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hopebrasfield's reviews
215 reviews
Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Ethan is the perfect encapsulation of limerence.
"These alterations of mood were the despair and joy of Ethan Frome. The motions of her mind were as incalculable as the flit of a bird in the branches. The fact that he had no right to show his feelings, and thus provoke the expression of hers, made him attach a fantastic importance to every change in her look and tone. Now he thought she understood him, and feared; now he was sure she did not, and despaired."
It's been about a month since I finished this, and that ending still sticks with me.
"These alterations of mood were the despair and joy of Ethan Frome. The motions of her mind were as incalculable as the flit of a bird in the branches. The fact that he had no right to show his feelings, and thus provoke the expression of hers, made him attach a fantastic importance to every change in her look and tone. Now he thought she understood him, and feared; now he was sure she did not, and despaired."
It's been about a month since I finished this, and that ending still sticks with me.
Throwback by Maurene Goo
emotional
funny
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Again with the time travel books--how does this happen, I promise I'm not looking for time travel books. Nothing wrong with looking for them, of course, but it's not something I actively seek out. They seek me out!
In terms of time travel books, this is among the most enjoyable I've read. The characters are more interesting and diverse than in others (by a mile, I'd say!), the plot makes more sense without being boring (that a plot makes sense and is interesting is not a given in this genre), and the writer manages to avoid relying on certain over-used tropes regarding money and privilege (very common time travel hack is to make your characters incredibly wealthy and privileged, which of course helps to explain my first point re diversity).
I'd recommend this to a friend looking for an easy read and introduction to YA, romance, YA sci fi, or time travel in general. You'd get a good sense of where you'd like to go from here by starting out with this book in particular!
In terms of time travel books, this is among the most enjoyable I've read. The characters are more interesting and diverse than in others (by a mile, I'd say!), the plot makes more sense without being boring (that a plot makes sense and is interesting is not a given in this genre), and the writer manages to avoid relying on certain over-used tropes regarding money and privilege (very common time travel hack is to make your characters incredibly wealthy and privileged, which of course helps to explain my first point re diversity).
I'd recommend this to a friend looking for an easy read and introduction to YA, romance, YA sci fi, or time travel in general. You'd get a good sense of where you'd like to go from here by starting out with this book in particular!
The Weekend by Charlotte Wood
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Quick thoughts:
A group of three friends--consisting of a mistress know-it-all, a broke has-been actor, and a washed up professor--confront the ghost of their Perfect Dead Friend™️.
This type of plot isn't usually my style, but I sure did enjoy the characters. As a whole, this book is great fodder for your journal, your upcoming therapy sessions, and your falling-asleep-anxiety-fantasies.
The author goes in and out of different POVs throughout the novel, which made it challenging at times--though in a purposeful way that pays off by the end, I think.
Memorable quotes:
“This was something nobody talked about: how death could make you petty. And how you had to find a new arrangement among your friends, shuffling around the gap of the lost one, all of you suddenly mystified by how to be with one another.”
"She had always been an outsider. All artists were. The thing she'd done that was unforgivable was to stay in the theater while other people got proper jobs. She'd spent her life living all the parts of herself, while normal people lived along the slenderest, most limited path of experience. They did not know themselves in the least. She made art, not money. And that, like slouching, was alright when you were young. Artistic poverty was romantic when you were 30. It was after 50 that people began despising you for it."
Recommendations:
I'm recommending this to everybody I know because I am cruel! Or, because I'd like to talk with friends about how the characters moved and felt and thought as one and apart and back together again; about the political economy of the characters' lives; and about the insights we get into object relations via these characters at this particular time in their lives.
A group of three friends--consisting of a mistress know-it-all, a broke has-been actor, and a washed up professor--confront the ghost of their Perfect Dead Friend™️.
This type of plot isn't usually my style, but I sure did enjoy the characters. As a whole, this book is great fodder for your journal, your upcoming therapy sessions, and your falling-asleep-anxiety-fantasies.
The author goes in and out of different POVs throughout the novel, which made it challenging at times--though in a purposeful way that pays off by the end, I think.
Memorable quotes:
“This was something nobody talked about: how death could make you petty. And how you had to find a new arrangement among your friends, shuffling around the gap of the lost one, all of you suddenly mystified by how to be with one another.”
"She had always been an outsider. All artists were. The thing she'd done that was unforgivable was to stay in the theater while other people got proper jobs. She'd spent her life living all the parts of herself, while normal people lived along the slenderest, most limited path of experience. They did not know themselves in the least. She made art, not money. And that, like slouching, was alright when you were young. Artistic poverty was romantic when you were 30. It was after 50 that people began despising you for it."
Recommendations:
I'm recommending this to everybody I know because I am cruel! Or, because I'd like to talk with friends about how the characters moved and felt and thought as one and apart and back together again; about the political economy of the characters' lives; and about the insights we get into object relations via these characters at this particular time in their lives.
Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto by Legacy Russell
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
TLDR:
I LOVE BOOKS ABOUT THE INTERNET.
General thoughts:
I'm not usually a fan of academic-speak. If you've familiarized yourself with that sort of language and figured out how it works (as a reader, writer, or both), I'm sure you've noticed just how irritating it can be when done poorly. I sure have, to the point of bringing a sort of pre-irritated, prove-me-wrong type attitude toward that sort of writing altogether. This is important for me to share in the context of a review of this book in particular because I want you to know I went into Glitch Feminism assuming it would irritate me in some way. Happily, it did not!
I'd recommend this to anybody who interacts with other humans on the internet and/or has a body and/or has ever created or consumed any sort of art. I suppose that means I'd recommend it to everybody!
If you're not used to reading academic-speak, this would be a great place to start. Russell's writing is so beautifully done you'd think they were born typing. At times, I felt like I was having something like Earthseed explained to me by Lauren Olamina herself, a manifesto or guide that feels just over your head while remaining within reach.
Memorable quotes:
"Glitch feminism urges us to consider the in-between as a core component of survival—neither masculine nor feminine, neither male nor female, but a spectrum across which we may be empowered to choose and define ourselves for ourselves. Thus, the glitch creates a fissure within which new possibilities of being and becoming manifest. This failure to function within the confines of a society that fails us is a pointed and necessary refusal. Glitch feminism dissents, pushes back against capitalism."
“As we engage with the digital, it encourages us to challenge the world around us, and, through this constant redressing and challenging, change the world as we know it, prompting the creation of entirely new worlds altogether.”
^ This is actually so super close to a quote from a Butler book, Parable of the Talents: "Our new worlds will remake us as we remake them. And some of the new people who emerge from all this will develop new ways to cope. They'll have to. That will break the old cycle, even if it's only to begin a new one, a different one."
“When we reject the binary, we reject the economy that goes along with it. When we reject the binary, we challenge how we are valued in a capitalist society that yokes our gender to the labor we enact. When we reject the binary, we claim uselessness as a strategic tool. Useless, we disappear, ghosting on the binary body.”
“To become an error is to surrender to becoming unknown, unrecognizable, unnamed. New names are created to describe errors, capturing them and pinning down their edges for examination. All this is done in an attempt to keep things up and running; this is the conceit of language, where people assume if they can find a word to describe something, that this is the beginning of controlling it.”
“As we fail, we morph. As we morph, we transcend captivity, slippery to those forces that try to restrict, restrain, and censor us.”
“The Internet continues to be a place of immense intimacy, where an “opening up” of being can occur, and where one can dare to be vulnerable. The Internet’s virtual channels provide protection from physical injury, make room for an expression of ideas and politics in a fantastic forum, thus amplifying collectivity, coalition building, and one’s courage to individuate.”
Topics or concepts I found to be super intriguing or thought provoking:
* the idea of internet spaces as utopian (would love to talk about what the creation and management of internet spaces that "work" tells us about the work needed in creating and managing other types of utopian spaces; i.e., that utopia will require all sorts of ongoing conceptual, emotional, and physical work!)
* the interaction between hypervisibility and invisibility (felt this one in my guts)
* the use of art both creatively and politically (e.g., "Through her self expression, [the artist] cracks open the possibility of containing multitudes, not only as a creative action, but as a political one.")
* the internet is real (in chapter 10, Russell takes on reductionist views re: the internet not being a "real" place, which they correctly point out to be rooted in things like racism, ableism, classism, etc.)
Books I'd recommend as companions:
Work Without the Worker: Labour in the Age of Platform Capitalism by Philip Jones https://www.versobooks.com/products/2518-work-without-the-worker
^ Russell asks if we can figure out a way to "occupy" certain online spaces, such as those owned by actual fascists. Reading Work Without the Worker is why I'm able to fairly confidently imagine that yes, this is possible!
Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness by Da'Shaun L. Harrison
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/670607/belly-of-the-beast-by-dashaun-harrison/
^ Bodies are sort of central to Glitch, and Harrison's book provides a similarly in-depth analysis of the concept.
Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler
https://www.octaviabutler.com/parableseries
^ Classics of course, and a great fictional fit with Glitch Feminism.
Documentaries I'd recommend as companions:
TikTok, Boom from director Shalini Kantayya
https://www.pbs.org/independentlens/documentaries/tiktok-boom/
^ This is the only documentary about how the internet works that I would feel comfortable recommending to somebody who isn't already super online.
The Internet's Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Swartz from director Brian Knappenberger
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M85UvH0TRPc
^ One of my very favorite documentaries. Aaron Swartz's story is essential in understanding how the internet as we know it was built, how it works, and what we're up against when we attempt to make any sort of statement or cause any sort of change. I think the hope he had about what the internet could be helps us to be more hopeful and imaginative ourselves, so please watch this and learn more about Aaron if you can!
Bonus companion recommendations:
Hackers from director Iain Softley
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers_(film)
The Net from director Irwin Winkler
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Net_(1995_film)
^ These are "funny" recommendations, sure, but I think they could also be incredible companion pieces! Watching these could help us to reimagine how we experience the internet today by looking at the popular imagination surrounding it at its start. These also both deal with the very real connections between our internet lives and our "AFK" lives (as described by Russell), even if they do so in fairly silly ways!
---
P.S.
I picked this up after watching a review and recommendation from @neuroabolition on Instagram (available here: https://www.instagram.com/reel/C1nS_WGuaHH/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==). It looks like they'll be making other book recommendations, too!
I LOVE BOOKS ABOUT THE INTERNET.
General thoughts:
I'm not usually a fan of academic-speak. If you've familiarized yourself with that sort of language and figured out how it works (as a reader, writer, or both), I'm sure you've noticed just how irritating it can be when done poorly. I sure have, to the point of bringing a sort of pre-irritated, prove-me-wrong type attitude toward that sort of writing altogether. This is important for me to share in the context of a review of this book in particular because I want you to know I went into Glitch Feminism assuming it would irritate me in some way. Happily, it did not!
I'd recommend this to anybody who interacts with other humans on the internet and/or has a body and/or has ever created or consumed any sort of art. I suppose that means I'd recommend it to everybody!
If you're not used to reading academic-speak, this would be a great place to start. Russell's writing is so beautifully done you'd think they were born typing. At times, I felt like I was having something like Earthseed explained to me by Lauren Olamina herself, a manifesto or guide that feels just over your head while remaining within reach.
Memorable quotes:
"Glitch feminism urges us to consider the in-between as a core component of survival—neither masculine nor feminine, neither male nor female, but a spectrum across which we may be empowered to choose and define ourselves for ourselves. Thus, the glitch creates a fissure within which new possibilities of being and becoming manifest. This failure to function within the confines of a society that fails us is a pointed and necessary refusal. Glitch feminism dissents, pushes back against capitalism."
“As we engage with the digital, it encourages us to challenge the world around us, and, through this constant redressing and challenging, change the world as we know it, prompting the creation of entirely new worlds altogether.”
^ This is actually so super close to a quote from a Butler book, Parable of the Talents: "Our new worlds will remake us as we remake them. And some of the new people who emerge from all this will develop new ways to cope. They'll have to. That will break the old cycle, even if it's only to begin a new one, a different one."
“When we reject the binary, we reject the economy that goes along with it. When we reject the binary, we challenge how we are valued in a capitalist society that yokes our gender to the labor we enact. When we reject the binary, we claim uselessness as a strategic tool. Useless, we disappear, ghosting on the binary body.”
“To become an error is to surrender to becoming unknown, unrecognizable, unnamed. New names are created to describe errors, capturing them and pinning down their edges for examination. All this is done in an attempt to keep things up and running; this is the conceit of language, where people assume if they can find a word to describe something, that this is the beginning of controlling it.”
“As we fail, we morph. As we morph, we transcend captivity, slippery to those forces that try to restrict, restrain, and censor us.”
“The Internet continues to be a place of immense intimacy, where an “opening up” of being can occur, and where one can dare to be vulnerable. The Internet’s virtual channels provide protection from physical injury, make room for an expression of ideas and politics in a fantastic forum, thus amplifying collectivity, coalition building, and one’s courage to individuate.”
Topics or concepts I found to be super intriguing or thought provoking:
* the idea of internet spaces as utopian (would love to talk about what the creation and management of internet spaces that "work" tells us about the work needed in creating and managing other types of utopian spaces; i.e., that utopia will require all sorts of ongoing conceptual, emotional, and physical work!)
* the interaction between hypervisibility and invisibility (felt this one in my guts)
* the use of art both creatively and politically (e.g., "Through her self expression, [the artist] cracks open the possibility of containing multitudes, not only as a creative action, but as a political one.")
* the internet is real (in chapter 10, Russell takes on reductionist views re: the internet not being a "real" place, which they correctly point out to be rooted in things like racism, ableism, classism, etc.)
Books I'd recommend as companions:
Work Without the Worker: Labour in the Age of Platform Capitalism by Philip Jones https://www.versobooks.com/products/2518-work-without-the-worker
^ Russell asks if we can figure out a way to "occupy" certain online spaces, such as those owned by actual fascists. Reading Work Without the Worker is why I'm able to fairly confidently imagine that yes, this is possible!
Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness by Da'Shaun L. Harrison
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/670607/belly-of-the-beast-by-dashaun-harrison/
^ Bodies are sort of central to Glitch, and Harrison's book provides a similarly in-depth analysis of the concept.
Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler
https://www.octaviabutler.com/parableseries
^ Classics of course, and a great fictional fit with Glitch Feminism.
Documentaries I'd recommend as companions:
TikTok, Boom from director Shalini Kantayya
https://www.pbs.org/independentlens/documentaries/tiktok-boom/
^ This is the only documentary about how the internet works that I would feel comfortable recommending to somebody who isn't already super online.
The Internet's Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Swartz from director Brian Knappenberger
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M85UvH0TRPc
^ One of my very favorite documentaries. Aaron Swartz's story is essential in understanding how the internet as we know it was built, how it works, and what we're up against when we attempt to make any sort of statement or cause any sort of change. I think the hope he had about what the internet could be helps us to be more hopeful and imaginative ourselves, so please watch this and learn more about Aaron if you can!
Bonus companion recommendations:
Hackers from director Iain Softley
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers_(film)
The Net from director Irwin Winkler
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Net_(1995_film)
^ These are "funny" recommendations, sure, but I think they could also be incredible companion pieces! Watching these could help us to reimagine how we experience the internet today by looking at the popular imagination surrounding it at its start. These also both deal with the very real connections between our internet lives and our "AFK" lives (as described by Russell), even if they do so in fairly silly ways!
---
P.S.
I picked this up after watching a review and recommendation from @neuroabolition on Instagram (available here: https://www.instagram.com/reel/C1nS_WGuaHH/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==). It looks like they'll be making other book recommendations, too!
Call Me by Your Name by André Aciman
Did not finish book. Stopped at 0%.
Did not finish book. Stopped at 0%.
The narrator may or may not have done something creepy and/or bad that I won’t be able to not think about while reading this, I’m sorry.
Stone Cold Fox by Rachel Koller Croft
lighthearted
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
Think Otessa Moshfegh's Death in Her Hands--but it's a prequel, and it's bad.
Reading this felt like reading the Sweet Valley High mystery-type novels back in middle school. Those books felt so potentially mind-expanding at the time (they were so much BIGGER than the original Sweet Valley books, and all the cool smart girls were reading them), if only I could get past them being not so good, actually.
It felt like watching Lost as it aired, dissecting what might happen next each week, only to find out the creators arguably never had a plan* for where the show was going story-wise.
I'm disappointed because this came so highly recommended by somebody whose content I otherwise very much enjoy over on BookTok. Goes to show you can have super interesting cultural takes while also having not so great taste in books! People are complicated! (Unlike the characters in this book.)
* https://www.complex.com/pop-culture/a/doug-sibor/the-lost-writers-had-no-plan-whatsoever
Reading this felt like reading the Sweet Valley High mystery-type novels back in middle school. Those books felt so potentially mind-expanding at the time (they were so much BIGGER than the original Sweet Valley books, and all the cool smart girls were reading them), if only I could get past them being not so good, actually.
It felt like watching Lost as it aired, dissecting what might happen next each week, only to find out the creators arguably never had a plan* for where the show was going story-wise.
I'm disappointed because this came so highly recommended by somebody whose content I otherwise very much enjoy over on BookTok. Goes to show you can have super interesting cultural takes while also having not so great taste in books! People are complicated! (Unlike the characters in this book.)
* https://www.complex.com/pop-culture/a/doug-sibor/the-lost-writers-had-no-plan-whatsoever
Content Warnings
Moderate: Child abuse, Death, Sexual assault, Death of parent, and Murder
Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
4.0
Entertaining and easy read. Reading this after having seen the movie so many times is kind of like reading the original fairy tales--the originals are always so much darker than what you grew up with.
The Democracy Project: A History, a Crisis, a Movement by David Graeber
5.0
Absolutely great. Too many notes and quotes to put in a little review like this.
I knew next to nothing about the actual occupy project before reading this book. I was a grad student while it was active, still believed in the meritocracy, and wasn't paying attention to the news or pop culture (and I certainly didn't have any sort of substantial political awareness at the time). This book helped to de-propagandize me and situated the movement within larger movements I've been reading about and taking part in.
I've read and re-read this essay a few times over the past year without realizing it's essentially the last part of this book. Definitely recommend giving it a read, especially if you're not able to read the book as a whole! https://thebaffler.com/salvos/a-practical-utopians-guide-to-the-coming-collapse
I knew next to nothing about the actual occupy project before reading this book. I was a grad student while it was active, still believed in the meritocracy, and wasn't paying attention to the news or pop culture (and I certainly didn't have any sort of substantial political awareness at the time). This book helped to de-propagandize me and situated the movement within larger movements I've been reading about and taking part in.
I've read and re-read this essay a few times over the past year without realizing it's essentially the last part of this book. Definitely recommend giving it a read, especially if you're not able to read the book as a whole! https://thebaffler.com/salvos/a-practical-utopians-guide-to-the-coming-collapse
Take What You Need by Idra Novey
3.0
It was okay! Also, I usually hate read by the author books--but I quickly forgot the author was reading one of the parts, she did a great job.
Loved the characterization of the stepmother as somebody who thinks of herself as a good person in that she works hard to be seen as a good person. I think the daughter is the same, though she takes it much further. Felt a little bit like the MC in Death in Her Hands, though not as fleshed out. Maybe our stepmother in this book would have eventually turned into the MC in Death, if that makes sense.
Loved the characterization of the stepmother as somebody who thinks of herself as a good person in that she works hard to be seen as a good person. I think the daughter is the same, though she takes it much further. Felt a little bit like the MC in Death in Her Hands, though not as fleshed out. Maybe our stepmother in this book would have eventually turned into the MC in Death, if that makes sense.
Old Enough by Haley Jakobson
5.0
Old Enough was like the Summer I Turned Pretty, only gayer and with more trauma (though not because one caused the other, they're just two themes that both exist within Old Enough and not so much in Summer). I loved this book, but all my specific reasons for loving it are going to have to go into a personal journal or in a confidential talk with a mental health professional!