Search

Rainy Day's Books, Video Games and Other Writings

Open Search
Author

Raney Simmon

Book Review: Lucid

Rating: 4 stars

What if you could dream your way into a different life? What if you could choose to live that life forever?

Sloane and Maggie have never met. Sloane is a straight-A student with a big and loving family. Maggie lives a glamorously independent life as an up-and-coming actress in New York. The two girls couldn’t be more different–except for one thing. They share a secret that they can’t tell a soul. At night, they dream that they’re each other.

The deeper they’re pulled into the promise of their own lives, the more their worlds begin to blur dangerously together. Before long, Sloane and Maggie can no longer tell which life is real and which is just a dream. They realize that eventually they will have to choose one life to wake up to, or risk spiraling into insanity. But that means giving up one world, one love, and one self, forever.

I enjoyed every minute I spent reading this book, wanting to know what I was in for and what was going to happen with these two girls. I wanted to know all about how they came to dream of each other’s lives, and how it would all end. As a result, this book was an enjoyable read for me.

What made this story in Lucid enjoyable to me was reading from Maggie and Sloane’s point of view. While there wasn’t much in the way of character development in the story regarding these two, I didn’t read this story for the purpose of learning more about them anyway. I was more interested in the world they inhabited and how they came to discover they were dreaming each other’s lives. And while I didn’t get an answer, I was so absorbed in their world that it didn’t bother me a bit.

I especially loved seeing the domino effect that took place once Maggie and Sloane had someone they could talk to about their dreams. How they started seeing people from each other’s lives to the point where they had interactions with them even though nobody else could see them. It was page turning to see how telling someone their secret could change the landscape of their world, and lead to the truth of who was really the dreamer.

I also enjoyed reading this novel from a teenager’s perspective. I especially enjoyed whenever Maggie would talk to her therapist Emma about these dreams because of the psychological conversations that would come about as a result. It also made it interesting because she’d explain things to Maggie in a way nobody else did regarding her dreams.

However, what I both enjoyed and have some criticism for when reading Lucid that most people didn’t seem to particularly care for was the ending. I know a lot of people found it confusing, which is understandable. However, I found it fascinating because this book didn’t end at all the way I had expected it to. Yes, I figured we would discover at the end who was dreaming everything, but it happened so quickly that it surprised me.

But at the same time, I also didn’t like the ending. I didn’t like it just because there wasn’t a thorough explanation of why this book ended the way it did with regards to who was dreaming. It made sense because out of the two characters, she was the one who had more family and friends in her life, but the reasoning behind it all didn’t really align. Especially because it was never fully talked about with her character, just implied.

However, I overall enjoyed reading Lucid. I found these two girls dreaming of each other interesting and was sad when I finished this book because I wanted to know more about the dreaming and how it all started. I highly recommend this young adult, paranormal literature to readers interested in a different type of story with an ending that leaves you questioning and thinking about dreams in a whole other way.

If you have any recommendations that sound like this book’s story or know of any other books that left you thinking, please leave a comment below. I’d love to hear from you!

0

Book Review: Tigers, Not Daughters

Rating: 2 stars

The Torres sisters dream of escape. Escape from their needy and despotic widowed father, and from their San Antonio neighborhood, full of old San Antonio families and all the traditions and expectations that go along with them. In the summer after her senior year of high school, Ana, the oldest sister, falls to her death from her bedroom window. A year later, her three younger sisters, Jessica, Iridian, and Rosa, are still consumed by grief and haunted by their sister’s memory. Their dream of leaving Southtown now seems out of reach. But then strange things start happening around the house: mysterious laughter, mysterious shadows, mysterious writing on the walls. The sisters begin to wonder if Ana really is haunting them, trying to send them a message—and what exactly she’s trying to say.

I feel like I’m missing something here because this book wasn’t as haunting and dark as I was expecting it to be. Especially since it seems like a lot of people online enjoyed reading this book. However, I wasn’t at all enchanted by the journey this book attempted to take me on in its pages. But before getting into the meat of why this book didn’t meet any of my expectations, let’s begin with talking about what I enjoyed about it.

Tigers, Not Daughters is definitely a woman’s tale. All the main characters whose perspective we read from are women. The subject matter covered in this book’s pages is issues women deal with, and the story starts off interesting enough to get your attention. When I first started reading this paranormal story, I found myself interested in what I was reading, wanting to find out what happened next to the Torres sisters. The sudden shift in the story between the three sisters Jessica, Iridian, and Rosa didn’t bother me at all. It was interesting to see the three-player tennis match we were in when it came to the storyline going back and forth between these three siblings.

But after a couple chapters, I quickly realized how much of this book truly was a drag to read. Especially when I found myself not caring to hear the story from Iridian’s perspective. She was a character that while I can relate to a lot, I found it annoying when it was her turn to tell me what she was seeing and experiencing. When she had her first paranormal experience, I understood her reaction but simultaneously found myself not feeling very empathetic towards her when it felt like she was traumatized from it.

I felt like this story belonged to Jessica and Rosa, and that Iridian was the Torres sister none of us really cared to hear from. Her chapters provided nothing of context to the story because all she did throughout most of the book was stay in the house and read her book or write in her notebook.

Another criticism of this book I have is the lack of an actual story within its pages. You find out this family lost a sister, and that a year after her death, she’s haunting the house. You’d think after finding this out, we’d get a lot of paranormal activity in the house from Ana. However, that’s not what happened at all in Tigers, Not Daughters. The only time Ana gets seen is whenever she touches the bathroom shower curtain whenever Jessica is in the shower, and when she writes all over the walls in her room.

I also expected there would be some sort of explanation as to why Ana was haunting the home. Instead, she haunts the house without no real explanation that I could see from reading this book. I was also bothered throughout most of this book by Jessica’s actions, which made it difficult for me to read. Her actions bothered me so much that they make me wonder if, during the story, she was being possessed by her dead sister. If she was, that would add an interesting layer to this work of fiction that I didn’t think about. It would also explain some of the choices she makes since Ana’s passing, such as choosing to date Ana’s boyfriend John.

While this paranormal read was interesting at times to read, Tigers Not Daughters was a disappointing story to me. I struggled with reading this book and wasn’t satisfied with how it all came together. So if you decide this is a book you’d like to pursue, read it with caution and be prepared to be disappointed by what you find.

But there’s no possible way I’m the only person who’s read this book that didn’t enjoy it. So if you’re reading my review and found you didn’t enjoy this book, what about it did you not like? Was it some of the same things I’ve mentioned here or something else? And if you haven’t read this book but have a book you’ve recently read that you didn’t enjoy, what book was it and what didn’t you enjoy about it? Please comment below if you’d like to share! Until then, happy reading, and I can’t wait to tell you about my next read!   

0

Tips for Getting Out of a Reading Rut

As an avid reader, sometimes I find myself having difficulty choosing my next book to read. Or worse yet, I find myself reading a book I don’t particularly enjoy and end up having a difficult time choosing my next read.

Are you an avid reader who also has this experience occasionally? If you are, don’t fret. It happens to all of us readers, especially when you least expect it. For that reason alone, I’d like to provide some tips you can try if you find yourself in a reading rut and are unsure what to do next.

Start With What You Enjoy.

Struggling because you just started a book, but aren’t feeling it and are wondering whether you should put it down? The answer is always yes! If you are reading and find yourself struggling to continue because you just aren’t enjoying what you’re reading, close the book and pick out something else.

But don’t just start with any book. Find something you know/feel like you’ll enjoy. For example, if you have certain genres you know you always gravitate towards, and always find something you enjoy, choose a book from that genre. Or better yet, have a book that you enjoy rereading because it’s one of your favorites? Read that book because chances are you’ll enjoy it and find yourself even more eager for your next read.

Then, Read Something Different.

I know this might seem like bad advice since I just told you to read something you know you’ll enjoy. But bear with me on this. Sometimes after reading a book/genre you know you’ll enjoy, choosing something different can make you even more interested in reading. Why? Because you’re actively choosing to read something different from your usual. And I don’t mean go with something you know you’ll actively not enjoy. I mean choose a book that sounds different from what you typically read, but that has things that you know will interest you within its pages.

For example, before I went to college, I never gave science fiction much of a chance. But after taking a class in school where all me and my peers did was read science fiction and talk about what we read, I realized science fiction was a genre I could enjoy. However, I also realized that I wouldn’t enjoy every science fiction book I’d get my hands on either. That’s because I know there are certain aspects to science fiction I know I wouldn’t enjoy. But when I find something within science fiction that I know I’ll enjoy, I’m willing to give science fiction a shot.

Do the same for genres that you’ve thought about reading but aren’t sure if they are something you’ll enjoy. You never know, you might just find a new genre of books to read that you never thought of exploring before.  

If the Book Doesn’t Interest You, It’s Okay Not to Finish and Read Something Else.

Attempting to read a book but quickly discover it’s not holding your attention? There’s no shame in putting it down and trying something else. Sometimes what you enjoy reading might not be what you should be reading at that moment. I know there have been plenty of times when I thought I was in the mood to read something when I quickly realized I wasn’t interested in what I was reading. It’s okay if that happens to you, even when reading in the realm of books you enjoy. Sometimes reading within your favorite genre can be too repetitive. When you start to feel that way (because reading should always be fun), read something else.

Read at Your Own Pace.

Reading a book and quickly discover how much you like it? Continue reading it but read at your own pace. I know sometimes as readers, we’ll want to get through the story of a book to find out what happens next. However, you shouldn’t always do that because you might end up finishing it a whole lot faster than you anticipated. While it’s a wonderful feeling at times to find books you enjoy and finish them, I know I sometimes have in the past read books and then been sad I’ve finished the journey I went on.

For me, reading is a journey with each book I read because I never know what I will discover. So I feel like as a reader, we owe ourselves to read something, and if we’re enjoying it, take it at a slower pace. That way, we can continue reading the story and allowing ourselves the time to actually enjoy it.

That’s it for my tips for getting out of a reading rut! Did the advice I provide help in any way? Are there tips that help you out that you didn’t see here? Don’t hesitate to comment below if there are any tips or things that help you out of a reading rut that I didn’t mention.  

2

Book Review: The Power of Regret: How Looking Backward Moves Us Forward

Rating: 3.5 stars

Everybody has regrets, Daniel H. Pink explains in The Power of Regret. They’re a universal and healthy part of being human. And understanding how regret works can help us make smarter decisions, perform better at work and school, and bring greater meaning to our lives.

Drawing on research in social psychology, neuroscience, and biology, Pink debunks the myth of the “no regrets” philosophy of life. And using the largest sampling of American attitudes about regret ever conducted as well as his own World Regret Survey–which has collected regrets from more than 15,000 people in 105 countries–he lays out the four core regrets that each of us has. These deep regrets offer compelling insights into how we live and how we can find a better path forward.

As he did in his bestsellers Drive, When, and A Whole New Mind, Pink lays out a dynamic new way of thinking about regret and frames his ideas in ways that are clear, accessible, and pragmatic. Packed with true stories of people’s regrets as well as practical takeaways for reimagining regret as a positive force, The Power of Regret shows how we can live richer, more engaged lives.

This book about regret and its power is an unforgettable read. Jammed full of knowledge that takes more than one sitting to digest, Daniel Pink is very insightful and knowledgeable when it comes to discussing regret in human life and the role each of us must play with it. From discussing the four distinct types of regret we each experience to how to go about turning our regretful actions into a positive direction, Pink uses his research and knowledge to transform regret into a powerfully positive force we can harness to our advantage. As a reader, I found that Pink transformed my understanding of what regret truly is into something that can be more insightful than I initially expected.

I found the way regret was discussed in each chapter insightful. I particularly enjoyed how he brought about discussing all the different types of regret a person can have by providing real-life examples. While most of the examples provided were things I couldn’t particularly relate to, I feel like the context of the regrets discussed made sense to me. The research he used to back up his perspective was interesting to read as it helped tie any potential loose ends together.

What I didn’t enjoy when reading The Power of Regret, however, is that how to deal with your own regrets isn’t fully discussed. Yes, he mentioned a couple helpful pieces of information regarding what you can do when handling a regret you have. However, he never fully explained this information to you as the reader. If anything, this book covers the subject of dealing with your own regrets for a short amount of time in comparison to the discussion had about all the different types of regret you can experience.

I also would’ve loved to have gotten more information with regards to how dealing with your own regrets benefits you. I feel like this would’ve been an interesting topic to have brought up through this book because then as a reader, I can understand how powerful dealing with my own regrets could truly be. Also would’ve loved to see Pink discuss some of his own personal regrets too. Not because I want to know all about his personal life, but to see how he handled some of the biggest regrets in his life using the knowledge he’s shared in this book. Overall, I enjoyed reading The Power of Regret. I found the overall information gleamed within its pages very insightful and something everyone could learn a little bit from. It made me reflect on some of my own life choices I’ve made and think about what would’ve happened if I’d done some things a little differently.

2

Book Review: The Forgotten Hours

Rating: 2 stars

In this evocative debut novel, Katrin Schumann weaves a riveting story of past and present—and how love can lead us astray.

At twenty-four, Katie Gregory feels like life is looking up: she’s snagged a great job in New York City and is falling for a captivating artist—and memories of her traumatic past are finally fading. Katie’s life fell apart almost a decade earlier, during an idyllic summer at her family’s cabin on Eagle Lake when her best friend accused her father of sexual assault. Throughout his trial and imprisonment, Katie insisted on his innocence, dodging reporters, and clinging to memories of the man she adores.

Now he’s getting out. Yet when Katie returns to the shuttered lakeside cabin, details of that fateful night resurface: the chill of the lake, the heat of first love, the terrible sting of jealousy. And as old memories collide with new realities, they call into question everything she thinks she knows about family, friends, and, ultimately, herself. Now, Katie’s choices will be put to the test with life-altering consequences.

This book wasn’t the most enjoyable read to me for a variety of different reasons. However, before I get into all of that, I’d like to discuss what I did like about The Forgotten Hours. The very few things I liked about this book are the subject matter and setting of the overall plot in the story.

What I found enjoyable about this book with regards to the subject matter is how the story doesn’t shy away from talking about sexual assault. Talking about that subject is something that can be quite heavy, and I feel like the way it was discussed was very informative in this story. I think what made it particularly informative was hearing things from the perspective of someone who had a loved one accused of committing such a horrible trauma. In most books, you get the perspective of the traumatized victim when it comes to sexual assault. However, in The Forgotten Hours, the story is told from the perspective of Katie, the daughter of the man who was accused of sexually assaulting her best friend. I found it interesting to hear what she had to say about what happened with her friend because I wasn’t sure what her perspective would be. While I don’t agree with the way she handled the whole situation, I felt sympathetic to her because of the accused being her father and couldn’t imagine how traumatic it must’ve been having to deal with everything that came after.

I also enjoyed the setting of the plot in this book, from the cabin at Eagle Lake where Katie held so many memories to her new life in New York after the trial. I found hearing about the landscape of Eagle Lake very interesting and felt like I was along with her when she was in New York.

But there are so many things about The Forgotten Hours that I don’t like that, unfortunately, overshadow the aspects of the story I did enjoy. While I found it fascinating to read a story that talks about sexual assault from the perspective of an accused’s loved one, I found the way Katie reacted to her best friend’s assault very damaging. While I understand it’s her father that’s accused in the story, I really don’t understand how a character can be so utterly clueless and naive. Throughout the book, she insists on her father’s innocence. But she never once during the time the trial takes place or before he’s set to be released look into what happened. She testifies at his trial yet has no clue who else testified until she goes back to Eagle Lake to get their family cabin straightened out. It isn’t until her father gets released that she begins to question what she thought was true, not years before when the events this story focuses on takes place. While I understand she was dealing with trauma from her best friend accusing her father, I feel like she could’ve handled everything a whole lot better than she did. She sided with her dad without looking into whether he committed the crime he was accused of, which I feel is a very damaging thing to do. Especially since the person traumatized was supposedly her best friend.

Another criticism I have for this book is how bad the overall plot of the story turned. While I enjoyed hearing the perspective of an accused’s loved one, I found Katie herself to be annoying. From the beginning, she insisted on her father’s innocence without so much as looking into what happened that night. And as a reader, you start to believe in him too with the way Katie talks about their relationship. But then when she discovers there’s more to her father that she has no clue about, I find myself not feeling too sorry for her at all. Especially since she never actually pays too close attention to the trial until she goes back to her family’s cabin. And personally, it takes way too long for her to figure out there’s more to the story than what she believes to be true. So when we as readers find out the truth of what happened, it feels sudden. While I expected that to be the case, I didn’t like the direction this story went, and it made me hard to continue reading.

Along with a bad plot, The Forgotten Hours also had bad characters too. Not just character development, but the characters in this book themselves I wasn’t too fond of. I feel like part of the reason for this is because they are very one-dimensional. Even Katie herself didn’t have too many sides to her character in this story other than being naïve about her father and blindly believing in him at the expense of friendship.

As a result, The Forgotten Hours is a book I read that I’m glad I finished so I don’t have to ever pick it up again. It’s a story with a messy plot and forgettable characters that made me wish I never read this book.      

0

Book Review: A Lily in the Light

Rating: 4 stars

For eleven-year-old Esme, ballet is everything—until her four-year-old sister, Lily, vanishes without a trace and nothing is certain anymore. People Esme has known her whole life suddenly become suspects, each new one hitting closer to home than the last.

Unable to cope, Esme escapes the nightmare that is her new reality when she receives an invitation to join an elite ballet academy in San Francisco. Desperate to leave behind her chaotic, broken family and the mystery surrounding Lily’s disappearance, Esme accepts.

Eight years later, Esme is up for her big break: her first principal role in Paris. But a call from her older sister shatters the protective world she has built for herself, forcing her to revisit the tragedy she’s run from for so long. Will her family finally have the answers they’ve been waiting for? And can Esme confront the pain that shaped her childhood, or will the darkness follow her into the spotlight?

I really enjoyed reading this book immensely for many reasons. I wanted to know how Lily’s absence impacted her family and how Esme used ballet to cope with her younger sister being gone. I also wanted to find out what happened to Lily, who ended up taking her and why. Wanting to find out the answers to all these conundrums made this book a quick page-turner for me.

I was also interested in learning more about ballet from Esme’s perspective. She was a very interesting character, and I found her perspective in A Lily in the Light endearing. It was interesting to see how Lily’s disappearance impacted her life and how she ended up using her pain in her ballet performances. As a reader, you could tell that Esme was traumatized by her little sister’s disappearance and I found reading about her trauma interesting.

I also enjoyed reading this book because it had a happy ending. I’m not going into specifics about what happened other than saying that everything ends up being okay and I get answers to some of the questions I had while reading this book. It made me so happy that I found myself feeling emotional when reading A Lily in the Light because I was happy for the family. They had dealt with such a heavy loss when their child was missing that I was glad things turned out good for them in the end.

What was missing from this novel that I wouldn’t have minded seeing is a little of the story told from Lily’s perspective while she’s held captive. Not specifically everything that happens to her during that time, but just a little so that as a reader I could see what she was going through. Mostly because before her disappearance, she was one of my favorite characters in A Lily in the Light, so I wanted to see her more in the story since the book centered around her anyway.

Overall enjoyed this read and was sad when I finished it. I recommend this book to readers who love mysteries, ballet, and coming-of-age stories. It makes me want to read other books by this author to see if I enjoy them just as much as I did this one.

0

Book Review: Stray: Memoir of a Runaway

Rating: 3.5 stars

Brutal and beautiful, Stray is the true story of a girl who runs away and finds herself.

After growing up in a dysfunctional and emotionally abusive home, Tanya Marquardt runs away on her sixteenth birthday. Her departure is an act of rebellion and survival—whatever she is heading toward has to be better than what she is leaving behind.

Struggling with her inner demons, Tanya must learn to take care of herself during two chaotic years in the working-class mill town of Port Alberni, followed by the early-nineties underground goth scene in Vancouver, British Columbia. She finds a chosen family in her fellow misfits, and the bond they form is fierce and unflinching.

Told with raw honesty and strength, Stray reveals Tanya’s fight to embrace the vulnerable, beguiling parts of herself and heal the wounds of her past as she forges her own path to a new life.

This memoir was overall an enjoyable read for me. What made this memoir enjoyable is the way Tanya opens about all the troubles she dealt with throughout her adolescence. She covers everything-from the abusive and emotional manipulation she experienced from her parents to her issues with alcohol addiction to cutting. I also found it relatable to any young girl having similar experiences and found I could relate to some of the struggles she was dealing with. Her memoir, however, isn’t for the faint of heart so if you have any triggers, her story more than likely isn’t for you. But if you decide to give it a read anyway, tread carefully.

I also found learning about the gothic scene through the eyes of an adolescent interesting. I knew absolutely nothing about it prior to reading her words, and she was able to paint a picture of what it was like being goth during her younger years in a way that made sense to me. And while I didn’t appreciate the amount of alcohol and cigarettes she seemed to consume, I found the party scenes with her friends very interesting. I found it was a good way for me as the reader to learn more about Tanya and her friends since there wasn’t much in the story to give me an inkling of their relationship to each other.

What bothered me about Stray: Memoir of a Runaway is how misleading the synopsis of this memoir is to the reader. Yes, Tanya runs away from her mother. However, she goes to live with friends from school, and her mom knows where she is the whole time she left. There is nothing about her situation that I would consider would make her a runaway and it doesn’t even play that much of a role in the overall plot of what Tanya goes through. She also eventually lives with her father, but only because in her memoir she says he lets her do what she wants while her mother doesn’t.

I was also bothered by the lack of transition regarding her life. She apparently overcomes all the problems most of the memoir mentions, but there’s nothing specific in the story itself that pinpoints what causes these changes in her life. I know in one part of Stray, she mentions to one of her teachers that she writes poetry and begins to go to that teacher’s classroom during lunch to share what she’s written. Otherwise, there’s nothing in her memoir at all that shows to me as a reader how she comes to be the person she is today, and how she overcomes all the challenges she’s had to deal with in life. And that bothers me because I feel like we learn more about her when she’s rebelling against her parents versus when she’s able to make the changes to her life that result in her becoming successful. It bothers me because I want to find out those details about her in her memoir and I didn’t get them.

However, I did enjoy reading Stray: Memoir of a Runaway. It captured my interest as a reader and was a nice first book to get back to since my unexpected reading hiatus. I recommend this book to readers who want to hear about someone’s personal struggles without words being minced and people who also want to learn more about the gothic aspects of the story that I knew nothing about going into this read.  

0

Looking to Start Over

I know it’s been a while since I last made a blog post here. It wasn’t intentional, life has gotten quite busy since my last one. My husband and I got married in August, moved to another state, and I got a new job since we moved.  Also the last book I read (Lord of the Flies) wasn’t all too enjoyable for me. As a result, I felt like I needed a little bit of a break from reading.

I unintentionally ended up taking a break from my writing as well. But I’m hoping that I can now get off my hiatus from here and get back into writing blog posts again. I know I’ve missed it quite a bit, but also realize too that when you need a break you should take one when your able to. So I’m also trying not to be too hard on myself for it.

So I’d like to take this moment and acknowledge that I’ll be starting over on my blog. Not in the sense that I’ll be deleting my previous blog posts or anything like that. Just that since it’s been a while since I’ve written anything, I feel like I need to start over in general. Give myself a reset here. I’m not planning on changing any of the type of writing I do on here since I enjoy my little niche of talking about books, writing and video games.

What I want to start over on is with regards to how frequent my blog posts become. I don’t want to keep doing what I’ve been doing in saying I’ll be back only to leave and be gone for months. I want to try and make my blog posts on here more consistent whenever I’m able to. Like writing my book reviews whenever I finish a book I’m reading and putting down commentary on a game I’m playing once I’ve gotten acquainted with the game enough to where I feel like I can honestly be myself when talking about it.

I know life has been hectic lately due to the way things are going on in the world right now and want to acknowledge how that also easily played a part in my hiatus too. But I’m tired of not writing anymore like I used to and am ready to be back here that I hope this blog post is well received by whoever decides to read it.

If you’re reading this and are new to my blog, I welcome you and thank you for taking time out of your day to read this! If you’re reading this but are someone who’s been following me, I thank you for coming to read this post and for continuing to follow me despite the amount of time that’s passed since my last post.

I hope you all have been doing well during this crazy time and can’t wait to hear from you!       

0

Can I Call Myself An Author Now?

For the second time in the past couple years now, I can say I have had a poem of mine published once again! My first poem published was in an anthology called We Will Not Be Silenced which shares countless stories through poetry, prose and art of survivors of sexual harassment and assault.

Me holding my copy of We Will Not Be Silenced, which contains what will be the first of many poems I’ll have published in the future.

What made me decide to contribute to this anthology about sexual harassment and assault is my own personal experiences. The long story short end of the matter was as I was growing up having to deal with being bullied in school by boys in my elementary and middle school years. The bullying I experienced in elementary school from boys my own age was physical, such as tugging at my hair during class to one of the boys sitting behind me on the school bus and punching the back of my seat.

Once I entered middle school, the bullying became more harassment in nature. In my 6th grade English class, I found myself hiding my face during class because one of the boys was always puckering his lips and making kissing noises at me. I tried getting him to stop to no avail. I also had to deal with another boy that same year telling me that he wanted to kiss me and telling me that he knew I wanted to kiss him too even though I never expressed any interest in him. At that point of my life, I’d never kissed anyone so I was worried that he might try to force a kiss on me one day.

These experiences and many others I experienced growing up inspired me to write my poem because the phrase I use to title my poem is a phrase many of us heard growing up when dealing with harassment from boys. But in my opinion, I see the phrase as a crutch to excuse boys from their wrongful behavior, which just continues to perpetuate and allow them to act that way as they grow up.

My most recent poetry publication is in an anthology called Through the Looking Glass: Reflection on Madness and Chaos Within. This anthology’s main focus is on mental illness and the experiences each of us have with dealing with our battle against our mental illness. Since mental illness is such a taboo subject, this anthology is an important step in the right direction to beginning the process of people actually talking about their mental health problems instead of feeling like their having to cope with them alone.

My big struggle that I talk about in Through the Looking Glass is with depression. I make a comparison between depression being an everyday fight against a demon that I have to slay and conquer every day because that’s how my experience with depression has been since I discovered I was depressed. I discovered I had depression when I was in college when I started having dreams and waking up with tears streaming down my face during the night and not understanding why. But it was not until years later in 2019 when my best friend lost her fight against cystic fibrosis that I discovered my depression getting worse. The depression I experienced during my college years was nothing like the demon I found myself fighting against once I lost my dear friend, one of the few people who I felt like knew me and understood me as a person. But I’ve been conjuring it one day at a time and I feel like I’m doing so much better now than I’ve been for a while.

 I also have another poem of mine that’s going to be published in another anthology that’ll be coming out in the near future that I’m excited about.

But one of the many reasons I wrote this post is now that I have some of my writing being published, should I consider myself an author? I mean most of the writing of mine that is getting published is poetry and each anthology is only going to have one of my poems, each one different from the other. But I do not know if I should consider myself an author because of these poems being put out there because I do not know if I feel like I deserve that title.

At the same time though, I love the written word so much and being published in any capacity has always been a dream of mine. I know technically I have been published since college along with since I started this blog back in 2015 after I graduated from college. But there is something different about seeing your name in a physical book you can hold in your hands. And to me (along with this blog of course), that feels like a huge accomplishment. Nonetheless, I still struggle with assigning myself the title of author because I still cannot believe I have accomplished this much in what feels like such a short amount of time. And I really cannot wait to see where my writing will go from here, what other publications I will find myself contributing to in the near future.

0

Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑