Month: June 2015

Document Your Life – May + June

Landline by Rainbow Rowell – REVIEW

18081809Landline is an adult contemporary novel. I read this in a paperback edition published by Orion Books.

Published: January 1st 2014

Publisher: St. Martin’s Press

Pages: 320 (hardcover)

Audiobook length: 9 hrs and 3 min

 

 

 

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 Synopsis by the publisher

Georgie McCool knows her marriage is in trouble; it has been in trouble for a long time. She still loves her husband, Neal, and Neal still loves her, deeply — but that almost seems beside the point now.

Maybe that was always beside the point.

Two days before they’re supposed to visit Neal’s family in Omaha for Christmas, Georgie tells Neal that she can’t go. She’s a TV writer, and something’s come up on her show; she has to stay in Los Angeles. She knows that Neal will be upset with her — Neal is always a little upset with Georgie — but she doesn’t expect him to pack up the kids and go home without her.

When her husband and the kids leave for the airport, Georgie wonders if she’s finally done it. If she’s ruined everything.

That night, Georgie discovers a way to communicate with Neal in the past. It’s not time travel, not exactly, but she feels like she’s been given an opportunity to fix her marriage before it starts…

Is that what she’s supposed to do?

Or would Georgie and Neal be better off if their marriage never happened?

Rainbow Rowell
Rainbow Rowell

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The Writing

Rowell’s writing is witty and I really did like the dialogue between the characters. Especially the ones between Georgie and young Neal.

There was a lot of easy humor, witty remarks and thoughts on love. And I loved the Tolkien references.

This is the second Rowell novel that I’ve read and I do really enjoy her writing even though I don’t feel as captivated by it as many others do.

The Characters

Georgie was a really ambitious character and I could relate to her in her frustration in feeling like she was trying to fulfill her dream as well as taking care of her family.

Seth and Neal made for two interesting male characters. I really fell for Seth in the beginning and just loved his smart remarks and his humor, but when young Neal came into the picture I had a hard time trying to decide which one of them I liked best.

Noomi is the cutest character in the bunch though! “Meow!”

The Plot

Landline had a pretty even pace and good build up.

It did take me a little while to get invested in the story, but when we got to around a hundred pages the story took a hold on me.

I felt like there could have been a lot more to this story as I did enjoy it quite a lot, but felt like everything got resolved a bit too quickly when there was so many feelings behind the whole plot.

I did like the ending though and it got me a little teared up.

My Thoughts

As I wrote above, it did take me quite a while to  get invested in this story. I was not bored for the first hundred pages, but I did not connect with the characters that much either.

But as the story finally took a hold on me I really did fly through it and enjoyed it very much.

It was an enjoyable and fast read but I didn’t love it.

3-stars-out-of-5

Would you like your own copy of Landline? Click on the Amazon or BookDepository logo below 🙂 

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A Series of Short Poems by Neil Hilborn

Neil Hilborn’s poetry always moves me in a way that few other slam poets do. His words are so vulnerable and filled with feelings. It reaches out of the screen and touches me. Makes me feel every little feeling that he’s trying to express. It is true talent by a true poet!

Enjoy!

I was thinking about childish things..

There is something so utterly magical about how the minds of children work. And being one of them who’s (hopefully) going to be a child at heart for the rest of my days I find it particularly sad whenever I meet someone who doesn’t remember what it was like to be a child. To play and use ones imagination to the fullest and not caring if it didn’t make sense to anyone else.

I believe that writers (like myself) can easily access that door into their own childlike mind. Maybe it is that we partly just refuse to grow up completely. Because who would ever want to do that?

I’m not saying that being an adult doesn’t have its advantages. But there really isn’t much that can top that adventurous bliss of childhood. I would easily trade every party for the opportunity to climb that tree that touched the sky for the first time again. To explore the forest behind my mother’s house and look for treasures. To dream about what my life would be when I grew up before I even knew what being a grown up meant. To look at the world as my own and packed with the possibility to become anything I could ever dream of and never care about any form of limitation.

I could be the best unicorn rider in the universe. I could travel to any planet at anytime. I would learn to fly and to breathe under water. To talk to animals and shift into any shape. Tame dragons and be the greatest heroine of our time.

The possibilities were endless!

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I’m going to let you in on a little secret. I still dream of all those things! And the greatest part is that I partly get to make them come true every single day. Liar, you say? No no! Let me tell you how.

I read and I write. 

This is my escape from the obligations, the bills and the boring parts of being a grown up. I get to be a child (yet again) every single day, if I want to! I can discover the wonderful universes created by others or I can make up my own. A place where I decide the rules and where I can explore everything for the first time just as I did with that forest behind our house.

I could never imagine myself a life without the possibility to enjoy this kind of imaginative escapes. And that is one of the things that I definitely wish for my son. For him to enjoy being a child for as long as he possibly can. To find the joy in reading books and making up his own stories and universes through storytelling and play. To allow himself to be childish even as he’s venturing into adulthood. To dare to dream and make his own future no matter how impossible it may feel at times.

There is so much joy in keeping your inner child alive. To stay creative and to explore.

Let’s run out there into our well known world as if it was completely new to us. Explore it and see it with childish eyes.

Come on! I dare you 🙂 

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Adultery by Paulo Coelho – REVIEW

20819682Adultery is a contemporary fiction novel. I read this in paperback format.

Published: August 19th, 2014 

Publisher: Knopf

Pages: 272 (paperback)

Audiobook length: 8hrs and 10 min

 

 

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Synopsis by the publisher:

Linda knows she’s lucky. Yet every morning when she opens her eyes to a so-called new day, she feels like closing them again. Her friends recommend medication. But Linda wants to feel more, not less. And so she embarks on an adventure as unexpected as it is daring, and which reawakens a side of her that she – respectable wife, loving mother, ambitious journalist – thought had disappeared. Even she can’t predict what will happen next…

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The Writing

Coelho’s writing is breathtakingly beautiful! There aren’t many writers that has captured and moved me the way that Coelho does again and again. The way he paints a perfect mental image of the honesty in any flawed situation is what made this book so hard to put down.

It’s utterly fascinating how he can put together the same words as we all use into an emotional masterpiece.

 

The Characters

I felt an instant connection to Linda. Her fear of missing out on things in life but in the same way fearing to let go of what she already had is something that I can see as relatable to so many of us.

Her temptations and thoughts were so brutally honest and showed us a very intimate strain of thoughts that I haven’t seen done so well in a while.

She was the perfectly imperfect character and she has a special place in my heart.

The Plot

Linda certainly goes through a lot in this short book and I really did struggle to put it down. I just wanted to know where her life was taking her and how she would handle it all.

There were some moments in the book where I was truly surprised when it came to Linda’s choice of action and even though it wasn’t the choices I hoped she would make (some of the times) but I still understood how she came to make those choices. And those choices made the story go in directions that took a hold of me and held me tight throughout the whole book.

It moved at an even pace and had some twists and turns that did not blow my mind but they felt right and true to the storyline.

 

Thoughts

I loved this book and I loved Linda and all her flaws. It was a story that differs so much from anything I’ve ever read.

Coelho writes perfectly about life, loss, fears and love. A provocative, honest story with a powerful message.

Highly, highly recommend!

five-stars

If you want your own copy of Adultery, click on the Amazon or BookDepository logo below!

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