Books I read over the Christmas break 2021/2022

Another Christmas done and dusted. Some very brief thoughts below on the books that I read while on leave from work (bliss).

Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro

This was so good. I read it in a day on Christmas Eve. It made me think about work and what the point of work is.

Exciting Times – Naoise Dolan

Fine…. Some good lines but mostly boring. Felt like bargain Normal People.

Every Last Secret – A. R, Torre

Yes, I saw the twist but I did find it satisfying. I hated Neena after she said “that Asian doctor”, which may be the author’s habits coming through rather than a purposeful decision meant to say something about the character but I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt. Some questions about the ending and how that will work out…

The Waves – Virginia Woolf

I just didn’t connect with this and found myself skimming most of it… So many people seem to connect with this book on a deep level but I’m not there. Hopefully one day.

The Man Who Died Twice – Richard Osman

I liked this a lot more than the first book in the series. It could still be a bit silly and twee but I found this one more focussed and so, enjoyable.  

How To Do Nothing – Jenny Odell

This started off great but because of the meandering style, I lost the thread towards the towards the end. I would like to buy this (I borrowed a copy from the library), re-read and highlight.

Do writers cringe when they read their old writing back? Awful awful awful awful awful awful awful. Why did I use that word? Why did I say that? Why did I think that was worth putting out into the world? BLEgHGrhghoghohgiorahgorhioghrohgiorhgohrgoaehgoah what is life life life life life life life life I’m not sure. What do I deserve? How do I feel again? How do I stop being dead inside? I wish I could erase it all. To be human is to be embarrassed. To be human is to regret. To be human is cringe. I wish it was easier and that I could stop being sad and that I wasn’t two seconds away from crying at all times.

After a break up

I know that I’ll be happy again but it doesn’t feel like it. Also my friends just got engaged. I feel worried about things that I never really thought about before.

Permanent Record by Mary H.K. Choi

I think I really enjoyed Choi’s debut Emergency Contact. The fact that I can’t really remember what it was I liked about it has nothing to do with the book but more my poor memory (which is why I’m trying to write my thoughts down after finishing a book more often).

Permanent Record was fine. It felt a bit too woke for the sake of beings socially aware for me – I think the language was a prime example of this. I’ve never been to New York so maybe people do talk like this but it was just so ‘slang-y’ that it took me out. I liked the writing style, it flowed nicely.

I liked the romance between Pablo and Lee from a wish fulfilment perspective only. As in, I wish that was me meeting Harry Styles once in some random encounter and then he instantly becomes obsessed with me for no reason and flies me out of the country to hang out with him… From a story perspective though, what the hell. Why would a super hot, super successful young popstar take such an interest in some random guy working in a bodega. I initially pictured Lee as a Selena Gomez because she’s LatinX but she slowly morphed into Ariana Grande for me, who is dating a real estate agent. I can’t tell you why but if I was a casting together, I would think Grande has a better look for the role of a manic pixie dream girl, which is what Lee was. Pablo and Lee were so infatuated with each other straightaway, which was already hard enough to believe, but then their subsequent interactions didn’t really prove that there was anything that drew them to one another in the first place.

Much like Call Me By Your Name, there’s a moving and thoughtful speech delivered by the main character’s father, and it warmed me to the novel a little bit more right before the end. Pablo’s dad says, “Life isn’t a destination. It’s the continual practice of things that make you wiser and happier.” I loved that. I would love to feel like I’m living like that one day.

Pablo was kind of an asshole. I don’t really need my main characters to be likeable but I just couldn’t handle his constant whinging and blaming other people for his problems. He was self-absorbed and a jerk to his friends, who I would have liked to read more about.

Chosen Ones by Veronica Roth

I have a really bad habit where I seek out bad reviews of books and then decide whether I want to read them or not based on those reviews. That must identify me as a cynic – it’s like I’m making sure that I can handle the flaws before I commit to reading a new book. I think the reviews must have put me off this book, though I can’t remember. I do know that it has been on my to-read list for a while and I picked it up last week because I wanted something light and easy to follow after slogging through Zone One by Colson Whitehead.

This book is about adults who are still dealing with the repercussions of saving the world ten years later. As teenagers, they had been trained by a secret government agency to save the world from The Dark One.

The most scathing reviews of Chosen Ones put Roth on absolute blast for ‘info-dumping’. I braced myself for that but didn’t really have any issue with the world building. I really enjoyed the first half of the book and learning about the characters and their shared backstory.

I’m not sure what makes this book an ‘adult’ novel. The characters felt like they fit well in the YA landscape, I think it was the angst. I can’t say this is specific to Roth though, I found this to be true of Ninth House (Leigh Bardugo’s adult debut published this year) and House of Earth and Blood (Sarah J. Maas’s first foray into adult fiction, also published this year). The main characters are also mad and sad but I kind of love it. Sloane, the main character in Chosen Ones felt so directionless and unhappy and I enjoyed reading about a main character who didn’t have it all together all the time.

Again, I really enjoyed the world building in this novel but only up to a point. Spoilers – when the second part of the novel transitioned into an alternate dimension, it was unexpected but not unwelcome. However, the reader then finds out the magic in the alternate dimension comes from WHISTLING? This took me out a lot.

The last third was definitely my least favourite part of the novel. The ending felt a bit too neat after such a long build up, as did the romance, and the villain’s motivations didn’t really have a satisfying explanation. That being said, Chosen Ones was so fun! It was exactly what I wanted. I want more novels like this that make me forget about the hellfire our world is by immersing myself in fictional hellfire worlds!

My Brilliant Friend

I just finished reading My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante. I got through this in four days, and quicker than I thought I would. I thought I would pace myself a lot more given the writing style. It felt like not a lot was happening but I was fascinated by the relationship between The two girls. I empathised with the feeling of being cruel for no reason towards the people we love sometimes and the feeling of being completely envious of close friends.

Murder Mystery Mania

I’ve always been interested in mystery and murder mysteries, as a kid I was reading Nancy Drew and I’ve been watching Poirot and Miss Marple my whole life. I’ve never really been into murder mystery as a book genre though, which is surprising.

That all changed after I read Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz and I’m loving it. Here are some quick thoughts on the mystery books that I’ve read so far this year (in chronological order):

Magpie Murders, The Word is Murder and The Sentence is Death by Anthony Horowitz

Magpie Murders was the best of the three (and unfortunately, the one I started with). I loved the story within a story plot and the way that it was revealed, it really built up the suspense and the classic references to the murder mystery genre were nice little easter eggs.

My main problem with the latter two books, which form the first two novels of Horowitz’s Hawthorne series is the homophobic comments made by Detective Daniel Hawthorne. I read these in January and can’t remember much but that in particular stays with me. These comments, I think, are meant to intrigue the reader and promote the idea of Hawthorne as an anti-hero but they just felt gratuitous and made me feel uncomfortable.

The Stranger Diaries by Elly Griffiths

My memory is terrible when it comes to reading, I read this book last week and can barely remember what it’s about now. This is why I want to get back into blogging and in particular, reviewing the things that I read so that I can remember. Similar to my experience reading Anthony Horowitz, I enjoyed the standalone book The Stranger Diaries more than Griffiths’ other books, which form part of her Ruth Galloway series. I found this similar to the The Stranger Diaries in that it felt like it was written for people who love reading, with the number of references and that it was centred around a murder seemingly inspired by the main character’s favourite novel.

The Crossing Places by Elly Griffiths and Janus Stone by Elly Griffiths

These are quick, easy reads and the references to ancient civilisations and rites, and the main character’s job as a forensic archaeologist were really interesting. However, because the novels are so short it means that there isn’t room to really flesh out the mystery and suspects, and so I found that often the conclusion wasn’t as satisfying as it could be. I really enjoy reading from the perspective of the main character, Ruth Galloway. I love levelheaded and intelligent characters and that I’m not internally screaming ‘WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS’ intermittently throughout the novel.

She Lies in Wait by Gytha Lodge

This was good – I liked how this was told in alternating viewpoints and timelines. Although all the books in this post involve murder, I found this book to be the darkest in content. It may be because this is the only book which offered the victim’s perspective and so I got to know her unlike in the rest of the novels.

In the Woods by Tana French

Okay this is the book that made me want to blog because I had to get my feelings down. This was the longest of all the books and the novel was extremely character driven as a result, it had the space to really flesh out Rob Ryan’s, the main detective, story. Ryan was the fucking worst. There’s a bit at the end where he pleads with the reader not to judge him too harshly because we were fooled too but the thing is I wasn’t fooled and the murderer was obvious, almost from the moment they were introduced. Ryan was self-centred and unprofessional and although it’s easy for me to say, a terrible detective. However, that the novel provoked this reaction in me speaks to how French made him feel like a realistically flawed person.

My main gripe with In the Woods is that one of the two major mysteries explored in the novel is left without a satisfying conclusion. The whole point of a mystery novel is the resolution and the reader being able to say to themselves ‘I knew it!’ or ‘I can’t believe it!‘. It probably has to do with real life not having solutions blah blah blah but it’s not real life, it’s a novel. If I wanted to hear about an unsolved murder I would read the news or listen to a podcast.

While writing this and going through my 2020 reading list, I can see that murder / mystery has been a common theme in other books I’ve read even though they’re not traditional murder mystery novels (Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier, Things in Jars by Jess Kidd and My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite). I’m looking forward to reading more in this genre and in particular, getting on with Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad series.

Reading my old posts back….

Wow, I’m better than I thought

10 Random Romcom Recommendations

Romantic comedy is my genre of choice, and I’m clearly not alone in this given the buzz surrounding the recent release of the Netflix produced romantic comedy Set It Up. Given the obvious appetite for these movies, it’s strange that Hollywood has neglected the genre in recent years. They’re relatively cheap to produce and appeal to a wide audience, and yet it feels like as a collective, us romcom fans have been surviving off corny Hallmark romances for so long. Romantic comedies offer a neat little package of 90-120 minutes of escapism and appeal to modern day fantasies of love and closure, which can be absent from our everyday lives.

Below you’ll find a list of a few of my favourites, the diamonds in the rough! Although I have to acknowledge the lack of diversity in the leads of the following movies is concerning. I could make a weak excuse and attribute that solely to the lack of diversity in Hollywood (SO excited for Crazy Rich Asians though, hopefully a sign of changing times). Although romantic comedies starring POC actors and actresses undoubtedly exist such as Bend It Like Beckham, Hitch, Already Tomorrow in Hong Kong, and Something New, they seem to be few and far between in Hollywood. However, despite considering myself a connoisseur in the genre of romantic comedy, I’m aware that I should still take this list as a sign that I should expand my palate, especially to non-Western films beyond Bride and Prejudice, because there are probably a lot of great films I’m missing.

The Heavyweight: Bridget Jones’ Diary. This is a staple of the genre. If I met an alien who desperately wanted to understand what romantic comedy was, I would sit them down and put this on, and then run screaming into the hills never to be seen again. A re-telling of Pride and Prejudice, Renee Zellweger is so charming and funny as is the whole supporting cast.

Most Unconventional: Lars and the Real Girl. I haven’t seen this in years and years, but I’ve never forgotten it and that must mean something… Though it could also mean that Ryan Gosling is so handsome that the impact of seeing his presence on film never leaves you. In this film Lars (played by Ry Gos) falls in love with a blow-up sex doll, Bianca, as if she is a real human woman. It sounds perverted but it’s very cute.

Classic: Barefoot in the Park. Robert Redford and Jane Fonda show that opposites do attract in this classic. They play two newlyweds trying to reconcile their differences as they get used to living together. Although the plot doesn’t go very far (or deep), the chemistry between the two leads is extremely compelling.

Miniseries, Pride and Prejudice (1995). I may have cheated with this one, because it’s not a movie at all but a miniseries. Furthermore, I don’t know if this is really a romantic comedy but humour underlies the entire thing, there are so many funny moments (especially those involving Mrs Bennett) and many commentators have recognised the source material as a comedy of manners. Maybe I’ll have to do a period romance post in future.

Television show: Lovesick. I’ve already cheated by including a miniseries so I’ll keep the tradition going by including a television show. It has often been argued of late that romantic comedy isn’t dead, it’s just moved to television.

Straight Man Doesn’t Luck Out for Once: Imagine Me & You. Follows the burgeoning relationship between Rachel and Luce, but unfortunately, Rachel is married to Hector. A sweet romance on its own, elevated by the fact that it is LGBT!

Another Austen-related pick: Austenland. I guess I love all things Jane Austen. Based on a novel by Shannon Hale (which I also loved), it follows a woman (Keri Russell) going on a holiday to a resort called Austenland where people role play as characters living in the time of Jane Austen’s works.

Jennifer Lopez’s Best: The Wedding Planner. Jennifer Lopez is truly a queen of the genre, but pending the release of her upcoming return in Second Act, I have to call The Wedding Planner as her best. This movie is hilarious and the chemistry between JLo and Matthew McConaughey sizzles.

Best Teen: Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging. So British, so good.

Most Neglected: Penelope. I feel like this movie is often overlooked, and I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the slight fantasy-bent to the story? It stars Christina Ricci as a young woman who has been cursed with a literal pig snout and kept in isolation by her (loving) parents as a result. Please don’t let my terrible summary deter you, this movie is perfect for letting go of your stress. Also, who knew Sigur Rós would pair so well with a kissing scene?

Writing this list has just made me realise how many more films I could have included (and have yet to see). Regardless, I’m ready for new meat, viva la romcom revolution!

The Earthsea according to Ursula K. Le Guin

As a child (and still now), I was a very voracious reader. I mean that in the truest sense of the word too because I was greedy when it came to books, after finishing one one I would immediately pick up the next. Unfortunately, this left little room for critical reflection and meant that I wasn’t a very critical reader.  I don’t believe that I ever thought of books as particularly good or bad either, because I really enjoyed the experience of reading all of them.  Who was I to question their wisdom?

While my critical analysis when it comes to books has improved over the years, I think reviews are a good way to challenge myself in this area. Hopefully, they’ll also be a great way to combat my poor memory and act as a diary for me. I don’t think I can put much too much time into this one, so I think this will just be a quick write up and publish without a thorough edit…. I apologise if the result is too scatterbrained.

I’m on my last holiday before starting full-time work, which I’m really nervous about. I’m mostly nervous at the thought of giving up all my free time, which I really cherish and have grown accustomed to over these past five years that I’ve been at university. I decided to read the Earthsea Cycle after actively ignoring it as a child for some UNKNOWN AND SURELY TRIVIAL reason. I did have difficulty getting into the first book, I really had to force myself to concentrate in the first few chapters and had to start over once or twice because I kept drifting out. I think this is because Le Guin’s style of writing doesn’t coddle the reader by dedicating too much time to explaining how Earthsea works. It reads as if it’s a story for someone who lives in the world of Earthsea. It also reminded me of the Bible, this might be Le Guin’s tendency to tell rather than show e.g. when relaying a character’s reaction to some bad news. I saw some reviewers on Goodreads criticising this but I did’t find it that it took me out of the story.

I read the six books of the Earthsea Cycle over three days. The first three I really enjoyed, and the first, A Wizard of Earthsea, the most. I found Ged’s arrogance so frustrating in the first half of the novel, but perhaps it would have been something I could have empathised with more if I had read this when I was a bit younger. The message of the story was so wonderful and well relayed that I really wish I had read this series when I was younger, or at least the first.

If A Wizard of Earthsea was my favourite, I would have to elect Tales of Earthsea as my least. While some of the short stories I really enjoyed (particularly The Finder), I didn’t find them as compelling as the action of the first four books. It t was interesting to see how Le Guin approached the series after an almost 20 year absence. The last two books of the sextet weren’t able to capture my interest as much as the earlier books did. Tehanu and The Other Wind felt a lot more subdued in their adventures. I think this was because these books followed Ged and Tehanu in their old age, and the tone better reflected the fact that the years had made them more world-wearied. However, I still wanted a bit of the adventure and excitement that I had come to associate with the series! I will say the feminist themes in Tehanu were undoubtedly important, but the story distressed me. I don’t begrduge Le Guin deciding to focus more on the women of Earthsea as the series went on, as many of the reviewers on Goodreads seem to by disparaging of Le Guin for being too ‘politically correct’. It was just that the discrimination and injustice that Tehanu repeatedly faces at the hands of men was extremely frustrating to me and hit too close to home, without really offering me a satisfying cathartic conclusion on this issue. Which I guess is like real life but when I’m using books to escape that, it’s not ideal.

Each of books on their own is good, but I think best read as a whole because the series itself is a testament to Le Guin’s talent as a writer and undeniable role in shaping the fact of fiction.

 

Dreaming of… Jake Gyllenhaal

Image courtesy of Peter Kudlacz

Inspired by the The Toast’s (RIP) ‘If X Were Your Y’ series.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, you would never go hungry. I don’t mean because he’s rich but I mean because the man can EAT, especially after Southpaw. You’d never feel wasteful though because he would always be ready to finish your leftovers but only after asking if you’re sure, twice.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, you would take turns over what to listen to in the car. He would listen exclusively to mixes he’s made specifically for driving whereas you would gleefully listen to Top 40 stations. Jake would protest but still sing along to humour you.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, you wouldn’t be nervous about introducing him to your parents because you know his powers of charm are unparalleled. You’re never jealous though, only proud.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, he would give you flowers just to surprise you but always a different kind. You ask why it’s never the same kind and he replies, “You said that you didn’t have a favourite. I’m still trying to work it out”.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, he would insist you get a dog.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, you and his sister wouldn’t be best friends immediately like you hoped. “It’s okay, she takes a while to let people in. She’ll love you almost as much as I do eventually”. She does.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, he would profess that he hates social media but when you show him a post on Facebook, your friends’ posts will catch his eye and he’ll ask to see it and you’ll end up on Facebook for an hour going through your second cousin’s ex-boyfriend’s photos from his trip to New York.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend, for your birthday each year he would let you choose one film from his filmography and sit down and watch it with you even though he makes it a point to avoid watching his projects once they’re finished.

If Jake Gyllenhaal were your boyfriend you would make him promise to never shave his head again.

Second Gen

My mum told me that she arrived in Australia with $150 in her bank account. It’s still difficult for me to imagine her willing to leave her home and take such a risk on a country she’d never even visited before on holiday. This isn’t a criticism because I’ve always taken comfort in the stability she provides, but my mum is the kind to check the stove twice before leaving the house. When I expressed my surprise she explained matter-of-factly that it was out of necessity, out of the hope of a better life.

My dad worked without sleep for twenty years. Sometimes he’ll offhandedly refer to the sacrifices he and my mum made so that I could have things they couldn’t. This isn’t a criticism of my him but it was a lot of pressure for a 9-year-old to handle.

’Living under the weight of privilege’ is a phrase you’d be justified in rolling your eyes at but that’s what it feels like sometimes. There’s pressure you place on yourself to succeed but the delineation between whether its for yourself or for the generations before you is unclear. There’s a feeling that you need to justify all the bets that were placed just so that you could grow up with hot water on tap. You feel guilty for finding any excuse to avoid working on your CV when you’re #blessed enough to walk into a job interview without the added anxiety of worrying you’ll take too long translating the questions from English into your native language in your head.

Career-based discussions have become a lot more common and less far-fetched now that I’m getting towards the end of my degree. The other day a friend offhandedly mentioned securing a full-time job through her dad’s friend and I was envious that my own parents hadn’t formed the connections that would give me a leg up. I conveniently (and brattily) forgot that moving countries away from their family and friends is potentially one of the leggiest ups they could given me.

Feeling sorry for yourself only leaves a bitter taste in your mouth after you remember that at least you have reliable electricity and more than one set of ‘Sunday clothes’. I’m lucky to come from a rich culture that has given me a true sense of community and a different outlook on life. My parents taught me the value of hard work, to look beyond myself and to be grateful for what I have. Maybe my HECS debt will be paid off one day, but there’s one debt I’ll have for much longer.

Beyond

I remember getting an email about an exclusive exchange opportunity a year ago to go to Austria and study international law. At the time I thought the program sounded great but quickly dismissed – mostly because it just wasn’t me. The idea of travelling halfway around the world to a foreign country by myself? I could never.

The other day I was accepted into that very same program for 2017. I’m excited and nervous but mostly proud of myself for pushing myself.

19 Things I like: August

1. When someone texts me at the exact time I’m thinking about them
2. Changing into my pyjamas as soon as I get home
3. Cutting open an avocado when it’s perfectly ripe
4. The smell of chlorine
5. Waking up without feeling tired
6. Completed to-do lists
7. Green tea lattes
8. Feeling filled with purpose
9. When someone has seen and liked the same obscure, cheesy movie that I saw and liked
10. Rifle Paper Co designs
11. Using a new inky pen
12. When appointments fit perfectly into the gaps in my schedule
13. When I get to wake up without any plans
14. Finishing a podcast episode and deleting it from my phone
15. When people say something that surprises me
16. The sense of community I feel when standing in the midst of people playing Pokemon Go
17. Comprehensible academic essays
18. Holding hands
19. Peanut butter with banana on well-toasted toast

Dear Julie Koh,

(This initially started off as an email I was going to send but as it got more personal I decided I might post it here instead and send it off if I ever get the courage.)

Dear Julie,

I just wanted to say that ‘The Three-Dimensional Yellow Man’ is the only story I’ve ever felt was written for me. I felt that it expressed the shame that I’ve felt being yellow, the requisite guilt accompanying that shame, as well as the pride in my culture and anger at things beyond my control.

In an interview with Books and Publishing you made a comment that your adult life has been spent trying to demonstrate to people what you’re not, and I appreciate this because of how strongly I identify with it. It’s become second nature to me to view and consider everything I do through a set of ‘yellow’-coloured glasses to pre-empt the confirmation of a stereotype hanging over my head.

And to what end? Sure I can convince one set of people that I can speak up, that I’m not a docile little China doll. Though who really wins when on the days that I don’t feel like talking much, I’m the one who ends up kicking themselves? 

It’s disheartening how much of my time is spent on worrying about how others perceive me just because of the slant of my eyes, or attributing others with false motivations or assumptions they don’t have.

After reading your story I felt a strange combination of both sadness and quiet comfort in the fact that my experience as a yellow woman must be shared by others.

Thanks,

Michaela

Here is where I read ‘The Three Dimensional Yellow Man’ by Julie Koh at The Lifted Brow. It follows a yellow man who steps out of a movie screen into the world and becomes 3D. Obviously, I highly recommend it.

Here is the interview I mentioned from Books and Publishing which just went on to cement my newfound admiration.

I can’t wait to read Koh’s new collection of short stories Portable Curiosities.

I saw my life branching out

“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn’t quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”

This is a classic passage from The Bell Jar by Virginia Woolf for good reason. It perfectly captures an anxiety often expressed by millennials as a result of the abundance of opportunities available to them. While this almost proves all the young-people-of-today-don’t-appreciate-the-chances-they’re-given, Woolf’s quote shows us that this feeling isn’t necessarily exclusive to a generation.

Though it’s undoubtedly beautiful writing, I can’t say that I share the sentiment at this time in my life. I feel more like Tarzan swinging from branch to branch in a bid to stay alive. Only there’s a tree-eating virus consuming the entire forest and it’s killing the boughs than I can swing. Any brach I even consider grabbing is devoured and disintegrates before my eyes before I can reach it.

Let’s Talk: Cartoons

In Michaela’s Museum of Idiotic Ideas and Additional Awful Alliteration there is one very large and very idiotic idea that I once held: I used to down on the idea of cartons for adults. I’d shrug and comment dismissively, “I just don’t get it,” probably thinking that I was just a little bit better than anyone who could be entertained by a media format created for children. Little did I know how wrong and simple-minded I was being. The half-hour comedy is an art form, they’re able to explore plotlines and gags that live action television can only dream of. I’m going to briefly set out the cartoons that changed my mind:

Of course, The Simpsons claims its rightful place at the top of this list. The Simpsons appealed to me as a child but only as I got older and understood some of the more complex jokes did I realise just how great of a show it is. Furthermore, it doesn’t hurt that quotes from this show are essentially a cultural commodity and so if you decide to cash in and start watching, you too will be able to use quotes from The Simpsons to bond with other comrades-in-television.

Next up, the iconic Daria, which I’ve written about before. I first watching Daria at 10 years old, probably before I could properly appreciate a large majority of the jokes but I loved it. I’ve re-watched Daria every couple of years or so and I enjoy it every time. Something about the sardonic teen really spoke to me then and continues to do so now.

A comedy about a family running a BURGER restaurant? How could I say no? I didn’t start watching Bob’s Burgers until it was well into its fifth season and I’m almost glad I slept on it for so long binging episode after episode was actually enjoyable if not incredibly unproductive.

Bojack Horseman is the darkest comedy on this list by far and definitely the most ‘adult’ cartoon here. It deals with some heavy themes and stars a deeply flawed main character, a horse who had his hayday (excuse me) during the 1990s when he was the star of a popular sitcom and who is now trying to make a comeback.

Honourable mentions: Rick and Morty and Archer

Erase Me

I wrote my first story at 5 years old. I then destroyed my first story at 8 years old. The reason I shy away from keeping daily recount style journals is because of my inevitable urge to destroy evidence of my past self. When reading Virginia Woolf, Joan Didion or Frida Kahlo’s letters I’m inspired to recount my own words and feelings at a particular time in my life. However, a year or even a few months after reading my own journal entries only inspires me to attack them with fire, scissors, scribble etc.

Just then, I talked myself out of going back through my old posts and deleting the posts which I felt weren’t ‘mature’ or that I didn’t feel really fit the person that I’m trying to present myself as right now. Though it makes me cringe I want to try to encourage myself to preserve the evidence of me as I was, as cringeworthy as it is. With time comes distance (I hope) and one day I might appreciate and find it more funny than embarrassing, more endearing than disheartening to remember what it was like to be me at a certain point at time.

“When you’re used to privilege, equality feels like oppression.”

My emotions are running high right now. I’m typing with the force of an ad-man in the 1950’s (typewriters?), or my doctor who for some inexplicable reason pushes the keys like she’s angry at them.  I don’t think it’s unfair for me to want to see my own culture represented in media. Are we crabs in a bucket, people???

• http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2016/02/hollywoods-black-and-white-filter/460326/

Questions I Have After the Finale of Scream Queens

1. Why did Coney die? How did a hapless mascot perpetuate the Greek system that Boone and Hester were raised to hate?
2. Why did Chanel #2 have to die? Though I am feeling glad the rest of the Chanels survived (even Chanel #5)
3. Why didn’t Hester get caught? I was really frustrated that the whole show was about bringing the killers to justice but that didn’t happen.
4. Not so much a question but general disbelief that WOW, Grace really was just that annoying, and not putting up a front because she was the murderer.