kolorful_kay_reads's reviews
123 reviews

The Grace Year by Kim Liggett

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adventurous slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

"As much as he thinks he loves me - his allegiance to his family, his faith, his sex will always prevail... He can tell himself he's only trying to protect me, but there will always be something in him that wants to contain me, hide me from the world." #TheGraceYear

When the girls in this town turn 16, the boys choose select each one for marriage before all the girls are sent to a one-year adventure known as "The Grace Year." Discussion of the year is prohibited; all that is publicly known is that the girls come back as magic-less women... and many of them do not return at all.

You may have seen people compare this as a cross between #TheHandmaidsTale and #TheHungerGames... but let's talk about that, because I strongly discourage that comparison.

The Grace Year (TGY) - quite literally - rips from the world of the Handmaids Tale in that the cultural expectations of women are similar; however, TGY is NOT a book based on history of systems, governments, and religions and reimagining those events in the future. Please note that - when the comparison is made - it's pretty surface-level and does NOT relate to the craft or intention of the novel. This misunderstanding/incorrect word of mouth marketing dampened my experience with the book.

TGY cleverly brings conversations to the foreground around womanhood, oppression, and power; for this, it is a great #BookClubPick . On the down side, it doesn't provide any unique insight. In fact, half-way through it turns into a really gross tropey book that loses the legs it was standing on in the first half. 

My recommendation? Read the short story "The Lottery" and then read "The Handmaids Tale" and call it a day. 
The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 27%.
Main character was insufferable. Barely made it to the school before I had to give up. Nothing dystopian about this through the first 92 pages; this is people's actual lives.
Swimming Back to Trout River by Linda Rui Feng

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challenging emotional reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Outline by Rachel Cusk

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reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

An Elderly Lady Is Up to No Good by Helene Tursten

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dark funny lighthearted fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

๐Ÿ‘ต All the millennial grandmas have been NAPPING on this fun little book. I mean, keep napping -- live your best life. But this pocket-sized book made a really tough week a little bit brighter. Gosh, am I thankful for that.

๐Ÿ“š This is a series of cozy mysteries about an 88 year old woman named Maud. She is your typical internally-driven older woman who is sick of everybody's shit... oh, and also a serial killer.

It's a simple and quick read of short stories. Maud's background in each of the individual stories has some minor inconsistencies, so the close reader will see these (and potentially be bothered). For me, the silly energy of the stories and Maud's constant manipulation of other people's misconceptions of lifespan development was MORE than enough to make-up for whether Maud has been to a spa or not. ๐Ÿ’โ€โ™€๏ธ
An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook's Battle for Domination by Cecilia Kang, Sheera Frenkel

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informative mysterious slow-paced

4.0


๐Ÿ“Š This book, independent of the material referenced, is its own divisive discussion topic. Despite exploring topics of technology, data, and privacy within the walls of Facebook - topics which are often considered intimidating or niche to those who are unfamiliar - Frenkel and Kang write in the way of investigative journalists interested in narrative voice; any reader who has used a social network will be able to engage with the book.

๐Ÿ“† The book explores the general timeline of Facebook's decision making, with the majority of the focus leading-up to and during a Trump administration in US politics. Many of the news stories you've read about - Cambridge Analytica, Russian election interference, engineers utilizing user data to stalk people they date, and more are covered in this book and won't necessarily be "new" information to the reader; however, through extensive research and interviews, Frenkel and Kang seemingly aim to prove that Facebook had the knowledge that these events were occurring and intentionally mislead the public on Facebook's culpability.

๐Ÿ‘ป Before going further, it should be noted that my vocation is in the technology sector. This DEFINITELY impacted my experience with this book.

๐Ÿ“ฃ Imo, this book is an interesting and well-written and -organized collection of Facebook's choices. However, the conclusions made by the authors makes it seem as though they have never worked in technology; some of the inferences border on egregious or ignorant of industry norm -- and this is coming from somebody who deleted their Facebook years ago and consistently cites "ethical concerns" as a reason for denying their job interview requests. For example, the authors mention how engineers have access to too much user data with limited-to-no restriction, something that comes as a result of originally being a small start-up and never having put the resources into making the arguably necessary change. This is exceptionally true - at every company I've ever interacted with. Readers SHOULD be concerned about this because its NORMATIVE; instead, the authors look at this issue as a uniquely Facebook issue and 'shame on Zuckerberg.' There's lots to shame him for (in this book and for reasons outside of it), but the authors seemed more interested in blaming him for all decisions instead of just the ones he can and should control, which lead me to read the book as though I had unreliable narrators. I questioned everything and definitely didn't agree with many of the conclusions, but it was enjoyable to read, engage, and question nonetheless.

๐Ÿ’ญ โ€œFor the past year, the companyโ€™s data scientists had been quietly running experiments that tested how Facebook users responded when shown content that fell into one of two categories: good for the world or bad for the world. The experiments, which were posted on Facebook under the subject line โ€œP (Bad for the World),โ€ had reduced the visibility of posts that people considered โ€œbad for the world.โ€ But while they had successfully demoted them in the News Feed, therefore prompting users to see more posts that were โ€œgood for the worldโ€ when they logged into Facebook, the data scientists found that users opened Facebook far less after the changes were made.โ€