*peeks out nervously* Anyone home?
I know I’ve been away for a month before, but I’ll be honest, this was a crazy month. Stuff happened and things went down and I was busy not reading books as hard as I could.
the stuff that happened.
A family friend passed away. To be honest, I wasn’t completely sure how to handle it – it was expected and I’d known about it for months, but somehow, that didn’t help. Being the unemotional bean that I am I still haven’t fully processed it. Now it’s really about keeping going – about loving the people who are left behind.
Because of the above mentioned stuff that happened, I didn’t read a lot. On top of it all, I had about a million assignments due (and still do) and was trying to get through them as much as possible (and still am).
I’m not just saying all of this to excuse myself, by the way. I’m happy with what I’ve read!! I love the books I’ve read this month (mostly ehe) and they are handpicked and were all worth reading. I just want to record what did happen, so in years to come I can look back and go “oh, May 2017. That month. Urgh.”
Without further ado: I read 4 books this month.
Wuthering Heights (Emily Brontë) – 4 // 5
reread: Mao’s Last Dancer (Li Cunxin) – 4 // 5 (review here!)
Salt to the Sea (Rupa Sepetys) – 5 // 5
Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency (Douglas Adams) – 3 // 5
about the books…
On the whole, reading less books than usual meant that I was able to think about them more. I wish I had liked Wuthering Heights more … but I didn’t. I reread a book that I loved the first time round, and also enjoyed the second time round. I discovered two new books, one of which goes onto my favourite books of 2017.
I’m not sad that I didn’t get to read as much as usual. I am happy that I got to read what I did.
(also Salt to the Sea IS SOOOOOO GOOOOOOOD, highly highly highly recommend!!!!)
A little quiet from me. I kind of lowkey disappeared towards the end of the month (just like on here ehe whoopsies), and haven’t geared myself up for returning yet. I’d like to. I want to.
Just not yet.
But I took some pretty nice pictures that I’m pretty happy with, so there’s that!
May Highlights
At first I was kind of looking frantically for some highlights, because this month has been a bit of a dodgy one. But it turns out that even in the darkest of times, light can still be found.
- Getting to see two musicals in one day! (it was a pretty good day 🙂 )
- Getting sent a delicious hot chocolate by my university, and enjoying it with three marshmallows in my favourite mug. Mmmmhmmmm.
- Watching The Sound of Music at midnight with a wonderful Best Friend xx
- Games nights with friends!!
- Also just downright wonderful support from friends and feeling generally blessed in that way.
Here’s me kind of hoping that June will be a better month than May was, and crossing my fingers that I passed all my assignments!! Also that my brain will hurry up and catch up with all the situations that are currently happening, because it’s all still very very blurry.
Anyway, how was your May?? What did you read??
Keep smiling,
Emmeline 🙂
a little word garden 
Aw, that’s too bad about all those sad things that happened. And prevented you from reading 😦
You read some good books though! Although out of those, I can say I *wanted* to like Wuthering Heights, but couldn’t. The characters just did things I could not compute. Could not understand their ridiculous behavior, especially their motives… When they could have done so many things differently. Did not get that book! You say you didn’t like it more, but hey, you still gave it 4/5? I think I gave it like 2 xD
I’ve got Salt to the Sea though, so one day 🙂
I read like 13 this month and I feel super great about it! Pop by my blog to see my update, if you want 🙂 it was a good reading month. But I’m still behind on my reading goal, so meh 😀 how does that even happen, right?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Firstly, thanks so much for your lovely comment! Completely made my day xx
Loooooking back on my WH rating I’m kind of regretting it ehe 😄 I’m the same, I just didn’t understand it! The characters were all over the place and I’m really not a fan of gothic lit anyway, soooooo…. But I think my rating was also slightly biased, because it’s my mother’s favourite book, and I had to write an english lit. essay on it. I think my reasoning was that if I could convince myself to like the book, the essay would be easier to write??? (it didn’t work btw XD)
YESSS READ SALT TO THE SEA YOU WILL NOT REGRET IT EAFGSHDGKJHEPHUEGKHHELP
Niiiiiiiiiice!!! I love it when good reading months happen, it always seems to make the rest of my life so much happier 🙂 Ahhhh reading goals, they will be the death of us bookworms!
LikeLiked by 1 person
My pleasure 🙂
You know, when you said WH was gothic I was like WHAT??? And then… Yeah, okay, it’s totally Gothic. But then again, it’s SO DIFFERENT to all the other Gothic books I’ve read! (Like, they were actually good??? :D)
So I don’t know. I don’t feel like WH was written badly – at all, and maybe on the contrary. But I just didn’t like the topic matter, the story. All the time reading it, I was like… Are these people ever going to grow up, get some self-control and stop doing ridiculous nonsense..? I didn’t get all the drama, cause it just felt so unnecessary, so… weird. I didn’t get it why someone would write an ENTIRE BOOK about people who just sorely needed to stop acting like they can’t see anything past their own nose. And yeah, a lot of books have characters like that, isn’t that what drama is basically based on 😀 but you know what? I’ve read a lot of books since, and I have yet to encounter a bunch as dense as those folks 😀
So that’s why I didn’t like WH, in a nutshell.
And actually, when I don’t like a book, I sometimes find it’s easier to write a BAD review than a good one 😀 you just turn your sarcasm on.. Although I bet it’s harder with essays! Teachers always expect you to be appreciative. And then there’s the incredible lack of the ability to use GIFs as well. 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sorry this took me so long to reply to, and thanks for your lovely reply!
That absolutely makes sense! I agree in certain aspects with what you’re saying – particularly that the drama felt weird! At points it did feel unnecessary, and the characters were pretty horrible to each other. Even the ones portrayed as the good guys were pretty darn awful, hey!
I think that a point that the book was trying to make was that a perfect domestic situation is impossible?? That everyone is flawed and we can’t try and be perfect because it doesn’t work?? Maybe?? I don’t know, I literally just wrote a whole essay on this and I barely agree with my own argument XD I wish I could have used gifs! XD
LikeLike
Maybe 😀 interesting essay though 😀 yeah, who knows though? It’s not like we can ask the author anymore 😀 maybe it’s worth reading an essay or two by really smart university folks to see what they think xD haha
LikeLike
Yeah that’s what I need to do ehe! Ahhh classics, will you ever stop confusing us 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person