inkerly's reviews
457 reviews

"Don't ever be surprised to see a rose shoulder up, among the ruins of a house. This is how we survived."

I had some difficulty reading this book the 1st time I picked it up, because there is a lot of history and terminology to process. But listening to this book via audiobook was so impactful. I have learned more about the conflict in Gaza and the Israel-Palestine history in these past few months thanks to social media and TikTok, which is how I came across this book. It's very well written and provides a lot of insight into just how backwards this entire thing is. I feel for Palestinians right now.

To those wondering what they can do after reading this book:
1. Continue to educate yourself more about Palestine
I would highly recommend reading the anthology of stories that the writers of this book put together, "Gaza Writes Back". It's just as gut wrenching, but necessary, and gives a similar 1st-hand account of how it is like for Palestinian civilians to live in their current circumstances.

2. Support Palestine by searching #OperationOliveBranch, and finding a family or GoFundMe to support (An instagram account of the same name should appear with a spreadsheet of several families and people that need help moving out of war-torn Gaza, and getting the supplies they need). Whether it's $1 or $100, it can save a life.

3. Write Letters or Email your Congressmen asking them to CEASEFIRE. We live in a country where the President of the United States would rather spend billions of dollars on giving weapons to one country to bomb innocent civilians, rather than use that money to help the citizens of their own country who are having a domestic war of their own. Do not support politicians who support or are silent on this matter.

4. Share and spread awareness about this issue on your social media. A repost, following a Palestinian page, etc. and keeping up with what's going on is important.


#CeaseFire #FreePalestine

I loved "Beast" by Pepper Pace when I first read it, and I knew I wanted to read another book of hers. Still I was nervous with what to expect. But 1954 was such a good read. It starts out with aspiring actress Bailey Westbrook who is invited to a mysterious casting call for an on-the-rise subscription show set in the realistic 1950s. The catch? The selected actors will have to live on the set for a full "year"/season and improv act as if they were in the 50s...and Bailey is a modern black woman.

This was set up to have such a juicy premise, and I love speculative African American fiction, so a plot like this really excited me. Act I and II were Bailey coming to terms with the conditions of being on a stage being watched by anonymous, rich viewers who wanted her to be as authentically 50s as possible. The kicker that the Producer and Creator of the show would also be playing her suburban husband and took "playing the part" to a whole 'other mad-scientist like level was also exhilarating. You really feel the stakes and I nearly binged half the book in 2 days.

The End of Act II/beginning of Act III is where I think things died down so to speak. Not to spoil anything but there was chatter that Bailey's character would stir a deeper conversation about racial relations in and set the tone for the Civil Rights Movement being depicted in the show, but instead we get...a storyline that does not highlight Bailey or amplify her character's struggles as a black woman living in  white suburbia at all.  I think Act III was written to ease some of the dramatic tension that had built up in Acts I and II but, I think it had the unintended effect of making all the other plots anticlimactic. I feel Bobby's "obsession" with a "perfect" 1950s was resolved all too easily. Their relationship also didn't really get too much heat. And the ending was...slightly shocking, but compared to the promises made in Act II, was tame in comparison. At this point is where I feel had the book stayed in the sci-fi/speculative fiction genre and not the modern contemporary category, it would've had a stronger plot.Although at 800 pages, I guess Ms. Pace wanted to wrap things up and get the novel over with :)


That said there were a lot of bright and great moments in this book that I liked.  I think the book set out to do what it intended to and despite some typos/naming mistakes, this is one of the better of the published Kindlevella novels I've read. The romance, the drama, the fun...all worth it. I'll definitely read more of her work.
 

This audiobook is a dramatisation of Maya Angelou’s 6th autobiography brought by the BBC Radio 4 cast. It is essentially a heavily cut down version of Maya’s 6th book with an entire crew of people narrating her story including herself.

In this book, Maya returns to America in anticipation to continue her work with Malcolm X , but tragedy strikes when the Muslim visionary is assassinated by his own people. She is distraught and moves to Los Angeles where she then seeks work in other ways and connects with black Americans there to understand the current plight.

This book brings Activist Maya and Poet/Writer Maya together because her civil rights activism and life in the Motherland help her to write powerful plays and poems that reflect the black  experience. 

The book comes full circle in the end with her being invited the opportunity to write a 10-series program on the African American experience for a Northern radio show, and later she is offered the opportunity to write an autobiography of her life and all she’s accomplished at the age of 40. Initially hesitant she ends up starting the 1st book, “I know why the caged bird sings” with a poem.
I think the dramatisation of this autobiography really captures her essence and the essence of the other Greats in her life. I think where this dramatisation could’ve been stronger is if it highlighted the work that she did for the movement. There’s a lot of mention of her past lovers and her relationships/connections with people like James Baldwin, who was also a playwright and colleague to her , but maybe 1 hr 10 minutes is too short to really capture that. I hope to read the full autographies very soon.

This audiobook is a dramatisation of Maya Angelou’s 5th autobiography brought by the BBC Radio 4 cast. It is essentially a heavily cut down version of Maya’s 5th book with an entire crew of people narrating her story including herself.

In this book, Maya stays in Africa after  divorcing her husband, South African activist Vusumzi Make, but moves to Ghana to accompany her son Guy while he’s studying in university and is embraced by a new circle of freedom fighters and friends who shape her growing mind. I want to be a fly on the wall of her life so bad, it was interesting to listen to her interactions with the Greats, David Dubois (son of WEB Dubois) and his mother, and Malcolm X himself. Maya is definitely more grounded in this phase of her life and she is more of a force than ever in these civil rights demonstrations . I’ll probably read the full book because at some points I didn’t really understand the implications of a scene (her and the German host for example - what was the issue there?)

This audiobook is a dramatisation of Maya Angelou’s 4th autobiography brought by the BBC Radio 4 cast. It is essentially a heavily cut down version of Maya’s 4th book with an entire crew of people narrating her story including herself.

This book highlights her transition from being a cabaret singer to civil rights activist involving herself with several organizations like the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), and South African Liberation for Freedom  . She meets a string of famous leaders and is strung out so to speak by the many lovers she finds along the way. One thing I took away is that the goodness of her heart took her to many places and she even landed opportunities in the unlikeliest of places because her circle of friends vouched for her. It’s just amazing to see the many lives and experiences she’s lived. Another beautifully narrated , dramatized biography, I can see why these are so revered

This audiobook is a dramatisation of Maya Angelou’s 3rd autobiography brought by the BBC Radio cast. It is essentially a heavily cut down version of Maya’s 3rd book with an entire crew of people narrating her story including herself. I’m in love. The last time I listened to an audiobook with stage production-quality was Will Smith’s memoir “WILL” , and that was an immediate 5 stars. This is the same.

Maya has lived a thousand lives and in this life it involves her marrying a Greek man who courts her at a record store, divorcing and becoming a dancer at a strip gala, singing and dancing as the “exotic” Cuban act “Maya Angelou”, and pursuing a life of on the road dancing and singing with greats like Martha Flowers. I’m glad this had a happier note than her 2nd memoir (that one still gave me chills). Eventually I will come back to read the full book because I really want to understand every part of Maya. I’m definitely going to listen to the dramatisation of her next audiobook as well.

Cute read . Wish there could have been more plot around the dragon though

I discovered this book on TikTok and knew I had to read it with my KU subscription. Interracial sapphic romance? Black fantasy world with witches, wolves, and vampires? Young teens fighting in a Hunger Games -like competition for power? This literally checks off all the boxes that Booktok loves so much. Because it was authored by a black person, I was sure I was going to love this book.

Then I read it. And I have mixed feelings. 

Firstly this was a very slow book. At least in the beginning. The first 15% of the book is one of the most painful 50 pages of reading in my life.  I blame several things for this. 1) the writer is new and it shows in the way the story is told (aka dumped) onto the readers for pages on end. The pages of backstory around the witch/vampire coven is a prime example. 2)  Poor editing. More than once, a character name was misspelled (Mairan?Mirian? I still have NO IDEA who she is). It does not help that this is written in present tense from Lucia's POV only.  Present-tense isn't my favorite tense because new authors tend to take the reader through every single thought the POV character/Lucia thinks at any point in time rather than important story plot points/juicy action. Basically the plot was interesting, but the way it was told felt boring. Ultimately that made me knock my rating down to 3* star territory.

The premise of the book starts at the 25% mark. Things improve when we dive into the competition and lives of the contestants, the quadratic love triangle, and the magic school Lucia enlists in. From then on it is a breeze to read. But it’s like trying to claw your way to the light at the end of the tunnel. 

That said, I actually like this book. Like REALLY like it now that I’ve finished it. But I think the sequel needs to really pin down the book to one MAIN plot and character arc because at times it felt like this book was meant to check off a series of tropes instead of telling a good story. The tropes in question:

✅ Spicy sapphic romance
✅ Forbidden love (incl interracial, paranormal, etc.)
✅ Love quadrangle : childhood bsf vs forbidden love vs arranged marriage 
✅ Witches vs wolves vs vampires 
✅ Chosen one prophecy
✅ Hunger Games-like competition in dysttopian society
✅ School for magical beings
✅ Murder mystery

You get the gist. Sometimes while reading I loved these elements blended together, sometimes I didn’t. For me, I’m an all or nothing kind of person and I don’t really like when authors dip and dally in things and don’t go all the way. For example this book very much reads as YA, but there are 2 scenes that are spice-coded🌶️ . There’s also teasing of a love quadrangle but Lucia only interacts romantically with one person. Either go in all the way or don’t! 

That said, I liked where it was going and the twist in the end. It opens up a whole new can of worms.  I’m willing to read the sequel if it addresses the issues of this book. 

I watched Howl’s Moving Castle , the movie which was loosely inspired by this book when I was in high school but I always wanted to read the book. Eight years later, and I have finally done so. I didn’t have any expectations on this book  as I had forgotten most of what happened in the movie. 

This was a really lighthearted adventure-packed tale that reminded me of other classic tales like “Alice in Wonderland”, “The Wizard of Oz“, etc. It is quite literally a bundle of riddles wrapped in fantasy , adventure and colorful language. 

4 out of 5 stars though because I felt like there were 10 different plots running concurrently at the same time - Sophie’s curse, Calcifers curse, Howls curse, the Prince, the Witch, etc…- that I could barely keep track of what was going on. I was confused almost the entire book. Especially since this book is under 300 pages it felt like these segments were slapped into the story  for shock value more than to actually move the plot forward. I think this is where the movie does the story justice as these subplots were whittled down considerably. But I would say I enjoyed the characters and their aloof ness very much.

I suspected that Howl knew Sophie’s identity all along and their back and forth like an old married couple in the end was cute. Everyone who loves riddle-like tales should read this.

The cover of this book is STUNNING😍 .  I loved the premise of black women being abducted by alien forces to repopulate their planet. But after they get abducted and land on the planet of Rakesh , I felt the book get stagnant. All of the enticing plot gets lost. There’s a side quest and arguing about whether the girls should stay or return to Earth.  But there is no baby-making and no bride proposal until the very end. Also all the women abducted were black, but we don’t get an explanation as to why. They may as well have been white/Asian/Latina/etc. 

Then there’s the Alien-King subplot. So much focus on Abrax’s kingsly duties  , we’re robbed of a good slow-build between him and Estelle. The two fall in love almost instantly. It gets boring quick and the erotic scenes don’t  “hit” as a result. Plus I just personally found Abrax to be dull in general and his mannerisms felt more “human” than “alien”. What kind of alien says “dripped out” and performs oral sex like an expert despite never having been with or interacted with a female? LOL.

I think if the author stuck to the initial premise , cut out some unnecessary parts and made this book longer that’d do it  justice. Still have lots of questions but I guess that’s what a book series is made for.