Books, Fiction

The Roxy Letters by Mary Pauline Lowry

Worth A Read Yes
Length 320
Quick Review It’s a fun novel filled with interesting characters and weird dramas, making it the perfect book to curl up with and distract from the pandemic outside our homes.  

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The Roxy Letters by Mary Pauline Lowry in Houston, Texas. | Dress | Watch |

In this strange time, we need as many reading options as possible to expand our minds or at the very least distract us from the raging pandemic going on around the world. The Roxy Letters by Mary Pauline Lowry will definitely keep you busy with a drama fueled plot set in Austin, Texas.  

Roxy is an artist working in the deli at the original Whole Foods and struggling to get laid and pay her mortgage when an ex-boyfriend, Everett, moves in to help cover the rent. She’s more committed to never getting back together with Everett than she is to committing herself to a vegan lifestyle. Her cat, Charlize Theron, and dog, Roscoe, keep her company. Instead of confronting Everett, she writes him letters to tell him what he’s doing wrong, what he needs to do better, and telling him about her life. The living situation doesn’t last, but Roxy keeps writing the letters without ever sending them. She’s working through her jealousy of her best friend and college friend’s corporate jobs, but, as an artist, she doesn’t want one herself. The artistic slump is real for Roxy when a new, sex-driven, outgoing, LuluLemon-wearing friend, Artemis, comes into her life and shakes things up. Roxy becomes intent on taking down LuluLemon, which is taking up prime real estate in Austin. Austin is under attack, and she wants to do something about it. 

As a Texan, it’s fun reading books set in my state. Austin is weird, and Roxy loves it as a native, mimicking the author. I love the mention of Austin sites, cementing this odd little book in real life experiences.   

The entire book is a series of letters written to Everett from Roxy. She is keeping him up to date on her life in a diaristic tone. They are never sent, but it allows her to write to a friend and catharsis her way through the ridiculous encounters happening to her or she puts herself in. I would call The Roxy Letters well written and fun. The narration is incredibly sassy and very in line with the way an intelligent 28 year old would talk to a friend…. I would know because I’m a semi-intelligent 28 year old with at least one friend, probably. Lowry does a great job creating fabulous echoes and letting things come full circle without being saccharine or trite. 

There are magical little moments  pushing against the linguist patriarchy in an endearingly hippy-dippy way. Roxy often prays to Goddess instead of God. It’s fun and light while still raging against the patriarchy; there’s a huge undercurrent of female empowerment and friendship without being angry or in your face. It’s feminist in the way I’ve always been a feminist. It’s about women without excluding or hating men.  

Lowry did ruin the word “nest” for me. Thank you for including a sex cult… It was a fun addition, and it made me incredibly uncomfortable.

The Roxy Letters by Mary Pauline Lowry will be out in five days on April 7, 2020! Preorder it so you can enjoy it during your quarantine because that’s what I did.

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

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Title: The Roxy Letters
Author: Mary Pauline Lowry
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Copyright: 2019
ISBN: 9781982132453

Books, NonFiction

Dreyer’s English by Benjamin Dreyer

Worth a Read Yes
Length 291
Quick Review The closest thing to porn I’ve ever read for a word-nerd.

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Posing with my friend’s flowers in a very writer like pose with  Dreyer’s English. | Dress | Fascinator | Earrings | Lipstick |

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I love everything about language. How it functions. How it changes. How it’s used. How it can be manipulated. I think it’s fascinating on every level. Dreyer’s English by Benjamin Dreyer is my version of porn. It’s an amazing book for language lovers, seasoned writers, author hopefuls, and everyone in between. We’re all writers; we do it every day in emails, text messages, proposals, and more. 

Dreyer’s English is my favorite style guide I’ve encountered. It’s not as thick, all-encompassing, or menacing as the MLA, AP, or any other style guide because it’s for writers who want to write. Dreyer writes with a sense of humor. He simultaneously says his way is the best and also allows for every other writer/copyeditor/reader/editor/person to have their own preferences — outside of the Oxford comma — because, if we’re being honest, writing and language are an art and inherently subjective. Do not glaze over the footnotes; they are amazing, full of wit, side remarks, random tidbits, and even mentions notes his copyeditor jotted to him. Gold. Amazing quotes and excerpts from books and media of all genres and eras are used as good and bad examples throughout. Unsurprisingly, Dreyer’s vast vocabulary makes the book even more entertaining to read. It’s unusual I come across a word I don’t know, but I came across a handful I had to look up. 

One of the first sections of the book speaks to breaking rules because that is exactly what artists do, and great writers are artists, “…Great Nonrules of the English Language. You’ve encountered all of these; likely you were taught them in school. I’d like you to free yourself of them.”. Dreyer wants writers to know the rules and break them. He also wants writers to know the stupid rules, which should have never been rules to begin with because there are a great many of those. I was lucky to have brilliant professors who told me a lot of the rules were archaic and stupid, and many of the other rules are breakable. The few things they didn’t teach me, I learned through trial and error as a writer typing, reading, editing, deleting, and retyping my work. One of the best pieces of advice I learned, Dreyer pointed out more than once, “One of the best ways to determine whether your prose is well-constructed is to read it aloud.” Learning is done through visuals, and Dreyer’s English is littered with bad versions and  good versions of sentences. My particular favorite is the correction from: “A mother’s responsibilities are to cook, clean, and the raising of the children” to the much better grammatically and societally: “A father’s responsibilities are to cook, to clean, and to raise the children.” Another fun example mentions my home-state’s capital, “I think of the Internet as a real place, as real as or realer than Des Moines.” It may not be a totally fabulous nod in Iowa’s direction, but it is a nod.

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There’s one thing I always look for in grammar guides: The writer’s opinion on the series comma, or Oxford comma. I’m a groupie of the comma, and anyone who disagrees is an idiot. Luckily, Dreyer is not an idiot and had my vote of confidence when he said, “I don’t want to belabor the point; neither am I willing to negotiate it. Only godless savages eschew the series comma.” Not only does he advocate for the appropriate way to write a series, his advice is spot on, in my humble opinion. I have told every. single. writer. I have ever worked with the same. exact. advice. found in Chapter 1 — and to delete “that” from 98% of their writing. The only thing I disagree with Dreyer on is using an apostrophe s to show possession after words ending in s. (I argue “Jesus’ fish” not “Jesus’s fish” looks better, Mr. Dreyer.)

Language and grammar are political. I took an entire college class on the subject. Dreyer does not come out and say so in Dreyer’s English, but through his footnotes, writing, side comments, and examples, it is clear grammar and language are political.

By the way… GET RID OF THE DOUBLE SPACE AFTER THE PERIOD. It’s been out for a very long time, but some people still do it. It drives me crazy. Benjamin Dreyer is copy chief of Random House. He is literally in charge of grammar at the publishing house. If you don’t want to listen to little old me, listen to him. Also use the Oxford comma. Benjamin Dreyer, the big boss, says so.

I loved reading Dreyer’s English. It’s my kind of porn, or as other people would call it, an accessible and entertaining guide to using the English language. Benjamin Dreyer is funny and smart, while also being relatable. He doesn’t mind letting his inner nerd shine through, which makes him even more relatable to me because I also do this: “Sometimes I’ll read old books as much for the pleasure of their old-fashioned stylistic oddities as for their actual content. We all have our own fun.”

Memorable Quotes
“Copyediting is a knack. It requires a good ear for how language sounds and a good eye for how it manifests itself on the page; it demands an ability to listen to what writers are attempting to do and, hopefully and helpfully, the means to augment it.”
“As much as I like a good rule, I’m an enthusiastic subscriber to the notion of “rules are meant to be broken” — once you’ve learned them, I hasten to add.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

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Title: Dreyer’s English; An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style
Author: Benjamin Dreyer
Publisher: Random House
Copyright: 2019
ISBN: 9780812995701

Books, NonFiction

Becoming by Michelle Obama

Worth A Read Yes
Length 426
Quick Review Becoming is the story of how Michelle Obama grew from a little girl on the South Side Chicago to an icon, a role model. 

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Reading Becoming by Michelle Obama in Houston, Texas. | Skirt | Chambray Shirt | Polka Dot Top | Head Band | Watch | Shoes | Glasses | Earrings |

I read this during Black History Month, but life wouldn’t let me sit in one place long enough to sit and write. It is the first book review of Women’s History Month. Apropos since she has done so much for women and women of color in this country and around the world. 

Michelle Obama is funny, complex, intelligent, thoughtful, realistic, loyal, hopefully, and more. It’s so easy to water down a person to the image presented by the media; more often than not, she was left to be the woman standing behind the man in the white house. Up until Becoming, I knew very little about her life outside of the basics. I loved her as the symbol of hope and change she has been for myself and others. As a human, I didn’t really know who she was. As I turned each page, I saw a great deal of my own qualities in her. Type-A, reader, observer, sense of humor, and not wanting to veer from the path but needing to. Michelle Obama is relatable; someone just about anyone could sit down and have tea with. 

For those wanting a book about Barack Obama, he’s written his own. This is about Michelle. Barack shows up because he is a part of her story, but he is a supporting character. She does not let him over take her story, nor does she speak for him. She is telling her story, and she is a force. 

Michelle Obama grew up on the South Side Chicago, watching the neighborhood change from diverse to predominantly black. From a young age, seh was filled with a drive to reach and garner approval from those around her. She studied vigorously and “miserably at my desk, in my puke-green chair – puke green being the official color of the 1970s…” not only proving her sense of humor but her strength of will to withstand such visual torture. After reaching her entire childhood with the support of her parents, she attended Princeton before Harvard Law to become a lawyer in a law firm in downtown Chicago, where she would mentor and fall in love with her husband. 

There is a vulnerability and strength in her story. Struggle was a part of her life from an early age. Growing up black in a city not known for its kindness towards the black population. Her father battled MS. She was a minority in the Ivy League universities she attended and battled discrimination and low expectations her entire life. Michelle Obama spoke about the decision to leave the law after working so hard to get there. It’s a conversation people don’t often have, but I don’t know anyone who hasn’t fought that battle internally. There were so many moments of humanity, vulnerability, and relatability throughout whether it was miscarriage, in vitro, marriage, family, and career. It’s hard not to feel like you know this woman. Very few people can relate or even know the first thing about being on a presidential campaign trail. What most people can relate to is the stress careers can place on a relationship and family. The struggle to support a significant other when it means letting go of hopes and dreams to create new ones. Michelle Obama makes the unrelatable universally relatable.

This story isn’t just hers, though. Through herself, Obama is telling the story of people of color and more specifically women of color. The problem and cyclic nature of the angry black woman, “The easiest way to disregard a woman’s voice is to package her as a scold.” How hatred is incessant and often unfounded, but through acts of kindness and listening, “I’ve learned that it’s harder to hate up close.” The fact that creating minor change is difficult, but creating large scale change to affect a great number of people, “It was another thing entirely to try and get the place itself unstuck.” The Obamas were reaching to make the world a better place for everyone because they understood the struggle intimately. 

When you’re a public figure, it can be hard to be honest and vulnerable, but Michelle Obama does it with sincerity and an open heart. She tackles the struggles women and minorities face, the problems in society and policy, racism and hatred, and more with kindness and honesty. It was a sad day when she and her husband left the white house for many reasons. I love and admire her honesty about the awfullness of Trump and what his presence in the White House means, especially following her husband’s presidency. 

Throughout Becoming, Michelle Obama reveals herself to be a strong, resilient, intelligent, driven woman with kindness, empathy, and tenderness flowing through her every action. Though she may have not had the same big picture change in mind her husband did, the ripples she created in society have been felt as strongly if not more strongly because of her character, compassion, and willingness to be human, accessibly so.

Memorable Quotes
“I just wanted to achieve. Or maybe I didn’t want to be dismissed as incapable of achieving.”
School counselor telling her she wasn’t Princeton material, “Had I decided to believe her, her pronouncement would have toppled my confidence all over again, reviving the old thrum of not enough, not enough.”
About men: “Hearing them, I realized that they weren’t smarter than the rest of us. They were simply emboldened, floating on an ancient tide of superiority, buoyed by the fact that history had never told them anything different.”
On the pain of miscarrying and speaking with friends, “helping me see that what I’d been through was no more than a normal biological hiccup, a fertilized egg that, for what was probably a very good reason, had needed to bail out.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

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Title: Becoming
Author: Michelle Obama
Publisher: Crown
Copyright: 2018
ISBN: 9781524763138

Books, Fiction

The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Worth A Read Yes
Length 406
Quick Review Delving into magical realism and familiar themes of justice, humanity, freedom, and equality, the era of slavery is raging in Ta-Nehisi Coates debut novel. 

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The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates in Galveston, Texas | Dress |

Ta-Nehisi Coates’ writes incredible essays and nonfiction, which are entertaining and thought provoking. I couldn’t wait to see what Coates would do in a world he created himself. Set in pre-Civil War Virginia, The Water Dancer is an impressive piece of fiction. 

Hiram Walker is the son of a slave and the Lockless plantation owner. His mother was sold when he was young, and he was taken in and raised by another slave on the plantation. The community is made up of Quality, slave/land owners, the Tasked, slaves, and classless whites. Hiram is an exceptional human because of his photogenic memory, but he also possesses the gift of conduction, the ability to travel across great distance through waterways. He eventually travels to Philadelphia through the Underground Railroad, where he meets Moses, a legendary Underground member. 

One of my favorite parts about the story is the way it is framed and told. Coates introduces Hiram in a death scene in chapter one. It captures the readers’ attention and holds it. There are also breaks in the narrative, where Hiram speaks as an older wiser man reminiscing about his younger years and even to speak directly to the reader. There is a lot of dependence on mysticism and suspension of reality. Coates shows the evils of slavery through the eyes of a slave. He also shows the entire society was trapped in the horrific cycle. Everyone suffered. No one was free. 

Story wise, it’s very interesting, well thought out, and thoroughly researched. Honestly, it’s rather forgettable. I’m having a hard time writing a decent or even remotely in depth review because it did not sweep me along. I read it and had to make myself keep reading. It’s not a novel I just had to know what happened. I remember the beginning far more than the ending. 

The Water Dancer is a combination of intriguing, boring, and well done. To be honest, it’s really hard calling, the beloved writer, Ta-Nehisi Coates’ prose boring, but it was. I thought it dragged on and on at times. Maybe part of it is that I don’t really like fantasy. I’ve never been a huge fan, and this is very much a fantasy novel. Although, I don’t think that has much to do with it. The fantasy bits were interesting and did not overwhelm the plot. 

Memorable Quotes
“She’d gone from that warm quilt of memory to the cold library of fact.”
“I was a man well regarded in slavery, which is to say I was never regarded as a man at all.” 

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

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Title: The Water Dancer
Author: Ta-Nehisi Coates
Publisher: One World
Copyright: 2019
ISBN: 9780399590597

Books, NonFiction

How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi

Worth A Read Yes
Length 320
Quick Review “Not Racist” is inherently racist. We’re all racist, but some of us are actively fighting against racism in the world and within ourselves, and that’s called antiracism.

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Reading How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi in Houston, Texas. | Dress  | Headband |

 

I didn’t know who Ibram X. Kendi was until this book. Now I’m a fan. I would love to go to coffee with him and discuss racism, history, and the meaning of life. He seems like the kind of guy who will point out how you’re being an asshole and let you grow from it because he spends How to Be an Antiracist pointing out the times he was a racist and grew from it. These are my favorite people; the people who acknowledge their growth by admitting the reality of their pasts. If only all of history could do the same, the world would be in a much better place. Books like this one are a step in that direction. It calls attention to history at large and personal to demonstrate and juxtapose how the two intertwine and affect each other. History is an amalgam of individual’s choices for good or bad, and all of those choices converge to create society, thought, and policy, which in turn influence individual choice for good or bad. 

Kendi doesn’t state anything revolutionary. If you’re tuned into policy, psychology, history, anthropology, sexuality, philology, African/African-American studies, sociology, gender studies, feminism, ethnic studies, etc., you’ll be aware of most of the topics and ideas in How to Be an Antiracist. The difference is in the wording. Kendi writes clearly and effectively, saying what he means even, especially, when it makes people uncomfortable. I had to stop taking notes and writing down quotes because there were so many poignant moments of blatant honesty. He names things as they are instead of finding a polite way of identifying racism, “Only racists shy away from the R-word – racism is steeped in denial.” As a writer, linguist, and reader, I’m a words person. I like them to be exact, and Kendi is the same. I love that Kendi does not like the word “microaggression” because of its inexactness. As an advocate, I have always used the exact words to describe things because anything else gives room for people to make excuses and shirk personal responsibility. Kendi calls racism racism, especially when it makes people uncomfortable. I’ve always believed people are uncomfortable because they can see themselves in it. 

How to Be an Antiracist is told through personal anecdotes, world history, policy, and culture. Kendi points out what’s wrong with society, policy, and everything by pointing out the ways he has had to face and overcome his own racism while breaking stereotypes, destroying myths, and shedding light on the truth. 

The book is pretty much summed up in the quote, “We know how to be racist. We know how to pretend to be not racist. Now let’s know how to be antiracist.” For more clarification on the term antiracist and the title, this quote speaks for itself,

“The opposite of “racist” isn’t “not racist.” It is “antiracist.” What’s the difference? One endorses either the  of racial hierarchy as a racist, or racial equality as an antiracist. One either believes problems are rooted in groups of people, as a racist, or locates the roots of problems in power and policies, as an antiracist. One either allows racial inequities to persevere, as a racist, or confronts racial inequities, as an antiracist. There is no inbetween safe space of “not racist.” The claim of “not racist” neutrality is a mask for racism.”

How to Be an Antiracist is intellectually stimulating and emotionally draining. Racism is rampant, systemic, cyclical, institutional, and ingrained in culture, history, religion, and policy. So many lines felt like a punch to the chest. I will never have to live in a world where my skin is viewed as a crime and a threat. I will never be able to comprehend that kind of pain, but Kendi’s words cut, making me ache to hug the pain away for every person who has been wronged, forgotten, abused, and left behind. I was also left to question, ‘What would I have done in that White person’s shoes. Would I make those same racist choices? Or would I have been better, done better?’  

Not only is Kendi a brilliant writer and scholar, he is a role model. Everyone has internal biases, which is a nice way of saying: we’re all racists. It’s hard to confront the ugly parts of ourselves, but society can’t move forward until we do so. Kendi is setting an example and a new standard for the way allies, advocates, and activists create change. He does so from the very first page in his introduction where he calls himself out for his racist ideas and misconceptions about the community he belongs to.

People often think books about racism or Black culture are antiwhite, but that, in and of itself, is a racist idea. As How to Be an Antiracist states, “The only thing wrong with White people is when they embrace racist ideas and policies and then deny their ideas and policies are racist.” Calling attention to racism is just that: calling attention to racism. It doesn’t matter your background, ethnicity, education, intelligence, skin color, we are all capable of being racist, but we are all capable of combating that and being antiracist. 

Memorable Quotes
“Internalized racism is the real Black on Black crime.”
“Racism itself is institutional, structural, and systemic.”
“The Black child is ill-treated like an adult, and the Black adult is ill-treated like a child.”
“Racist ideas make people of color think less of themselves, which makes them more vulnerable to racist ideas. Racist ideas make White people think more of themselves, which further attracts them to racist ideas.”
“The use of standardized tests to measure aptitude and intelligence is one of the most effective racist policies ever devised to degrade Black minds and legally exclude Black bodies.”
“Racist ideas love believers, not thinkers.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

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Title: How to Be An Antiracist
Author: Ibram X. Kendi
Publisher: One World (Penguin Random House)
Copyright: 2019
ISBN: 9780525509288

11..., Reading Lists

11… Black Writers I LOVE

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The Travelers | The Water Dancer | How to Love a Jamaican | A Raisin in the Sun | The Palm Wine Drinkard | Infidel: My Life | I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem | Passing | Half of A Yellow Sun | Homegoing |

Some of my favorite books are written by black authors. The first book I read by an African author was The Palm Wine Drinkard by Amos Tutuola. It completely opened my mind to a new voice, culture, and world. 

Black authors have done more to open my mind than any other demographic. I would not be the person I am today without these authors, their stories, the characters, and the challenges they gave me to face in the mirror and the world.  

    1. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie… I’ve read all of her books, and they are amazing. Americanah is absolutely stunning. I can’t recommend her enough. She has a uniquely African, American, female, human voice, which creates empathy and understanding by bridging the differences and finding the commonalities. 
    2. The Palm Wine Drinkard by Amos Tutuola was my gateway book. Before it, I had always gravitated to the European classics. Tutuola opened my eyes to a more diverse world of literature, and I’ve never looked back. It’s an amazing novel. You should read it. 
    3. One of the first novels I read by a black woman after discovering Achebe was Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. It is an incredible novel, and I fell in love with Hurston’s prose. She was incredibly talented, witty, and amazing. Anything she wrote is gold. 
    4. A few years ago, Yaa Gyasi was all over the place because of her debut novel Homegoing. It is absolutely worth the hype. I love the book and reviewed it, here.
    5. Ta-Nehisi Coates is a great writer. I really love his essays. They are incredible and insightful. 2019 saw the publishing of his first novel, The Water Dancer, which I’ve just read and I’m in the process of writing a review.
    6. The playwright, Lorraine Hansberry, is best known for A Raisin in the Sun, a play depicting segregation in Chicago and the Black Americans living in it. It was the first play by a black, female author performed on Broadway. 
    7. Alexia Arthurs has an amazing and unique voice. I can’t wait to see what else she brings into this world. Her collection of stories How to Love a Jamaican is wonderful. I reviewed it, here.
    8. I love memoirs, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a phenomenal memoirist. She’s had a challenging and tragic life, but she overcame it and created good in the world through her activism and writing. I highly suggest any of her memoirs, but Infidel: My Life is particularly incredible.
    9. I recently discovered Nella Larsen and her novella Passing. It was published 91 years ago, but it still holds so much up in today’s world and provides insight into the days of years gone by. Read the review, here.
    10. I read Moi, Tituba, Sorcière… Noire de Salem or I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem by Maryse Condé in college. Some of the scenes in the novel have stayed with me ever since. It’s an amazing and heart wrenching novel in the original French and just as powerful in the English translation. 
    11. Regina Porter’s debut novel The Travelers is fantastic. It’s an amazing snapshot of American history. I reviewed it a few months ago, here.

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna