The Help Readalong: Week Four. We Are Getting INTO This.

SO CLOSE. We are so close to being done. And just about time, too, because frankly, I'm getting sick of Skeeter to a huge degree. And SO MUCH OF THE STORY IS HER POV. Which I guess makes sense because that's what Stockett can relate to the most, but OMG I don't care about her social troubles or her boyfriend or how she's been fired as editor of the Junior League newsletter.

I just don't care.

This whole section...I dunno, things seemed to start getting really annoying. Like when Skeeter's listening to the radio and this happens: "I ease into the Tote-Sum store parking lot and listen to the song. It's better than anything I've ever heard....A voice in a can tells me his name is Bob Dylan."

I just went "Really? REALLY?" And yes. Obviously time for another gif:

I see what you did there

Trying to make characters sympathetic or seem forward-thinking by having them like things that are NOW considered amazing before everyone thought they were IRRITATES ME TO NO END. Mainly because it's cheap and stupid. So that angered me up for most of the rest of the chapter.

I don't even know what to say about the rest...I still love Minny and Celia and want them to have a reality show. Don't tell me you wouldn't watch that shit. They beat a crazy naked man with a fire poker. That's good television. When Minny brought her a tray of ham sandwiches, all I could think was '...damn, a whole tray of ham sandwiches.' And now seeing that again, it's all I want and might possibly influence my lunch plans.

The what-did-Minny-do revelation was eh. I kind of assumed that's what she did? So it was just sort of gross seeing it in print. The Constantine thing was more interesting, but left me in a similar "meh" state. I'm not that surprised by Skeeter's mom, especially in the context of her time. The only way she was being truly ridiculous was telling Constantine she couldn't see her daughter anymore, and I'll bet that could've been smoothed over after everyone had calmed down. So it all just seems kind of unnecessary and anticlimactic.

My new go-to label for passages where Hilly's being awful is "Hilly, don't be such a bitch." And because Hilly has NO REDEEMING FEATURES other than apparently loving her kids, this is used a lot. Here, I made you all a picture:

"Now that I've stolen the gold mine from the Widow Jessup, I shall reign
as queen over this town. Mwahahaha!"

One of the last straws for me was the line "I don't underestimate how far she would go to make sure I suffered the rest of my life." Hm? Why is that, Skeeter? Is Hilly a perhaps not-so-nice person? Oh, this hasn't been mentioned FIVE MILLION TIMES, so thank you for clarifying that for us.

This damn book better end soon. And it does! Chapters 29-34 for our next and final week, where we can rag on this for the last time.

Book Blogger Hop, Pt II

All right. The question for this week is: "Do you read only one book at a time, or do you have several going at once?" Oh-ho my. I have an issue with book commitment. I start a new book, and it's exciting and fresh, and I get really jazzed about it, and then 20% of the way through, almost without fail, I start getting bored and want to start another book. I once had seven books going at the same time, because I kept getting bored and starting new ones. It's a sickness. Right now I'm being pretty good and working on The Monk , Northanger Abbey , Kissing the Witch , and I'm about to start Waiting for the Barbarians since my friend lent it to me. But The Monk and NA are basically books I only read when I'm at work, so I don't see it so much as working on four books, as having books in different locales. Yes. This entry wasn't as good as some of the others, but I shall rally on the morrow. Yes I shall.

Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy: Readalong Signup

You know what was the third bestseller of its time after Uncle Tom's Cabin and Ben-Hur ? THAT IS CORRECT, Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy. No one talks about this book anymore, but it was a sci-fi utopian novel about a young man waking up in the year 2000, which is a socialist utopia . Looking Backward spawned over 150 "Bellamy Clubs" that got together and discussed political issues, and it looks like a damn fascinating book. It is also available FOR FREE online. Here's the Project Gutenberg link . So read this not too long book with me in February and get familiar with a bestseller of the 19th century!

Minithon: The Mini Readathon, January 11th, 2020

The minithon is upon us once more! Minithons are for the lazy. Minithons are for the uncommitted. Minithons are for us. The minithon lasts 6 hours (10 AM to 4 PM CST), therefore making it a mini readathon, as opposed to the lovely Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon and 24in48, both of which you should participate in, but both of which are a longer commitment than this, the Busy Watching Netflix person's readathon. By 'read for six hours' what's really meant in the minithon is "read a little bit and eat a lot of snacks and post pictures of your books and your snacks, but mostly your snacks." We like to keep it a mini theme here, which mainly means justifying your books and your snacks to fit that theme. Does your book have children in it? Mini people! Does it have a dog! Mini wolf! Does it have pencils? Mini versions of graphite mines! or however you get graphite, I don't really know. I just picture toiling miners. The point is, justify it or don't...

Reading Rambo

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