Like sand through the hourglass

Today I'm talking about The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab. It took far longer to finish than I had anticipated and that was mostly because I expected it to be one thing and it was decidedly another. I had thought (and hoped) it would be heavier on the historical fiction side of things and while it did start out that way it ended up leaning more towards romance (not my fave genre as you know). The reader follows a young woman named Addie LaRue (as the title suggests) who in a moment of desperation cries out to the universe for help and the answer she receives is not at all what she expected. In order to truly be free and live a life of her own choosing she is sentenced to be forgotten by everyone she meets. The story bounces between time periods beginning in the early 1700s and ending up in 2014/present day. Schwab's descriptive writing is truly beautiful and there were many passages that gave me Hamnet vibes (i.e. they were deliciously written) but these sections were brief and generally devolved into Addie's relationship with the god who cursed her. I also appreciated the chill LGBTQ+ vibes that were threaded throughout. However, if I have to distill all my feelings about this book into one word it would have to be: lukewarm. 4/10

[A/N: If you've read this book and want to discuss the ending hit me up in the comments but make sure to tag it as SPOILERS just in case anyone else happens upon it.]

Source: StoryGraph

What I'm currently reading: Spring by Ali Smith and Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond

**If you're interested in buying any of these books or any books really, you can click here. This will re-direct you to AbeBooks which is a site I use all of the time to find used books at an excellent price. A lot of the time I don't even pay for shipping! Full disclosure: I will receive a commission on all sales made through this link. You will not be charged anything additional for my commission. I wouldn't recommend a site that I didn't use and you are under no obligation to purchase anything. :-) ** 

Delightful surprise

I love science. I also love learning about scientific theories and the scientists who brought them to light. Initially, I thought Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman was a true account of how Einstein came up with his theory of time (relativity). Instead this collection contains fictionalized diary entries (dream journal style) from 1905. Each dream accounts for a different way to view time and is set up almost as if they take place in alternate realities. Maybe all events are fixed and predetermined so time is meaningless. Or perhaps there's a world where the closer you get to the center of a location the slower you move until you are arrested completely. Do you think there's a place where those living in higher altitudes age slower than those below? I don't even know if I could handle the world where immortality is a given and so you are forced to live and live and live. In between each of the 'diary' entries, Lightman writes about Einstein processing each of these dreams and honing his eventual theory of relativity. [Bonus: Beautiful pen and ink drawings of Berne scattered throughout.] As I said at the beginning, I started off thinking this was going to be a non-fiction biography of sorts but I think I like this even better. If you're looking for a short little dip into the dimensions of time and how they might look based on your reality then you've hit the jackpot. This is the best kind of sci-fi surprise! 9/10

Source: Amazon

What's Up Next: The Killings at Badger's Drift by Caroline Graham

What I'm Currently Reading: Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places by Colin Dickey

**If you're interested in buying this book or any books really, you can click here or here. The first will re-direct you to AbeBooks and the second will re-direct you to The Book Depository. These are great websites for purchasing books (AbeBooks carries inexpensive used and out-of-print books and The Book Depository ships free everywhere in the world). Full disclosure: I will receive a commission on all sales made by following either of these links. I wouldn't recommend a site that I didn't use and you are under no obligation to purchase anything. :-) **

The man known as the "greatest novelist of the 20th century"

Deanna Tiao from Yale University Press reached out to me for a review of the following book.


Benjamin Taylor's Proust: The Search is a part of the Jewish Lives series from Yale University Press. This biographical account details Proust's journey as a writer and his penultimate work In Search of Lost Time. I have to admit that until I read this book the only thing I knew about Proust was that he was a wordy writer and Steve Carell's character from Little Miss Sunshine was obsessed with him. He was most certainly a flawed man who had to contend with poor health, prejudices against his sexuality, and preoccupation with his chosen craft. The majority of his time was either spent wooing young men or feverishly writing. It seems he was quite feverish in his wooing as well although all of his romances were of short duration. He was passionate, intelligent, and ambitious. While this book is a part of the Jewish Lives series, Proust was not in fact religious. His mother was Jewish and because of that he would often speak up for the Jewish people but as often as not he would stay mute when others would decry the faith...except in reference to Alfred Dreyfus. During the course of the Dreyfus Affair, as it later came to be called, Proust was very interested in the proceedings and outspoken in his beliefs that a miscarriage of justice had occurred. Up until this point, he had been mainly concerned with other writer's and their works but after this he began to reflect on human nature and the changes that occur over time. I've decided to give In Search of Lost Time a shot and I've added it to my TRL. Taylor has certainly hyped it up and only time will tell if it lives up to it. (haha joke about time haha) Fans of biographies will most certainly enjoy this and if you've never really given Proust much thought then a read of this book might just change your mind. 8/10


**If you're interested in buying this book or any books really, you can click here or here. The first will re-direct you to AbeBooks and the second will re-direct you to The Book Depository. These are great websites for purchasing books (AbeBooks carries inexpensive used and out-of-print books and The Book Depository ships free everywhere in the world). Full disclosure: I will receive a commission on all sales made by following either of these links. I wouldn't recommend a site that I didn't use and you are under no obligation to purchase anything. :-) **

I wanted to make a Time Lord joke but I couldn't think of any :'-(

A lot of people are preoccupied with time: How it should be spent, how it can be saved, and how to make sure it isn't wasted. Have you ever accused someone of stealing your time? Momo is the only person who is able to resist the allure of the grey men who are time thieves. An already unique child, Momo, is abandoned by all of her friends who have fallen prey to these menaces (and they really do sound menacing + the illustrations are delightfully creepy). Much like The Neverending Story, the city that Michael Ende has created feels tangible and real...actually it sounds like Rome. The characters leap off of the page. Fantasy is done right when your imagination is allowed to run rampant and a talking turtle is as ordinary as a gorilla that learns sign language (I still think that's amazing). Momo is all about making the most of your time by spending it with those that you love. I think this is an especially poignant message for adults who are bombarded with deadlines and to-do lists and children who often feel neglected by those same adults. The message is clear but the delivery is what makes Ende's writing so special and why I believe he is an underrated children's author in our country (but not in his home country of Germany!).
I love science and I love space soooo I'm reading The 4% Universe: Dark Matter, Dark Energy, and the Race to Discover the Rest of Reality by Richard Panek. By this point, most people have heard about dark matter which is the stuff that can't be seen but which we know exists because of its gravitational effects on other objects that we can see. Panek conducted hundreds of interviews with many prominent scientists which shed light on the subject (and the drama in the scientific community). My science senses are tingling with excitement!