Well, first of all I did make it to the plant and I made my partner take a picture of me through the live stream. It was quite large.
I have honestly not totally gotten back into reading until the last few weeks, but here I go!
Fiction
Redwall by Brian Jaques
Why I chose this book: I put this book on hold a long time ago when I was like “when I want something light to read” because this was one of the first books someone recommended to me that I actually liked. I am pretty sure a clerk at a Barnes & Noble recommended it to me.
Mood: childhood
I’m kind of convinced that there are Harry Potter series kids and Redwall series kinds and I’m on the Redwall side. Maybe because there was always a super long wait on Harry Potter from the library. I remember a library did recommend the books to me and I would search for a while but they were never available. (I also though Harry Potter was the author’s name).
Non-fiction
Our Bodies, Their Battlefields: War Through the Lives of Women by Christina Lamb
Why I picked up this book: I was trying to find a book to read to about Afghanistan…and then tried to find one not written by a white guy and came across Christina Lamb’s books. This was the one available at the library but it’s not exclusively about Afghanistan
Mood: ???? [<-these were supposed to be emojis but my blog is out of date] You know how some books about the atrocities kind of make you angry and want to act? This was more just deep dark sadness for me.
From GoodReads: “Lamb chronicles extraordinary tragedy and challenges in the lives of women in wartime. And none is more devastating than the increase of the use of rape as a weapon of war. Visiting warzones including the Congo, Rwanda, Nigeria, Bosnia, and Iraq, and spending time with the Rohingya fleeing Myanmar, she records the harrowing stories of survivors, from Yazidi girls kept as sex slaves by ISIS fighters and the beekeeper risking his life to rescue them; to the thousands of schoolgirls abducted across northern Nigeria by Boko Haram, to the Congolese gynecologist who stitches up more rape victims than anyone on earth. Told as a journey, and structured by country, Our Bodies, Their Battlefields gives these women voice.”
Where the Past Begins: A Writer’s Memoir by Amy Tan
Why I picked up this book: My mom suggested I watch her documentary on Netflix and after I did I wanted to see what she’s written recently and saw this
Mood: Reflective
First: I really like Amy Tan and her books. The Joy Luck Club was one of the first book I read with Asian characters and we had to read an excerpt in middle school.
On this book though, I also really liked it, haha. I felt really connected to Amy Tan’s experiences and ways of thinking even if our lives are so different. I really felt her description of how she relates to expectations put on her and could relate to it.
Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor
Why I picked up this book: I’ve been doing more mediation and learning about the body’s physiological reaction to breathing on things like stress so picked up this book that I’ve seen mentioned pop up here and there
Mood: Felt kind of new-age-y in retrospect
I kind of don’t know what to think after reading the book because I knew that some of the things I had heard about from reliable sources (like breathing techniques that medics use to remain calm), but some of the correlations he talks about are absolutely baffling if true. That nasal breathing has all these benefits (I don’t think I realized how many people mouth breathed though), the reason for our crooked teeth, are mouths are getting smaller and that actually expanding our jaw is better for breathing than making them smaller (what most people do with their braces)…the benefits of proper breather training on things like athletics, sleep apnea, and even emphysema…it’s like, if these were true surely more people would be doing it, wouldn’t they? I don’t know if I’d totally recommend this book unless you’re curious.