S Reignite

‘that what the Head had left undone and could not do, the Heart may have been doing silently.’ Mr Gardgrind. As someone who is aspiring to be a bookworm, I felt that I can’t hold that title without reading a book by renowned British author Charles Dickens. Unable to find one of his more popular books I stumbled upon Hard Times and choose to read it was presented in the blurb as a ‘celebration of the power of the imagination.’. The story starts out with an introduction to the Gradgrind family and how Mr Gradgrind teaches his children and students at the local school, in the interesting city of Coketown, the importance of ‘facts’, an understanding that Cecilia Jupe or Sissy, doesn’t seem to grasp so after an unfortunate event with her father, Mr Gardgind takes Sissy into his home to educate her and giver her a better future in life. Although at this point in the book the direction of the story seems clear, at almost most two hundred pages in I became more unsure what the p...

‘A woman just couldn’t relinquish her control’- Daphne Will Boast’s debut novel, ‘Daphne’ offered me nothing new nor intriguing as a reader despite its enticing concept and stimulus. I chose to read the book based on its tagline; ‘Emotion suffuses everything we do, think, and are. Who would guess it could quite literally paralyse you.’, as I believe as humans we all do both consciously and unconsciously, use our emotions to control our lives and decisions but the idea, and unfortunately some people’s reality that it can paralyse you  and I wanted to better understand this reality. I first started reading the book at the beginning of October but after the first four chapters I had determined that I had no interest in Daphne’s trials and tribulations with her neurological condition, job and personal life, so was deciding upon returning it the book to the library, but after consulting several favourable reviews on Goodreads I gave it another chance, read it all, and sa...

‘She looked like a zombie. A zombie that has just been shot’ – Lorenzo Niccolò Ammaniti’s 2010   ‘Me and You’ novel stood out to me in the library but unfortunately the overall story did not. Although, Ammaniti’s name is obviously Italian, I initially didn’t know that the novel was translated from Italian but as I began getting into the story there were moments in the book where information was presented very literally, out of tone with the rest of the book, which caused me to disengage with the novel at times. Despite this, I was intrigued to begin with as a Lorenzo appeared like more than a child who just struggled to fit but someone who had deep issues that affected him, which was proved to be true. The time I started reading the novel coincided with the announcement of YouTuber Shane Dawson’s latest docu-series which investigates whether fellow YouTuber Jake Paul is a sociopath. Due to this, I have began playing the role of a psycologist and do somewhat question ...

‘The rules no fucking longer apply’ Starr Carter The other week when I went to watch the BlacKkKlansman the trailer for the up and coming film adaption of the novel ‘The Hate U Give’ was played and it got me riled up and intrigued. I’ve seen the book advertised in my local library for a while but hadn’t picked it up till now mainly because it is categorised as a teen book and I felted I’ve out grown the genre, but I was very wrong. The novel tells the story of a teenage girl named Starr Carter who witnesses the murder of her best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer and how she and the people in her lives react to the situation. From the first page I fell in love with this book. The way it is written sounds very much like the thoughts in my head which makes it so easy to read, so much so that I finished the book in only four days. Angie Thomas merges potentially the two things that mean the most to me and to herself according to her interview with ...