Just finished reading CUJO by Stephen King. It’s about this friendly Saint Bernard who, when bitten by a rabid bat while roaming about in the woods, goes on this vicious, violent rampage in town. This leads to his family that may or may not be the ones to take him down before Cujo racks up a higher kill count.

It’s one of those underrated Stephen King novels that immerses you right into the suspense and makes you feel like you’re confronted with Cujo’s presence. Not as brutal with the animal horror as Pet Semetary (that one kept me up) and it’s a slow burn of a novel at first but it’s well worth it.

For those who read it, what did you think?

This is the first time im making a post and i just have to say I need to know if anyone else has read The Grace Year by Kim Liggett. I just finished it and it was the best book I've read in years. Wow just wow!

I loved how complex the characters were and how their emotions changed through out the story the more they understood the situation they were placed in. A big part of me wanted Tierney to off Kiersten but I'm glad it didnt happen lol. Hans on the other hand deserved his ending. I felt so disgusted when she realizes Hans was a nasty MOFO that has wanted her since she was 7!! Like brooooo eww! 🤬. And dont even get me started with Ryker. AHHHHH!!! 😭 My heart was torn to shreds with his ending. And most of all, the women in this story deserved better because what the hell, man 🥲 This is the kind of trauma that will take years of therapy.

Even though I would love for a follow up book, a huge part of me is glad that there isnt. I know I'll be riding this book high for weeks! Gosh, I truely love this book. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Have you ever loved a book so much that you don’t know where to start praising it? This might be the best book about history and ideas that I have ever read, and it also won the Pulitzer Prize for biography. If you love incredibly well-written nonfiction, or books that are built around a great central question that pulls you in, or that offer you a perspective you never had before: this book has all of that.

This book has it all.

It’s structured around the rivalry between two men in the 1700s, both of them captivated by the idea of classifying all life. One of them, the madly ambitious Swede Carl Linnaeus, was a fabulously unpleasant human being who sent his apostles off to die in the jungle while he sat home in Sweden refusing to educate his daughters. Minerals confused him, he classed walruses as amphibians, and by the time he died he had been almost forgotten.

Meanwhile, in France, the polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, was running the King’s garden, correctly deduced the existence of both Pangaea and the Bering land bridge, was an abolitionist and supporter of women’s rights, made groundbreaking discoveries in metallurgy, and was hailed throughout Europe as the greatest genius of the 18th century.

But within a few decades after their deaths, LeClerc would be forgotten, and Linnaeus would be the one who was raised on a pedestal for posterity.

Why? And how did it happen?

The author brings both these men to life, along with the times in which they lived. He’s the kind of writer who’s got a fabulous eye for those anecdotes he knows will fascinate you – like the story of “Jean” Baret, a botanist’s assistant on France’s first attempt to circumnavigate the globe, who was only discovered to be a woman when they got to Tahiti! Jeanne was put ashore in Mauritius, but later managed to get back to France on another ship – making her the first woman to go around the world. I love that he makes room for her and other stories like that, he knows how to keep you engaged and interested.

He also writes, not from our current perspective, but starting from what people knew at the time, so that you can understand how their ideas evolved (and why those walruses ended up as amphibians…) There’s an intellectual line through to Lamarck – who it turns out has been misrepresented for two centuries – and eventually Darwin, and you can see how the ideas build one on the other. At the same time, there’s also a line straight through to British colonialism and to racism to this day, and he follows that as well, because this is also a political story.

(Personally I think my favorite thing in the book was Thomas Jefferson’s visit to Leclerc. In the US we were always taught Jefferson was an American genius, but LeClerc as an abolitionist of course was unimpressed from the start, and when Jefferson spent his visit insisting that there were mammoths roaming the American west Leclerc thought he was a fool. And you can see why. I loved that about the book too, that he consistently gives me new perspectives on people and events that I thought I knew well.)

Have I made it sound like a lot? Roberts makes it all so clear. It’s an absolute pleasure to read.

Really, if you love biography, or anything about the history of ideas or the history of science, or just the question of why we remember some people and not others, I bet you will love this!

- "Healing Self-harm"..

I read "Piercing" by the famous Japanese author Ryu Murakami (rest in peace)...

I started reading it because of Nicolas Pesce’s movie—which, by the way, I didn’t like... Sure, it has its own visual style and that neon vibe, but after watching it, I didn’t understand a thing...

And speaking of the book, it’s better! (Surprising, isn’t it?) Overall, I like the dynamic between the characters and, of course, the powerful monologues mixed with dark humor

The story itself is presented in an interesting way through two characters, each with their own traumas. Murakami shows that traumatized people instantly sense each other’s inner brokenness, forming a deep empathetic bond that strips them of their usual cruelty.

The author himself shows that even in a metropolis like Tokyo, there is a form of existential loneliness. The novel emphasizes that behind the prosperous walls of these apartments, dark human deviances may lurk—deviances that society doesn’t care about until someone sees a corpse or some other tragedy…

And the novel’s title is the central metaphor. For Tiaki, piercings and self-harm—just like Kawashima’s desire to pierce flesh—serve an important therapeutic (albeit destructive) function… they both survived the horror of childhood abuse. A piercing is pain that a person chooses for themselves.

It’s a way of declaring: “My body belongs to me, and only I decide when and how I will feel pain.”… and for Tiaki, cuts and piercings are a way to escape a state (where it feels as though she doesn’t exist).

That very pain brings her back to reality.

Naturally, the book doesn’t attempt to justify them or their deviant behavior.

It’s a ruthless psychological diagnosis of a society that ignores childhood trauma.

The author shows that violence against a child never goes unnoticed; it remains within a person like a time bomb that will go off sooner or later.

But of course, there are some downsides I should mention:

The novel’s ending leaves a sense of incompleteness, in my opinion; it cuts off at a climactic moment, offering no resolution or answers to the questions raised. The story is certainly short and intimate, and the downside is that I felt it lacked further exploration; but on the other hand, the open ending is just as it is.

In my view, the ending shows that they don’t become “normal” in that sense. However, the author offers hope: they cease to be alone in their madness.

Ryū Murakami shows that salvation from inner demons lies not in therapy, but in absolute, terrifying sincerity and acceptance of one’s partner’s dark sides.

Kawashima abandons the idea of killing his daughter, as his destructive impulse has found an outlet and understanding in Tiaki.

I Recommend