It is day three of #TheSealeyChallenge and I am emotionally unprepared for what I feel like some of these collections are going to do to me. These two collections have pushed the air out of my lungs wondering if I’m making the right choice by diving head first into more like them. My initial thoughts after just reading these two is that I was surprised they followed some type of narrative. Please keep in mind I’m pretty much a complete n00b right now. However loose the narrative is, it’s definitely there in these two collections. It’s clear you can read each poem individually, but the collections work as a whole. I honestly don’t know what I was expecting, bc it does seems obvious now that poetry collections follow themes, much like art exhibits and novels.

#Unaccompanied by Javier Zamora singes the skin. It is raw, emotional, and cutting. Zamora is a Salvadoran poet and activist, he came to the US when he was 9 years old. He has a memoir coming out soon, and I will one thousand percent be reading that. Favorite poems are: Saguaros, Second Attempt Crossing, Cassette Tape, Abuelita Says Goodbye, and June 10, 1999. Thanks @laurathestudent for this rec.

While Unaccompanied is all fire and dust, #DeafRepublic by Ilya Kaminsky is snow and ash. Making your skin prickle and your eyes sting with tears. This was breathtaking in its beauty and stretched my imagination on what this art form is truly capable of. It swallowed me whole. The poems tells the story of a town under occupation, finding ways to communicate and protest after the death of a young boy renders the whole town deaf. It will definitely go down as one of my favorite books this year. Thanks for the push @sethisreading

By the end of August I imagine I will be a puddle. This world can be a cruel place, but damn, look at the beauty we can create.

[ID: Viv’s hands holds up the two poetry chapbooks Unaccompanied by Javier Zamora and Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky. In the background are the branches of an old oak tree.]

#TheSealeyChallenge #Poetry #DeafRepublic #Unaccompanied #Poems #Bookstagram #Bookstagrammer #readmorepoetry

This was an action packed summer read I loved! Fans of Iron Widow will probably love this wild ride too. It features Ikenna, a bad ass, foul mouthed MC on a revenge mission. More please! A wonderful fantasy. I can’t wait for book 2! Edit: this can also be adult fantasy. But ya know what genre stuff can be so stupid. Read whatever the heck is good. [ID: The Blood Trials by Nia Davenport rests flat on a porch banister. There are green plants and a fountain blurry in the background.] #YA #youngadultbooks #youngadultfantasy #niadavenport #thebloodtrials #readmoreYA #fantasy #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #epicbooks #adventurebooks #duology #duologybooks #adultfantasy #adultfantasybooks

The first week of The Sealey Challenge! I probably won’t get through all of these but I’ll have fun trying and flexing some poetry chops. Pictured in the reel are the chapbooks I got from my library: Don’t Call Us Dead by Danes Smith, Unaccompanied by Javier Zamora, Counting Descent by Clint Smith, Night Sky Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong, An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo, Electric Arches by Eve L. Ewing, Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky. I’m trying not to get overwhelmed. The point of this for me personally is simply to read more poetry and see what works for me. Hope everyone is having a good Monday! #thesealeychallenge #poetry #poems #chapbooks #readmorepoetry #bookstagram

#JulyReadingWrapUp

July always tends to be a big reading month because it is summer vacation, but I was sort of underwhelmed by my reading month as a whole. I think there are a lot of reasons for this, some of it is because I was dealing with some personal things in July that made it difficult to really focus and find a solid groove with a book, and another is the books themselves. None really grabbed me, and there were several that I sort of skimmed through because they just did not hold my attention. Again, was it just me? Or the books? Probably both. Of the ones I read, I would recommend The Mountains Sing to generally everyone (I listened to the audiobook and I found myself waiting for moments to keep listening, I thought it was great), the rest I would only recommend to certain people. Trust Exercise was strange, and I can see why its polarizing, but Susan Choi can definitely write very well. Blonde was good, but very long, and JCO said some pretty dumb things on twitter about ¾ through my read so it definitely took the wind out of my sails a bit. But reading that in tandem with She Said was QUITE the experience. More thoughts on those two soon….Cheers to a better August.

[ID: Pictured from top to bottom: The poetry book Field Guide to a Haunted Forest, by Jarod K. Anderson, Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates, The Mountains Sing by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai, The Blacktongue Thief by Christopher Buelhman, She Said by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, Columbine by Dave Cullen, Just By Looking At Him by Ryan O. Connel, Trust Exercise by Susan Choi, and Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley]

#Poetry #Fiction #NonFiction #Bookstagram #ReadingWrapUp #MonthlyWrapUp #TheMountainsSing #Blonde #Nightcrawling #TheBlackTongueThief #SheSaid #JustByLookingAtHim #ReadMoreBooks #AlwaysReading #Books #Bookstagrammer #AAPIBookstagrammer

Lazy Saturday. Am I reading. Or am I on my phone? I’m sure you can guess. [ID: a stack of books rests on a small, black round table. There are sailor moon bookmarks next to the stack. The wall in the background is light blue] #saturday #lazysaturday #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #stopscrolling

I was tagged by @theoreads and @pilartyping to share my five star predictions, and finally got around to curating a small stack that is pictured on this table:

1: Stay with Me, by Ayobami Adebayo: I honestly don’t know what this book is about, I just know after reading @readwithemilyg review I had to read it. It’s also a favorite of @thatgoodgoodbook so you know it’s going to be excellent.

2. This is How You Lost the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone: I am book edging this one. Badly. I know its a favorite of so many here, don’t yell at me.

3. Allow Me to Retort: Ellie Mystal: I read the first page and was hooked. Mystal has a clear narrative voice and dispels information in a way that is not only accessible, but also funny. Sign me up.

4. Invisible Child by by Andrea Elliott: It won the Pulitzer Prize and the synopsis alone was enough to convince me. Synopsis: Invisible Child follows eight dramatic years in the life of Dasani Coates, a child with an imagination as soaring as the skyscrapers near her Brooklyn homeless shelter. Born at the turn of a new century, Dasani is named for the bottled water that comes to symbolize Brooklyn’s gentrification and the shared aspirations of a divided city. As Dasani grows up, moving with her tight-knit family from shelter to shelter, this story goes back to trace the passage of Dasani’s ancestors from slavery to the Great Migration north. By the time Dasani comes of age, New York City’s homeless crisis is exploding as the chasm deepens between rich and poor.

Now to get to the business of reading them………….

#FiveStarPredictions #Bookstagram #NonFiction #Fiction #GreatBooks #LosAngelesReads #Bookstagrammer #AlwaysReading #ReadMoreBooks #BestBooks2022 #EducateYourself