Reading Review

Well, that was a bit of fail on my part for not regularly updating my blog. I wanted to keep up with books I have read in the past months and I could find no list. I have been reading a lot now that I am almost done with grad school.

I just finished the Coldest Winter Ever by Sister Souljah. I have long avoided this book and many others that fall under the genre urban/street/hood/etc. literature. This book has started the revival of the genre in the past decade. It is well written with an engaging plot, realistic dialogue, and characters that stick with you even if you don't like them. I'm glad I bought the copy with a Reader's Guide included. It had an interview with the author and gave a lot of insight into why she wrote the novel. I really regret being a book snob and avoiding books like this. I have to tip my hat to the graphic novels class I took this summer, which lead my to evaluate my own literary biases.

Over the summer I read:

• The Hunger Games and Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins -mixed feeling a sci-fi world underealized because of an unreliable protagonists and I am sick of love stories and love triangles in Young Adult literature. I was hoping that Katniss would be a lesbian in a great twist,
• The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus - the movie was better than the book but I am horribly biased in favor of Chris Evans, and Scarlett Johansson,
• The Politician by Andrew Young - serious what was wrong with this dude? I can't believe he stayed with the Edwards that long and Rielle Hunter was a nut,
• Red Son by Mark Millar - I don't like how he made Wonder Woman a damsel in distress for Superman. I'm so angry at his fridging of her and he has so many issues with minority characters and female characters,
• and I caught up on the last three volumes of Marvel's Runaways.

I watched Daybreakers, The Messenger, and Julia & Julia this week. They were all great for different reasons. Daybreakers was a horror and science fiction movie with a wonderfully realized world and great visuals. It was also great to see a very bloody vampire movie. The Messenger had great acting from the cast and a touching and and timely subject. Julia & Julia also had great acting and wonderful visuals. There was food porn and hat porn. I wanted to buy cloche hats, church lady hats, and more and then go out to squeeze fresh fruit, inhale the aroma of fresh pastries, and cook something in half a stick of butter. The chemistry between Stanley Tucci and Meryl Streep is electric (please ignore the mixed metaphor).