Welcome to Litsy!

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“If one word can mean so many things at the same time then I don‘t see why I can‘t.”

“They are all wrong. There‘s a reason why we have no word for it. You don‘t get to keep the feelings for someone you once loved. Once you‘ve washed your hands of that person, all those feelings, all that dirty water is washed out to sea. There is no word for that dirty water.”

While the writing itself was extraordinary in its own rights, could not understand where it was heading. Was a good slow read though. Set in a small fishing town, which has the highest alcohol drinking in the nation, there‘s not a lot that happens. The way suicide was handled did not sit well. It felt to me like it was mystifying the act instead of finding a way to heal. Did like the varying ways everyone tries to get through. Odd no sense ending

Beautiful lake day. One of my favorite places to sit back and relax with a good book. This is an intriguing story of a young lady pinning after an admittedly older war veteran (with ptsd). She also believes herself a mermaid. Which I think is a coping mechanism for her fathers suicide. While not sure of the plot, age gaps of more then 10 years irks me, the writing is amazingly done. I can feel every written words passion.

Lovely, murky and sad.
I really loved this story 💜

Day after surgery goals 😜🤓

I broke myself real good, so expect to see a lot of me posting about all the reading I will be catching up on while convalescing 😜

This has easily risen to my top five favorite books PEROID. What is real? A story combing the fantastic, grief, women, and the water.

Not gonna lie, making the spreadsheet for reading challenges is probably my favorite part. 🤷🏼‍♀️ #Booked2020

Set in a small fishing village, a young girl, who believes she is a mermaid, falls in love with an older troubled man.

I‘ve seen a lot of varying reviews on this one, but I loved the beautiful prose and re-read some of the lines multiple times. The story is a slow, engulfing one. #24B4Monday

Set in a northern coastal town with the highest rate of alcoholics per capita, the teenage narrator falls in love with an older man damaged by his time in the Iraq war. This book is smart, sad, fantastical, and real. Oh, and did I mention the narrator might be a mermaid?

A new independent bookstore opened up near me so of course I just had to go check it out. The wonderful hubby even bought me books! #bookhaul

#7days7covers Day 6 #covercrush

Day 4 The Seas

Post your favorite cover for 7 days no explanation needed.

#7covers7days #7days7covers #coverlove #covercrush

“The Seas” is a *little* too murky & a *little* too pretentious but it‘s mostly just brimming with literary magic (as confirmed by the shimmer in this photo, which definitely isn‘t just the result of a sunblock-streaked camera lens). Mental health, story, & language are strong themes. I‘m eager to read another, more recent title from Samantha Hunt to see how her talent has grown.

“Subject delusional — she wholly believes in the elements we fabricated for this experiment, namely,
love
death
ocean
mercy
The words fall like drops in some ancient water torture.”

“I see my grandmother Marcella walking on the line that makes her name. Mare is the sea and Ciel is sky so her name means seasky. She is the horizon line. She‘s as big and bright as a sun setting.”

“On the surface of the ocean, the tallest theoretical wave made by the wind could reach a height of 198 feet. This would be called a rogue, any wave over seventy feet is called that. He told me little is known of these waves because if you see one you most often die. These rogue waves usually come in threes. The three sisters is what they are called and I thought, just like the dry land to name the cruel things in the water after women.”

“Last week he brought me a miniature bouquet, like a bouquet for a mouse. It was one or two purple asters, their stems wrapped in the foil from a peppermint patty.”

Starting a new book with my little Moo this morning.

#7days7covers #covercrush Day 5

Day 2: #7covers7days #covercrush

Full of gorgeous prose about my favorite thing: the sea!

The writing is beautiful, the narrator is unreliable, the storytelling is sparse, magical, and poetic. This novel somehow has a bit of everything in it: a mermaid, King Neptune, a long lost father, a deaf community, a veteran suffering from PTSD, watery dreams, romance, and a seaside village.

Wow—- I‘m extremely impressed! This book was amazing! It‘s very rare that, even while reading a book, I know that I‘ll return to it again and again, but this is one such book. It was incredibly well written, and the writing style was so unique and interesting that I kept exclaiming to myself in delight. Definitely a new favorite of mine! Magical realism meets the stuff of legends and fairy tales. Highly recommended! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️!!

Suddenly I am recategorizing my books (and shelves) in my head based on how I feel about the author ❤️

I don‘t know why, but I had a hard time with this particular story containing a suicide. It wasn‘t the best time to read this book. I lost a friend to suicide in 2016 in similar circumstances, that same year is when I tried as well. The anniversary passed recently. I wouldn‘t recommend to people who has lost anyone in the same manner of suicide. As an advocate for suicide awareness now, I thought I should share my experience and let others know

These are the books that I read in December. This is NOT representative of how I live my life in a normal month. This IS representative of my last minute panic trying to achieve my goodreads challenge goal.

"I always thought it was because the ocean is like a one-of-a-kind thing, like there is nothing else similar to it in the entire world and so the ocean feels no love, no mother, no father or husband, like a space alien. I always thought that just made it an extremely nasty and greedy thing, like an only child."

You guys! @erinreads is the best! Look what arrived today. I'm so touched. Thank you, Erin! 😍😍😍

Look at the gorgeous cover art on this book! I‘m so excited to read it. I loved Mr Splitfoot so much. 😻

Of course I had to buy this book as soon as it came out, @Tin_House creates these beautiful little hardcovers and I‘m kind of obsessed. But I only just started reading it. So far it‘s as strange and lovely as I hoped it would be.

I‘m in a book club with some friends from college. We graduated 10 years ago & started the club 5 years back when we felt we were starting to drift apart. It‘s done wonders for keeping us in touch, ensuring that we get together (via video chat; we‘re spread across the country) to talk at least once a month.

All this to say: there‘s 6 of us. We each get to choose 2 books to read a year. The time is nigh for picking 2019 books! Top 2 choices above.

Might‘ve bought some books on vacation? Visited four bookstores in NY and got something at every single one. Even saw the sweetest fat cat at one of them. 😻 Love a good vacation #bookhaul! #catskills

Day 4 of #riotgrams was #shelfie - but I didn‘t take a pic of my own bookshelf. I was at #NYCCNYPL yesterday and I ducked into the NYPL gift shop, and they have a section of ex-library books. This beautiful edition of “The Seas” was on display, and I thought a moment about buying it. Maybe I should‘ve. But I‘m trying not to buy multiple copies of books I own, even if I love them. Oh, gosh, look at that gorgeous mermaidy cover. 🧜‍♀️ @bookriot

The Seas is about the stories we tell to establish a sense of identity and carve out a narrative for ourselves. It‘s likely that the narrator is in fact insane, but she tells her story with utmost conviction, her only way of making sense of the world around her. I struggled with it at first, and then finally found my rhythm in the second half during the buildup and aftermath of the striking climax. The writing is compelling and evocative.

I am so glad this got republished with a fancy new cover (though the original cover is also great). This would have been beyond my radar when first released so appreciating the buzz that clued me in.

There is SO MUCH in this book and it‘s glorious and terrifying, like the ocean. I‘ll be looking for all of Samantha Hunt‘s other work now.

“You‘ll never know what being scared is like. Only mothers can really know.”

“Just like the dry land, to name the cruel things in the water after women.”

This book feels slow and quiet, but with writing like this, I don‘t care if nothing happens.

Now this is more like it!

I lost a lot of sleep last night reading the Seas, but this guy just slept right through it.

My indie bookstore haul from yesterday! All but two if these I bought used and for really good prices (the Valente and the Hunt I bought new). Really excited to pick these up soon! #bookhaul Also I was surprised to see a recent #botm pick in the used book section

Excited to start this one tonight.

Mornings with this book that keeps drawing me in.

I've had this on my TBR stack for a few months now, but loaned it to my father yesterday after he finished Mr. Splitfoot. He's usually a slow reader but he handed it back to me at breakfast with a one sentence review: "Samantha Hunt is seriously messed up." Just might have to read this one next...