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gajanperry's reviews
66 reviews
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
5.0
Reread!!! One of those books that gets better with time
Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man by Siegfried Sassoon
5.0
Returned to this after ten years on from high school and it absolutely stands up as one of my all time favourites. The Flower Show Match is among my favourite ever chapters of writing. But also maybe it’s just nostalgiacore
Incidental Inventions by Elena Ferrante
4.0
Don't go to therapy; just read this book instead (or make your therapist read it).
"My mother was very beautiful and very clever, like all mammas, so I loved her and hated her. I began to hate her when I was around ten, maybe because I loved her so much that the idea of losing her threw me into a permanent state of anxiety, and to calm myself I had to belittle her." (p.73)
Also, I've never felt so seen as by the article on the nervous difficulty of leaving social situations (including ones which aren't even that pleasant).
"Maybe the truth is that saying goodbye seems to me a rejection of human warmth - even the minimal warmth that makes us feel solitude less. I mean real solitude, which rises up by surprise and lasts a few seconds, the solitude that derives not from lack of company or affection, but from our innate separateness from one another." (p.90)
"My mother was very beautiful and very clever, like all mammas, so I loved her and hated her. I began to hate her when I was around ten, maybe because I loved her so much that the idea of losing her threw me into a permanent state of anxiety, and to calm myself I had to belittle her." (p.73)
Also, I've never felt so seen as by the article on the nervous difficulty of leaving social situations (including ones which aren't even that pleasant).
"Maybe the truth is that saying goodbye seems to me a rejection of human warmth - even the minimal warmth that makes us feel solitude less. I mean real solitude, which rises up by surprise and lasts a few seconds, the solitude that derives not from lack of company or affection, but from our innate separateness from one another." (p.90)
Sunbathing by Isobel Beech
3.0
Almost refrained from rating this one because I'm a coward. But while Sunbathing has some of the best prose I've read all year (the chapter about digital media use is brilliant) and some truly beautiful moments reflecting upon grief and friendship, I did find that there was also a fair bit of naff to wade through. Found that a good deal of the cultural references and the Italy narrative made the overall portrayal of grief a little bit inaccessible, although maybe that's just my own personal failing.
EDIT: I’ve realised that I was still way too cowardly to express my actual disappointments with this book which I truly did want to love completely - so ignore everything I’ve written here and my awfully articulated stilted half-criticism, altered review is coming
EDIT: I’ve realised that I was still way too cowardly to express my actual disappointments with this book which I truly did want to love completely - so ignore everything I’ve written here and my awfully articulated stilted half-criticism, altered review is coming