Reading and Love Lessons from 'God Help the Child'

In a bid to escape everything I'm worrying about, I'm trying to read.

So I googled some books to read in your twenties, seeing as teen books are a bit hit and miss with me and I'm not ready to read about the monotony of marriage, and I've found a few that are interesting to me.

I'm starting with The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides which is so good already. The vocabulary has me a bit stumped but I'm especially enjoying it because of this. It's set at university which is already helping me to look forward to studying in Spain a little more (going back to uni is kinda daunting atm) and they're talking about places mentioned in Gossip Girl (which I love) like Brown University and the Upper East Side. It's all very exciting. I'm not sure I'll review it though. I feel like I'm in over my head with a lot of these novels. Like, I used to be smart but maybe I benefited from being in small schools with teachers that liked to focus on 'bright' pupils.

You can click this link for my book list so far http://scribbless.com/lists/list/315117

If you wanna keep reading this post, I'm gonna share an unfinished book review with you of an amazing novel I read. I couldn't finish the review for a number of reasons, (including the fact that the book is harrowing and Toni Morrison is such a phenomenal author) so forgive me if it's not up to scratch.

 

Love Lessons from Toni Morrison's 'God Help the Child' (A Review)

I really don't want to upset anyone so pay attention to the following trigger warnings.
TW: Abuse, sexual abuse, violence, racism

I'm not going to pretend this book was easy to read. It definitely wasn't and at times, I got confused at the point of it. It painfully discusses racism, colourism (the specific prejudice against darker skinned people within communities, like this Brazilian beauty queen, Nayara Justina) child sexual abuse and tumultuous upbringings. Many of the characters had been subjected to sexual abuse as children which was often written about in a way that surprised me, not exactly casual, but in a bored way like it was so common there was no build up or hesitation after a while. Like, 'This is what happened and this is why I'm fucked up now'. (This is not to say victims of abuse are a monolith, with the right support many recover well, the book just highlights how events in our childhoods can affect us in adulthood in ways we don't even realise as well as ones we emphasise).

So why did I even pick up such a heavy book? (Heavy as in difficult subject, not weight, the version I read was an eBook.) Well, I wanted to read a book by a black author and this book had a dark-skinned black woman on the cover so I thought it would be perfect.

It didn't quite work out like that.

I was repulsed by the colourism on the opening pages and the way the protagonist, Bride (Lula Ann), was treated awfully because of her "ugliness" by her lighter-skinned mother. Oddly (but rightly), Bride grew up to be considered absolutely stunning by everyone around her and she learnt how to use this to her advantage, but this didn't save her, which made the book heartbreakingly realistic.

The Love Lessons <3

• I learnt that there's lots of different types of love, degrees of love and that everyone thinks that their way of giving it is the best they could do, at least at the time
• Humans are strange. They treat other people how they think they'd like to be treated themselves but often it's the exact opposite
• Love is hard (maybe already knew that one)
• Time doesn't really heal. It just lets you move on, if you're equipped to

I'd recommend the book anyway, don't be scared or put off by anything I've said because the story, the twist and the impression the book leaves on you is immense and totally worth it. I'll definitely be reading more Toni Morrison books, one of them is recommended on my book list. Hopefully some of the other books I read will be just as valuable but a bit happier. I'll you know! Until next time, Antonia xx

Here vs There

So, if you don´t know already, this post is going to be one about the differences about things here and back home in sunny England. I really haven´t decided where I prefer, and seeing as I really haven´t explored that much of England, let alone the UK as a whole (London, Essex, Brighton and Hove, Cardiff, Loughborough, Leicester... Devon as a child, not sure I´ve actually been anywhere else!), and it does actually rain here, it wouldn´t be fair to make that kind of judgement yet.

Let´s start with stuff I prefer here:

1. Pace of life
2. Prices (in Balaguer things are actually cheap, in bigger cities this is mostly due to the exchange rate)
3. Less fear of having your stuff stolen (this definitely only applies to Balaguer and the villages I've been to. In the cities I am so careful of my stuff that drives me slightly insane)

And stuff I prefer in the UK... (might only apply to London)

1. Personal space (and the fact that people will move out of your way in the street instead of doing their best to walk into you or force you to swerve. I'm not even being dramatic!)
2. Ability to buy hair extensions!! (Check the post before this one to see the struggle of buying hair extensions)
3. Walking pace (Sometimes you actually want to go somewhere and need to walk at more than 0.0001 mph)

And here´s some stuff that´s just different:

1. People don´t have passwords on their phones! (I have struggled not to take advantage of this)
2. Please and thank you aren´t that important (if you want to be polite to someone you know, just make sure you speak nicely. Passing someone the salt isn't going to win you a plaque in your honour)
3. There´s dog shit everywhere (it's as if most people actually consider the pavement a toilet for their dogs. Thankfully, this wasn't the case in Barcelona)

Here are somethings I wanted to talk about in a tiny bit more detail. This post is a lot to write easier having been to Barcelona and spent time with my own family, as I've noticed what they've found hard to adjust to and they've picked up on some differences to!

Weather:

Of course I prefer the weather here than in London! It does rain (shock horror) but it's not the incessant, depressing mess of English weather that I'm used to. The sun shines. It's also cold and sometimes windy, so I'm not sitting on the beach tanning like I was in Valencia, but it makes getting out of bed in the morning much easier.

Buying drugs:

Well, that escalated quickly! Okay, so I don't know anything about where you can get your coke fix, but if you want some hardcore paracetamol, don't go to the supermarket. You have to buy drugs in the pharmacy and you can get more in one go than you'd get in England. They're bigger too, so you don't have to take two to feel like your headache might've got better. I prefer Barcelona for this, buying basic medication along with your bread and milk is all well and good, but if you're like me it's worth it to stock up and that's hard to do when you're limited to 16 tablets.

Everyone wants to sell you something:

This got pretty jarring pretty quickly. Cries of "selfie" "cheap price" will interrupt your conversations, meals and strolls along the beach. Some of them will push it, try to convince you to buy it by staying near you which is uncomfortable but I've never felt an urge to pay them just so they'll go away. The guys selling flowers are the most likely to interrupt your meal so if you're on a date, sit inside for a better chance of being left alone. Definitely prefer London in this case. No one's gonna try to get you to buy their stuff unless you're on a market or passing a promotional stall in a shopping centre.

Begging:

Homelessness looks absolutely pitiful in Barcelona, as it is in too many big cities. I found myself giving people a bit of change or food if I had it, but not to the people that actively begged. I don't know if this is bad, that people will come up to you and ask for money or sit on the street and wail "ayudame por favor" but something in me wanted to avoid those people. In London people beg too, but you occasionally get someone discreetly asking you for change rather than wailing on the street. In this case I prefer London because it's convenient that you can walk by and pretend you haven't noticed someone in need. But both cities need to do more to help people with nowhere to live. These are global capitals. There's no excuse. 

Museums:

Make the most of the free museums in London! And join any campaigns to keep admission free because it's really worth it. That being said, the museums in Barcelona were beautiful and I didn't feel too bad paying an entrance fee. Getting into the Picasso Museum was free because I'm at university but I was blown away by it, so paying wouldn't have been so bad. Anyway, the reason I prefer London in this case is because you can see as much or as little of as many or as little museums as you want, without feeling like it wasn't worth it because you couldn't see asmuch as you wanted. Basically, there are a lot of museums in the city and its hard to fit them all in.

Transport:

The underground system is definitely better in Barcelona. You can use your mobile, there's more space and the trains  come at least every 3 minutes (if there's not a strike!). Of course, London's system is the oldest I the world, but you would've thought they'd have modernised by now for the the price of it. However, I don't know if Barcelona's Metro stretches as far and wide as London's and the buses are apparently better there too. 

*If you have any questions or are curious about other things then feel free to comment or message me privately and I'll talk about it in the next post!*

Thanks for reading!

Until next time,

Antonia xx

First Review: Caitlin Moran's "How To Build A Girl"

So this is my first book review since I was what... 14?

Libraries are pretty awesome for books

I picked up How To Build A Girl because it was staring at me every time I went to the library. Seriously, the bright green cover, the ripped tights and the chunky army boots were irresistible to my inner rebel. I was horrified reading the blurb though and read it at least 3 times before I calmed down and realised the protagonist didn't actually kill themselves, just changed who they were, like most teenagers. This isn't a spoiler btw, the blurb gives away as much. I don't think I could've read the book when I did if it was about suicide, like Eric Lange's Butter, which I recommend but won't review, just because the story touched me so much and I'm not ready to connect with all the emotions I felt. (Yeah, I'm super sensitive, especially when a book is well-written.)

Rating

7/10

Good Points 

• The characters were really vivid and believable for the most part. I got so annoyed by Johanna's dad and wished her mum would get some proper support with her depression. I also felt the hunger when they ran out of money and were eating the least satisfying meals imaginable. The family felt really close-knit even though their situation was pretty abysmal, which was refreshing. Also with the characters feeling so real it was easy to understand Johanna/Dolly's relationships with them, which I feel made the book more enjoyable. Her attachments to certain guys were particularly raw, though not too dark.

• The plot was awesome, it went from a kind of suspense thriller to a coming of age novel, really smoothly. You saw coming the point where Johanna would have to grow up, but you didn't know exactly when it would come. 

• The setting was perfect. I really enjoyed the fact that Johanna came from a place I knew nothing about, apart from that it's somewhere up north, and that made her see London with these fresh eager eyes that Londoners don't see London with. 

Not As Good Points

• I wasn't quite ready for Johanna's sexual liberation but this might be more of a reflection on me. Teens are curious at that age whether we as a society want to acknowledge it properly or not. Still, it's there *bam!* first page a 14 year old is masturbating. Okay, *cringe* maybe I shouldn't be reading this on a packed train to Brighton? (Where incidentally, Caitlin is from)

• There's a sentence that says something about hip hop being scary. I don't know if hip hop did used to be scary to teenage white girls but I just didn't like it. I listen to lots of genres of music, sometimes alternative RnB, sometimes rock, sometimes indie, sometimes hip hop. I felt as if me and the character were from different worlds at that point, and didn't see the need for the comparison. But maybe that's the point, Joanna was unique as much as she was relatable.

• Also didn't feel the book needed to be as long as it was, just felt like nothing was happening for a while or events were dragged on. I could also be being impatient. I'm the kind of person who reads a few of the first pages then skips to the end to make sure everything is okay, before returning to the beginning!

Overall

One tip would be to research the musicians and bands mentioned as you go along. I have no idea if they're real or not and I can't remember their names or whether they sounded familiar. Other than that the book is easy to follow and I would definitely recommend reading it. It's funny (seriously, I guarantee you'll laugh), shocking, feminist and memorable.