My top favorite books

Ciao Babes,

As the youtube world continues to test my technology skills and patience. I thought I’d share a stand in blog post of some of my favorite books. Travel destinations have been on pause due to the pandemic. But that doesn’t stop us from escaping into another world through a novel. During this pandemic I’ve fallen in love with reading again. So here my top 5 favorite books at the moment.

Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden

Through the words of Arthur Golden he celebrates the beautiful and timeless subjects of women, culture and history. A recipe for my favorite type of books. Nitta Sayuri tells the story of her life as a geisha. In Memoirs of a Geisha, we enter a world where appearances are paramount; where a girl's virginity is auctioned to the highest bidder; where women are trained to beguile the most powerful men; and where love, always elusive, is scorned as illusion. During WWII the need of tea houses and geishas are no longer needed. Syuri is forced to find her own kind of freedom.

The Vegetarian by Han Kang

So I randomly found this novel at my local bookstore drawn to the vibrant cover. ( I know they say never judge a book by its cover. But nobody has time to read book reviews.) Let me tell you 200 pages was not enough to for me Han Kang. I finished this novel within 3 days and was ambushed with so many mixed emotions. Within Vegetarian Han Kang writes hauntingly events in alluring and beautiful text. Yeong-hye and her husband lived an ordinary, controlled life. But she begin to have nightmares—invasive images of blood and brutality—torture her, driving Yeong-hye to purge her mind and renounce eating meat altogether. It’s a small act of independence, but it interrupts her marriage and sets into motion an increasingly grotesque chain of events at home. As her husband, her brother-in-law and sister each fight to reassert their control, Yeong-hye obsessively defends the choice that’s become sacred to her.

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Ok, so by now you can get the idea what my favorite types of genres are. The idea of a women going through her own self-discovery adventures leading towards her own self love and independence. Those are the type of non-fiction characters I fall in love with and get attached to so much. Besides your fantasy vampire and werewolf love triangle story line. Side note after taking AP literature in high school my wonderful teacher has forever altered the way I read books. So I cannot watch a film nor casually read a book without analyzing the story line. So when it came down to reading Eat, Pray, Love it took me a long time to finish this novel. When I mean a long time I mean some of the pages have bazillion highlighted metaphors and guidelines to life. Other things are food and coffee stain within the pages. Let alone some torn edges. But I always say that most tattered books were the ones you really loved. Elizabeth Gilbert had everything a modern American woman was supposed to want—husband, country home, successful career—but instead of feeling happy and fulfilled, she was consumed by panic and confusion. So she decides to leave her success and set out to explore three different aspects of her nature, against the backdrop of three different cultures: pleasure in Italy, devotion in India, and on the Indonesian island of Bali, a balance between worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence.

Playing the Enemy By John Carlin

So to take a break from my girl power books I thought I’d share one of my favorite history books. If someone were to ask me what kind of superpower I’d want. I’d respond: “time traveling, duh!”. Because my oh my would I have loved to have meet Nelson Mandela during his political activist era. I mean come on the man is a genius. To use the sport of rugby to unite a nation that was torn apart of 50 years of apartheid. His plan was ambitious if not far-fetched: the national rugby team Springboks-long an embodiment of white-supremacist rule-to embody and engage a new South Africa as they prepared to host the 1995 World Cup. The string of wins that followed not only defied the odds, but capped Mandela's miraculous effort to bring South Africans together again in a hard-won, enduring bond. Although I am a history major that does not mean I did not struggle with John Carlin heavy text. But once you get passed that if you love history, sports and independence this a great book to read.

Girl, wash your face by Rachel Hollis

So I had a hard time choosing a last book to wrap up this blog post. Typically I’d would have mention something from Shakespeare or Hemingway. But I thought I’d mention a book you wouldn’t be forced to read in your literature class or at least something from this era. Self help books are probably one of the top genres to read for my generation. But to tell you the truth I’ve never really favored them. I’d rather fantasize myself as a non-fiction character and use their story line as a metaphor/guideline for life tips. The closest I ever gotten to reading some type of self help text. Was when the rage of minimalism happen not to long ago everyone hopped on that trend. So when Marie Kondo came out with her Tidying up novel I was very much intrigued with the subject. But I’ll be honest I could not get myself to purchase a novel about cleaning. ( I ended up purchasing the manga version) But Rachel Hollis has phenomenally changed the way I view self help books. In this conversational book, Rachel exposes the twenty lies and misconceptions that too often hold us back from living joyfully and productively, lies we’ve told ourselves so often we don’t even hear them anymore. She reveals the specific practical strategies that helped her move past them. In the process, she encourages, entertains, and even kicks a little butt, all to convince you to do whatever it takes to get real and become the joyous, confident woman you were meant to be. Because you really can live with passion and hustle – and give yourself grace without giving up.

Ciao love,

Chrystal