writer + book enthusiast
Fans of the 2017 Oscar award-winning movie, The Shape of Water, need look no further than this sensual book about a cursed mermaid who falls in love with a local fisherman who saves her from captivity after she is caught swimming in the Caribbean by two Americans. Blending magic and myth, The Mermaid of Black …
Continue reading “The Mermaid of Black Conch by Monique Roffey | Book Review”
A heartwarming read that can be gobbled in seconds, or savoured in bite-size pieces. I recently interviewed with a publishing company for an editorial assistant position working with their gift books list. Ahead of the interview, to prepare, I visited several bookshops to chat with booksellers about what kind of gift books they had in …
Continue reading “The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse by Charlie Mackesy | Book Review”
“Posterity, take notice!” So begins Must I Go, acclaimed author Yiyun Li’s fourth novel. This epistolary work follows Lilia Liska, a cynical 81-year old woman, as she reminisces on life. Flipping between the past and the present, the book tackles themes of mortality, grief, and family, as Lilia obsesses over the published diary of a …
This book was a technically great, insightful read that unfortunately, I didn’t connect with emotionally. Bad Blood tells the true story of the collapse of a multi-billion dollar healthcare startup, Theranos, which promised to revolutionise the medical industry through the invention of a machine that could carry out blood tests with but a prick of …
As far as final instalments in a series goes, this one was pretty decent. I first picked up Truly Devious in 2018, during my final year at University, and fell in love with the series. The Hand on the Wall is the third and final book in the Truly Devious trilogy, a YA murder mystery …
Continue reading “The Hand on the Wall by Maureen Johnson | Book Review”
In one word: meh. Even before the upsurge in the Black Lives Matters movement earlier this year (2020), Between the World… was a book that I had been planning to read for a long time. I was excited to pick this book up for several reasons: it had a gorgeous title, a beautifully plain book cover (yes, …
Continue reading “Between the World and Me by Ta Nehisi-Coates | Book Review”
I don’t know what it is about Sally Rooney, but she just gets it. Rooney’s debut novel, Conversations with Friends (CwF), is set in Ireland and follows Frances, a 21-year-old college student, as she embarks on an affair with Nick, an actor in his 30s. Similar to Rooney’s Normal People (her better known novel about two teenagers’ mutual …
Continue reading “Conversations with Friends by Sally Rooney | Book Review”
It pains me to say that for me personally, this book really missed the mark. Going into reading, I had high expectations. The book seemed promising: it had a beautiful title, and was an own-voices Asian-American novel that had been nominated for the National Book Award in 2019. Quickly, I found that this book was …
Continue reading “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong | Book Review”
Warning: this book hits hard. Just as I had named Mark Mansen’s self-help book my favourite non-fiction read of 2020, Miller’s Know My Name dethrones it to take the top spot. Given how brilliant this book is, I am both unapologetic about my sudden change of heart and the fact that this book review is longer than usual. …
Continue reading “Know My Name by Chanel Miller | Book Review”
If there were ever a year where the world was in need of a good self-help book, 2020 would be it. The Subtle Art… by prominent blogger Mark Mansen is a refreshing, tongue-in-cheek read that provides a common-sense approach to finding happiness. Broadly, Mansen argues that true happiness comes from: embracing failure and discomfort as part of a …
Continue reading “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Mansen | Book Review”
Longlisted for the National Book Award for 2019, Fleishman Is In Trouble is Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s debut novel that follows fictional Toby Fleishman’s journey as he deals with the disappearance of his ex-wife. Through the story of one upper-middle class man’s divorce, Brodesser-Akner explores complex themes of marriage, gender and success, and her evocative prose and comedic style …
Continue reading “Fleishman Is In Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner | Book Review”
Beautiful prose, bewitching memoir. Educated chronicles one woman’s true, yet fantastical, story of growing up as the sheltered daughter of survivalist religious zealots. Exploring themes of familial conflict, abuse and the role of education, in this memoir, Westover documents the path she took from being a home-schooled child without any formal education, to studying at …
VANESSA PHAN 