Jade: Afrobubblegum

A few weeks ago, in my ethics class, a girl in my group started raving about this movie she had just seen. It was a private screening as part of a different course, and she even got the chance to meet the director/producer. She went on to explain that the film, RAFIKI, is a love story between two girls who live in Nairobi. Immediately, another member of my group expressed how heartbreaking the movie must have been. I also jumped to the conclusion that there would be a tragic ending.

Enter afrobubblegum, a term coined by the movie's director/producer Wanuri Kahiu. From her website of the same name, she states: "We believe in a fun, fierce and frivolous representation of Africa. To that end, we work to curate, commission and create fun work that celebrates joy."

I think afrobubblegum is awesome. It's a movement that ignores the general, presumed dialogue of African movies and books as either historical, depressing, or strictly morally concerned. I understand that oftentimes movies and books are a great medium for history to be taught and those suffering to be heard (with the hope of raising awareness and support), but there's something to be said about cherishing culture and fostering positivity as well. It's a terribly hard line to draw though, because no one wants to overshadow those who are struggling, those who are in need.

But if we want racial dialogue to ever shift, we need afrobubblegum. In a different context, I try to read Asian American authors whenever I can, but a significant amount of the time, the books I find are some version of historical fiction. While again, I can appreciate that these books are important because they are another voice, another perspective, I just wish that there were more options which integrated Asian culture with the modern day. Otherwise, as I see it, we remain isolated from the society and culture now. I crave a "fun, fierce and frivolous" Asian American story, I don't want more reserved tones or moral lessons.

The podcast I listened to, Books & Boba, gave me some hope. While one of the reviews I listened to was about a book retelling China's history, Game of Thrones style, there were others that seemed to fit this idea of afrobubblegum. Books about detectives, superheroes, modern love—these themes reach beyond race, and make me hopeful that as an Asian American, there is room for my stories even if they aren't a drama that takes place in 1700s Beijing.

Sebastian: Reading for Friday

Please read Richard Nash and Jane Friedman chapters in Literary Publishing in the 21st Century.

Sara: Book review (beware, it is a romance) (I know, I should read more variety but oh well)

This week, I feel all my creativity and energy in general has been taken by due dates and group presentations and also the fact that I saw my advisor to get my graduation clearance - I'm mildly super ultra scared about graduating so that was not fun. Anyways, I didn't know what topic to use for my blog post, so I'm going to review the last book I've read, which it also feels a little bit in accordance with our last class discussion.

The book is called "Falling into us", published in 2013 and written by Jasinda Wilder. It is a romance, as I warned in the blog title, and it was mind-blowingly amazing. I know most of the people in the class is not into romance, but it is the last thing I read and I thought it was one of the "good romances", so here are my thoughts. 

It is the second book of a series called "Falling", and I've also read the first book which was so so so so good too, but I actually enjoyed the second one even more, which is a feeling I love. "Falling into us" is written in a double POW from the two main characters: Becca and Jason. The story begins on their sophomore high school year, and it spans until they are on their middle twenties. Usually, I don't like books that have such a big time gap, but I think the author did an amazing job keeping the storyline cohesive and their chemistry on point. 

Becca is a shy girl, super smart and loyal, but quiet and insecure with her words because she stutters. Jason is a popular football player, and so far we see the typical high school trope with the nerdy girl and the jock, but honestly, the two of them were way more than that. She is half Italian, half Lebanese and lives in a house where her dad is super strict and protective and her brother is bipolar. Jason's dad is a police officer and is physically abusive toward his son, wanting him to be the best football player or as a consequence of failure to expect a beating. 

That's their life at home, but in a really unexpected way, they both end up having a date and they fall in love. It is really sweet, but it never reaches cheesiness - believe it or not I have DNF books that were extremely cheesy and/or had unrealistic chemistry between the characters. They are both their first's for basically all the romantic firsts you can think of, and I'm going to say that Jason was too perfect to be real. Here is when I read books with too good to be true guys and I have to tell myself this is a fictitious world, and I in no way can have book-guy standards in the world we live in. Everything between them was amazing and sweet until Jason's best friend dies right after their high school graduation. That is the first drama in the book, and I already knew that one from the first book, so I was not too shocked. I actually was impressed by the author's way to deal with it. I really approve of how Jason and Becca felt and acted, helping each other and going to therapy so they were able to move on. 

The book was super long, and with my ability of rambling I feel I've already written too much, so I'll try to wrap up my feelings and thoughts. One of the main reasons I loved the book was because all the drama was external. I'm the first one who appreciates some angst, but it can also be super exhausting. With Jason and Becca, every problem they had was something nonrelated to their personal relationship. There is a point (super big spoiler ahead) where Becca's brother commits suicide and I'm not going to lie, I cried reading that scene. The author did an amazing job portraying a person with a mental health issue, and here is where I think the romance genre can actually talk about serious matters. There was so much more in this book than just Becca and Jason's love tale. It was a coming of age story that dealt with domestic violence and mental health and figuring out what love really is. It was a really emotional novel, and even though there were really hard parts to read, I truly enjoyed it. 

Jae: Dear Sara

Dear Sara from our class,

I am currently reading the book, "The Hating Game" as you recommended to me a while ago. I am now at the part where Joshua and Lucy are at the hotel and things are getting... spicy. To be fair, they were spicy before and I think that will likely be the case in the future. I knew it was a YA romance novel, but I wasn't quite expecting it to be like this. Nevertheless, the book is really good. BUT WHY ARE THERE SO MANY SEXUAL TENSIONS/ I-HATE-HIM-SO-MUCH-THAT -I-WANT-TO-KISS-HIM trope? But thank you for recommending this book because I'm enjoying it overall. 

Best wishes, Jae LEe

Mia: Book to Screen Adaptations

I was thinking recently about book to screen adaptations. One of my favorite book series, The Raven Cycle, is becoming a TV series. I follow the author on Twitter and she's mentioned that she is going to be apart of the script writing team. To be honest, even so, I'm terrified.

Why are book to screen adaptations notoriously so bad? I think it has a large part to do with the fact that we all probably have perfect versions of what the story should be like played out in our minds. We imagine characters in our heads and when they don't meet those expectations, we get upset (side note: I dislike when covers have pictures of the characters). On top of that, the medium of TV or movie is way different than a book. Simply writing a script is a different process from writing a book. Plus, if they were to follow everything exactly as it was written, it would probably take much longer than the time allotted.

More on the side of books, I wonder how authors view their adaptations - do they hate them? Find them funny? Regretful? Love them? Like... Rick Riordan can't be happy with those movie adaptations... Although, the money was probably good (HOWEVER, Logan Lerman is cute and pretty much exactly how I pictured Percy, so that was cool). (Also, as I'm writing this, I realized I've never looked up interviews. I'm sure they exist. I'm gonna look them up later. Anyway.) I'm sure there's a lot to do with legal and contract work, but I'm always curious as to how much every author is allowed to be in the process. How much power or say do they have? Again, I'm sure it varies from production to production, but sometimes I feel like the scripts veer so wildly off the course of the book that it can't be considered the same thing.

Book to screen adaptations are a blessing and a curse. There have always been times where I thought, "Man, I'd love to see this in movie/TV form" - hell, I've thought that about The Raven Cycle. But I have so many things I want it to get right: the atmosphere, the small town magic, the way Blue's house looks in my mind, how all of the characters dress, Blue's hair clips. And I know that my expectations can't possibly be met. Also, you know they're going to stop before they get to the fourth book and I'm sad just thinking about it. Henry Cheng deserves better. But that being said, I don't want them to introduce him before he's supposed to be in the story... And this is exactly why book to screen adaptations are hard.

Right now, I can't really think of many book to screen adaptations that I've thought were accurate. None really come to mind. It's easy to hate on them, but it's hard work converting books to movies. Personally, I like to view them as two separate entities because they are two different mediums and to be honest, it makes me enjoy it more. And just cause I'm talking about it, I prefer TV series because I think they allow for more time and detail work... Anyway... Apparently I had a lot more to say than I thought I did. I really never know how to end these posts. Enjoy the long weekend!

Evelyn M: A Possibly Hot Take — probably just mildly spicy

Hello, I have returned to the blog after my two week long struggle with google after they thought I was stealing my own identity and locked me out of my gmail account — so now I have a new one!

Fun fact: 3 years ago, someone in the US government made a clerical mistake and filed that my stepmother Tiffany was DEAD. So we suddenly got all of these forms to fill out and her social security number was cancelled etc., all because she was legally considered dead. Classic pranks!

Anyway, this will be a very rambling blog post on modern feminism in literature, specifically as seen through dystopian feminist books. I believe I first read The Handmaid's Tale (published in 1985) when I was about 14 or 15, and I was like HOLY MOLEY! At that point in my life, my personal introduction to women's issues/rights and feminism in general was just beginning, so reading that book was almost like an outsider looking in. I found it powerful and shocking and waved it around to anyone who would listen.

Now, however, at the ancient age of 21, I find reading books of the same vein as The Handmaid's Tale absolutely exhausting — and they just keep coming out!! From The Power, to The Women's War to The Water Cure, to VOX, all of these novels deal with gender politics in a violent and dystopian way. As a young woman, I am ACUTELY aware of how much sexism sucks each and every day and feel so TIRED when I have to read fiction about it too.

I'm tired of reading books like this!!! I think we've discussed escapism through literature before, and this type of writing to me is just the opposite. It's literally painful for me to read through yet another dystopian society (that is way too familiar to our own) of violence against women. Frankly I just have lost sight of the value that these books bring to literature. That's all I have to say, I'm gonna go watch Gilmore Girls.

Molly: The Worst Bestsellers Podcast

I finally got to listen to a few episodes of the podcast I chose, and I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. I've been living under the impression that I don't like podcasts for a while, so I was a bit apprehensive to listen to this one. The basic overview of this podcast is that they read bad books (or watch bad movies or other things) so that 'we' don't have to. And by bad books, they generally mean books that had very opposing opinions where some people loved them and others hated them.

In looking through their roster of episodes, I wanted to see what their first selection was, and they had chosen Twilight. I immediately was interested because I really love Twilight, and I know the majority of the world hates it, so I wanted to see what they had to say about it. Since it was the first episode, I don't know if it was their normal podcast format, but I also listened to another one and it was mostly similar. There are over 100 episodes on the podcast app. They didn't have advertisements, but they did talk about their Patreon pretty often (more in the later episode I listened to)

When the podcast started, I was not excited because the first person to talk hates Twilight. She used to work at a YA bookstore, so she remembers the initial surge of popularity when the books first blew up. That, on top of other reason most likely, has led her to have a negative view of the series as a whole. But then, another of the hosts (there are three total I believe? Or two and a guest?) admitted that she was Twilight fan, so I settled down. I liked the range of opinions among the hosts which helped it not be swayed in one direction for the whole time. They were all very open and weren't like, married to hating or loving it. They discussed in depth the main characters and their interactions. They also talked about the differences and similarities between the book and the movie. Their banter was really entertaining, and it was actually a conversation I wish I could have joined in on. (side note- one of the hosts had a voice that sounds exactly like a friend of mine, who would never be talking about Twilight in that much detail, or at all probably, so it was very distracting thinking it was her lol...) They gave recommendations for people who liked Twilight, including a lot of other vampire related content. At the end of the first episode, they played a game of would you rather (mostly questions about Twilight vampires vs Dracula) and gave a recommendation for a candy pairing for the book, which I found very entertaining.

The second episode I listened to was out of personal curiosity as well. It was about the movie Christian Mingle, which if you haven't seen it, please don't watch it. Or do if you want a good laugh. It's like a Hallmark Christmas movie, but worse. As a Christian I had a real good laugh though. This episode was a bit different from the first for three reasons: 1) they called it a 'bonus' episode in honor of reaching a funding goal through Patreon; 2) it was about a movie; and 3) they were all tipsy. It had a similar flow to the first episode, where they discussed the characters and plot, as well as their opinions of the movie as a whole. The combination of the ridiculousness of the movie and the Strawberr-itas consumed made for a fun time as a listener. This episode was a bit more of a collective roast than a debate.

My last thought is that I think these episodes are way too long. I am not a podcast expert, so I don't know what the norm is, but each episode was an hour long and by about 35 minutes I was ready for them to wrap it up. Despite that grumpy take, this podcast made me realize that made my original disliking of podcasts was maybe too quick of a judgement. I didn't know a lot of the other books they were talking about, but I would definitely consider getting into it more.

Jess: Book Review Panel

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vulture.com/amp/2018/09/brooklyn-book-festival-2018-the-most-memorable-moments.html


See details under the Mass Extinction of Book Reviews

Sebastian: Hero

https://parulsehgal.com/

Jess: The Bookstore (Podcast)

This week I listened to the Bookstore podcast. Their tag line is “it’s like book club but we actually read the book.” In hindsight, this was probably not the podcast for me because I love book clubs and that critique seems a little unnecessary. The premise is that best friends Becca and Corinne spend each week talking about a book. They used to work at an independent bookstore together, and the podcast was meant as a way to talk not just about books but also all of the book related topics that used to come up. They list some of those in their one minute trailer and they sound pretty similar to the types of questions we open class with. That said, they didn’t get to any of those types of topics (which author would you want to have dinner with, what three books would you take to a deserted island, etc.) in the episodes I listened to.

The first episode I listened to was one on Swing Time from April 23, 2018. I originally tried to start with their most recent episode on My Sister the Serial Killer, but was promptly warned that there would be spoilers. So I scrolled back a long ways to find a book I had read. On Swing Time, they made a lot of points I agreed with. For one, they talked about how surprisingly readable Zadie Smith is, despite her place as a modern literary icon. But they also had some comments I truly could not get behind. Swing Time is somewhat separated into two sections, one focused on childhood and one on adulthood. I was generally more drawn to the former, I found those stories more compelling. They both seemed to think the adulthood part was more understandable and well-written mainly because they didn’t understand one of the characters motivations at all. I’m going to try to not get to into this here, except to say that The Bookclub podcast I listened to on this book had enough dissenting opinions and nuanced conversation that they didn’t entirely miss the point. 

The way I felt about that first episode didn’t bode well for the next. I decided to listen to an episode on a book I wouldn’t read. I picked I’ll Be Gone In The Dark because I was interested but don’t have the stomach to read a book about a serial killer. I found the episode to be surprisingly upbeat. Personally, I felt they were a little bit cavalier about the experiences of the survivors, and that made me largely uncomfortable. I think the hosts have a nice rapport, but they get along so well it never feels like they take a moment to question each other and have a real conversation.

To switch gears, I listened to an episode from March 5 on what they’ve been reading and some book suggestions. Unlike the rest of the episodes, I hadn’t heard of any of the books they recommended. In true bookstore employee fashion, it seemed like they knew a lot of smaller publishers and new releases that may have flown under the radar. Their tastes range from nonfiction to poetry to short story collections, and if you’re looking for something new I think they had a great number of reads that sounded excellent. 

Would I listen to this podcast again? Probably not. But I might go back and look for the recommendations they gave in that last podcast. 

Tom - Podcast: The Librarian is In

This podcast ended up being pretty interesting. The Librarian is In is "The New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture, and what to read next." The two hosts, Gwen and Frank, have a constant back and forth conversation style that was easy to listen to. 

The first episode I listened to was called Mourning Heathcliff, Hedwig, and All the Literary Dogs. I picked this episode mainly out of my curiosity for the topic that was to be discussed, which was the effect of character death on the reader. For this episode, Gwen and Frank brought along a guest named Eric Molinsky who is the host of a podcast called Imaginary Worlds. 

One of the most important discussions revolved around the role of parasocial relationships, or relationships that one can have with someone that they don't actually know in real life. When you think about it, this is quite an interesting concept. Sometimes we become so connected to characters in a story, we feel as though we know them on a real-life, personal level. This was the main argument for how readers are effected by the deaths of characters that they have parasocial relationships with. The emotions elicited are vivid and impactful. An expert determined that from a psychological standpoint, readers are most likely to establish parasocial relationships with characters that display avoidant attachment styles. Due to their limited circle of friends and conservatism when it comes to trust, forming a parasocial relationship with such a character makes you feel as though you are actually one of their best or closest friends. 

Before listening to this podcast episode, I never truly pondered the reasons behind we as readers can feel such powerful emotions when a character we connect with dies. 

I also listened to the episode titled That Episode about 'Cat Person'. I was drawn to this episode since we have all individually read Cat Person, and since we have discussed it in class. I was interested to learn that many of the story's critics were conflating non-fiction with fiction as they read. 

When discussing the end of the story where Robert sends repeated and increasingly vile texts, Frank says that he felt heartbroken for Robert, although he did not approve of his actions. On the other hand, Gwen states that she felt sorry for Robert the entire time until he sent these texts. Gwen says she predicted the last line of the story, whereas Frank was caught more off guard. Personally, I was shocked when Robert sent his final text. 

One final topic of discussion had to do with the difference between the societal pressures faced by men and women today. Gwen and Frank bring up the point that women are pushed to think about other peoples feelings and emotions, even if it means doing something they don't necessarily want to do in order to preserve someone's feelings and emotions. For Margot, this involves following through with Robert when they go back to his house even though she wants to leave. Conversely, the societal pressure for men to hide and compartmentalize their emotions is discussed in the context of Robert, when he can't accept the emasculating facts about the situation he is in. 

I felt like this episode provided a solid overview and analysis of Cat Person from different perspectives.

The Librarian is In was light, engaging, and provided new insights into some ideas I have never considered deeply before. I give it a thumbs up.

Mia: Podcasts

I'll talk more about the podcast I chose tomorrow (?), but I started scrolling around my podcast app to try to find more literary podcasts to listen to. What's interesting is they're pretty hard for me to find - there's no one set genre for podcasts of this nature and I had to do some digging to find a couple (didn't really like them, also it was easier to find ones from publishing companies, which is to be expected). That being said, maybe I'm just horrible with technology (which is usually the case).

I don't usually listen to literary podcasts. I listen to a lot of D&D, comedy, and other miscellaneous shows that I can't really put into genres - stuff like My Brother, My Brother, and Me, Wonderful!, Friends at the Table, Wikicast, etc.

Anyway, if anyone listens to any kind of podcasts that they adore, I'd love to listen to more!

Anna: Mommy Blogger Drama

I don't know what made me think about this story again, but back in January mommy blogger Christie Tate wrote a piece about how her daughter confronted her about her blog. The daughter had just gotten a laptop, and upon googling her mom's name, found dozens of written pieces detailing her experiences growing up, including potty-training and losing friendships in school, all from her mom's perspective.  She asked her mom to remove the pieces and to stop writing about her, but Tate refused to stop. I remember reading a lot of the backlash on Tate's decision to go against her daughter's wishes, albeit coming up with a few compromises, like never using her daughter's real name and asking for her veto on certain topics.

One of the choice quotes from Tate's article that makes my head spin:

Promising not to write about her anymore would mean shutting down a vital part of myself, which isn’t necessarily good for me or her. So my plan is to chart a middle course, where together we negotiate the boundaries of the stories I write and the images I include. This will entail hard conversations and compromises. But I prefer the hard work of charting the middle course to giving up altogether — an impulse that comes, in part, from the cultural pressure for mothers to be endlessly self-sacrificing on behalf of their children. As a mother, I’m not supposed to do anything that upsets my children or that makes them uncomfortable, certainly not for something as culturally devalued as my own creative labor.

Even after revisiting this, I don't know what to make of it. On one hand I would feel mortified if details of my turbulent adolescence were published online by my mom, but on the other hand Tate has made a livelihood surrounding her experiences as a mother, giving her a public platform in an otherwise very insular, sometimes isolating role. Either way, it brings the issues privacy and agency into question with situations like this.

Buzzfeed article detailing the drama

Beaks & Geeks podcast

I chose the Beaks and Geeks podcast, a podcast under Penguin Random House. Its 'tag' is "Candid conversations with authors" which seems pretty true to form based on the episode I listened to from December 2015 with guest George Saunders -- which, yeah, I chose because I like George Saunders. He was phoning in though, so it was a little weird at first to be listening to a podcast of two people having a phone conversation. It starts similarly to late-night shows, where the guest promotes what they've been working on. For Saunders at this point it was promoting his children's book The Very Persistent Gappers of Frip. After that, though, they went on to discuss the implications of the book, which is centered around the Syrian refugee crisis, and delved into national morality, etc. It's really less about the work and more about picking the brain of the author, based on this episode. Emily, the host, was a little awkward, but that's to be expected from someone whose career centers around books (no offense, professor). Early on in the podcast she said "I'm sure New York is happy to be used by you" and I could hear the regret after she said it. She also asked certain prompts like "What is your most productive time to write" or "What is your favorite place to write".

Like this or Die response

Lorentzen starts out the article with a passage discussing consumerist culture and how "the algorithm" shapes the things that we consume. Here he raises the shadow of an interesting question: how exactly is consumerist culture and "the algorithm" affecting the identities of people who have built their lives around consumption? Lorentzen points out the ways in which consumerist interactions with culture aren't based around an enjoyment for the material, but rather the ways in which this consumption reinforces the ways we already view ourselves (I'm a busy person, I stay in the loop, etc.).

What made this confusing to me was that Lorentzen seems to veer very sharply away from this course later in the article. His focus becomes not whether or not we can genuinely interact with art through the lens of consumption, but seems to shift instead to people consuming "incorrect" books in an "incorrect" way. Lorentzen points to the ways in which book reviews have been streamlined and "dumbbed down", but he doesn't seem to consider that the ponderous, critical New York Times reviews he loves so much are also a form of consumption. It seems that Lorentzen has just as much of his identity invested in reading the "right" books the "right" way as Alex and Wendy have in watching the best TV shows all their friends enjoy. His criticism then isn't of consumerist culture and the formulation of identities around the things we consume, but rather a call for a change to a different kind of consumerism.

Sam: Emilia Clarke Article

Speaking of algorithms and things that come up on our feeds…I got sucked into reading Emilia Clarke’s essay that was published today titled a “A Battle for my Life” when it popped up on my Twitter. If you don't know her by her real name, she plays Daenerys Targaryen. Like thousands of others I love Game of Thrones, so naturally I was curious what she was writing about.

I do wonder how this article came about--if she approached The New Yorker wanting to write this piece or if they somehow approached her. She says in the article this was her first time speaking about her health struggles so I wonder why The New Yorker for avenue of choice..? Someone of her status could easily go on a talk show, do an interview, and be done with it. Was she given special editing attention in composing and revising the text? It's only been out for a few hours and the initial New Yorker tweet already has 10k+ retweets and 30k+ likes.

Fates & Furies

I realize that like all of my posts are just updates on what I'm reading but whatever. I picked up Lauren Groff's Fates & Furies yesterday and am already ... surprisingly halfway through it. As the slowest reader in the world this is really wild.

I really unashamedly was interested in it because of all the hype it got a few years ago and also because Barrack Obama said it was his favorite book of 2015 - which surprised me knowing the genre/plot/etc. Anyways I think its quite good.

Also learned that Groff writes characters and certain moments with color palettes in mind that lead her to make certain decisions tonally and whatnot which I found interesting. Like synesthesia. Literary synesthesia!!!!!

Anybody else read this before? Lmk.

xoxoxoxoxoxo

Molly's blog

Hi friends,

Per request of Professor Stockman, here is the link to my blog!

https://mollykauper.wordpress.com

Sorry I guess that makes y'all my side blog :/ :/

Check it out :)

Sebastian: PLAN FOR FRIDAY

A lot of moving pieces today! I thought I'd work to clear up a few loose ends.

On Friday, I will confab with the rest of you (at a faster clip, I hope) to talk about your project plans. 

Then we'll discuss one of my favorite topics: reviews! Book criticism: what's it even for?

Please read these:

—Jessa Crispin's "The Self-Hating Book Critic" in Literary Publishing in the 21st Century

—Christian Lorentzen's just-out Harper's piece Like This or Die: The Fate of the Book Review in the Age of the Algorithm

Supplemental:

I'll also be drawing on this piece for our discussion. But it's a little too obsessive for me to ask you to read the whole thing (I think it's literally 20,000 words).

And, just for fun, this old profile of the once-savage book reviewer Dale Peck (who stopped doing vicious reviews after publishing his own novel, I think?): The Takedown Artist

Jae: Small Question

Can a literary agent sell a script/story to other industries? I was thinking circumstances where authors write stories for stuff like video games/movies/apps/etc. I mean, I think the "Cursed Child" by J.K Rowling was originally published as a Broadway show. And how watching the Broadway show was 1000x better than actually reading the script (that's what my friend told me after she saw the show).