#Adi Alsaid

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We have three books on our radar this week! Which ones are you interested in?

Forty Words for Love by Aisha Saeed Kokila

In this luminous young adult novel by New York Times bestselling author Aisha Saeed, two teen protagonists grow from friends to something more in the aftermath of a tragedy in their magical town. Moonlight Bay is a magical place—or it was once. After a tragic death mars the town, the pink and lavender waters in the bay turn gray, and the forest that was a refuge for newcomers becomes a scourge to the townspeople. Almost overnight, the entire town seems devoid of life and energy. The tourists have stopped coming. And the people in the town are struggling. This includes the two teens at the heart of our story: Yasmine and Rafay. Yasmine is a child of the town, and her parents are trying and failing to make ends meet. Rafay is an immigrant, a child of Willow Forest. The forest of Moonlight Bay was where people from Rafay’s community relocated when their home was destroyed. Except Moonlight Bay is no longer a welcoming refuge, and tensions between the townspeople and his people are growing. Yasmine and Rafay have been friends since Rafay first arrived, nearly ten years ago. As they've gotten older, their friendship has blossomed. Not that they would ever act on these feelings. The forest elders have long warned that falling in love with "outsiders" will lead to devastating consequences for anyone from Willow Forest. But is this actually true? Can Yasmine and Rafay find a way to be together despite it all? -- Cover image and summary via Goodreads

Writing in Color: The Lessons We've Learned edited by Nafiza Azad and Melody Simpson Margaret K. McElderry Books

So, you’re thinking of writing a book. Or, maybe you’ve written one, and are wondering what to do with it. What does it take to publish a novel, or even a short story? If you’re a writer of color, these questions might multiply; after all, there’s a lot of writing advice out there, and it can be hard to know how much of it really applies to your own experiences. If any of this sounds like you, you’re in the right place: this collection of essays, written exclusively by authors of color, is here to encourage and empower writers of all ages and backgrounds to find their voice as they put pen to page. Perhaps you’re just getting started. Here you’ll find a whole toolkit of advice from bestselling and award-winning authors for focusing on an idea, landing on a point of view, and learning which rules were meant to be broken. Or perhaps you have questions about everything beyond the first draft: what is it really like being a published author? These writers demystify the process, sharing personal stories as they forged their own path to publication, and specifically from their perspectives as author of color. Every writer has a different journey. Maybe yours has already started. Or maybe it begins right here. Contributors include: Julie C. Dao, Chloe Gong, Joan He, Kosoko Jackson, Adiba Jaigirdar, Darcie Little Badger, Yamile Saied Mendez, Axie Oh, Laura Pohl, Cindy Pon, Karuna Riazi, Gail D. Villanueva, Julian Winters, and Kat Zhang. -- Cover image and summary via Goodreads

Actually Super by Adi Alsaid Knopf Books for Young Readers

A globetrotting novel that takes a determined teen from Japan to Australia and to Argentina and Mexico on a quest to prove that humanity is more good than bad from the author of Let’s Get Lost and Before Takeoff. Isabel is having an existential crisis. She’s three years into high school, and everything she’s learned has only shaken her faith in humanity. Late one night, she finds herself drawn to a niche corner of the internet—a forum whose members believe firmly in one that there are indeed people out in the world quietly performing impossible acts of heroism. You might even call them supers . No, not in the comic book sense—these are real people, just like each of us, but who happen to have a power or two. If Isabel can find them, she reasons, she might be able to prove to herself that humanity is more good than bad. So, the day she turns 18, she sets off on a journey that will take her from Japan to Australia, and from Argentina to Mexico, with many stops along the way. She longs to prove one— just one— super exists to restore her hope for the future. Will she find what she’s looking for? And how will she know when—if—she does? -- Cover image and summary via Goodreads

[coollovebibliophilethings]

Moments to Return by Adi Alsaid

Title: Moments to ReturnAuthor: Adi AlsaidIn: Hungry Hearts (Caroline Tung Richmond & Elsie Chapman)Rating Out of 5: 5 (I will read this again and again and again)My Bookshelves: Contemporary, Death, FoodPace: MediumFormat: Short storyYear: 2019 At least to a degree, everyone is aware of death knocking at the door. At least, that’s how I’ve always felt. And I really enjoyed the fact that this…

[bookcoversonly]

Title: Let's Get Lost | Author: Adi Alsaid | Publisher: Harlequin Teen (2014)

[battyaboutbooksreviews]

Books by BIPOC Authors August 2023

🦇 I grew up surrounded by a melting pot of cultures, diverse communities, and unique experiences. Despite the different sources of those multicultural voices, their stories still covered universal topics of colonialism, migration, identity, and race. Each story was another flavor, another sweet spice adding to that melting pot. Today, we have books by BIPOC authors that put those unique voices to the page. If you're interested in traveling to different worlds, whether familiar or foreign, here are a few books by BIPOC authors to add to your TBR! 🦇

✨ Tomb Sweeping by Alexandra Chang ✨ The Dark Place by Britney S. Lewis ✨ Forged by Blood by Ehigbor Okuson ✨ Accidentally in Love by Danielle Jackson ✨ A Council of Dolls by Mona Susan Power ✨ Still Born by Guadalupe Nettel, translated by Rosalind Harvey ✨ The Injustice of Place: Uncovering the Legacy of Poverty in America by Kathryn J. Edin, H. Luke Shaefer, Timothy J. Nelson ✨ Hangman by Maya Binyam ✨ The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride (Historical Fiction) ✨ Under the Tamarind Tree by Nigar Alam ✨ Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas ✨ An American Immigrant by Johanna Rojas Vann

🧭 Forgive Me Not by Jennifer Baker 🧭 Two Tribes by Emily Bowen Cohen 🧭 A Quantum Life: My Unlikely Journey from the Street to the Stars by Hakeem Oluseyi and Joshua Horwitz 🧭 Writing in Color: Fourteen Writers on the Lessons We've Learned (edited by) Nafiza Azad and Melody Simpson 🧭 Ghost Book by Remy Lai 🧭 The Water Outlaws by S.L. Huang 🧭 Plantains and Our Becoming by Melania Luisa Marte 🧭 Forty Words for Love by Aisha Saeed 🧭 The Great White Bard: How to Love Shakespeare While Talking About Race by Farah Karim-Cooper 🧭 Take the Long Way Home by Rochelle Alers 🧭 Swim Home to the Vanished by Brendan Shay Basham 🧭 Actually Super by Adi Alsaid

✨ Never a Hero by Vanessa Len ✨ I Fed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me by Jamison Shea ✨ The Infinity Particle by Wendy Xu ✨ Night of the Living Queers, edited by Shelly Page ✨ Sign of the Slayer by Sharina Harris ✨ Her Radiant Curse by Elizabeth Lim ✨ My Father the Panda Killer by Jamie Jo Hoang ✨ Barely Floating by Lilliam Rivera ✨Happiness Falls by Angie Kim ✨ A Tall Dark Trouble by Vanessa Montalban ✨ Neverwraith by Shakir Rashaan ✨ House of Marionne by J. Elle

[godzilla-reads]

I am going to scream about this book because it is so underrated but: We Didn't Ask For This by Adi Alsaid. More people need to read this book!!

I’ll have to check it out!!

[winningthesweepstakes]

Actually Super by Adi Alsaid

Actually Super by Adi Alsaid. Alfred A. Knopf, 2023. 9780593375808 Rating: 1-5 (5 is an excellent or a Starred review) 4 Format: Hardcover Genre:  Realism, with a touch of fantasy What did you like about the book? Isabel is going to travel the world in a hunt for superheroes. Not the ones in the comic books or movies, but the real heroes of the world – normal people with a power or two. She…

[gabibookworm]

BOUNDLESS is on NetGalley! This is a YA anthology about multiracial and multicultural experiences including authors such as Emiko Jean, Akemi Dawn Bowman, Adi Alsaid, Erin Entrada Kelly, and many others!

Request on NetGalley

Add on Goodreads

[whatisthismandoinghere]

Book asks:

1, 2 and 15 please. I need to read something new...

Thanks for the ask! Hope you find something that tickles your fancy

1. Book you've reread the most times?

Hmm... it's between The Book Thief, To Kill a Mockingbird, and The Hobbit

2. Top 5 books of all time

*suddenly forgets every book I've ever read*

Also this was super hard, I like too many books 😂

Days of Infamy by John Costello - tells you about what happened at Clark Field on Dec 8, 1941 and Douglas MacArthur's shortcomings, is sheer perfection, go read it

Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J R R Tolkein- I mean the amount of effort put into the world building here, the detail, the characters, the plot, absolutely divine

Dracula by Bram Stoker - I loved all the different viewpoints and it was scary in a good way, has stood the test of time

World War II: The Definitive Visual History from Blitzkrieg to the Atom Bomb (from DK, Smithsonian Institution) - this book is so thorough, gives you stuff leading up to the war, during the war, and after the war, has maps, pictures, timelines, everything, you could become an expert on ww2 from this book, borrowed it from the library then went and bought it cuz I liked it so much

The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe - I don't care if it's a short story it still counts, it's creepy, it's well written, gives me twilight zone vibes and I love it

Was that way more than you wanted to hear? Probably. Sorry for my rambling

15. Recommend and review a book

Let's Get Lost by Adi Alsaid

A little background: it's about this girl named Leila who's on her way to see the northern lights and helps some strangers along the way

This book has everything: adventure, fun, a little mystery, and some heartwarming moments. I like that it feels like separate stories but also like one single story at the same time. It's something different and not what you'd expect. And the ending wrapped everything up perfectly.

[raychillray]

“That's what the Northern Lights are. All the lives that we're not living.”

Adi Alsaid, Let's Get Lost

[guide-to-galaxy]

Top 5 (anticipated reads for Apr-Jun 2022) Tuesday

Top 5 (anticipated reads for Apr-Jun 2022) Tuesday

A whole bunch of books just came out and now we have to think about books that aren’t out yet? Just kidding, I’ve thought of a couple! To see what Meeghan @ Meeghan Reads thinks is newsworthy, go check here! And then remember that it’s okay to that your Tbr is overflowing – because we’re all in the same boat, except that other boat will get filled faster with more people… 📚🚀📚 Hell Followed…

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New Releases 

New week, new books out tomorrow! Are any of these on your TBR pile?

Kismat Connection by Ananya Devarajan

Is it possible to change your fate? Madhuri Iyer is doomed. Doomed for her upcoming senior year to be a total failure, according to her astrology-obsessed mother, and doomed to a happily ever after with her first boyfriend, according to her family curse.

Determined to prove the existence of her free will, Madhuri devises an experimental relationship with the one boy she knows she’ll never fall for: her childhood best friend, Arjun Mehta. But Arjun’s feelings for her are a variable she didn’t account for. As Madhuri starts to fall for her experimental boyfriend, she’ll have to decide if charting her own destiny is worth breaking Arjun’s heart—and her own.

Boundless: Twenty Voices Celebrating Multicultural and Multiracial Identities edited by Ismée Amiel Williams and Rebecca Balcárcel When identities cross boundaries, with love that knows no bounds. From platonic and romantic love to grief and heartbreak, these stories explore navigating life at the intersection of identities, and what it means to grow up surrounded by a multitude of traditions, languages, cultures, and interpersonal dynamics. Returning to a father’s homeland. Trying to fit in at chaotic weddings and lavish birthday parties where not all are welcome. Processing grief at family gatherings. Figuring out how to share the news of a new relationship with loved ones. This collection celebrates multicultural and multiracial characters at the helm of their own narratives, as they approach life with a renewed sense of hope and acceptance.

Featuring original stories from: Adi Alsaid Rebecca Balcárcel Akemi Dawn Bowman Anika Fajardo Shannon Gibney I.W. Gregorio Veera Hiranandani Nasugraq Rainey Hopson Emiko Jean Erin Entrada Kelly Torrey Maldonado Mélina Mangal Goldy Moldavsky Randy Ribay Loriel Ryon Tara Sim Eric Smith Jasmine Warga Ismée Williams Karen Yin

What She Missed by Liara Tamani When Ebony and her parents move from Houston, Texas, to her grandmother’s house in a small lake town, Ebony is sure her life is doomed. And to make matters worse, the ghost of Ebony’s beloved grandmother—a strong swimmer who tragically drowned in the lake—is everywhere. Alula Lake does offer one perk: reconnecting Ebony with her childhood friend, Jalen. But as Ebony settles into life, she finds herself drifting away from Jalen and gravitating to his older sister, Lena. Lena is chaotic, disorderly, and rebellious, yet she offers a reprieve for the anger and sadness Ebony feels about losing so much.

An ode to nature, art, friendship, history, family, and love, this lyrical coming-of-age story explores one girl’s summer of self-discovery as she reimagines the world and her place in it. What She Missed is for fans of Sarah Dessen, Nina LaCour, and Nicola Yoon.

Everyone Wants to Know by Kelly Loy Gilbert This ripped-from-the-tabloids young adult drama by the critically acclaimed author Kelly Loy Gilbert about a girl’s famous-for-being-famous family fracturing from within as their dirty laundry gets exposed.

The Lo family sticks together. That’s what Honor has been told her whole life while growing up in the glare of the public eye on Lo and Behold , the reality show about her, her four siblings, and their parents. Their show may be off the air, but the Lo family members still live in the spotlight as influencers churning out podcasts, bestselling books, and brand partnerships. So when Honor’s father announces that he’s moving out of their northern California home to rent an apartment in Brooklyn, Honor’s personal upset becomes the internet’s trending B-list celebrity trainwreck—threatening the aspirational image the Los’ brand (and livelihood) depends on.

After one of her best friends leaks their private conversation to a gossip site, bruised and betrayed Honor pours all her energy into reuniting her family. With her parents 3,000 miles apart, her siblings torn into factions, and all of them under claustrophobic public scrutiny, this is easier said than done. Just when Honor feels at her lowest, a guarded yet vulnerable boy named Caden comes into her life and makes her want something beyond the tight Lo inner circle for the first time. But is it fair to open her heart to someone new when the people she loves are teetering on the edge of ruin?

As increasingly terrible secrets come to light about the people Honor thought she knew best in the world, she’s forced to choose between loyalty to her family and fighting for the life she wants.

[hellotomyoldheart]

quotes i can't stop thinking about

part one

"grief is different. grief has no distance. grief comes in waves, paroxysms, sudden apprehensions that weaken the knees and blind the eyes and obliterate the dailiness of life." - joan didion, the year of magical thinking.

"but sometimes, unexpectedly, grief pounded over me in waves that left me gasping; and when the waves washed back, i found myself looking over a brackish wreak which was illuminated in a light so lucid, so heartsick and empty, that i could hardly remember that the world had ever been anything but dead." - donna tartt, the goldfinch.

"i like red - don't get me wrong. but i have a deep appreciation for anything that is willing to be totally and utterly itself. if you're going to bed red, well, then, be red, goddammit. from your steering wheel to your hubcaps, be red." - adi alsaid, let's get lost.

"i hope the leaving is joyful; and i hope to never return." - frida kahlo.

"i believe in gentleness. lord, i believe in light. i am my own higher power. i will carry myself out." - sierra demulder, after googling affirmations for abuse survivors.

"1-800-273-8255. that's the suicide hotline, we can call it together." - nora cooper, i won't write your obituary.

"that summer i did not go crazy / but i wore / very close / very close / to the bone." - dorothy allison, to the bone.

"i am exhausted, i am exhausted. pillar of white in a blackout of knives. i am the magician's girl who does not flinch." - sylvia plath, the bee meeting.

"sorry about the blood in your mouth, i wish it was mine. i couldn't get the boy to kill me, but i wore his jacket for the longest time." - richard siken, dirty valentine.

"sometimes i wanted to be touched so badly i was scraped by longing." - emma cline, the girls.

"i told her once i wasn't good at anything. she told me survival is a talent." - susanna kaysen, girl, interpreted.

[battyaboutbooksreviews]

Books by BIPOC Authors - August 2023

🦇 I grew up surrounded by a melting pot of cultures, diverse communities, and unique experiences. Despite the different sources of those multicultural voices, their stories still covered universal topics of colonialism, migration, identity, and race. Each story was another flavor, another sweet spice adding to that melting pot. Today, we have books by BIPOC authors that put those unique voices to the page. If you're interested in traveling to different worlds, whether familiar or foreign, here are a few books by BIPOC authors to add to your TBR! 🦇

✨ Tomb Sweeping by Alexandra Chang ✨ The Dark Place by Britney S. Lewis ✨ Forged by Blood by Ehigbor Okuson ✨ Accidentally in Love by Danielle Jackson ✨ A Council of Dolls by Mona Susan Power ✨ Still Born by Guadalupe Nettel, translated by Rosalind Harvey ✨ The Injustice of Place: Uncovering the Legacy of Poverty in America by Kathryn J. Edin, H. Luke Shaefer, Timothy J. Nelson ✨ Hangman by Maya Binyam ✨ The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride (Historical Fiction) ✨ Under the Tamarind Tree by Nigar Alam ✨ Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas ✨ An American Immigrant by Johanna Rojas Vann

🧭 Forgive Me Not by Jennifer Baker 🧭 Two Tribes by Emily Bowen Cohen 🧭 A Quantum Life: My Unlikely Journey from the Street to the Stars by Hakeem Oluseyi and Joshua Horwitz 🧭 Writing in Color: Fourteen Writers on the Lessons We've Learned (edited by) Nafiza Azad and Melody Simpson 🧭 Ghost Book by Remy Lai 🧭 The Water Outlaws by S.L. Huang 🧭 Plantains and Our Becoming by Melania Luisa Marte 🧭 Forty Words for Love by Aisha Saeed 🧭 The Great White Bard: How to Love Shakespeare While Talking About Race by Farah Karim-Cooper 🧭 Take the Long Way Home by Rochelle Alers 🧭 Swim Home to the Vanished by Brendan Shay Basham 🧭 Actually Super by Adi Alsaid

✨ Never a Hero by Vanessa Len ✨ I Fed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me by Jamison Shea ✨ The Infinity Particle by Wendy Xu ✨ Night of the Living Queers, edited by Shelly Page ✨ Sign of the Slayer by Sharina Harris ✨ Her Radiant Curse by Elizabeth Lim ✨ My Father the Panda Killer by Jamie Jo Hoang ✨ Barely Floating by Lilliam Rivera ✨Happiness Falls by Angie Kim ✨ A Tall Dark Trouble by Vanessa Montalban ✨ Neverwraith by Shakir Rashaan ✨ House of Marionne by J. Elle

[lost-in-november]

É engraçado como é preciso sentir certa dor para lembrar que algumas partes do nosso corpo estão vivas.

— Perdidos por Aí (Adi Alsaid)

[winningthesweepstakes]

Before Takeoff by Adi Alsaid

Before Takeoff by Adi Alsaid

Before Takeoff  by Adi Alsaid. Alfred A. Knopf, 2022. 9780593375761 Rating: 1-5 (5 is an excellent or a Starred review) 3.5 Format: Hardcover Genre: Horror/dystopian/magical realism What did you like about the book?  Defying any attempt to slap a genre label on it, Alsaid sets his novel in a berserk airport in with endless flight delays, bizarre weather and geologic phenomena, and passengers…

[reviewthisbook]

Reading Roundup: December 2019

Favourite > The How and The Why: Cynthia Hand - The chapters alternate between Cass and letters from her birth mom, but we don’t read them at the same time she does. As is common with books like this I enjoyed reading the mom’s entries more than the main story but as a whole I really liked this book. It does get a little cheesy at the end, but I’ll let it have that.

Least Favourite > On a Scale of One to Ten: Ceylan Scott - Thought I would like this book about teens with mental illness more but it fell a little flat. It has a good plot, but I didn’t feel any connection or strong emotion to make it come alive.

Rereads > Persuasion: Jane Austen; Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You: Peter Cameron