September Book Haul #7

September has been a month marked by a reading slump, So I ended up enjoying only 3 books.

I find it very important to read your national authors, to learn more about your countries values and works of art.

I started reading a Romanian classic novel called "Spider web" (n.r. Panza de paianjen) by Cella Serghi. This is her debut novel, but it felt really mature and poised, well structured, it offered an original view of a very well known and overused problem that appears in my countries literary endeavours.

It is a romance novel. But the romantic relationships have a sad ending. We learn about our main character, Diana Slavu, through her diaries which she borrows her best friend, Ilinca. We learn about her childhood and her family, her mother, father, brother and sister. She lived in a poor, hardworking family, she had to move a lot, staying in houses with gas lamps, where rats were lurking. Diana was very beautiful, she liked learning and reading, she was a coquette, she was the life of the parties, the girl of every young gentleman's dream. She was the creature of the sea, she loved the sun, the sand, the sound of waves. When she was in Mangalia, at the seaside, she met the painter Petre Barbu, who became her first and only passionate love. But because of the age difference, and because Petre was seeing a different woman, they never were together. Even though both their hearts desired that. Diana is faced with money problems, she could hardly pay her school tax, she managed to get into Law School all thanks to her mother. She decides she has to get married to someone who can sustain her, and finally live in a normal house, where she could invite all her friends. And so she does, but short after her husband's family becomes broke, and she is forced to live in another poor house. She manages to become a lawyer's assistant, a position which was really hard to obtain because she was a beautiful young lady. She goes at the seaside in Balcic with her husband for the summer, where she meats a young man, who quickly becomes an interesting and very important part of her life. She is faced with her fathers death, with having to realize that her marriage is no longer working because she never actually loved her husband in that way. In the end she discovers her goal in life, and manages to be a good lawyer and regaining her life back, enjoying it, without having to make anymore sacrifices.

The second book that I've read was "The Virgin Suicides" by Jeffrey Eugenides. I watched the movie, directed by Sofia Coppola and I really liked the story line. The movie and the soundtrack are worth your time. The book as well.

The story is about the deaths of the Lisbon sisters, told through the eyes of a group of boys, who were infatuated with the girls, even as mature men they were still thinking about them. It's interesting to read a book such as this one, from the perspective of the community  in which they lived. 

The girls were strictly supervised by their mother, they weren't allowed to have parties, or talk to boys. And after the youngest of them attempted to take her life, their parents tried to give them opportunities to socialize more. After the youngest dies, her whole family was in shock, each member coping with it in their own way. With time the girls become more and more promiscuous, and after a long time of being locked inside their house they plan their deaths carefully. And the boys are there, spying and witnessing their every step.

I don't know how many of you are aware that Tim Burton writes! He wrote and illustrated "The Melancholy death of oyster Boy and other stories". If you find it in a bookstore and think it's too expensive to buy, but have let's say... 15 minutes free, go ahead and read it! That's the exact amount of time you'll need to go through it.

I find that the illustrations said more than the actual words. It's a black humor kind of book, about strange kids, about women that try to win over men by having their babies, and all different kinds of hybrid characters. Everyone that likes his movies will love this book and it's also perfect for Halloween! 

This is it!

Hope you found a book that you might fancy :)

Keep reading!

xoxo 

The Genre Swap Project

In my last post I mentioned The Genre Swap Project. This was started by 2 booktubers: Jesse from jessethereader and Andrew from HeavyShelves. Basically they partner 2 readers: one that reads mainly YA and one that reads mainly classics. The one that reads YA will send the one that reads classics a YA book and vice versa. This project is destined to help you expand your literature taste, getting to experiment with uncharted genres. Here are their viodeos:

I was partnered with Little Book Owl, an Australian booktuber. She sent me a YA novel: The Archived by Victoria Schwab, and I sent her a classic novel: Tess of the D'Ubervilles by Thomas Hardy (as you can see in the picture above).
Here is her video, opening the mail:

I also did a video opening the envelope and a book review one. You can see them here and here.

A tiny review of The Archived:
The Archived is basically a library filled with the histories of the dead. Sometimes the histories escape and the Keepers have to return them. They follow the histories through the Narrows. The older the History the more violent they are. The older ones are called Keeper Killers. Our protagonist is Mackenzie Bishop, who was thought everything by her grandfather, Da, and became a keeper at an early age. After her brothers death, her family moves into an hotel turned into an apartment building, The Colorado, where a mysterious murder happens - but the traces (the memories) are erased. And she is left to solve this case with a help of her new friend. Even though it is a part of a series, this could very well be a standalone book. If you see it in the bookstore please give it a chance, because it is a great story!