This Bright Future

A month ago I couldn't have told you a single thing about Logic. I was vaguely aware that he was a rapper but other than that....no idea.

My sister started telling me about his novel, Supermarket and how it deals with a lot of mental health topics like anxiety, bipolar, derealization, and things like that. So she loaned me Logic's novel and memoir and told me I would be absolutely shocked at his story.

But I wasn't. His story is one that I've heard a million times from people incredibly close to me. Some of his stories are word for word the same stories I've been told. The unstable home life, the drug and alcohol addicted parents, the stark reality of mental illness in poverty ridden areas. I've heard this all before. It breaks my heart to hear anyone has gone through the abuse and mental torture that comes with this way of life. But it's amazing to see a story that doesn't end with arrests or overdoses. It's so illogical that Bobby Hall became Logic.

 

The rawness of his story really grabbed my attention because most celebrities don't talk about being a child in this environment. Most rappers and rockstars created this life for themselves, they weren't born into it like Logic was. This was his every day reality and yet he somehow managed to pull himself into stardom with the help of AIM chatrooms and early Internet rap battles.

I'm not going to lie, I've never listened to a single one of his songs but when he started talking about how he came up with the song 1-800-273-8255 I was hooked. This dude really took Mac Miller's death to heart, wrote a song, and used the National Suicide Prevention Hotline number as the title. It's incredible.

This is a come up story focused on mental health. I just think we need more truly candid entertainers like Logic in the world. We need peace, love, and positivity.

Looking for other books by Bobby Hall?

Supermarket

The Last Thing He Told Me

Protect her.

 

That is all Owen's note to Hannah said.

Then he disappeared.

 

Owen and Hannah had been married for a little over a year. So, it's safe to say Hannah was still getting used to her stepdaughter, Bailey. This was uncharted territory for the new family. Owen and Bailey were on their own for nearly a decade after Bailey's mom was killed in a freak car accident. Hannah was nearly 40 with no previous marriages or children. Not to mention, she barely had a relationship with her own mother. So becoming a stepparent to a teenager didn't exactly come easily.

I don't know if I just overhyped this book in my own head or if everyone else overhyped it. I was expecting Little Fires Everywhere vibes based on the cover (and yes, I 100% judged this book based on it's cover). It does have many of the same undertones but it was a completely different kind of story. Don't get me wrong; it was good, if not a little predictable. It was a quick read though, finished it in a day. Definitely could have imagined myself laying on a pool float, soaking up the sun, and devouring this book. That's honestly the vibe.

 

You Can't Be Serious

You Can't Be Serious is honestly a great title.

Kal Penn is such an enigma. I hardly knew anything about him when I picked up his memoir. But I knew he was in some of my favorite shows, like How I Met Your Mother and New Girl. Not to mention he's half of the dynamic duo, Harold & Kumar. Oh, and he casually left Hollywood to fulfill his passion for civic duty by literally working in The White House with the Obama administration. 

I've read a lot of celebrity memoirs, but the one thing I always love is when I can hear their distinct voice while reading their book. Kal Penn's voice rang true throughout his entire story. He doesn't shy away from his personal life but it does take a backseat throughout the story. He reflects upon important moments, like his Grandfather marching with Ghandi, or his dad driving him to auditions in the middle of a blizzard, even to how his soon to be husband won him over with NASCAR and beer koozies.

It's a quick read filled with Hollywood humor and D.C. professionalism and I loved it.

A History of Wild Places

 

 Hoooooooly, oh my god.

A History of Wild Places has everything I'm looking for in a book. A disappearance, a man with a knack for locating people, and a small community where no one would look. I'm honestly still trying to wrap my head around everything that just happened.

Children's author, Maggie St. James has been missing for five years. Desperate to find their daughter, Maggie's parents hire Travis Wren. His specialty lies in the objects the missing leave behind. He can read them in a way that gives him an insight into what might have happened. Having been out of the game for awhile, he's reluctant to look for Maggie. But after a cryptic interaction with Maggie's mom, he sets out to find the small community of Pastoral.

This book is incredibly difficult to review without giving away major spoilers. It's not your typical missing person, mystery, thriller, story. It's a story that creates doubt in everything you've ever believed in. It makes the reader question everything. It's not predictable in the sense that I saw it coming, but in the sense that I fully believed the path the story was on. It led me straight to the answers I was looking for. Honestly, I think that's what it set out to do for the characters too.

Definitely one of the best books I've ever purchased on a whim.

Without Pity

In Without Pity: Ann Rule's Most Dangerous Killers, Rule details 12 true crime cases that have haunted her throughout her career as a crime writer. I've always loved her writing style but this book just was not my favorite. Since we're reading about 12 cases, it doesn't let the reader really sit with the facts of the crime. Most of the case studies stayed around 40 pages each, which isn't bad but I felt like I couldn't dive right in and let the case consume me like some of Ann Rule's other works.

But let me tell you, the second to last story really got to me. It was titled "The Lost Lady" and detailed the disappearance and eventual death of Marcia Moore. This one bothered me for a number of reasons. So this is the one I want to talk about in my review today. Marcia Moore studied psychology and astrology and her much of her published works showed the interaction between the two. Shortly after marrying her husband, a well known anesthesiologist, they began experimenting with daily Ketamine use while trying to find a way to market "Ketamine Psychotherapy." Ketamine was a relatively new drug in the 70s and they had no idea what injecting 50 mg a day would do to Marcia. But they did it anyway.

 

Her husband came home one evening to find Marcia missing. Her kimono was thrown on the floor and all her personal belongings were on the table. But she was nowhere to be found. Two years later, her partial skull was found a mere 15 miles away from her home. They believed she wandered away in a drug induced haze and her death followed soon after.

 

Ann Rule shared updated details on this case in 2003. So I decided to do some internet sleuthing and discovered that this case has never been solved. But what is even more weird....Marcia's son, Christopher, went missing in 2010. His family assumed he was distancing himself from them, so they never filed a missing person's report. But several of his students created the Facebook Group, Where Is Mr. Roof? A former student was listening to a true crime podcast about an unidentified John Doe who was found in November 2010, in the woods, wearing a beanie with the name Chris stitched into it. She had a gut feeling that she knew it who it was. Christopher Roof remained a John Doe for over a decade before he was positively identified in September 2021.

It just feels like an odd coincidence that both Marcia and Christopher died mysterious deaths. Nearly 40 years apart and on opposite coasts, they both died in the woods, alone. I'm about to let this case completely consume me, so get ready for more books on this one.

Looking for other books by Ann Rule?

The Stranger Beside Me

Lust Killer

Lying in Wait