Category Archives: Book Reviews

Carrie Soto is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid | Book Review

Sometimes there comes along a book, like Carrie Soto is Back, that addresses such a specific set of issues and questions, that it makes you wonder why you’d never thought of it in detail before. Questions like: Why is it okay for a man in the public eye to be aggressive but not for a woman? Why is it okay for a man to be unsmiling and intense but when a woman does it, she’s labeled a b*tch? Why is it that an ambitious man is seen as just that but an ambitious woman becomes callous and unfeeling in the eyes of the public? And this sexism is turned around and slapped back onto the woman’s shoulders, calling it her overreaction, that she can’t take a joke.

Carrie Soto is Back is a smack in all these faces. Taylor Jenkins Reid, through Carrie Soto’s story, takes us through the unfairness that the world pulls out every time a woman takes center stage. And it is proof, yet again, that even though things have gotten a lot better, we still have a long way to go.

Heresy by Yashesh Rathod | Book Review

Yashesh Rathod, in his short, aptly titled nonfiction book called Heresy shares his opinions on a range of topics. I say ‘aptly titled’ not because I think what he’s saying is heresy, but because these are thoughts that to some will be nothing but heresy.

Cosmos to Consciousness by Sekar Manickam Retd IPS | Book Review

One thing that leaves everyone in awe is the utter vastness and versatility of the universe. Questions of where everything came from aren’t unanswered, but those of how it works are – at least some of them. Different cultures and religions across the world have their own explanations about why certain things like eclipses happen and how life came into being. In this new book called Cosmos to Consciousness by Sekar Manickam retd. IPS, he aims to explore many of these cosmic level topics, including quantum physics and mechanics, with a generous mix of opinion and fact.

This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone | Book Review / Thoughts

If you’ve been on Book Twitter over the past few weeks, you’ll know that an account called Bigolas Dickolas Wolfwood tweeted about a book called This is How You Lose the Time War. The tweet blew up, so much that there are now cosplays involving people holding up huge mockups of the book. This became, for me, a case of wanting to jump on the bandwagon, especially since I’d seen this book on a few lists by this point and made a mental note to get to it someday. The tweet came as a final push.

Life, Living & Livelihood: Short Poems on Life by Santosh Nair | Book Review

I’ve always been entranced with words and the way they come together to make rhythmic sense. When I wasn’t reading them, I was bringing them together, even as a child. My writing journey started when I was around 10 or 11, when I decided to start writing poems. I didn’t know Frost or Dickinson or Gill at the time. All I knew about poetry was that the lines had to rhyme. So it began, with me maintaining notebook upon notebook of these poems. And then came a time when I stopped. Maybe because I grew up.

Santosh Nair’s poetry collection, Life, Living & Livelihood: Short Poems on Life, took me right back to that time, to that corner, to the pages of that notebook.

Dear Girls by Ali Wong | Book Review

A few weeks ago, I borrowed Dear Girls from my local library, thinking about how Ali Wong was a badass woman, an inspiration, and wanting to see what she had to say. Dear Girls, her memoir, is a letter to her daughters in which she recollects things she’s done in her life. She warns them not to read the book before they turn 21 and I agree one hundred percent because boy, oh, boy, there’s some stuff that’s not share-worthy at all. Especially not to one’s daughters. But going into the book, I had some really high expectations – from the book, from actor Ali Wong, and from comedian Ali Wong, and from writer Ali Wong.

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan | Book Review

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan was the first book I read in 2023 and almost immediately, in a fit of emotion and productivity, wrote the review. I even uploaded this review to Instagram and Goodreads, too, I think. But somehow, to put my thoughts about this book here, seemed too intimidating for me. Maybe because writing a review on the blog needs me to open up more of myself than I would for the other media. There’s more space here for me to spill my thoughts and I know that once I start, it usually takes me more energy than I can spare to stop. And The Joy Luck Club is a book that makes me do this. Yes, it’s a confusing thing to reconcile oneself with, but it’s still a powerful narrative.

Dust Child by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai | Blog Tour Stop

Hello and welcome to my blog tour stop for Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai’s newest book, Dust Child! I was supposed to write a post about the progress I’ve been making on this story. Instead, here I am, writing a full review because of how invested I was in it. Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai does it again with this book, infusing it with a gentle understanding and compassion that makes me such a huge fan of her writing. I read Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai’s debut novel The Mountains Sing in December 2022 and it marched its way onto my favorites of the year list. That (and more) made the author an instant favorite, propelling Dust Child into my most anticipated book releases of 2023 list.

The Daughters of Madurai by Rajasree Variyar | Book Review

There are some books, very rare, that grab at an issue and twist it until it’s nothing but a bunch of bare threads. Everything that constitutes it is out in the open – circumstances, decisions, relationships, reasons, strengths, weaknesses, heartbreaks – all of it. For us women, especially, each of these threads are as important as the other, because we simply cannot afford to be shortsighted. And yet, push us far enough and we will harness all our strength and push back so hard, you’ll find yourself questioning your reality. Putting all of this – a complex web of feelings and thoughts and decisions – into one book is a feat in itself. And Rajasree Variyar does it in fabulously in The Daughters of Madurai.

The Mountains Sing by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai | Book Review

Historical fiction is a difficult genre to write in, especially because the times are so far back in the past that you have to be extremely careful with your research. You can’t disrespect the past while you write your story, and you have to get things exactly right. But when authors do get it right, they manage to blow you away in more ways than one and in ways you’ll often not see coming. Among this population of authors is Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai, who, after seven years of research, published the book The Mountains Sing, a story set before and during the Việt Nam war. I became an instant fan of her when I finally read it in December 2022. And not just because of the book.