#its crazy i have friends whose parents did similar/worse stuff & they still love them. could not b me lol

[sturnmad]

8 more months & I am outtttttt of here!!!!!!

[your-rose-highness]

Tell Me What Is Love (Ch-6)

note- Feat. JB (Jaebeom) of GOT7.

It was the middle of May when the songs of spring were heard the loudest. Hye hee walked along the Han river, the world seemed a blur in front of her eyes. The crowd seemed to buzz with ecstasy, a sight of the most beautiful sunset lay ahead of them. The golden yellow soft waves of the river mimicked the sun’s dramatic mood, as though pretending to be the same.

I’m a part of you, it seemed to whisper.

Hye hee’s feet stopped suddenly, lifting her head to watch the world gleam. After all these years, Baekhyun was still the sun she glittered for. Something drew them together. Or, she was imagining it all. What did she have? She was left with nothing. At the end of the day, she would have to go back to her empty and dingy apartment, meeting ghosts of her past. Where would she run to getaway? No matter where she went, her heart yearned for something unattainable. It had to be stopped. Like a stern mother who would discipline her beloved child, for the future unforeseen. The laughter around her rang in her ears, as though hurting her physically.

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She walked slowly to her neighborhood, walking the familiar path home. The streets were awfully dark she noticed, at this early hour too. It was hardly 7 pm. Picking up the pace, Hye Hee took longer strides to get to her apartment which was just around the corner. An odd feeling of someone behind her made her quickly look over her shoulder. 

Was she being followed?

She had lived in this neighborhood for years now and never had she felt a chill rise in her spine as she continued to walk faster.

She left a sigh of relief when she sighted her apartment.

 Hold on, why was there such a huge crowd in the front? Running to the crowd, she found people swarming around a woman on the stairs, who seemed to have fainted.

Jane.

“Oh my!”, hye hee exclaimed, her bag dropping to the floor.

“Here she is!! Ms. Song! A person just drove by throwing stones at this lady as she waited and rang your door!! I saw it with my own eyes!”, exploded the young girl who lived upstairs of her apartment.

“Did you see who it was?”, panted hye hee, hurriedly trying to pick up Jane’s head in her lap.

The right side of her temple dribbled with blood, and jane seemed semi-unconscious, trying to mouth words.

“No! I couldn't! They drove by so quickly! I tried to chase and note down the car number but failed. I couldn't contact your phone and I couldn't carry her inside. I’m so sorry.”, she whimpered.

“No its okay, thank you for being here.”, hye hee said as she tried to call the hospital.

“This is the first time something like this happened in the neighborhood. I thought this was safe! But look! We find stones being hurled!”, complained someone.

“Miss, you better inform the police. This incident cannot be dealt with lightly.”, advised her landlord.

The ambulance arrived soon, and hye hee found herself crying bitterly by her friend’s side. 

What if this was because of that tweet? Had the fans found out? It can't be a coincidence that her friend was attacked on the same day that she went to the agency for her interview.

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“Will she be fine? She won't die, right?” wailed hye hee, looking at the paramedic.

The paramedic had a faint smile on his lips, which she missed, as she cried on the side.

“She will be fine, ma’am. It’s just a mild concussion.”

“There’s so much blood! How can this be mild?”

“Oh! Believe you me, this is mild. I’ve seen skulls being broken apart in my career, you can't imagine…”, he trailed off after he looked at hye hee whose face was scrunched in horror, “but you don't need to know that. All I am saying is that your friend will be fine, ma’am. 

They reached the hospital soon, dragging away jane on the stretcher. While she waited in the corridor full of white coats, jane was called into the doctor’s cabin.

“Oh, guardian of Lee Jae In?”, he asked, looking up from Jane’s patient form.

“Umm… yes.”

“Are you her family?”

“No. I mean, she’s my best friend.”, hesitated Hye Hee.

“Right! But the official documents can be signed only by the patient’s family members.”, he said, while typing furiously on his computer, “sorry, hospital protocols.”, he continued, nodding at her.

“I see. Is she awake?”

“Not completely. But she will be in an hour. Don't worry, she’s fine, the scans came out clean. It could be worse though. May I ask what happened?”

Should she tell him? What if this converts into something much more complicated? 

“She fell down the stairs. There was a lot of water on the floor.”, she finally framed.

The doctor seemed to look at her with suspicion but didn't say anything.

“Alright. Please contact her family. We will observe her vitals for a day and then she is free to go.”, he sighed as he handed her the forms.

Hye hee entered jane’s room after she opened her eyes. Her usually strong and fierce friend seemed so weak, it broke her heart. A smile played on jane’s lips as she spotted her friend in the room full of fear. She extended her hand towards hye hee, as she quickly grabbed it. 

“I’m so sorry jane. I’m so sorry. It’s all my fault. I thought I was going to lose you.”, cried out hye hee.

“Not that easy, love. Why are you apologizing for this? God knows why they threw stones at me… I haven’t written a scandalized piece in months…”

Jane wiped her tears away and pinched her hand to lighten the mood.

“I need to call someone to sign your papers. Anyone in town?”

“My brother is here. Mum and dad are in Jeju visiting family. Where’s my phone? Ah, here it is. Call him. I’m going to rest my eyes for a bit. I feel really tired.”, jane yawned.

“Yes, you rest up. I’ll call him. Oh, password?”, hye hee asked.

“00000”, jane mumbled.

“Who puts 5 zeros as their password in this age?”

“Aish. don't come at me now, I’m hurt. You're lucky I remembered. What if I had lost my memory? You could guess it and call my brother. I am now a soothsayer…” she mumbled as she closed her eyes.

Hye hee sat beside her to call Jaebeom. She had never met her brother in person. Occasionally having only heard jane talk to him over the phone, which usually ended with one of them yelling at the other. Classic sibling behavior.

The ring tone rang only for a few seconds before he picked up the call.

“Jae in! You have some courage to call me after two days!!....”, he laughed over the other end.

“Hello, Jaebeom? This is hye hee. Jane’s friend from the company?”

“Oh? What? Is something wrong?”, his boisterous laughter quickly turned into one dripping with fear.

“Jane met with an accident. We are at Severance Hospital…”

“What?! Is she okay? What happened!”, his worried voice boomed.

“She’s fine. Just needs to be under observation for a while.”

“I’m coming. I need 10 minutes.”, Jaebeom hung up.

Hye hee didn't have to wait very long as Jaebeom soon arrived at the hospital. 

“Hye hee?”

Hye hee snapped out of her thoughts to look up, “yes. Jaebeom-ssi?”

“Yeah. where’s Jae In?”

“In here.”, she said, guiding him into her cabin.

She stood behind him, letting him absorb the situation. No one could have ever thought that he was jane’s brother. There was no single similarity. Except probably, the fierce eyes.

He was handsome. Well, jane was quite pretty herself. Maybe they have good looking parents?

“How did this happen?”, Jaebeom suddenly turned to ask hye hee.

Before she could answer, the nurse dragged him away to the doctor’s cabin. 

What was she going to say? Surely she can't lie. Jane would tell him what really happened and then he’d want an explanation. What if the doctor told him? How was she going to explain? 

He soon got out of the doctor’s cabin, looking a little confused. He headed to jane’s bed and placed his hand on her head. Looking towards Hye Hee he whispered, ”Dr.Mark said I can take her home tomorrow morning. Thank you for coming with her. You can leave now. I’ll stay here and take care of her.”

Hye hee had just begun packing her stuff when he questioned again, “how did she end up here?”

Hye hee gulped and felt her lips go dry. Something about Jaebeom told her that she couldn't lie to him.

“She was outside my apartment when someone attacked her with stones.”, she phrased.

“Excuse me?”, he yelled.

“We don't know who it was. Or what they wanted. My neighborhood was particularly safe, I don't know why someone would do this.”

He didn't answer, but his gaze screamed at her. “I'm sorry”, continued hye hee.

Jaebeom let out a sigh before turning his back towards her. Hye hee felt a pit in her stomach, the guilt ate her insides, convinced that this was all her fault.

She slowly moved downstairs and met with a sharp cold breeze blowing at her from the outside. It was pouring rain. 

She quickly checked the time- 10 minutes to 1 am.

“Real nice. Thank you universe!” she exclaimed, digging through the bag to find her wallet. It's as if the universe had been conspiring against her today. She didn't have her wallet, nor did she have her card.

Stifling a rising scream, she decided to sit the night at the hospital, when she spotted Jaebeom, at the reception, coffee in one hand, looking at her.

He approached her swiftly wondering why she hadn't left already.

“What?”, he simply posed.

Hye hee couldn't meet his eyes, “I don't have money or an umbrella.”

“Where’s your car?”

“I… sold it.”

He shook his head and went through his pocket pulling it some money. “Here, go get yourself something hot to drink. I’ll get drop you home, wait here till I get my keys.”

“You don't have to. I’ll just stay….”

Hye hee couldn't finish her sentence as Jaebeom once again seemed to glare at her. “Okay.”

Sipping on her hot chocolate, she stood waiting for Jaebeom. The hot liquid seemed to cruise through her spreading warmth, instantly making her feel better. 

Instant hot chocolate for instant happiness. The thought made her smile.

Only Jaebeom was looking at her, deeming her crazy to have been standing near the vending machine and smiling like a fool.

The two of them walked to the entrance, ahead lay a night, pitch dark, blurred from the heavy rain. Jaebeom was kind. Pulling up his hoodie he sprinted across the parking lot to make sure hye hee didn't have to get wet. As sorry as she felt, hye hee was overwhelmed with the gesture.

The car ride was quiet except for the faint rain sounds that hit the car, as they drew out of the hospital. He asked where she lived and soon reached. Stopping near the turn, Jaebeom got out of the car grabbing the umbrella. Hye hee just felt bad that he was being this kind despite having hurt his sister. Coming around, he helped hye hee get out of the car, half drenched as he shielded her from the rain.

“You didn't have to do this. I could just run in.”

“Right. Let’s have another one hurled stones at. I thought you said this was a neighborhood. If they’re throwing stones at you guys, I won't be surprised if they’re still lurking around.” he mumbled.

Bingo. 

Walking a few steps ahead, they saw two dark figures, pointing towards the windows, as though speculating.

“What on earth are they doing? These little…”, Jaebeom whispered, about to confront them.

“No please! Let them go away on their own, they might be dangerous.”, hye hee blurted.

“What do you mean? You're going to stay here, while these little jerks lurk around you? How is that safe?”

“Maybe I could stay at the hospital.”

“I would take you to Jae in’s apartment, but seeing this, I wonder who’s lurking outside hers.”

“That’s a great idea. I can stay over at her place!”

“But what if something happens?” he asked, very concerned.

“It’s only me they’re tracking! Her house will be fine!”

They got into the car once again, driving through the familiar route to Jane’s house.

“Care to explain?”, Jaebeom inquired.

Hye hee took a deep breath, laying down a few important parts, obviously skipping the one about being terribly in love with baekhyun.

“Oh, so you're the one Jae in said knows an idol. Haha. I thought she was kidding. Glad to know she didn't make it all up.”, smiled Jaebeom.

Jaebeom was charming. Something about him put hye hee at ease, she felt safe. Quietly watching him from the corner of her eye. If he had dressed in a hurry and looked this good, one can only wonder. She quickly averted her eyes when she felt Jaebeom look in her direction. 

He left quite quickly after opening the door with his spare key. Hye hee turned on the lights of the bedroom that she had so frequently crashed in on girls’ night outs. As her head hit the pillow, she let out a huge sigh. Today was quite eventful, and a lot of emotions washed over her simultaneously. It’s not that she didn't love baekhyun, but right now, love simply wasn't enough. There was a lot involved that she couldn't avoid. Alas, if only it was her she had to deal with. Baekhyun was a challenge. From what she knew, he could burn down everything and that was terrifying. Love shouldn't have to be a sacrifice. Sleep overcame her despite her fighting it. Maybe a few hours of peace? The quiet night lulled her to sleep.

[what-ever-happened-to-chip]

Lanas day continued

We reached Yunas room and Gray was not in there.

“Where the fuck is Gray?” Joni announced

"I don’t know haven’t seen the fucker”

“Thank you Aiden!” I had assumed she would leave with that but she walked over and made herself a refreshment and found herself a place on the couch to sit.

I wondered if her and Gray had sex. I am pretty sure they don’t even though Grays smugness he seems to try to get people to think they do. She's with Noah anyhow I am pretty sure. Do they have sex? I have heard Jonis not the sexual type. Unsure if that's from her childhood or what. It spooks me out knowing so many people's intimate life stories. Yet Harry seems to get some sick pleasure of making sure everyone knows everyone else's past tragedies. I remember when they had to put me in the “worst life” contest I was disturbed them arguing about if getting raped or parents dying is worse. How can you even compare it? Spooky. Anyhow the room was popping from just a glance I noticed Aiden was here seemingly blazed outta his mind. Yuna by his side in a similar boat and camping with the pipe. Didn’t see Marcus but noticed his coat so he probably was here earlier, maybe he’ll come back. Natsu and Adam sat on the couch thumb wrestling loudly and Rikku sat in corner coloring in a colouring book.

Yuna definitely made her room welcoming and cozy for a large amount of people. She had two couches, 3 chairs, along with her bed for places to sit. Her table had on it numerous apparatus for smoking weed, plus a giant jar of weed next to it, a hookah, a cigar box filled with cigarettes and even another box filled with heroin paraphernalia for her other friends. She herself didn’t use, but she liked keeping it around for her friends. Our sin savior really was a saint.

She smiled warmly at me and busied herself asking if I needed anything and pulling out a chair for me.

“No I am good, thanks Yuna.”  I smiled. Yes, these were my people. Needed to reset after what I just went thru with Jenn. Should I mention to Aiden he probably was going to come home to an angry girlfriend? Nah best he finds out for himself and I leave myself out of it.

Aiden began busying himself making up a hit for him and Joni who yelled at him to make her one. I looked away. Even though I had seen people shooting up on multiple occasions it still made me feel a little weird watching it. I heard Joni swearing about missing her vein.

“Aidennn find a vein for meeee” She whined.

“What are you gonna do for me?’

“Please I’lll get Noah to suck your dick”

Aiden scoffed at this but proceeded to hook her up. He was incredible at finding veins I once saw him find one between his toes to use.

“Shit this stuff isn’t as good as Grays, where the fuck is he?” Joni said this while nodding. The junk could be 1% actual dope and 99% chocobo shit and she still would shoot it up.

“Well go find fucking Gray then.” Aiden made himself comfy leaning against Yuna for support. I wonder how Jenn would feel seeing this. Maybe that's why she doesn’t come around. I wanted to bring up the jealousy thing but was waiting for Marcus. Also probably better to do it with Aiden not in the room.

“THUMB WRESTLER CHAMPION OF THE WORLD FUCK YEA BITCHES.” Natsu got up and made a lap around the room. Accidentally kicking Rikkus shoe on his way around

“YOU STUPID FUCK WATCH WHERE YOU’RE GOING!!” Rikku got up and pushed Natsu who proceeded to fall over the table and knock many things over in the process. Yuna gently moved Aiden to a pillow then rushed to help him up and began cleaning up the mess. I got up to help her out and almost jumped out of my clothes, noticing christian in the corner. Was he here the whole time and I missed him? He’s so strange sometimes when I am in the dark in my room I swear to god he’s breathing in the corner.

Chrisitan smiled his creepy smile and spoke to me “Hm just sensing my presence?”

I thought he had to touch people to read their minds. I hope I am right on that.

“Yea sorry didn't see ya before”

He smiled knowingly at me and lurked back in his corner. I swear to god the corner go darker when he moved back in it.

“Nobody notices your ugly ass mug” Aiden flashed his raised lip smirk at Christian then stared at me. “Wait what the fuck are you doing in here get the fuck out I don’t need your dumb fuck self around right now.”

“When shall I return?’

“3:14 A.M now fuck off”

Christian lurked out of the room giving me strange smile on the way out. The guy gave me goosebumps.

Aiden seemed to notice I walked in now “Where have you been? You look weird”

Fuck is my uneasieness showing? Play it cool Lana. “umm I was-”

“We were hanging with Jenn ! Why don’t you bring her around more Aiden? She’s soooo much fun!” Joni giggled and lurked around looking for fresh booze.

Aiden stared at her not seeming to know if she was joking or not. For being as sarcastic as he is, he seems to have difficulty picking it up himself.

“Why were you with Jenn?” Oh shit his paranoia seemed to be coming out.

I quickly spoke before Joni could fuck it up “I was looking for some mascara and I assumined she had some. We just hung out a bit.”

“She kicked us out, she just freaked out, out of nowhere.” Joni either forgot about the cigarette dropping or didn’t feel that was relevant to Jenn freaking out.

“Oh no is she alright?” Yuna looked at us with real concern. I wonder if she knows Jenn’s feelings towards her. Not that it would change her concern. She still worries over Axel. The flaming fuck of a person who not even sure why they still keep him around.

“Oh yeah she's fine, she just got upset over her pants.”

Aiden seemed to cool off after this, I assume she freaked out over her clothes a lot so he didn’t need to venture into why she freaked out. Their relationship has always been a curiosity to me. How the hell did those two end up? It would be like if I got with Thomas, or worse Harry.

Marcus meandered in with Buddy and retook his chair with his jacket. Before this though he walked up to me and gave me a kiss on the cheek. I grew so giddy inside. Marcus rarely showed physical affection to me in public. Butterflies swam around in my stomach.

I wanted to be with Marcus so bad, pathetically so. We kinda were in ways like we had sex regularly enough. I knew he cared about me too but dating just wasn’t his style. At least to me since I knew he had a girlfriend named Lisa for quite some time. He had various reasons why we weren’t boyfriend/girlfriend. Generally being about his camp and it not being a suitable place to date. But its like we are gonna at this camp literally forever and we didn;t age or die so couldn’t even escape it in that way. We had in past had some people as they put it “actually die” but we always had to go on a mission then to do something weird like get a stone or a potion or something and then they were brought back. So yea previous point confirmed, couldn’t actually die. I also suspected he liked to keep himself available for any other girl he wanted to have sex with. That I would be okay with, I can do an open relationship I like sex as much as the next guy. It just sucks and so confusing. Some days he’s all loving and super into me. Then other days its like he’s meeting me for the first time. For today thought it seems like the former, which perks my day up.

“Bro Marcus guess whose the thumb wrestler champion?”

“Wild guess, you? Perhaps?”

“Yea bro its me, wanna challenge the pro?”

“Mmmm perhaps after I have trained up. Wouldn’t want to give you such an inadequate fight.”

“Aight brah! I gonna remember this and then “ Natsu blew on both thumbs then proceeded to double thumbs up “Its on!!!”

“Take on the thumb it get you numb. Fight with all your might but Natsu’s know shiatsu and them thumbs leave ya a bum” Adam rapped

“BROOOOO that was fuckin tight !! Gimme 5!” Natsu and Adam did a minute long handshake that they musta had to have rehearsed at least 100 times.

“Aww my dear Lana where have you been I was looking for you.”

“I was hanging with Jenn.” oh right I was hanging with Jenn! I have to tell him the findings.

Still gotta wait for Aiden to leave though, damn. I decided to try to speed that up. “Idk maybe you should check on Jenn she did seem pretty upset.”

He scowled at me and I was terrified he was gonna flip out.

“Dude I go check on her, she likes me” Natsu stated this with so much conviction for a second I believed him

“You stay the fuck away from her.” I think if Aiden wasn’t so high he woulda been a lot more scary at this point.

“Nah bro you sit tight me and Adam got this come on bro.” They got up rather quickly and huddled out of the room. Aiden at this sighed grabbed his gear and followed them out.

“Damn white people be actin crazy all day” Buddy began rolling himself a blunt and shakin his head muttering about white folks. We didn’t really notice skin colour in Spira, it was just race of Al Bhed but here they seem to hate black people. I feel bad for Buddy in both worlds he’s looked down on. I guess apartly after Yuna saved the world, Al Bheds gotta get a lot more involved in shit. I missed that though, didn’t get to benefit from the perks of sin being gone.

Joni rolled herself outta the bed and muttered about finding Gray and also departed the room.

Marcus turned himself towards me “So you were with Jenn? No wonder I couldn’t find you I would not have assumed you two would be together.”

“Well I went in there to kinda see what Jenn was all about.”

“Wait Lana shut up I am calling Jesse, I know he’ll wanna hear about this.” Rikku took out her phone and loudly yelled into it “JESSE GET THE FUCK IN YUNAS ROOM WE TALKING SHIT ON JENN.”

“I wouldn’t say we talking shit on Je--”

“Lana shut up you know its gossip and you know theres only shit to talk about with her. She suckssss so bad.”

Jesse entered surprisingly fast. “YO YO bitches whats the 404?”

“Whats 404.” Rikku asked while pulling her skirt up some before pushing Jesse on a chair and planting her ass right on his dick. Smiling mischievously while doing so and winking at him.

“Ya know hot gos, ins and outs, whats the fad”

“hee hee your so funny.” She then proceeded to intensely make out with him

“So Lana relay your information to us” Marcus smiled and patted the chair next to his

I moved into it and he pulled it closer to his to place his hand on my thigh. Fuck I loved it

“Okay well me and Joni were in there, well first Gray but he left and Joni was in there looking for Gray but well anyhow Yuna got brought up and she seems like shes like jealous of Yuna.”

Rikku peeled her face off Jesses at this “OMG no way thats so funny and like she probably totally is cause shes such a cunt and Yunies the bestest!”

Buddy laughed slapping his knee while doing so “Man dat girl don’t got no sense to her.”

“I feel Jenn probably sees some threat in our dear Yuna here, yet if she would really grasp who Yuna is, she would realize that everything is in order.” Marcus proclaimed. His hand was rubbing back and forth up my thigh.

Yuna looked quite flustered at all this and grabbed the blunt from Buddy to take a surprising large hit for her frame. Exhaling with ease and no coughing. Impressive.

Sighing she sat in the bed “I don’t understand why she would be jealous of me, shes so beautiful and wonderful and a fantastic artist I just don’t see it.”

“Yunie shes jealous your gonna fuck Aiden !”

Yuna blushed and looked down “Oh I didn’t realize she felt that way.”

“Damn she should be jealous if that boy had any brains he should get with you, your a steal girlie.” Buddy pinched her shoulders a little and Yuna laid her head on his.

“Oh Buddy your the best friend a girl could have!”

“Seriously though Jenns a-” Jesse looked both ways dramatically for effect then hollered “A BIIITTCHHHH”

Rikku laughed her bimbo laugh she used specifically when flirting with dudes “Shes more like a class A cunt with a pretty face, I hate her.”

Rikkus bitcheness was impressively callous.

“I wouldn’t call her that, I would say she is more ,perhaps, confused. A confused girl in a hard world she hasn’t fully come to grasp.”

Passing outside the door I noticed Gray and Marcus called out to him

“Oh there you are Gray, please come join us. Lana’s observations have led us to discuss, why Jenn has a special hatred for our dear Yuna here.”

Gray looked in on us. He looked like he had seen a ghost. He looked like shit

----then to your story----

[sentrava]

Books a Million, Part XXI: Memoirs, Chick Lit & Growing Up Different

Winter tends to be my favorite time to catch up on my reading. From the week of Thanksgiving until midway through January, everyone in the tourism industry seems to disappear—it’s as if conference season is over, their budgets have been planned for the following year, and they’re taking a very lengthy hiatus. I took the opportunity over the holidays and my birthday trip to Puerto Rico to whittle down my 2019 book list, just a smidge.

Here’s everything I’ve read in the past couple months in case you’re heading on a Spring Break or summer trip of your own soon and looking for a good vacation read of your own.

Man in the (Rearview) Mirror by LaRue Cook

I’m at that point in my career where so many peers and friends are publishing books, and I can barely keep up with reading them all. But when a friend sent me a link to LaRue’s book, I bumped it up the chain and immediately ordered the paperback instead of waiting for the Kindle version to drop. LaRue and I started as writers at the UT paper, The Daily Beacon, on the same day; I was 20, he was 18, halfway through his freshman year. We immediately became journalist friends, and I was soon promoted to features editor, he one of my most reliable writers. He later went on to be the editor of the paper after I graduated.

Our lives ran parallel for years; I worked a stint at Entertainment Weekly, and he took over the same job a year or two later. He and his girlfriend at the time, another of my close college pals, moved to NYC in my final months there before moving to California, so I got to spend some time with them as my neighbors while he was getting his feet wet in sports writing for ESPN. But then, he dropped off my radar. He was never on social media back then, despite being younger than me, and I often lose touch with people I can’t track via Facebook and Instagram. I now know that’s partially because he was going through his version of an existential crisis, and after a decade with ESPN, he quit, moved back to Knoxville and became an Uber driver. While doing this (and driving more than 5,000 passengers around town), he wrote a book—a memoir told through the parallel lives of his passengers. A read that covers so many topics in the span of 234 pages: racial inequality, sexual orientation, faith and religion, his own infidelities. It’s always weird reading a memoir by someone you know, as it feels a bit like your peeling back the layers of their soul. I’d love to write something similar someday, but am not sure I’d ever be able to approach it with such honesty as LaRue did. This is a great book for anyone looking for a non-fiction read that examines how losing your pillar at a young age—in this case, LaRue’s dad at 15—can go on to shape a person’s identity as a young adult.

Hum If You Don’t Know the Words by Bianca Marais

I’m still shook by this book. You know that it’s a powerful read if you’re still thinking about it two months later. I started and finished this book at the beach in less than 24 hours, and man, it was some heavy stuff.

Taking place in an 18-month span during the height of apartheid, Hum chronicles the lives of two very different heroines—a nine-year-old white girl whose parents are slain and a 50-year-old black woman who came to the big city to track down her rebel daughter caught up in the Soweto Uprising—and at the heart of the story, impresses upon the reader how no matter the color of our skin, our sexual orientation, our religion or where we were born, no one is any greater or worse than the next human (and that good people do bad things and bad people do good things). Particularly poignant during the racial inequality happening still today, this book really tugged at my heartstrings and should be on everyone’s must-read list.

All The Missing Girls by Megan Miranda

I love me a good mystery, and All the Missing Girls is in a similar vein to Gone Girl and every Mary Kubica book I’ve ever devoured. It starts off with Nicolette, a 28-year-old teacher who had fled her small Appalachian town after high school to move to the big city, returning home to care for her ailing father—and confronting the ghosts of her past, specifically the disappearance of her best friend. Not long after she arrives, another young girl goes missing, and Nicolette makes it her mission to figure out what happened to her—and if it is indeed linked to the same missing girl from a decade prior.

Contrary to what other reviewers have written, I found the pace of this book quick and engaging, and those who like suspense will likely find it entertaining. The only thing I didn’t really care for was the erratic storytelling style in which the author kept jumping a day back in time to set the stage. It made it a bit confusing to piece together the timeline on the reader’s end. Overall, though, I’d read this book again and give it four out of five starts if I were still rating my reads.

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

We’re never really told what exactly is wrong with Eleanor Oliphant; we just know from the opening lines of the book that she’s different. And that difference takes us through her life in a deadbeat job with no friends or family to call her own, a curious character who becomes overly infatuated with a rockstar she’s never met, to the point where she begins to stalk him, both at gigs and at his own home, and even thinks he’s her boyfriend.

Socially awkward Eleanor is always saying the exact wrong thing, and she’s never even aware she’s the butt of everybody’s jokes in the office. A chance encounter, however, brings her close to a coworker who she previously had written off as uninteresting: She falls into an unexpected friendship with Raymond when they come to the rescue of an older man who has fallen in the street and needs to be taken to the hospital. This book isn’t so much plot-driven, as it is about character development, and Honeyman is a master of that particular trope. Peculiar and uplifting despite its somber undertones—alcoholism, mental illness, child abuse—Eleanor Oliphant was one of the most unexpectedly endearing books I read in the past year. The cadence of Eleanor’s narrating takes a bit of getting used to, but once you insert yourself into her mind, reading in her voice becomes second nature.

The High Season by Judy Blundell

The premise of this book—an artist and gallery curator, Ruthie, dealing with a separation who longs to keep her life in a sleepy Long Island coastal town in one piece when everything around her seems to be falling apart—made me think this was going to be a beach read (or maybe the fact that it was actually set on an island did that). But it was a bit, well, sleepier than that. It took nearly halfway through the book until I even knew what it was really about: Ruthie’s failed marriage, her career crumbling at the hands of her board and coming to grips with everything changing around her, including the loss of her home and her daughter, who is midway through high school. There was a socialite aspect to this book I kind of liked when the Hampton set arrived in the North Fork for the summer; it brought a little Sex and the City edge and scandal to what was dragging on as a mundane novel to that point.

In the end, this book was fine; not great, not terrible. I liked the art gallery aspect of it; the fact that SVV and I are part of so many groups and on various art boards these days made the book a bit more relatable. If I still gave ratings, this one would get two-and-a-half stars: very slow in parts, but enough of a story to hold my interest till the end.

The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillroy

The Wedding Date is, hands down, one of the worst books I have read ever. I am still shocked it got such positive ratings on Good Reads and Amazon—does no one read for content anymore?! I stuck with it kept waiting for the plot to develop and … nothing. In the opening pages of the book, Alexa meets Drew in an elevator, then soon after agrees to be his fake wedding date to his ex-girlfriend’s wedding. The two fall into an on-again, off-again romance, and there’s just no storyline AT ALL.

I never read any of the 50 Shades of Grey trilogy, but I imagine it was a lot like this: heavy on the sex scenes, light on the content. No thanks, not my jam. It’s a shame, too, as this could have been a powerful tale about interracial relationships and the trials faced by both side, but instead it was just plain garbage.

When Life Gives You Lululemons by Lauren Weisberger

If you loved The Devil Wears Prada, you’ll be happy to see that Lauren Weisberger is back many years later with another follow-up tale that chronicles Miranda Priestley’s assistant Emily Charlton as she navigates life’s changes after her time at Runway. (Side note: Somehow I must have missed the second in the series, Revenge Wears Prada? Anyone read it?) Emily is a fixer, an image consultant of sorts for the Hollywood set, and when her career starts to falter, she takes a job in Greenwich, Conn., trying to help a former supermodel navigate a scandal involving her senator husband while also suffering life in the suburbs.

I’ve read every other book of Weisberger’s, and while none can compare to Devil, this one is satisfying for anyone who loved the original.

Crazy, Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan

I’ll admit that I had no desire to read this book until I saw the movie trailer. Then, I immediately signed up for it at my local library, but was approximately 368th on the list, no exaggeration, so it took ages to land in my inbox. And when it finally did, it was worth the wait—nothing at all like I expected.

Rachel Chu is a professor at NYU whose boyfriends Nicky invites her back to Singapore with him for his best friend’s wedding; little does she know, his family is basically Singapore royalty. Despite the fact that she’s Asian-American—she never knew her father, but her mother was a Chinese immigrant—many members of Nick’s snobby family doesn’t give her the time of day, particularly his mom who is out to destroy their relationship. What follows is a fascinating look into how the upper crust, the social-climbers for whom dropping a cool million on a pair of earrings is an everyday occurrence, live—private planes! private clubs! private islands!—in one of the world’s most extravagant, over-the-top cities. One of my dear friends is a Singapore native, and I fact-checked much the book with her—she says it’s very accurate to the 1% there and even knows the families upon whom the book is based.

I then watched the movie on a recent flight and was equally pleased by it. I suppose next up I’ll be reading the second and third installments of this trilogy—please tell me they’re as entertaining as the first?

The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine

You know the kind of book you think is going to end one way, then midway through, you’re hit with a whammy and completely left off-guard? That’s The Last Mrs. Parrish to a tee. Amber Patterson is a con-artist who weasels her way into heiress Daphne Parrish’s world of excess by becoming her friend in Single White Female fashion—later going as far as trying to become her, attempting to take over her husband and her home. The book ping-pongs between narrators, both Amber and Daphne, and there’s really no way to tell you anymore of the plot of Amber’s metamorphosis into Daphne without spoiling any of the zingers, of which there are many. Go. Read. This. Book!

I’m really, really hoping The Last Mrs. Parrish gets made into a movie starring (or produced by) Reese Witherspoon.

This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel

Oh my, I LOVED This Is How It Always Is. I didn’t know what it was about in the slightest, but so many people recommended it, that I immediately requested it from the library. Based on Frankel’s own experiences with having a boy who early on began identifying as a girl, this book chronicles a set of five brothers, the youngest of whom always felt different. When this feeling becomes evolves into exploration—wearing dresses, putting on makeup, playing with dolls—his parents begin to realize it’s more than just a phase. So they take steps to letting their son become their daughter by moving across the country and completely resetting their lives.

At the root of this story is the message that all families have issues, all families keep secrets—it’s how they choose to deal with them that sets them apart.

**********

Currently I’m reading The Paris Secret and A Gentleman in Moscow, neither of which have really grabbed my attention, but I’ve also got Bad Blood, Becoming, Pete Buttigieg’s Shortest Way Home and Far Away and Further Back, a memoir by my friend Holly’s dad. I guess it’s a non-fiction kind of reading month over here!

What have you read and loved so far this year?

Books a Million, Part XXI: Memoirs, Chick Lit & Growing Up Different published first on https://medium.com/@OCEANDREAMCHARTERS

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Books a Million, Part XXI: Memoirs, Chick Lit & Growing Up Different

Winter tends to be my favorite time to catch up on my reading. From the week of Thanksgiving until midway through January, everyone in the tourism industry seems to disappear—it’s as if conference season is over, their budgets have been planned for the following year, and they’re taking a very lengthy hiatus. I took the opportunity over the holidays and my birthday trip to Puerto Rico to whittle down my 2019 book list, just a smidge.

Here’s everything I’ve read in the past couple months in case you’re heading on a Spring Break or summer trip of your own soon and looking for a good vacation read of your own.

Man in the (Rearview) Mirror by LaRue Cook

I’m at that point in my career where so many peers and friends are publishing books, and I can barely keep up with reading them all. But when a friend sent me a link to LaRue’s book, I bumped it up the chain and immediately ordered the paperback instead of waiting for the Kindle version to drop. LaRue and I started as writers at the UT paper, The Daily Beacon, on the same day; I was 20, he was 18, halfway through his freshman year. We immediately became journalist friends, and I was soon promoted to features editor, he one of my most reliable writers. He later went on to be the editor of the paper after I graduated.

Our lives ran parallel for years; I worked a stint at Entertainment Weekly, and he took over the same job a year or two later. He and his girlfriend at the time, another of my close college pals, moved to NYC in my final months there before moving to California, so I got to spend some time with them as my neighbors while he was getting his feet wet in sports writing for ESPN. But then, he dropped off my radar. He was never on social media back then, despite being younger than me, and I often lose touch with people I can’t track via Facebook and Instagram. I now know that’s partially because he was going through his version of an existential crisis, and after a decade with ESPN, he quit, moved back to Knoxville and became an Uber driver. While doing this (and driving more than 5,000 passengers around town), he wrote a book—a memoir told through the parallel lives of his passengers. A read that covers so many topics in the span of 234 pages: racial inequality, sexual orientation, faith and religion, his own infidelities. It’s always weird reading a memoir by someone you know, as it feels a bit like your peeling back the layers of their soul. I’d love to write something similar someday, but am not sure I’d ever be able to approach it with such honesty as LaRue did. This is a great book for anyone looking for a non-fiction read that examines how losing your pillar at a young age—in this case, LaRue’s dad at 15—can go on to shape a person’s identity as a young adult.

Hum If You Don’t Know the Words by Bianca Marais

I’m still shook by this book. You know that it’s a powerful read if you’re still thinking about it two months later. I started and finished this book at the beach in less than 24 hours, and man, it was some heavy stuff.

Taking place in an 18-month span during the height of apartheid, Hum chronicles the lives of two very different heroines—a nine-year-old white girl whose parents are slain and a 50-year-old black woman who came to the big city to track down her rebel daughter caught up in the Soweto Uprising—and at the heart of the story, impresses upon the reader how no matter the color of our skin, our sexual orientation, our religion or where we were born, no one is any greater or worse than the next human (and that good people do bad things and bad people do good things). Particularly poignant during the racial inequality happening still today, this book really tugged at my heartstrings and should be on everyone’s must-read list.

All The Missing Girls by Megan Miranda

I love me a good mystery, and All the Missing Girls is in a similar vein to Gone Girl and every Mary Kubica book I’ve ever devoured. It starts off with Nicolette, a 28-year-old teacher who had fled her small Appalachian town after high school to move to the big city, returning home to care for her ailing father—and confronting the ghosts of her past, specifically the disappearance of her best friend. Not long after she arrives, another young girl goes missing, and Nicolette makes it her mission to figure out what happened to her—and if it is indeed linked to the same missing girl from a decade prior.

Contrary to what other reviewers have written, I found the pace of this book quick and engaging, and those who like suspense will likely find it entertaining. The only thing I didn’t really care for was the erratic storytelling style in which the author kept jumping a day back in time to set the stage. It made it a bit confusing to piece together the timeline on the reader’s end. Overall, though, I’d read this book again and give it four out of five starts if I were still rating my reads.

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

We’re never really told what exactly is wrong with Eleanor Oliphant; we just know from the opening lines of the book that she’s different. And that difference takes us through her life in a deadbeat job with no friends or family to call her own, a curious character who becomes overly infatuated with a rockstar she’s never met, to the point where she begins to stalk him, both at gigs and at his own home, and even thinks he’s her boyfriend.

Socially awkward Eleanor is always saying the exact wrong thing, and she’s never even aware she’s the butt of everybody’s jokes in the office. A chance encounter, however, brings her close to a coworker who she previously had written off as uninteresting: She falls into an unexpected friendship with Raymond when they come to the rescue of an older man who has fallen in the street and needs to be taken to the hospital. This book isn’t so much plot-driven, as it is about character development, and Honeyman is a master of that particular trope. Peculiar and uplifting despite its somber undertones—alcoholism, mental illness, child abuse—Eleanor Oliphant was one of the most unexpectedly endearing books I read in the past year. The cadence of Eleanor’s narrating takes a bit of getting used to, but once you insert yourself into her mind, reading in her voice becomes second nature.

The High Season by Judy Blundell

The premise of this book—an artist and gallery curator, Ruthie, dealing with a separation who longs to keep her life in a sleepy Long Island coastal town in one piece when everything around her seems to be falling apart—made me think this was going to be a beach read (or maybe the fact that it was actually set on an island did that). But it was a bit, well, sleepier than that. It took nearly halfway through the book until I even knew what it was really about: Ruthie’s failed marriage, her career crumbling at the hands of her board and coming to grips with everything changing around her, including the loss of her home and her daughter, who is midway through high school. There was a socialite aspect to this book I kind of liked when the Hampton set arrived in the North Fork for the summer; it brought a little Sex and the City edge and scandal to what was dragging on as a mundane novel to that point.

In the end, this book was fine; not great, not terrible. I liked the art gallery aspect of it; the fact that SVV and I are part of so many groups and on various art boards these days made the book a bit more relatable. If I still gave ratings, this one would get two-and-a-half stars: very slow in parts, but enough of a story to hold my interest till the end.

The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillroy

The Wedding Date is, hands down, one of the worst books I have read ever. I am still shocked it got such positive ratings on Good Reads and Amazon—does no one read for content anymore?! I stuck with it kept waiting for the plot to develop and … nothing. In the opening pages of the book, Alexa meets Drew in an elevator, then soon after agrees to be his fake wedding date to his ex-girlfriend’s wedding. The two fall into an on-again, off-again romance, and there’s just no storyline AT ALL.

I never read any of the 50 Shades of Grey trilogy, but I imagine it was a lot like this: heavy on the sex scenes, light on the content. No thanks, not my jam. It’s a shame, too, as this could have been a powerful tale about interracial relationships and the trials faced by both side, but instead it was just plain garbage.

When Life Gives You Lululemons by Lauren Weisberger

If you loved The Devil Wears Prada, you’ll be happy to see that Lauren Weisberger is back many years later with another follow-up tale that chronicles Miranda Priestley’s assistant Emily Charlton as she navigates life’s changes after her time at Runway. (Side note: Somehow I must have missed the second in the series, Revenge Wears Prada? Anyone read it?) Emily is a fixer, an image consultant of sorts for the Hollywood set, and when her career starts to falter, she takes a job in Greenwich, Conn., trying to help a former supermodel navigate a scandal involving her senator husband while also suffering life in the suburbs.

I’ve read every other book of Weisberger’s, and while none can compare to Devil, this one is satisfying for anyone who loved the original.

Crazy, Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan

I’ll admit that I had no desire to read this book until I saw the movie trailer. Then, I immediately signed up for it at my local library, but was approximately 368th on the list, no exaggeration, so it took ages to land in my inbox. And when it finally did, it was worth the wait—nothing at all like I expected.

Rachel Chu is a professor at NYU whose boyfriends Nicky invites her back to Singapore with him for his best friend’s wedding; little does she know, his family is basically Singapore royalty. Despite the fact that she’s Asian-American—she never knew her father, but her mother was a Chinese immigrant—many members of Nick’s snobby family doesn’t give her the time of day, particularly his mom who is out to destroy their relationship. What follows is a fascinating look into how the upper crust, the social-climbers for whom dropping a cool million on a pair of earrings is an everyday occurrence, live—private planes! private clubs! private islands!—in one of the world’s most extravagant, over-the-top cities. One of my dear friends is a Singapore native, and I fact-checked much the book with her—she says it’s very accurate to the 1% there and even knows the families upon whom the book is based.

I then watched the movie on a recent flight and was equally pleased by it. I suppose next up I’ll be reading the second and third installments of this trilogy—please tell me they’re as entertaining as the first?

The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine

You know the kind of book you think is going to end one way, then midway through, you’re hit with a whammy and completely left off-guard? That’s The Last Mrs. Parrish to a tee. Amber Patterson is a con-artist who weasels her way into heiress Daphne Parrish’s world of excess by becoming her friend in Single White Female fashion—later going as far as trying to become her, attempting to take over her husband and her home. The book ping-pongs between narrators, both Amber and Daphne, and there’s really no way to tell you anymore of the plot of Amber’s metamorphosis into Daphne without spoiling any of the zingers, of which there are many. Go. Read. This. Book!

I’m really, really hoping The Last Mrs. Parrish gets made into a movie starring (or produced by) Reese Witherspoon.

This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel

Oh my, I LOVED This Is How It Always Is. I didn’t know what it was about in the slightest, but so many people recommended it, that I immediately requested it from the library. Based on Frankel’s own experiences with having a boy who early on began identifying as a girl, this book chronicles a set of five brothers, the youngest of whom always felt different. When this feeling becomes evolves into exploration—wearing dresses, putting on makeup, playing with dolls—his parents begin to realize it’s more than just a phase. So they take steps to letting their son become their daughter by moving across the country and completely resetting their lives.

At the root of this story is the message that all families have issues, all families keep secrets—it’s how they choose to deal with them that sets them apart.

**********

Currently I’m reading The Paris Secret and A Gentleman in Moscow, neither of which have really grabbed my attention, but I’ve also got Bad Blood, Becoming, Pete Buttigieg’s Shortest Way Home and Far Away and Further Back, a memoir by my friend Holly’s dad. I guess it’s a non-fiction kind of reading month over here!

What have you read and loved so far this year?

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