxious, there are more than one time that I actually feels like that whatever it is that Vera seems to go through in her life, I felt it too.
One thing that made this book seems hard to enjoyed in the beginning was the language and the structure of the sentences; as this book was written sometime ago, it was hard to grasp the nature of Vera’s voice when you are a millennial, but after a few chapters it became easier and next thing you know, you’re accustomed to it already. Other things that caught my attention was that it was hard for me to sympathise with Vera in the first part of the book, as she seems to value herself too high that at times it seems like she’s an arrogant woman; I remember thinking to myself that had this book was written and published today, she would have been labeled as a first world problem complainer. Thankfully, this changed as she met Roland; I don’t like to think that she changed merely because she met a man in his life, but Roland definitely had a huge impact on her in seeing the current life in the UK at the time.
What is so beautiful with this book, more than anything, was Vera and Edward’s relationship. How a sibling relationship grew stronger during the war and how badly it affects Vera as Edward part away with the world that Vera was left behind in. It was also thanks to Vera’s words that you felt like you knew all her contemporaries personally; how, along with Vera, I wished that Edward would have survived the war because you felt a close kinship with his persona throughout the book.
This would definitely be a good book for those who consider themselves as going through a quarter life crisis, or anyone who is going through a big major change in life. Imagine, one day you are about to embark to school only to have a war breaking out before your eyes and it seems like the war would never end and all it does is taking away all the raging fire of youths along with its destruction; surely it would put your life in a brighter perspective.
I’m currently reading Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain, for three weeks already and I have just reached half of the book. I was kind of hoping I would be finished with this book by now, but turns out it was harder than I have expected. I picked up this book while I was surfing through Youtube and I stumble upon a trailer of a movie adaptation of this book; seeing that stories that occur during the wars always interests me, I thought I’ll give myself a go with this book.
Turns out, the timing was very wrong. I picked this book four days before Fall semester (which happens to be my last semester of graduate school); so what happens then this book got neglected quite a lot of the times, as I have so many school readings that I have to do. But, I shall not worry about finishing this book as this book is definitely quite interesting (if you can ignore how Vera Brittain can seem quite self-absorbed and self-righteous at times).
During 2015, I have read several books (I think, two non fictions and one historical fiction) that occur in the first world war, and so far those books had not been a disappointment. In case anyone is interested, the books that I read were Life After Life (by Kate Atkinson, this book span from the first world war to the second world war), The Romanov Sisters (by Helen Rappaport, this was a non fictional work of the lives of the Romanov Sisters; admittedly there’s only a small glimpse of the first world war which was at the end of the book but it was still interesting to see the life of the OTMA sisters before the outbreak of the first world war that would eventually bring the downfall of the imperial family), Nicholas and Alexandra (by Robert K. Massie, this was a nonfictional work of the life of both the Tsar Nicholas II and his wife but it was pretty interesting to see how the outbreak of the first world war affects the couple and their family as their monarchy fell), and The Lost Crown (by Sarah Miller, this was a historical fiction about the OTMA sisters, and although it almost did not focus much on the first world war it was still interesting to see the life of the two eldest sisters’ life as they work as a nurse for the injured soldiers).
Rating: ⭐️⭐️
Genre: Nonfiction, Humour, Biography
I love Richard Ayoade! He is such an entertaining man and I like the fact that it seems like he doesn’t even have to try that hard to be funny. I can watch and rewatch every single shows that has Richard Ayoade in it and still enjoy it as if it was the first time I watch it. That is how much I like him, so when I knew about this book it was like a given fact that of course I will be reading it. But, me being me, I tend to always make a terrible mistake by just assuming about something and take it as the truth.
Anyone with a good pair of eyes would know that this book would most probably be about things related to cinema (or at least about how Richard Ayoade’s take on cinema), but not me though. I assume this was going to be a book where Richard Ayoade is going to go on a rant about basically anything (most probably cinema), alas this was literally about cinema and honestly it was not an interesting topic for me as I’m not much of a cinema person, let alone talking about it.
Don’t fret about it, although the whole theme was not to my interest, Richard Ayoade’s quirky way of writing this book got me hooked and feeling weird at certain times, but this was also a double edge sword because at times it felt somewhat tiring and I felt like I just want to end this book; it was too much. Thankfully the pace was a quick one, a trait that somehow I felt was very Richard Ayoade, he just dwell into things and get it all done with, yet the last part of the book was too boring and too much to handle for my liking. Overall I wouldn’t say I enjoy this book very much although, admittedly, there was some parts that I did like, it’s just not my cup of tea.
Before I end it, I would just like to say that the two points rating I gave for this book does not mean that this was a crappy book, if anything I was the crappy reader for not enjoying a book about cinema (again, I still think it was my fault for actually thinking that this book might be about something else other than cinema). But, if you’re into cinema (or you’re a massive cinemagoer), feel free to read this book because there are some good points about making movies or stuff (rest assure, these so-called point were very Richard Ayoade-like, as in you’ll end up asking yourself whether or not he meant any of the things he mentioned in the book).
no page gets left behind 