The Regrets | 
Recommendations for works with a similar vibe but a completely different tone/voice:
•Watch Beetlejuice (film)
•Watch Ally McBeal (tv)
•Listen to Ashes of American Flags by Wilco (song)
Respectively, you‘ll get:
•A glimpse into the bureaucracy of The Afterlife
•The inner machinations of a self-involved woman obsessed with The Daydream
•The heartbreakingly-painful sentiment, “All my lies are always wishes...I would die if I could come back new.”
panOne of my most anticipated reads of 2020. I love it when ghost stories wear literary fiction as a sheet, with holes cut out for the eyes. Something about the synopsis reminded me of The Waiting Room from “Beetlejuice,” & I could not have been more excited about the perceived resemblance.
Despite my negative rating, I have to admit: conceptually, I continued to find the story interesting. 👇🏻
This is a weird little book so far and I‘m not sure how I‘m feeling. Would definitely recommend for friends of the Pisces. But the cover is great.
so-soI don‘t know if a so-so rating is fair other than it wasn‘t what I was expecting. I can tell that a lot of thought and time went into this book and the cultural references point out that the author is well read/ educated. I felt like there wasn‘t much distinction between characters, male or female. Perhaps it was intended or I was just seeing the author in all of her characters. I thought this book would be more philosophical or psychological 👇
I‘ve never been more “Me”: (ghost) book in hand, bun in lap, smile on my face. 👻📖🐰😍
To date, this book was on my Top 3 Most Anticipated Reads for 2020. It‘s not going as well as I expected. I keep vacillating between like & dislike. Sometimes, it‘s so painfully hip & judgmental. See:
“He seemed to have many fully developed theories about me, most of them now confirmed...”It makes total sense that you grew up in Maine...I bet you can knit. Of course you like Almodovar...Who‘s your favorite Japanese writer? Let me guess, Mishima.”
“The wheelchair?
“Yes.” My mother hadn‘t forgotten the word; she simply considered it indecent to speak aloud of misfortune (or sex, for that matter) & angled whenever possible for others to do it for her. When it was necessary to speak these words, she did so in a whisper. “You know,” she‘d say, “he has *cancer,” or “she got *pregnant.” To this day, as far as I know, she still has never fully voiced a wide range of words, from “suicide” to “wig.”
“I looked at him a lot. I touched him all over with the fingers of my eyes.”
Guess if I like the above phrase?
That‘s a hard “no.”
#bookhaul When all your pre-orders arrived at once! 😳💸.... Thank goodness for my 40% employee discount! Now.... how to sneak them in the house?...🤫
No! I‘m reading two books already that I own and I went to pick up my book hold from the library, The Regrets, and The Lost Book of Adana Moreau and A Bookshop in Berlin were both on their new release shelf! I couldn‘t leave them there, but I hope I can read them all within the next three weeks. Super excited to read these!
re·grets
/rəˈɡrets/
plural noun
“Incursions of the past into the present. Threats to one‘s temporal integrity. An inability to coexist with oneself.”
About to dive in. I‘m a little bit nervous. I‘ve been waiting so impatiently for this! 💖
I don‘t normally do a #weeklyforecast post; I‘m too much of a mood reader to come up with such an organized plan of attack.
BUT. The Regrets came in for me at the library this week & there‘s *no way* I‘m not reading it next. So:
•FINISH Such a Fun Age
•START (& finish) The Regrets 👻
•FINISH Lady from the Black Lagoon (audio)
•START Little Women (audio)
•Recommit to poetry in the morning & try to come close to finishing Spell (by Lauterbach) 🔮
I thought I‘d start a hashtag for books we are looking forward to reading next year....
I‘d love to see what new releases you are excited about... these are the beauties at the top of my list 📚
Tag me and use the hashtag #mostanticipated2020
I‘d love to see your lists 👍😊💕
