So I usually do a trimester's worth of flash book reviews at a time, but I read so much in January that I did those books in a separate blog post.
My two February books were started in January, but I've decided to count books as pertaining to the month in which they were finished.
The first Feb. book was
The Elements of Eloquence, which was about rhetorical devices. An example (I no longer remember the specific name for this) is when you hear something like "he stole my heart and then my car" in a song. Get it? It juxtaposes literal theft (car) with metaphorical theft (a figure of speech). I'd heard dozens of lyrics like that but I never knew it was rhetoric. I liked this book, but unless you're a language nerd like me, you're probably going to find it too boring. The author has a very dry British sense of humor, and he provided lots of examples that I found interesting and often funny. He brought up William Shakespeare a lot, but the book didn't touch on him as much as I thought it would, although of course Billy S. was mentioned a good deal. This was a library book. (late Jan.-early Feb., 3.9/5 stars)
The second Feb. book was
Step Aside, Pops by one of my favorite cartoonists, Kate
Baeton Beaton. Just like
the first Hark! A Vagrant collection, I'd already read probably 99% of all the comics included, but this is not at all a detractor for me. I like having physical copies of things I love from the Internet. I got this one from Barnes & Noble with a coupon, I believe. (late Jan.-early Feb., 5/5)
I started off March by rereading two books for children in order to decide whether or not I wanted to keep them (I shelved all my books in the beginning of March, but unsurprisingly, there are a few stacks that need to be taken care of!).
The first March book was
Whittington, a Newbery Honor book that I was assigned to read in one of my Children's Lit classes. It is a solemn, rather charming story within a story. The outside story has to do with barnyard animals getting along and trying to encourage a young boy in his struggle with dyslexia. The inner story is his reward for the struggling: hearing the story of Dick Whittington and his cat from Whittington, a descendant of that cat. One thing I didn't like was that the DW story was supposedly passed down from cat to cat, but it felt like a story humans would tell, as it was all from Dick's perspective. The cat's perspective would have focused much more on the cat's experiences and feelings rather than Dick's feelings towards the merchant and his daughter. Overall this was like a less frolicsome
Charlotte's Web written by someone who usually writes for adults. I do like this but will give it away to my cousin's kids. (mid-March, 3.9/5)
The second March book was on paintings, especially portraits of young girls, from American Girl.
Imagine the Girl in the Painting is a lovely book to inspire creative thinking and an appreciation of art, as well as learning about history. This will also go to my cousin's kids. (mid-March, 4/5)
Probably my most harrowing book of the month was
The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone, wherein the author examines loneliness in the context of a breakup, being alone in New York City, technology, and several NYC male artists whose work or lives in some way embodied loneliness. Many of the artists were abused in their youth, which was horrible to read about, and some of the things the author wrote about loneliness were 2real. I do recommend this though, and will try to look for more from the author. Trigger warnings for abuse, rape, self harm, mental illness, depression, suicide, and violence. This was a library book. (mid to late March, 4/5)
After such an emotionally wringing read I needed to take a break, so I read the next three Artemis Fowl books in basically one sitting:
The Artemis Fowl Files (a filler book that is supposed to be book 4.5 or something),
The Lost Colony, and
The Time Paradox. After (spoiler!) Commander Root was killed off in the beginning of the 4th book
The Opal Deception, it was nice to see him again in one of the
Files' short stories.
The Lost Colony is my favorite post-Opal book because of No.1, while I've never been that enamored of
The Time Paradox (even my credulity can be strained, plus I hated it that REDACTED). I think I've mentioned before that while they are still enjoyable books, some of the magic is lost a bit when reread as an adult. I still like them a lot, though. (late March, 3.9/5, 3.99/5, 3/5)
