"Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth."
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Latest Posts by alphareader - Page 2
People died. Innocent people died Granda. And they were someone’s mother, father, daughter, son. Nothing can ever make that ok. And the people who took those lives, they’re just gonna walk free.
Derry Girls (2018-2022)
@lgbtqcreators battleship bingo- free choice
Rev Dr Jill Richardson: I got to tell a kid in church that no, intrusive thoughts are brain chemistry, not sin, and I almost cried. Y’all, there is so much pain out there. Let’s not make it worse.
Daphne ColemanPerine; I once heard a preacher say, you can’t control what bird flies over your head but you don’t let it have to build a nest in your hair. That was honestly a breakthrough for me.
I’m again at a loss for words, and turning to those who know better. I keep thinking of Gloria Steinem’s dedication in her memoir, ‘My Life On The Road.’ I had the honour of listening to her speak about this book when she came to Melbourne in 2016. Her dedication is still one of the most perfect and fierce I’ve ever read:
‘THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO:
Dr. John Sharpe of London, who in 1957, a decade before physicians in England could legally perform an abortion for any reason other than the health of the woman, took the considerable risk of referring for an abortion a twenty-two-year-old American on her way to India.
Knowing only that she had broken an engagement at home to seek an unknown fate, he said, “You must promise me two things. First, you will not tell anyone my name. Second, you will do what you want to do with your life.”
Dear Dr. Sharpe, I believe you, who knew the law was unjust, would not mind if I say this so long after your death:
I’ve done the best I could with my life.
This book is for you.’
✊❤️
Outgoing Australian of the Year - Grace Tame - meets with Prime Minister Scott Morrison. Photographs by Alex Ellinghausen. Worth noting that this same government failed to include Grace in their child sex abuse strategy (despite being a childhood sexual abuse survivor herself and spreading the word about the “Let Her Speak,” campaign), the government that stood with Christian Porter and Andrew Laming, that “paused” the investigation into the alleged rape of Brittany Higgins that happened at Parliament … they don’t deserve civility or respect from this activist. And no woman owes you a smile. Or a photo opportunity. Grace Tame - rock on 🤘
⭐️ Top 25 Reads of 2021 ⭐️
I’ve had an amazing reading year this year (mostly due to the super-boost I got last January from starting my reread of The Saddle Club) so I wanted to highlight some of the best books I had the pleasure of reading. Feel free to ask me questions about any of these books or you can find my reviews of them by searching the title or author on my blog 😊
I’ve listed the titles below in the order they appear in the collage above (which is no particular order lol) and I’ll mark them with rainbow flags and wheelchair symbols to denote queer and disability rep!
The Other Side of Perfect by Mariko Turk ♿️
Social Queue by Kay Kerr ♿️ #LoveOzYA
The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones ♿️
The Boy From the Mish by Gary Lonesborough 🏳️🌈 #LoveOzYA
(US release March 2022, also titled “Ready When You Are”)
Stars in Their Eyes by Jessica Walton & Aśka ♿️🏳️🌈 #LoveOzYA
Near the Bone by Christina Henry
Growing Up Disabled in Australia (ed.) by Carly Findlay ♿️🏳️🌈
The Monster of Her Age by Danielle Binks 🏳️🌈 #LoveOzYA
Do You Dream of Terra-Two? by Temi Oh
Every Single Lie by Rachel Vincent
The Degenerates by J Albert Mann ♿️🏳️🌈
How It All Blew Up by Arvin Ahmadi 🏳️🌈
Burden Falls by Kat Ellis (also titled “Wicked Little Deeds)
The Iron Raven by Julie Kagawa
Stay Another Day by Juno Dawson ♿️🏳️🌈
Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero 🏳️🌈
Clown in a Cornfield by Adam Cesare 🏳️🌈
Ghost Bird by Lisa Fuller #LoveOzYA
Echo After Echo by AR Capetta 🏳️🌈
Girls on the Verge by Sharon Biggs-Waller
Tell Me Again How A Crush Should Feel by Sara Farizan 🏳️🌈
Out of the Blue by Sophie Cameron ♿️🏳️🌈
These Witches Don’t Burn by Isabel Sterling 🏳️🌈
This Is Not A Ghost Story by Andrea Portes
I Kissed A Girl by Jennet Alexander 🏳️🌈
The Monster of Her Age by Danielle Binks Rating: 5/5 #LoveOzYA
“I’m still hurt by you, and mad at you — but I can forgive you. Because you are more than just your worst moments, Bubbe. And we had so many good ones too.”
My greatest love, after books, is movies, so a book about movies was already a win. Add in a lovely wlw romance and a beautiful family story and you’ve got yourself a marvellous little book. The Monster of Her Age is about the wonders and horrors of love of all kinds and how films shape our world and our lives; how they connect people from all walks of life - all abilities, all cultures, all sexualities. If you loved Mara Wilson’s memoir Where Am I Now? or Everything Leads to You by Nina LaCour, definitely track down a copy of this gorgeous Australian YA.
Warnings: death, grief, references to emotional and psychological abuse.
If you liked Everything Leads to You by Nina LaCour, try The Monster of Her Age by Danielle Binks
They both include:
sweet wlw romance
a window into the scandalous lives of fictional Hollywood stars
explorations of how films impact and interact with real life
More of my recs are available in my “book recommendations” tag!
Anne Rice was an author who had a really complicated (and fascinating) relationship with fans and fandom … but she leaves behind quite the literary legacy, that helped pull a genre and monster into the modern-era.
Condolences to those who loved her, and her words.
People are going to have so many different takes on Anne Rice’s legacy … but one of my favourite odes to her is ‘What We Do In The Shadow’ opening credits and Harvey Guillen’s pure-soul Guillermo de la Cruz character cos-playing as Armand. Perfect respect.
A moment’s pause that tips it’s hat to the fact that you don’t get to ‘What We Do In The Shadows’ without ‘The Vampire Chronicles’
Vale.
Oh nothing, just Paul McCartney casually predicting the misogynistic blame-game the media put on Yoko Ono …
Happy Halloween 2021! - here’s ‘The Monster Of Her Age’ vibing with other the-story-behind-Horror books 🧟♂️📖 and also the 👑, Shelley’s Frankenstein. A meta (sorry 😬) way to engage with the genre if Horror is not your thing, and also if you really want a YA queer kissing book 😘 Also featured are:
🎃 ‘Monster, She Wrote: The Women Who Pioneered Horror and Speculative Fiction’ by Lisa Kröger and Melanie R. Anderson
🎃 ‘She Made a Monster: How Mary Shelley Created Frankenstein’ by Lynn Fulton, illustrated by Felicita Sala
‘The Monster of Her Age’ drops on July 28 with Hachette Books Australia. Here are some reviews that mention similar-reads;
“This book is all kinds of wonderful. From its smart and nuanced look at how we respond to art, to questions of whether it's possible to separate art from its problematic artist, Binks has written a book I so wish existed when I was a film-obsessed teen. It brought to mind ‘Actress’ by Anne Enright and ‘The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo’ by Taylor Jenkins Reid but also ‘Looking for Alibrandi’ in the way it untangled secrets and pain passed down from grandmother to mother to daughter. The chats about the horror genre are so well done and made me immediately want to join a film group. The queer love story is beautifully told. And the look at how a family manages death is beautiful and real and profound. The chapter closes are all so nicely done too which is a minor point but shows that care was paid to both the big and the small. All up this is my favourite kind of contemporary YA and this book is perfection.” — Jaclyn Crupi
“A warm hug of a book that's packed to the brim with tenderness, truth, and timeless charm. ‘The Monster of Her Age’ is as much an homage to film as it is to family and heart-fluttering crushes. A must-read for fans of Nina LaCour.” — SARAH ROBINSON-HATCH, The YA Room
How do you ruin someone's childhood?
Ellie Marsden was born into the legendary Lovinger acting dynasty. Granddaughter of the infamous Lottie Lovinger, as a child Ellie shared the silver screen with Lottie in her one-and-only role playing the child monster in a cult horror movie. The experience left Ellie deeply traumatised and estranged from people she loved.
Now seventeen, Ellie has returned home to Hobart for the first time in years. Lottie is dying and Ellie wants to make peace with her before it's too late.
When a chance encounter with a young film buff leads her to a feminist horror film collective, Ellie meets Riya, a girl who she might be able to show her real self to, and at last comes to understand her family's legacy.
Little news ☺️ “Alyssa Miele at HarperCollins/Quill Tree Books has bought ‘The Year the Maps Changed’ … Publication is set for fall 2022; Annabel Barker at Annabel Barker Agency handled the deal via Jacinta di Mase at Jacinta di Mase Management.” 🗺 ‘Maps’ is a very Australian-focused book, and I am incredibly thankful that it’s been acquired by a US-publisher who is intending to keep it that way. Quill Tree has this motto; “Many branches, Many voices,” and I’m so grateful that with such an outlook, they saw fit to take onboard my little #LoveOzMG book. Most of you would probably know how important this particular aspect is to me, and I am truly just so floored and happy!
Poem by Palestinian-American poet and reporter, Noor Hindi. What’s happening right now is atrocious and terrifying. Raise up Palestinian voices, listen.
Poem by Naomi Shihab Nye, whose father was a Palestinian refugee. From her 2019 book; ‘The Tiny Journalist’
When your book-cover illustrator gifts you the original! 🥺🥰
In a neo-Gothic mansion in a city at the end of the world, Ellie finds there's room enough for art, family, forgiveness and love. A coming-of-age story about embracing the things that scare us from the author of ‘The Year the Maps Changed.’
How do you ruin someone's childhood? You let them make-believe that they are a monster. But sooner or later, the mask must come off...
Ellie Marsden was born into the legendary Lovinger acting dynasty. Granddaughter of the infamous Lottie Lovinger, as a child Ellie shared the silver screen with Lottie in her one-and-only role playing the child monster in a cult horror movie. The experience left Ellie deeply traumatised and estranged from people she loved.
Now seventeen, Ellie has returned home to Hobart for the first time in years. Lottie is dying and Ellie wants to make peace with her before it's too late. But forgiveness feels like playing make-believe, and memories are like ghosts.
When a chance encounter with a young film buff leads her to a feminist horror film collective, Ellie meets Riya, a girl who she might be able to show her real self to, and last comes to understand her family's legacy - and her own part in it.
A story of love, loss, family and film - a stirring, insightful novel about letting go of anger and learning to forgive without forgetting. And about embracing the things that scare us, in order to be braver.
First pages back for the forthcoming YA novel ...
What is ~time~
‘The Monster of Her Age’ by Danielle Binks - coming August 2021
In a neo-Gothic mansion in a city at the end of the world, Ellie finds there's room enough for art, family, forgiveness and love. A coming-of-age story about embracing the things that scare us from the author of ‘The Year the Maps Changed.’
How do you ruin someone's childhood? You let them make-believe that they are a monster. But sooner or later, the mask must come off...
Ellie Marsden was born into the legendary Lovinger acting dynasty. Granddaughter of the infamous Lottie Lovinger, as a child Ellie shared the silver screen with Lottie in her one-and-only role playing the child monster in a cult horror movie. The experience left Ellie deeply traumatised and estranged from people she loved.
Now seventeen, Ellie has returned home to Hobart for the first time in years. Lottie is dying and Ellie wants to make peace with her before it's too late. But forgiveness feels like playing make-believe, and memories are like ghosts.
When a chance encounter with a young film buff leads her to a feminist horror film collective, Ellie meets Riya, a girl who she might be able to show her real self to, and last comes to understand her family's legacy - and her own part in it.
A story of love, loss, family and film - a stirring, insightful novel about letting go of anger and learning to forgive without forgetting. And about embracing the things that scare us, in order to be braver.
‘Sunburnt Veils’ by Sara Haghdoosti
Girl meets boy, ghosts his text messages, then convinces him to help her run for the student union. Just your typical love story with a hijabi twist.
Tara wears hijab even though her parents hate it, and in a swipe right world she's looking for the 'will go to the ends of the earth for you' type of love. Or, she would be, if she hadn't sworn off boys to focus on getting into med. Besides, what's wrong with just crushing on the assassins, mages and thieves in the fantasy books she reads?
When a bomb threat on her first day of university throws her together with totally annoying party king and oh-so-entitled politician's son Alex, things get complicated. Tara needs to decide if she's happy reading about heroes, or if she's ready to step up and be one herself.
April 1. Wakefield Press. Australia.
It’s true though
I’ll tell you how the Sun rose (204) — Emily Dickinson
Just a reminder that Zadie Smith is cool and brilliant (as if anyone could forget!) I don’t remember where this photo is from (a gala? Oscars after-party?) that’s her husband Nick Laird to her left but it doesn’t really matter who anyone is ... that’s Zadie f’ing Smith in the middle and don’t you *ever* forget it!
“Talking to yourself can be useful. And writing means being overheard.”
— Zadie Smith, ‘Intimations’