Welcome to Litsy!

A lovely bookstagram friend informed me that this is a National Velvet retelling 🐎♥️🐴🏇🏻

#CHILDRENSCLASSICREAD2022

Good read, lots of layers, but ending left me wanting.

Book 27: (Catching up on books read in 2017!)

A tad longer and drawn out than it perhaps needs to be but, nonetheless, The Mare evolves to be a tale of two cities. Both an antithesis of each other - the fresh air and bareback freedom of the country fights to win over the pollution - moral and environmental - and suffocation of the city. But there is still dirt in the country...

My library has a sharing arrangement with two other libraries so I can log into Overdrive through all three - each has different books available. This is how big my wishlist is on just one of them 😅 I go through and add more every time they add new books - and I'll add anything I'm even vaguely interested in, as it's free! I mostly borrow audiobooks as I own so many print books.

Done for the week and I've got the house to myself for a brief time so going to make some headway into my next Baileys Prize longlist read. Fascinating so far.

Whilst it's definitely readable The Mare bored me & annoyed me overall. Mainly because of the 'white rich couple take in a poor black girl for a while and bond with her and turn her into horse riding star' cliche, then the perfectly happy married couple who actually are happy cliche and also as I felt like it patronised anyone Dominican from whatever walk of life they came from. A well written book, but a slightly tame, easy and lazy one too.

The Mare was my favorite book this month! #bestofmarch #marchintoreading

Another day, another book #bliss

I didn't enjoy this book at all. I never finish books that I am not enjoying, but this one made me want to stick around for the ending, which was so anticlimactic that I regretted wasting time on it. #DidntLikeItStillFinished #MarchIntoReading

Ay caramba. This book. It was a gut puncher, that's for sure. It's supposed to be an urban version of National Velvet, but I felt pretty beat down by the language and disturbing images of life in inner city Brooklyn. It's hard for me to read about child abuse, and I just kept waiting for an adult or friend to step in. Probably why I read to the end. The climax was anticlimactic for me.

"My eyes shot open; I thought, The horses have what people here have (Crown Heights, Brooklyn). They get beat down and locked up but still, when they run, nobody can stop them."

Spent all afternoon and evening listening to this audiobook while cleaning house and decluttering/reorganizing. I was looking for a light, inspirational read but this book is "mad dark." Complex and now I need to just finish it already. How will it end?!? #audible

Just started my first audiobook of the year! This one happens to be an audible book I own, which is great as I'm challenging myself to read my own books this year. #audible #currentlyreading #currentlylisteningto

Though the plot sounds a bit contrived, this is a richly textured character study that focuses on relationships within and between families. Also an exploration of race, class, age, and identity development. I didn't love it at first, but did by the time I finished it.

I really enjoyed this book. It's not so much a page turner as a character study. Mary Gaitskill writes beautifully and insightfully. The relationship between girl and horse is a powerful metaphor. And the insights into art, addiction and relationship ring so very true.

This book was uncomfortable to read in the best way. It was not a perfect read for me, but it made me think and feel and I respect it for that. I am definitely going to read more from this author.

My dear Mary Gaitskill has everyone talking about her new hit "The Mare" -- a tender, fierce story of love, disconnection, and horses. In other news, here we are checking mailboxes for the No Tokens letter writing contest. It's the year of Gaitskill!