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seliverydervice · 2 years ago

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n's july delights!

in an attempt to forge a time capsule of the things i enjoy, here is my first try: a recap of my july! includes: a personal recap, books, and films/shows. i wanted to include comics, as well as music and poetry, but the length already more closely resembles an amateur's attempt at an editorial piece than a wrap-up written by someone who actually knows what they're doing—so maybe next time.

PERSONAL RECAP

i wanted to savour the saturday night of summer (as august is its sunday night; and yes, i am stating this now, and i am still planning on repeating it for august’s wrap-up!) the best i could. i can’t say for sure whether i was successful, but the month kicked off with a trip to bali, and shortly after my return, i took another trip to bogor! lovely were the people in bali, and lovely were the sights to see in bogor. we took a historical tour bus in bogor, something i had never done before, and our tour guide was an old man who spoke with so much certainty that my mom and i were certain he’d been there himself; he talked about the pool parties in the 18th century like he was present to see the dutch cannonball into (what is now known as) the oldest swimming pool in bogor. my mom thought he was just old, but i was positive he was a vampire.

he must’ve heard our conversation, because out of nowhere, he clarified he was fifty-five. mom was mortified. we bumped into him again at a mini-market after the tour. i was stocking up on snacks and masks; he only brought with him a bottle of water, and he stood directly in front of me at the line for the cashier. he recognized my family and my stepdad paid for his drink. (until now, my family and i all think the hotel—who had hosted the tour—should have bought him a bottle of water too, given as they’d included a snack (a hot dog that wasn’t a hot dog) and water for the people taking the tour. so why not the tour guide, too?)

BOOKS

this was such a delightful month! i had a reading slump that began in march (or was it february? i should have kept a diary), and i’m happy to say i’ve gotten back into the swing of things! i eased myself back into reading by starting off with a middle grade book (it was r.l. stine—i started the month with a taste for horror), and i’ve adopted a new reading principle: to read whatever i want to. it’s an obvious tip, one i really should have employed years ago, but i’ve always had an issue re: picking up books that actually interest me vs. reading what other people like even when they aren’t my cup of tea. i wasn’t afraid (okay, maybe i was a little scared) to try reading books i couldn’t get through before too—some books deserve second chances—and i managed to this time. more than that, i loved them! there are books you can’t get through because they really aren’t for you, and then there are books you stumbled upon when it wasn’t the right time. and re-discovering them again, when the time is right and the stars have aligned, is nothing short of wonderful.

if you check out any of the books, please heed their trigger warnings!

THE MAJESTIES by TIFFANY TSAO

why-dunnit. a girl in a coma, with nothing else better to occupy her time, retraces her memories to understand why her sister murdered their entire family. set in jakarta, and i know i’m biased, but i am fond of books that aren’t set in north america or western europe. this left me reeling.

REBECCA by DAPHNE DU MAURIER

if i knew how to write like du maurier, i would never stop writing. everything about this book is iconic. the prose? top notch. she was so good at painting a vivid image of everything that was happening while staying on theme; there was a sense of eeriness to the writing, even in the story’s lighter moments. this is about a girl (we never find out her name) who has recently become the new mistress of manderley. unfortunately for her, unpleasant things await, most of them borne from the ghost of her husband’s dead wife’s memory. a ghost story, even in the absence of a literal ghost.

HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE by DIANA WYNNE JONES

this was my first diana wynne jones book! i am one of the many whose first exposure to howl’s moving castle was the ghibli movie. i still love the movie, don’t get me wrong, but if there was a way i could time travel to my childhood and give little me a copy of the book, i would. it’s not a slight against the movie at all; i just wonder how i would have grown up had diana wynne jones been one of my childhood companions. this book is a perfect example that you don’t need a complicated magic system for a book to be magical. in fact, i think it’s one of the most magical things i’ve ever read. sophie gets cursed and turns into an old lady, and seeks refuge as well as answers at the wizard howl’s moving castle. there, she befriends the fire demon calcifer, howl’s apprentice michael, and even howl himself.

WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE by SHIRLEY JACKSON

as you can probably tell, i had a bit of a gothic kick. this story is as haunting as it is eccentric. our narrator, mary catherine blackwood (merricat), lives in a big house with what is left of her family: her cat, her sister, and her uncle. the rest are dead. the townspeople hate them, and she hates them right back. things start to change when their cousin, charles, moves in with them. i feel like this is one of the books where the less you know about it, the better, but if you want to know what the book is about; i think, most of all, it is about isolation. (also: constance and merricat are one of my favourite sisters in literature.)

EMMA by JANE AUSTEN

remember what i said about picking up books that previously came at the wrong time? this is one of them. i can’t remember exactly when i first tried reading emma, but what matters is i did eventually try reading it again, and this time, i loved it! emma woodhouse is... she’s everything to me. she is an icon. a legend. she is the moment, one of the first ever it girls #ToMe. it is likely a familiar story (hello, clueless?), but seeing emma constantly be off the mark about matchmaking, the exact thing she claims is her talent (and to be fair, it’s not like she has a god-awful track record), is hilarious. i just know jane austen was giggling and kicking her feet writing some of this. what appealed the most to me was not the romance, but emma herself. you just can’t help but root for her!

REPUTATION by LEX CROUCHER

this is mean girls meets gossip girl but regency. honestly, this was probably the funniest book i read this month, but it’s not just fun and games—it has its moments when it gets dark, so please, look up the trigger warnings if you decide to read it. our protagonist, georgiana, has been sent to stay with her aunt and uncle over the season by her absent parents. she finds it dull, but is saved from her boredom by frances campbell, wealthy socialite and trouble magnet. frances adopts georgiana into her group of friends, introducing her to a world of opulence, splendour, and debauchery.

STEERING THE CRAFT by URSULA K. LE GUIN

i confess: though i claim to be a writer, i barely read writing books. but, if you want to read a book on writing at least once in your life, i could not recommend ‘steering the craft’ enough. le guin was a master of her craft, and this book is pretty much my new holy scripture. she gives advice without sounding patronizing, and this book just makes writing feel so... accessible? she shares her opinions on some of the more popular writing tips and it’s just... wow (active vs. passive voice comes to mind). i don’t think i can summarize it and do it justice. the book has writing exercises, too!

FILMS/SHOWS

EMMA (2020) dir. AUTUMN DE WILDE

i’m pretty sure this was the only movie i watched in july that i actually liked, and it wasn’t even a first watch! there is just something very comforting about emma (2020). watching it in july counted more as a re-watch, but it was my first time watching it after reading the source material, so it was an entirely different experience, too. this movie is warm and hopeful, and it feels like a hug and a steaming cup of tea on a rainy day. also it has anya taylor-joy, and can you really go wrong with anya taylor-joy? if anything, watch it to see the scene where she gets a nosebleed on cue.

SUCCESSION by JESSE ARMSTRONG

i could write an essay on succession, but i doubt i would have anything new to contribute. if you've never seen the show yourself, you're probably going to think there's something wrong with me, but listen. listen. i know this show is about rich people and stocks and business with snippets of dialogue that sounds like it came from a stan twt sentence generator, but it is also: a shakesperean tragedy, and the depth of it only continues to unravel as we progress further and further into the show. the acting is amazing. the directing, too, and the writing is one of the best i've ever seen on television. it's game of thrones if game of thrones was set in a modern day, corporate structure. these characters are not good people. they're rich assholes who have no idea how the real world works. but they're human, and they're three-dimensional; they're interesting, they're tragic, and they're so compelling you can't help but to keep watching, whether you want to see them fail or succeed.

#monthly wrap up #book recs #i feel hesitant about tagging this as film or show rec as i only have one of each lol #so maybe not!#book recommendations

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