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MY THOUGHTS ON 140 BOOKS
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MY THOUGHTS ABOUT THE BOOKS I'VE READ
I read a lot. Okay, not a lot, but about one book per week. I’m grateful to be gifted with the desire to dive into the words of other writers in a quest for entertainment, understanding an awakening*.
* A Honky’s version of becoming woke. In that spirit, every book you see in my, I Love It section: I loved!?! I find giving these books a score pointless. I try to share how the books made me feel as opposed to firing out a synopsis. Every book on these pages deserves 5 STARS! Because, who, am I, to try to tell anyone else what to like? And because, unless the book is filled with hate, writing is hard, writers deserve to be encouraged to keep writing. Unless of course, you suck as a writer, even then, keep writing, one day you might stop sucking. 
(I TRY TO REFRAIN FROM SHARING THOUGHTS ON BOOKS I DON'T LIKE)
ULTIMATE RATING SCALE
5 STARS = 5 STARS
5 STARS? = Less than or greater than 5 STARS - YOU DECIDE
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15
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SOON COME
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HOW TO SLOWLY KILL YOURSELF AND OTHERS IN AMERICAKiese LAYMONI don't want to be racist.
5+ STARS |
How did the book make me feel/think?
I don’t want to be racist.
I don’t announce myself as a doctor or a lawyer because I’m not.
I don’t want to announce myself as non-racist.
How can I not be racist?
I’m white, I think, long story. I grew up surrounded by people mostly looking like me. And we sucked. We didn’t know any different. How could we? We’d been conditioned from birth and come from generation after generation after generation of whites being told there will always be someone below you—if you listen to us—watch what we create for you—read what we tell you—learn what we teach you. If you do, you’ll be okay. We’re giving you the advantage.
I don’t want to be racist.
We had a Siamese cat named Guy. My brother nicknamed it Guy blank-blank, blank, blank-blank, blank-face. When I was eight, I’d stand on our porch and call out Guy’s nickname, signalling time for Guy to come home.
One of my aunts, after visiting Jamaica, stated her opinions on Jamaican fathers. It wasn’t glowing.
When I was twenty-three, my girlfriend’s parents told her, he wished she behaved more like the polite Japanese volleyball girls he’d been tasked with driving around.
We’d get floor-licking drunk, that was okay, because we were not indigenous.
I don’t want to be racist.
I’ve been pulled over for traffic offences on a few occasions; I swore at the police officer, even going so far as calling one a—without repercussion—without fearing repercussion.
A friend and I were stopped by police while pushing our car home while drunk—no repercussions.
A few days ago, while out walking, I saw two non-white guys looking down at a causeway; my first thought, I’d never say aloud, shamed me. Why is it on the ready?
I don’t want to be racist.
I want to share with the few black people I know, announce, really, I’ve read this book. I’m not sure if that’s okay. I think it would only reveal how much of an ass I can be. So, I won’t.
“How to Slowly Kill…” and other books about those who do not look like me are salves to heal my conditioning. They call out to all white people to look inward and continue growing in this never-ending understanding, we are not unique; we all bleed red.
I’ll never truly comprehend the unwavering advantage I’ve been given and the unforgivable truths we’ve inflicted on those who don’t look like us, just because we’ve been conditioned to believe the festering lies of entitlement.
I don’t want to be racist.
So, I’ll read more.
WRITTEN: January 22, 2021
I don’t want to be racist.
I don’t announce myself as a doctor or a lawyer because I’m not.
I don’t want to announce myself as non-racist.
How can I not be racist?
I’m white, I think, long story. I grew up surrounded by people mostly looking like me. And we sucked. We didn’t know any different. How could we? We’d been conditioned from birth and come from generation after generation after generation of whites being told there will always be someone below you—if you listen to us—watch what we create for you—read what we tell you—learn what we teach you. If you do, you’ll be okay. We’re giving you the advantage.
I don’t want to be racist.
We had a Siamese cat named Guy. My brother nicknamed it Guy blank-blank, blank, blank-blank, blank-face. When I was eight, I’d stand on our porch and call out Guy’s nickname, signalling time for Guy to come home.
One of my aunts, after visiting Jamaica, stated her opinions on Jamaican fathers. It wasn’t glowing.
When I was twenty-three, my girlfriend’s parents told her, he wished she behaved more like the polite Japanese volleyball girls he’d been tasked with driving around.
We’d get floor-licking drunk, that was okay, because we were not indigenous.
I don’t want to be racist.
I’ve been pulled over for traffic offences on a few occasions; I swore at the police officer, even going so far as calling one a—without repercussion—without fearing repercussion.
A friend and I were stopped by police while pushing our car home while drunk—no repercussions.
A few days ago, while out walking, I saw two non-white guys looking down at a causeway; my first thought, I’d never say aloud, shamed me. Why is it on the ready?
I don’t want to be racist.
I want to share with the few black people I know, announce, really, I’ve read this book. I’m not sure if that’s okay. I think it would only reveal how much of an ass I can be. So, I won’t.
“How to Slowly Kill…” and other books about those who do not look like me are salves to heal my conditioning. They call out to all white people to look inward and continue growing in this never-ending understanding, we are not unique; we all bleed red.
I’ll never truly comprehend the unwavering advantage I’ve been given and the unforgivable truths we’ve inflicted on those who don’t look like us, just because we’ve been conditioned to believe the festering lies of entitlement.
I don’t want to be racist.
So, I’ll read more.
WRITTEN: January 22, 2021
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HOME FIREKamila SHAMSIERedemption + Assimilation + Family + Love: Bottled together in a desperate broth.
5 STARS |
How did the book make me feel/think?
HOME FIRE left me reeling. As much as I enjoyed the unrelenting twisting fiction of the story, I felt I was supposed to dive deeper into the gears turning humanity.
Kamila (author not a character) is of Indian descent, born into a patriarchal society shading womanhood in a sickness gripping many, not all, of the men. A thousand+ year struggle for equality + to find a voice—much most of us have never been exposed to, nary capable of grasping and understanding.
HOME FIRE elicited visceral emotions + a profound session of reflecting. Several questions sprinted through my mind, a reckoning of sorts—transcending borders.
Conflicted is the best way to describe the swallowing of my sensitivities while reading the searing realities in this captivating tale of love, family, deception, and the quest for the illusiveness of wholeness, + the overwhelming desire to belong.
As the story tumults perpetually to the confounding conclusion—mouth agape, I gasped as a single tear rolled over my left cheek.
That’s how this book made me feel.
WRITTEN: January 21, 2021
HOME FIRE left me reeling. As much as I enjoyed the unrelenting twisting fiction of the story, I felt I was supposed to dive deeper into the gears turning humanity.
Kamila (author not a character) is of Indian descent, born into a patriarchal society shading womanhood in a sickness gripping many, not all, of the men. A thousand+ year struggle for equality + to find a voice—much most of us have never been exposed to, nary capable of grasping and understanding.
HOME FIRE elicited visceral emotions + a profound session of reflecting. Several questions sprinted through my mind, a reckoning of sorts—transcending borders.
- How are children supposed to bleeping assimilate in new homelands when their roots are stripped away from them, and past family digressions haunt them with every step they take?
- What is assimilation supposed to do, and who defines assimilation?
- Can a radicalized person return to salvation after discovering the path he has been dragged down is clouded in deception?
- Is it possible for love to prevail over the differences of faith, especially when money and power smother out kindness + hope?
Conflicted is the best way to describe the swallowing of my sensitivities while reading the searing realities in this captivating tale of love, family, deception, and the quest for the illusiveness of wholeness, + the overwhelming desire to belong.
As the story tumults perpetually to the confounding conclusion—mouth agape, I gasped as a single tear rolled over my left cheek.
That’s how this book made me feel.
WRITTEN: January 21, 2021
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TALKING ANIMALSJoni MURPHYI laughed. Pondered. Cringed. Became aware. And then, frightened.
5+ STARS |
How did the book make me feel/think?
TALKING ANIMALS, this should be cute, light-spirited read about our lives from the point-of-view of the animals, primarily an adorable alpaca who’d emigrated from South America to NYC, I thought.
And it is both hilarious and cute, but it is so much more. I flip a page, and I’m immediately drawn into the destructiveness of us, the humans, to everything living, to everything we need to survive—to our health and well-being, to our very existence.
I laughed. Pondered. Cringed. Became aware. And then, frightened.
It is not like I don’t know what the animals in this poignant tale are trying to convey to us. Still, much like the inhabitants of the sea and greed’s persistent lack of care for anything but hoarding wealth, well, if it is not glaring in your face, all of us are complicit in the consumption of everything, which ultimately is leading toward an inevitable ending.
“What’s really destroying us is this slow carcinogenic drip. It comes from everywhere. What you can’t see is more dangerous than what you can.”
A friend who used to be a friend (a willing participant in the hoarding of wealth) travelled to the Java Sea—there is no seafood to be found. Imagine that.
We are floundering in capitalism. We are distracted by life and shiny things.
What Joni Murphy adroitly does in this entertaining, somewhat dystopian romp is bring to the forefront through the eyes of a delightful alpaca what power, greed, racism, corruption, and the many forces we humans must come to terms with together. Then, battle through by dropping our opportunities to allow those who come after us to have a future. We’re all in this collectively, and hopefully, we will open our eyes and realize the land needs the sea as much as I need you!
“The pig was blaming the world’s problems on fish, when fish were getting poisoned and eaten, and eaten and poisoned, by all the creatures on land who’d built their industries on sea exploitation.”
“I learned the rich are weak, twisted creatures. I learned to hate them while serving them smoked-salmon canapés.”
That’s how this book made me feel.
WRITTEN: January 12, 2021
TALKING ANIMALS, this should be cute, light-spirited read about our lives from the point-of-view of the animals, primarily an adorable alpaca who’d emigrated from South America to NYC, I thought.
And it is both hilarious and cute, but it is so much more. I flip a page, and I’m immediately drawn into the destructiveness of us, the humans, to everything living, to everything we need to survive—to our health and well-being, to our very existence.
I laughed. Pondered. Cringed. Became aware. And then, frightened.
It is not like I don’t know what the animals in this poignant tale are trying to convey to us. Still, much like the inhabitants of the sea and greed’s persistent lack of care for anything but hoarding wealth, well, if it is not glaring in your face, all of us are complicit in the consumption of everything, which ultimately is leading toward an inevitable ending.
“What’s really destroying us is this slow carcinogenic drip. It comes from everywhere. What you can’t see is more dangerous than what you can.”
A friend who used to be a friend (a willing participant in the hoarding of wealth) travelled to the Java Sea—there is no seafood to be found. Imagine that.
We are floundering in capitalism. We are distracted by life and shiny things.
What Joni Murphy adroitly does in this entertaining, somewhat dystopian romp is bring to the forefront through the eyes of a delightful alpaca what power, greed, racism, corruption, and the many forces we humans must come to terms with together. Then, battle through by dropping our opportunities to allow those who come after us to have a future. We’re all in this collectively, and hopefully, we will open our eyes and realize the land needs the sea as much as I need you!
“The pig was blaming the world’s problems on fish, when fish were getting poisoned and eaten, and eaten and poisoned, by all the creatures on land who’d built their industries on sea exploitation.”
“I learned the rich are weak, twisted creatures. I learned to hate them while serving them smoked-salmon canapés.”
That’s how this book made me feel.
WRITTEN: January 12, 2021
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THE BOOKSHOPPenelope FITZGERALDA story about an underdog battling the evil of 'have.'
5 STARS |
How did the book make me feel/think?
Florence Green is a lost widow, floundering in a small town, trying to matter. She’s vulnerable. She’s trying to cope. To dig herself out of the doldrums, Florence opens a bookshop to bring hopes + dreams to a town left in the past. Filled with simple people living simple lives. Anytown. Anywhere.
‘It is a good book, and therefore you should try to sell it to the inhabitants of Hardborough. They won’t understand it, but that is all good. Understanding makes the mind lazy.’
Simple is kept simple by those who yield the power—for no reason other than they can. The definition of evil?
These exterminators of hope have no shame.
Florence Green is a lost widow who finds a generational soulmate in a voracious reader—waiting for his inevitable end. He sees passion in Florence’s soul. He tries to protect her from the exterminators.
The Bookshop is a flowing tragedy, where sadly, ‘haves’ exterminate ‘have-nots’.
Bookshop shrewdly mirrors real life, cheering for hopeful failures while at the same time lamenting the inevitability of those holding the cards turning life into a loss for all—for no reason other than they can.
That’s how this book made me feel.
WRITTEN: January 8, 2021
Florence Green is a lost widow, floundering in a small town, trying to matter. She’s vulnerable. She’s trying to cope. To dig herself out of the doldrums, Florence opens a bookshop to bring hopes + dreams to a town left in the past. Filled with simple people living simple lives. Anytown. Anywhere.
‘It is a good book, and therefore you should try to sell it to the inhabitants of Hardborough. They won’t understand it, but that is all good. Understanding makes the mind lazy.’
Simple is kept simple by those who yield the power—for no reason other than they can. The definition of evil?
These exterminators of hope have no shame.
Florence Green is a lost widow who finds a generational soulmate in a voracious reader—waiting for his inevitable end. He sees passion in Florence’s soul. He tries to protect her from the exterminators.
The Bookshop is a flowing tragedy, where sadly, ‘haves’ exterminate ‘have-nots’.
Bookshop shrewdly mirrors real life, cheering for hopeful failures while at the same time lamenting the inevitability of those holding the cards turning life into a loss for all—for no reason other than they can.
That’s how this book made me feel.
WRITTEN: January 8, 2021
