Authors – Dimples Migraines and Aahs

I pride myself in starting the year strong and making the best use of those first days before things settle. This January, I managed to get my hands on four books: The girl with the lauding voice by Abi daré, a spill over from 2023, The invisible life of Addie Larue, a secret Santa gift which I had to momentarily pose and dig into Animal Farm by George Orwell, the book club read of the month and lastly Committed by Elizabeth Gilbert, a re-read that feels like a first time reading.

Most people have found it difficult reading the girl with the lauding voice because of the broken English. Having been forewarned and further explained to that the writer was in character with the girl narrating the story, I was in awe because the writing style is certainly hard to pull off. Our brains are trained to correct error. It is an uphill task reverse engineering and having deliberate spelling errors. One can easily blame it on poor editing like I do but not this time.

The innocence of the girl, the unfortunate things that happen to her and the helplessness of her situation keep you rooting for her and turning the pages to find out if she gets a reprieve. That being said, I am taking a break from Nigerian authors because I have reached saturation with their kind of content. The invisible life of Addie Larue is out of my comfort zone. Very mystical and definitely a book that I would not have picked for myself. Addie prays to the Gods who she was warned not to ask from and in the spur of the moment, she asks for the gift of life for as long as she is not tired of living.

Addie is not given parameters for her ask, she does not take time to seek clarification either which is what I would have done in her position. She was just praying and did not expect to be answered and when the answer came, she was not certain of what she wanted. She learns “on the job” that she cannot say her name, she cannot tell the truth, people do not remember her, she cannot have friends, a lover, a relationship only because everyone else’s memory of her is fleeting. She might as well be a ghost, It would be easier because then she would not worry about having a place to live, needing money for food or any of life’s luxuries and a change of clothes. So far, Addie has done the most with the cards life has dealt her.

The length of Animal Farm made reading the book bearable. I was quickly taken back to my high school days when we learnt about personification and symnolism. I was pleasantly shocked that pigs would be the cleverest of the animals, I only know them as dirty and greedy. The book is mostly a mirror and if that is lost to any reader, the writer says as much in the last page. It is insightful on leadership and how the society perceives leaders and rules. I am glad to have been introduced to George Orwell’s works.

I must have written about committed. I remember being smitten with the book then as I am now the only difference being that now marriage is not a far off chance topic as it was then. I have been searching the depths of my soul and interrogating the beliefs I hold about marriage as an institution and everything that grace’s the occasion right from the engagement ring, the white dress, the notion of brides maids, the venue of the wedding, the roles of each party in the marriage and the extent to which the two parties have control on the state of the marriage.

For each couple that is eager to be wedded, there is an equal number of those trying to weed themselves from what they got into. Much thought has been given to the institution and the pertinent questions one needs to have answered leading to the decision to marry/wed. Reading Committed reminded me of the many nuggets I picked from my all time favourite of Elizabeth Gilbert’s books, City of Girls. I have been recommending this book to anyone who has ears to hear and eyes to read to the extent that I got upset when two of those people keep pushing it further down their to be read list and I angrily told them that they should not even get the book because they are unworthy of the Gems in it. I am yet to determine whose choice was more distasteful between them and the person who started and left it halfway.

Committed is well written. Elizabeth allows us to grapple with the same questions she did as she shares her findings with us. I have learnt so much about marriage as an institution but like she says, it is ever changing. You think you now have the tools to do it right but when you put what you have learnt in practise you have totally different players and their response to the tools is completely different which sets us out on another learning curve.

With this good start, I am looking forward to the insights I will get from books in 2024, I hope you are here for the ride.

The more you read, the more books and authors you discover. The more you want to read, the less time you have. In 2020 I read books differently. I had them read and discussed to me and I also got to be part of a book in addition to the traditional reading. I of course had book slump moments when I did not feel like reading at all but this is when I turned to reading blogs and the letters I have been receiving and sending on a weekly basis.

You are probably wondering how books can be read and discussed to you. Allow me to introduce Mike Carruthers. He has a podcast called Something you should know and there are very many things that one should know. I thought of having a standalone post on this podcast and maybe I will. He addresses our day to day concerns, things that happen to us or around us that we never bother question. Turns out that there are people who have devoted their time to let us understand these things happening, with their research and studies. The people he brings on the pod are experts in a field and they are authors of a book in the same. They discuss what they wrote about, how they came to that conclusion and the studies they carried out to establish that theory. With this detailed discussion, I believe I have read as many books as the authors brought in each episode.

Choices is my platform to be in a book. It is an application that has several books of different genres. You choose how the characters in the book should look like and you even get to name the main characters. As you are a character in the book, you are entirely in charge of the choices you make and perhaps this is the insight to the tittle of the application. As usual, each book has chapters. You need keys to access a chapter and you are only given two at a time. Once you use your first key, it takes about 2 hrs for it to be renewed hence giving you time and controlling your pace.

As I mentioned, there are choices to be made. Some choices cost you dearly and others are given to you freely. Each day, you have the opportunity to collect 5 coins after watching several advertisements. At the end of each chapter, you collect 2 coins. As I am writing this, I have been part of 2 books; the royal romance and America’s most eligible. Royal romance was a typical grass to riches story. The story starts when I am a waitress who gets to serve a Prince in disguise while he is visiting New York. He takes a liking to me and using my coins, I unlocked a scene where I got to spend time alone with him. Next thing, I’m in the race with other suitors to be the future queen. In that journey, I learnt all about the waltz at least all I could learn in book 1. I did not proceed to book 2 as my faint heart could not take it that I was not chosen queen. I realized that although the book sets you out to be the main character, things do not go in your favour just because.

Disappointed by that book, I turned to America’s most eligible. It is a reality TV based book which reminded me of Netflix’s show Too hot to handle. There are challenges that you take part in and you learn basic life skills. I have become a connoisseur of sorts thanks to the two books. In this book, you have to choose a personality, you can build relationships and mostly, learn about your reaction to different situations. All through you work on winning the admiration of fellow contestants but also trying not to be too perfect as that breeds envy which leads to enmity. You also have to entertain the audience by stirring up just enough drama and knowing the balance so as not to go overboard. You need to remember things about different characters throughout the book as this knowledge comes in handy when making choices. Like the previous book, I was not crowned America’s most eligible nevertheless I was proud of my achievements throughout the book and the new catch phrases that I have already started dropping in my everyday parlance.

Other important skills you gain from this form of reading is patience and tact. Patience because you’ll have to wait for the 5 coins collected in a day to add up to a sizeable amount to trade in. When in possession of coins, you have to decide on the most worthy decision to spend them on. There are instances where you have the option of visiting a stylist to enhance your look or maintaining your day to day style. If anything, dressing really goes a long way but you have to weigh this against other opportunities that may put you in a better position.

This was to be a draft in readiness of my annual book reading recap but given that the word count is far in for a stand alone post, I shall leave it as such. I am worried that I may not be able to get to my target of reading 40 books as my schedule is getting busy. Nevertheless, I will be happy if I achieve my other reading goal this year which was to finish reading the Bible from cover to cover. There is a Kenyan readathon being held and this would be my first time participating in one if I get to do it. Also, I am crossing fingers to win book vouchers that are up for grabs courtesy of this readathon.

Tag: Authors

January in books

Books in 2020 read different