Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

The Literary Book Club Box is a quarterly box that features a classic novel + curated gifts to be opened throughout the book. I've gotten a few of these boxes now and honestly, I love it.

I was completely unprepared for how much I enjoyed Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. It's not something that I ever would have picked up for myself. But I found myself completely immersed in it.

It's not at all what I was expecting. I assumed since it is a sci-fi adventure novel that it would be filled with undiscovered underwater sea creature battles. But instead I found a book filled with descriptions of the beauty of the water, the schools of fish, the depths of the ocean yet to be explored. I think that's what made me love this book. I grew up in a beach town where we took field trips to do scientific experiments on the different types of water in the area. Sea life is something that's ingrained in me.

There are some battles with giant sea creatures, tumultuous terrain during a hurricane, and a few harrowing moments where I literally could not stop reading. This book really snuck up on me, but I really do love it.

The Maximum Security Book Club

I have a lot of mixed feelings about this book.

The premise is amazing. Mikita Brottman begins leading a book club in Jessup Correctional Institution (JCI), a men's maximum security prison. The idea is to introduce these men to new worlds through literature. Each chapter details the discussions surrounding each book. These men challenge Mikita's perceptions of each story. She assumes they will be able to relate to some of the darker themes of the books. But what she doesn't expect is for them to see through themes she believed were convoluted. For example, I read The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka in high school and found it incredibly hard to relate to. But these men who spend their time locked within the confines of JCI, immediately related to Gregor. The idea of waking up as someone completely different isn't an idea to them. One man admitted that they all woke up as murders, rapists, and thieves after committing their crimes. It wasn't a foreign concept to them and really makes me want to re-read it with a fresh set of eyes. Another book that really resonated with the men was Lolita. It seems like Mikita struggled with the idea that this book was not the love story she remember. The men immediately saw through the pretentious ideology of Humbert Humbert and saw him for the despicable man he truly was.

I found by the end of the book, Mikita continually struggled to find her place within the prison walls. She alternated between thinking of the men as her friends while simultaneously loving the perceived danger of leading a book club with incarcerated men. In the afterword, she talks about meeting with some of the men who have been released. She suggests they start another book club on the outside and quickly realizes that reading is the last thing they want to do. She even goes as far as to question if they will be able to keep out of prison in the future.

Some of the men took issue with the way they were portrayed in an article. They felt that one single derogatory line discredited the entire article. Many of them have spent years behind bars and have the mentality that if one thing goes wrong, everyone is punished. So while I did enjoy reading this book and seeing the alternate perspectives, I felt that Mikita often discredited the men she occasionally thought of as friends.

Looking for books they read in The Maximum Security Book Club?

The Metamorphosis

The Speckled Beauty

"I don't think any dog knows home better than one thrown away once already."

I have a habit of reading sad dog books.

 

Seriously, you can scroll back through the past 10 years of this blog and you'll find dozens of books like this. Dogs are such a huge part of my life. I got my pup, Sophie roughly 6 years ago. I have no idea how old she is, or what breed she is, or what her story was before she came into my life. But that's the beauty of rescuing a dog.

My grandfather sent me a copy of The Speckled Beauty by Rick Bragg and I immediately bumped it up on my TBR shelf. It's a wholesome story about throw away dogs; which is a huge issue in the US, specifically in the South. Shelters stay over-crowded and the employees stay overworked and underpaid. Many people turn their dog loose to the streets. It's heartbreaking. Honestly, I'm crying writing this review.

Rick Bragg knows about throw away dogs. His dogs and mine have similar stories....thrown away for unknown reasons, in towns not far from each other in Alabama. The Speckled Beauty details life with his most recent adoptee, Speck. Speck showed up broken down, beaten, and bleeding. He even took off a few more times before realizing he finally had a home. Unlike my dog, Speck took no shit. He regularly battled with the mules and swung kittens around in empty sacks. He was used to fighting for his life, his meals, and a place to sleep. He found all that in an aging man who needed something to take his mind off of things. Somehow this little hell hound won him over.

Looking for other books by Rick Bragg?

Where I Come From

Happy People Are Annoying

I feel like Josh Peck gave himself far less credit than he deserves.

Like many Millennials, I discovered Josh on The Amanda Show. But he's widely know for his role on Drake and Josh, which is a show I literally still watch and I'm now 26.

 

I was kind of expecting Happy People Are Annoying to be a tell all of what it's like to be a child actor. But Josh quickly mentions how ordinary that is, and he's anything but ordinary. He goes on to say people have a habit of assuming because we watched him (or any other character) grow up on television, that we somehow know who they are as a person. But let me tell you, I was unprepared for everything he talked about in this book.

 

This book kind of humanized Josh in a way that felt relatable. He repeatedly had to change his preconceived notions of what it means to make it in Hollywood. He talks about being sober. He talks about his insecurities. He talks about being in his 20's and thinking, "I have no idea what I'm doing with my life." AND THAT'S ALL SO RELATABLE.

So, my suggestion is we make Josh the leader of the millennials.

That's all.

I'm The Girl

I've been obsessively following Courtney Summers newsletter for details on her upcoming book, I'm The Girl. She's posted on social media about how this book is set in the same world as Sadie. If that doesn't give you any indication of how brutal this book is, then I don't know what will.

When I got the email about review copies for I'm The Girl, I immediately accepted.....and then I read the entire thing today. I'm so emotionally drained from this story. The energy of this book is raw and real. It does a deep dive into the power hungry people who seem to have the run of the world. These people enable abusers and will go to great lengths to protect themselves and the good 'ole boys.

It hurt me to read this book.

But the power behind the words is what makes this story one of Summers' best books yet.

Sadie broke my heart but I'm The Girl obliterated it.

 

I'm The Girl hits shelves September 13, 2022.

 

Huge thanks to St. Martin's Press & Wednesday Books for sending me an e-ARC.

Looking for other books by Courtney Summers?

Sadie

The Project

Cracked Up To Be

Hiding My Candy

If you haven't noticed, I tend to read books set in the areas I live in. My husband and I move around A LOT, which means I get a whole new city to explore through books! Our most recent move brought us to Savannah, Georgia. So obviously, I had to read Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt. His book featured one of the most infamous characters, The Lady Chablis. I immediately grabbed a copy of her book, Hiding my Candy.

 

Now, if you haven't read Midnight or are not familiar with the drag scene in Savannah....then you probably have no idea who The Lady Chablis is. She was one of the biggest names on the Drag circuit in the late 1980s all throughout the 1990s. Her stage persona featured comedy, singing, and emceeing. She created a name for herself in show business.

Hiding My Candy details the early life of The Doll, a name The Lady Chablis likes to refer to herself as. Her story is unique for several reasons. I mean this woman was one of the first Trans performers to sashay her way into the spotlight. She let it be known that she was all woman and expected to be treated as such. Which was honestly such a power move, I mean it's the South in the '80s. The Lady Chablis was an all around bad bitch, in the truest sense of the word. She took no shit from anyone. She stayed true to herself and refused to let society change who she was.

 

Now, it was written in 1996, so a lot of the terminology she uses is outdated. But that doesn't change the overall message of her story. She walks us through every single decision she made and why she made it. She talks about discovering her sexuality and what it would mean for her future relationships. I'm positive The Lady Chablis lived the life she never dreamed possible, and she looked killer doing it.

Looking for other books featuring The Lady Chablis?

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

This Might Hurt

Stephanie Wrobel knows how to write revenge.

This Might Hurt really had me questioning how we look at cults.

This story follows sisters, Natalie and Kit over the course of several months. Their alternating storylines are interspersed with an unnamed character's flashbacks. It was written in a way that leaves you to wonder who is truly at fault at any given time. It lets us get inside each characters head and understand why they did the things they did.

What started as a 6 month retreat, turned into a new life for Kit. She quickly dedicates her life to Wisewood and joins the rankings of the Inner Circle. She's given up everything in her previous life, her job, her apartment, even her sister. She never could move past their mother's death, but maybe Wisewood could help with that.

When Kit told Natalie about Wisewood, her eyes almost rolled out of her head. Natalie couldn't believe her sister was willing to throw her money away on a retreat like this. After not hearing from Kit in nearly 6 months, an threatening email lands in her inbox. She can't let someone else tell Kit her biggest secret, she had to do it herself.

Wisewood is a weird little community, filled with people trying to escape their past.

They just want to live their Maximized Lives without any interference from friends or family.

But dark forces are in motion, it's just a matter of time until they come to the light.

This was not my favorite cult story. It had an air of mystery around it, but it wasn't quite as twisty as I wanted it to be.

Looking for other books by Stephanie Wrobel?

Darling Rose Gold