KReilly

It’s Batch Edit time on BookLikes Shelves.

 

Use batch edit to make the same edits to many books at the same time. Now you can update reading status, change shelves and remove from your Shelf multiple books at one go.

The entrance to new admin view of your book collection is on admin Shelf page (click upper navigation bar). Once you press Table view, you’ll be moved to your table-organized book collection where you can select several books or all of them and move them to particular shelves, add review, date or change reading status in two seconds. You can also use multi remove option. 

 

To keep your books organized you can create thematic shelves and keep a single book on many shelves. This helps in organizing your book collection, especially when it’s big and diverse. You can also add missing book covers to green books which lack images as well as add books manually when you don’t find them is a book search box.

Genuinely laugh out loud funny throughout the whole book. If you enjoy Jim's stand-up this book will not disappoint.

Painful.

Actual rating 4.5Totally engaging the whole way through. Moving without being too depressing. Humourous but also poignant. I want Darling to narrate every book I read from now on.

Epic. I feel like the McCulloughs are my family I know them so well. Totally worth the 570 page commitment. Will be an award winner and perennial favourite without a doubt.

Loved this book. Totally engaging throughout, with just the right amount of scientific elements mixed with tales of human nature. My fave non-fiction book of 2013 so far. I wrote a blog about it for Indigo.ca here: http://blog.indigo.ca/non-fiction/item/1409-indigo-spotlight-between-man-and-beast.html

Actual rating = 3.5Sarah's story really had an impact on me. At 29 years old, I am just over the age Sarah was when she found out she had breast cancer. I can't even imagine what that diagnosis would do to your life at a time when you're just coming into who you really are as an adult, and making decisions about your career and family life goals. Her descriptions of loneliness during treatments, and mourning for the body and life she will never have again were extremely moving and impactful. There were however parts of this book that I did find a bit confusing - she sometimes mentions things in passing that seem important but are never brought up again. Early on she says she's 'done many bad things', yet there is no evidence of this behaviour anywhere in the book. Or when she mentions that some fake loans were taken out under her name, she never mentions if she found out who stole her identity, or even mentions the situation again at all. This book also felt like memoirs sometimes can, where the author is concerned with writing with a particular structure to give the story more of an impact. There are 83(!) chapters in this 260 page book, each ending with a 'hook' sentence, which really felt unnecessary - the story speaks for itself, it doesn't need any added drama. Where The Invisible Girls succeeds is when Sarah brings you into her most intimate and personal experiences with the disease - the physical and emotional indignities she suffers throughout the course of her illness and recovery, and how her faith in God suffers as a result of constant disappointments, and the persistent need to know 'why me?'. When she shares her experiences with the Somalian girls, the issues of women and how they are treated as physical beings is brought into focus in a way I think will really connect with a lot of people in this generation. I almost never say (or think) this, but I actually believe this book could have actually been longer - it would have done well to go into more detail about Somali or immigrant culture in the US, so this book has more of an educational aspect with perhaps a bigger and more lasting reach. Still, it was a worthwhile read, and one I will recommend to others.

Actual rating = 3.5This was a nice, scandalous read. Without giving too much away, I liked that it ended without everything being wrapped up with a bow, without every character 'seeing the light' of their arrogant, snobby, classist ways. There were too many descriptions of material possessions, which atually took up quite a lot of the prose of this book (almost to the point of redundancy), for me to rate it higher. I do however believe there is a large audience out there looking for a soap opera-y, Gossip Girl type book for adults, and this one fits that bill perfectly.

This is a book that is impossible to read quickly. Every sentence needs to be ingested as you would a favourite desert that is meant to be savoured. I dare you not to fall in love with young Bonaventure Arrow, whose innocence and kindness comes across on every page. So, so good.

There really aren't any words that will do justice to the experience of reading this book. Deraniyagala shows how unique the experience of grieving is for each person - this book is written eight years after the tsunami in Sri Lanka that tragically took away her family, a large amount of time compared to what seems to be the trend in today's culture of sharing personal experiences on television in front of the world what seems like immediately after a traumatic event. I didn't cry while reading this book, but I could not lift the heavy feeling from my chest as I moved through each chapter. A truly heartbreaking read.

Actual rating = 3.5There are a few things wrong with this book - First, I know the book is called Drunk MOM, so the focus is on the year after her son is born when she relapses, but it would have been nice to have had more of a backstory as to who Jowita is and how she has found herself in the position she was in 2009-2010. She says many time that this story is "not the TV show Intervention", but what makes that show so compelling is that you are with the addict in present time but also get a (re)view of their past life, so you get a more complete picture of the addict as a person outside of the chaos of their addiction. Bydlowska gives you hints that she has been a caretaker to her younger sister after they arrives in Canada from Poland, but never any details about where her parents were or why they aren't a bigger part of her life now. Second, it often feels as if Bydlowska is trying to prove to the reader that her son was actually safe at all times, even when it is obvious he was not. She often gets blackout drunk while acting as his primary caregiver, but always makes sure to point out that although she was a mess, the baby was still not put in any harm. This is not a judgement on her behaviour - she has obviously admitted that she has a problem, and throughout much of the book admits that she made one poor decision after another, but trying to constantly prove that the baby was ok seems to only serve to make herself feel a bit better about the whole situation.Now to what is good about this book: I genuinely found it to be un-putdownable most of the time. Bydlowska writes with such candor about so many things, showing just how far addicts go to justify their actions and behaviours to themselves and everyone else, and how easy it can be to make excuses and deny that a problem exists. She talks about how the notion of suffering from postpatrum depression as a "luxurious term", that normal women wouldn't behave like her so she isn't able to excuse her behaviour in that way - showing how addicts often believe is is something morally wrong within themselves causing them to behave the way they are, instead what really may be the problem. She talks openly about how aware she is that this is a problem that she will be dealing with for her whole life, and how terrifying that prospect is. Her relationship with her boyfriend, the father of her baby, revolves around the mutual, unspoken understanding that if they don't talk about the drinking problem then it doesn't really exist. At first Bydlowska considers this a blessing, as it allows her to continue drinking, but slowly starts to wear on her, as the lies, spoken and unspoken, become stifling and ultimately unbearable. I really consider this a worthwhile read, and would recommend it to anyone who read and enjoyed A Million Little Pieces (scandal or no scandal) or really any addiction based bio.

Really enjoyed this one. Dickey is honest and forthcoming about his experiences throughout, and there's not much more you can ask from an auto-bio. Crazy to think this was written just before he had his CY Young year in 2012.

Many thoughts, will add later

Actual rating = 3.5