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Books and Clevernesshttps://rdietz07.wordpress.comI am a creative writer and editor looking for a nice quiet place to put my thoughts! I love books, dogs, and knitting!
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Top 3 Books I Want To Read

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Hi friends! So this week I’m in a funky mood. I’ve been wanting to buy more books but I don’t have enough money and I already have a ton of books that I haven’t read yet that I need to read. It pains me to want to buy books so badly and not do it, but it’s for the best, I’m sure.

I have a pretty big collection of books. Most of them I’ve read but some of them I haven’t. Recently I’ve been trying to read all the books I own instead of going out and buying new books. This is great for my bank account, and it’s super difficult for me. So rather than pine and think of all the books I want to buy, I’m going to get myself excited about the books that I already own.

So without further ado, let’s begin:

  1. The Revenant – Michael PunkeTheRevenant_Poster

I actually just saw the movie based on the book and it was fantastic! I had no idea that this movie was a book first (published in 2015) and the second I saw the cover at Barnes & Noble I had to buy it. This is my most recent purchase and I’m just itching to read it. For those who haven’t heard of the book or the movie, the premise is about a trapper in the 1800s who is mauled by a bear and left for dead, but not before his son is killed before his eyes with no way to stop it. This book/movie is the ultimate book of revenge and vindication, and I can’t wait to read it.

Side note: The movie was incredible (yes, I will eventually do a Book vs Movie on this one). And I love Leonardo DiCaprio. He’s easily one of my favorite male actors. Everything he touches turns to gold (except his Oscar…. poor Leo.)

2. The Mole People: Life in the Tunnels Beneath New York City – Jennifer Toth

This is a book I’ve wanted to read since the mid-2000s but was a little too scared to. As someone who lives relatively close to New York City, I’ve walked those streets many-a-time and don’t really like thinking that there could potentially be an entire race of people who live beneath your feet in total squalor, but with a somewhat advanced society. I don’t know, it just always scared the living daylights out of me.

molepeopleBut recently I’ve wanted to learn more. I’ve been told that this book is fiction, but nearly everything I’ve read has said that this book is categorized under “non-fiction” and “history” and that fascinates me even more. This book and the stories told within it could be fiction or they could be facts.

It’s one of those things where when I think of it, my brain logically goes into “oh please, this is totally fiction” but slowly changes to, “hold up. Of course it’s true!” I mean let’s just discuss the possibility here for a second: New York City is completely overpopulated. Years and years ago it was so crowded that they couldn’t build outward anymore, only upward. Who’s to say that they couldn’t built downward as well?

Looking at an entire city filled with more than 8 million people spanned over 305 square miles, where are they all going to live? Let’s assume that each person has an apartment – that’s 400 square feet that they need to live in. At a certain point you can’t build flat anymore – you have to start building up. There’s unlimited space in the sky. Maybe having the world’s tallest apartment building isn’t the greatest idea, but hell! It gets people to be off the streets and in their own space!

So if you agree with the fact that you can’t build on the ground anymore, and can only go up, what makes you think you can’t go down? What in the world would stop people who don’t have the money to afford a NYC apartment from inhabiting the tunnels hundreds of feet below the surface? Nothing! They’ve already been excavated, you can continue to excavate the area, and you’re free of the windy air pummeling down on the other NYC homeless. And that’s why I absolutely can’t wait to read it. It’s just so interesting!

    3. The Lost Symbol and Inferno – Dan Brown

I know I’ve already discussed reading the first of the Robert Langdon series Angels & Demons but I’m just so so so excited to finish this series. I’m halfway through the second book, The DaVinci Code, and I’m absolutely loving it. My boyfriend was sweet enough to surprise me with the last two RobertLangdonbooks of the series so that I wouldn’t have to go out and buy them. (He’s a good man who knows the way to my heart!) And since then, they’ve been sitting on our coffee table just whispering, “read me! we love you! you know you’re curious! read me!” and damn is it hard to resist!

I’m not even halfway through the entire series and I’m already thinking this is one of the best mystery/adventure/historical fiction-ish series I’ve read. It has everything: history, murder, bad guys, guns, an awesome symbologist, super smart women, and conspiracy theories (that honestly make a hell of a lot of sense)! It’s amazing!

I highly recommend reading these books if you haven’t already (I know, I’m late to the Dan Brown game).

So those are the top three books that I have in my possession right now that I absolutely can not wait to read!!!!!!

If you have any books that you think I should read, or any books that you think I should add to my collection please feel free to let me know!

Until next time!

Rachel

e-mail: rachel@booksandcleverness.com

Angels & Demons – Dan Brown Review

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Hi friends! I’ve been meaning to write this post for the last week, so I’m really excited that I get to write it now. “Rachel, why are you so excited to write this blog?” Because, friends, I have finished the very first book in my quest to read all of the Robert Langdon series by Dan Brown. angelsanddemons

I know, I know. I’m super late to this party. Here’s how it happened:

On New Years Day I watched The DaVinci Code on Netflix. My boyfriend and I hadn’t watched this movie since it came out in theatres (2006, holy shit!), so I was really excited to watch it. I’m a huge fan of history, a huge fan of secret societies (hay, Masons, haaaay!) and a huge fan of adventure movies, particularly when there’s a mystery involved.

What I remembered about the movie was minimal, so I really had an open mind going in… I was enthralled the entire time. My boyfriend not so much, but I loved it. So I immediately decided I needed to read the series and we took a late night trip to Barnes & Noble and picked up Angels & Demons and The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown.

I think I’ve mentioned that recently – maybe in the last year or so – I’ve been reading at a much slower pace than usual. Well, when I started reading Angels & Demons on New Years Day night, I read 75 pages which is basically a full 50 more pages than I’ve been reading per night (A fact that I’m incredibly ashamed about – I’m sorry! I just get sleepy!)

To say that I was excited about these first 75 pages is an understatement. I wasn’t just excited, I was involved. I was in Rome with Robert Langdon and I was seeing a dead scientists on the floor with a brand on his chest. In fact, I was so involved that for the next four weeks I read A&D almost every night and finished the more than 700 page book and was so incredibly proud of myself. Again, I hadn’t been reading more than TWENTY-FIVE PAGES PER NIGHT. I don’t know if you know how long it takes to finish a book by reading twenty pages per night, but the answer is: a long time. A lot longer than I want. It really is almost a shameful amount because I had been reading 100 pages per night easily for a very, very long time.

Anyway, finishing the book was awesome and sad. It was an amazing book and I got to start the next one in the series, but it was also a great book that I didn’t want to end.

So let’s get into the review. 5 stars. 100%. A+. Seventeen thumbs ups.

Seriously, I have not read a book that I have enjoyed this much since The Martian back in July 2015. That’s a long ass time, man.

This book, for starters IS the first book in the series. Why The DaVinci Code movie came out first, I have no idea. My only guess is that it was more popular than the first book and could easily be an independent story, separated from the rest. But nonetheless, it is, in fact, the first book of the series. It goes:

  1. Angels & Demons
  2. The DaVinci Code
  3. The Lost Symbol
  4. Inferno

Now, A&D was incredible. Again, I know I’m way too late jumping on the bandwagon, but honestly I’m really glad that’s happened because now I know that there’s a solid movie series to go along with the books when I’ve completed them.

I remember when the movie Angels and Demons came out and I remember loving it. But I don’t remember anything else. There were little snippets of memory that I thought might be from the movies but I wasn’t sure (like some guy being branded by a fire) but I didn’t remember who was good and who was bad. That made reading this book even better.

I know that I’ve discussed this, but I actually don’t mind seeing the movie version before the book version because then I get an idea of how someone looks, I can really imagine their features and facial expressions. I’m not saying it’s great for every movie, but I’m never really upset that I saw the movie first. That’s only happened a handful of times.

That’s why when I was reading A&D I had so much fun following around Robert Langdon. Not only is the character strong, funny, intelligent and fun to follow, he also looks exactly like Tom Hanks in my brain and I’m A-OK with that. Who doesn’t want to think about Tom Hanks before bed? He has such a soothing presence.

This book was witty, funny, sad, emotional, thrilling, and every other adjective under the stars. It was an absolute joy to read and it made me really look into the historical side of the societies Brown brings up. He’s a phenomenal writer and a brilliant man when it comes to intertwining historical and factual references into completely fictional situations. Not to be confused with historical fiction. He is not a historical fiction writer. He is simply wonderful at using facts about history to support his own crazy fictional adventure.

I would liken this book to something a little more for young adults: the movie National Treasure with Nicolas Cage. I don’t care what anyone says, I really like Nic Cage. Rage Cage is awesome, and he might not be the best actor but he sure is fun to watch. My boyfriend and I have been saying we’re going to watch Pay The Ghost for a while now, and maybe we just will this weekend! (Note: my boyfriend and I are people who really enjoy B movies and not great movies/movies with maybe not so great actors. We also like to be entertained. If you are like my sister and her husband, this movie, or anything with Rage Cage in it may not be suitable for you. You’ve been warned.)

Anywho, I really highly recommend this book to people who love history and who love to be challenged when reading a book. This book will keep you on your toes the entire time and I guarantee that if you don’t mind a reading a huge fucking book (700+ pages) with a lot of plot twists before you get the truth, you will LOVE this book. Go get it!

I’ve also just begun The DaVinci Code and I can’t wait to finish it. It’s about 500 pages, and I’m about a third of the way through, but it’s already amazing. I even remember the plot from the movie and it’s still good. I’ll keep you all posted on my thoughts of that book and the next books.

I’m instituting The DaVinci Code as the February book for the Books and Cleverness book club, but you can read whatever you want. Just get those books under your belt!

Well, that was a long one.

Until next time!

Rachel

e-mail: rachel@booksandcleverness.com

Book Club???

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Hi blog friends! This post is going to be incredibly short, so I’ll just get to the point:

Does anyone want to do an online book club?

I’m on Goodreads, which is an awesome app for anyone who really enjoys reading and sharing their opinions. You can log the books you’ve read or want to read and can categorize them in any way that you want. It’s really spectacular. Nevertheless, every year they have a reading resolution where you can set a goal for yourself. For example, I’ve decided that over the course of 2016 I will read 15 books.

I know, I know. Fifteen books isn’t that much. But that’s my point: I want to surpass it and see how much more I can read. I have a busy schedule and it’s with a heavy heart that I say (and you know) that I haven’t been writing or reading as much recently. I used to get into bed at 9pm and read until 11pm and I would just plow through books. But now I’m in bed at 9pm and asleep by 10pm, and read maybe 50 pages a night. It’s a rough life.

Hopefully that’ll change this year, though. I thought the best way for me to commit to reading the books I’ve been wanting to read (in a more timely manner, of course) is by starting a Books and Cleverness book club. We read fifteen books over the course of the next 11 months, and I’ll write my reviews on them and we can share our opinions in the comments or you can e-mail me (my e-mail address is rachel@booksandcleverness.com).

If anyone is interested I’d be more than happy to pick some books that I’ve wanted to read or you can give me some ideas of books you want to read and we can combine them and create our own book club!

I’d just like to end this by saying even if no one wants to do a book club with me, DAMNIT, I’M DOING IT ON MY OWN!

Get ready, 2016. Books and Cleverness is gonna read aaaaall over you.

Until next time,

Rachel

P.S. Happy Anniversary Books And Cleverness!!

The Wave – Todd Strasser : Warning! Opinions!

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Hi blog friends! I’m going to start this blog by saying that I’m a total nerd. As if writing a blog about books wasn’t a huge clue to you, yes: I am a nerd. I’ve always been a literature geek, and I’ve always been super into history. Fortunately, that means I’m incredibly well-read and bitch I can school you on the goddamn Dust Bowl! Unfortunately, it means that I can’t tell you anything about physics and if you ask me for change I will need to pull out my calculator. The things you sacrifice for art.

Rachel? You might ask. Where the hell is this going? I’m glad you asked, friend. You see, a little while ago my significant other told me about a book that he loves to this day. It’s called The Wave by Todd Strasser. The book is actually based on a real life classroom experiment gone wrong. The premise is exactly the same as what happened in real life, only fictionalized to bring in the human interest side of the novel.

It’s about a history teacher that was trying to teach The Holocaust to his students, but his students couldn’t understand how the people of Germany, and the surrounding Nazis, could just blindly follow someone and do horrible things. The teacher tried to explain to them that sometimes people just get caught up and can’t find a way out. The students still couldn’t understand. To them, it makes no sense how someone can forget their morals and do what everyone else around them is doing just because it’s the hip thing to do. (Am I old for saying “hip”?)

What the teacher decided was to give his students “order”. He taught them about “strength through discipline” and gave them specific rules to follow and specific ways to address him. Mr. Ross, the history teacher, finds that this works incredibly well with his students until they start a movement in the school called “The Wave”. Anyone in the classroom that Mr. Ross is using the “strength through discipline” technique is a part of The Wave, and if you don’t join, members of The Wave get violent and cruel.

A group of people from the school newspaper see the terror in this and try to expose the true story: When there is someone or something to blindly follow, people who have incredibly strong opinions will defend it no matter the cost. The school soon sees what Mr. Ross has been doing to the students – getting them to understand how a huge sum of people could be inclined to do stupid and horrible things just because everyone else is doing it.

This is an incredibly short novel, it’s less than 150 pages, and honestly it doesn’t need to be any longer – it gets to the point very easily and anything more would just seem drawn out.

The thing that really interested me about this novel was not the historical implications or the way that the author writes about how a school could get caught up in such a thing. Instead it made me think of the modern world and how that same thing happens in so many different countries all over the world.

For example, remember back in 2011 the revolution in Egypt? There was a tyrannical dictator for 30 years, and people had had enough. A congregation of about two million people of all races, ethnicities, and religions came together in Tahrir Square to do a sit-in until President Mubarak stepped down. And you know what? He did.

But the revolution didn’t stop there. Because after that joyous occasion, different groups of people began to come into the light under the guise of wanting to better the Egyptian society. Unfortunately, the next elected president, Morsi, wanted almost complete power in Egypt (declaring himself Egypt’s “new pharaoh”) and the people that had followed him and wanted him to president to better Egypt were now stuck between a rock and a hard place: do they follow him when he’s saying to attack anyone who opposes him? Or do they fight for what they believe in?

This is the same thing. Maybe it’s in a different century, but it’s still a People that wanted a better life for themselves and their children, following someone that may not have all of the citizens best interests at heart, but promised a better life, and ended with yet another dictator stronger than the last.

If you don’t remember the revolution or if don’t know about it, I highly recommend looking into it because something like “the wave,” or the Egyptian revolution can happen at any time. The thing that matters is sticking with what you believe in and not letting anyone tell you how you should act, how you should think or what you should believe in.

…Well, that was my rambling way of saying that this book is frickin’ awesome. It’s very short, it’s to the point, but the message is incredibly strong. Humans are prone to faults, that’s just a fact. But the important thing is to realize that even though we can be clique-y and often way too stubborn in our beliefs, that doesn’t mean we have to be mean or cruel to people to get that point across. That doesn’t mean that we can’t have brains, and use our words instead of taking radical action.

History is always doomed to repeat itself if we don’t first understand how it comes to be in the first place.

Alright. It’s time for me to grab a piece of chocolate and read Dan Brown’s Angels & Demons – AKA  I’m going to get into bed and never come out again until I find out what the damn ending is.

Until next time, friends!

Rachel

email: rachel@booksandcleverness.com

Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling Review

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Well, I officially suck at consistency. It’s been almost two months since my last post, and the only thing I can say is: blame it on the holiday season? Please?

Today I’m going to give you a little bit of insight into my actual human life and not just my blog life: I am a person with a lot of anxieties. Unfortunately, I’m also the type of person who will have a panic attack and think, you know what I should do? Watch a serial killer documentary. Probably not the best idea, but how else am I supposed to know how to get away with murder?

My family and my boyfriend are always so helpful, though. In December my boyfriend told me I should stop reading Holocaust memoirs and read something a little more uplifting. Good job, boyfriend. Good job.

So I put down the book and we went to Barnes and Noble to pick out books together. I bought a few books including Yes Please by Amy Poehler and Mindy Kaling’s Why Not Me? I remember talking to you guys about Mindy Kaling’s first book, Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) and telling you how awesome it was. So when I found out (way too late in the game, I might add) that Mindy had written a new book, I was stoked and could not wait to get home to read it.

I have to say, I was a little disappointed. Not because it wasn’t a funny book, or an entertaining book, but because I thought that now that Mindy Kaling is a little more famous than before, she tried to pander a bit to her audience, but ended up doing it in a bad way.

I’ll explain:

Since her first book was released she has been a role model to women and girls of all ages, of all sizes and shapes, and of all colors. Kaling openly admits to being a size 10 in both of her books, and in the first one she makes a big deal about being content with how you look. Personally, I thought that was an incredible message to send out to people. As a woman who is bigger, myself, I see and feel the pressure every day for women to look a certain way. There isn’t just pressure towards bigger, curvier women to be smaller, there’s also pressure towards skinny and less curvy women to be slightly bigger – to be a Victoria’s Secret Model. Everyone wants to make the perfect potion to make themselves look a certain way: add a pinch of C-cup boobs, a sprinkle of the perfect tan, a dash of a toned and flat stomach, a half a cup of flawless skin, and an eye of newt.

But to be frank, all of that is complete bullshit. There’s so much pressure in everything you do: jobs, relationships with other people, goals, there’s even pressure when you drive (screw you guy behind me – I’m going 5 miles over the speed limit, get off my butt). The only thing you can do to help yourself is tune them out. Do what you think is right. Be proud of how you look. Don’t let anyone tell you what you should and shouldn’t do. Every BODY is different, and there’s a reason for that. It’s not because we need to be the same, it’s because we’re SUPPOSED to be different.

But I digress… In Mindy Kaling’s second book she kind of does a 180 from her original opinions. I don’t think she means to, I actually think she’s trying to convey a better message. But here’s what happened:

Kaling tries to say that she’s a real person too and sometimes doesn’t love the way she looks. That’s an awesome message, I agree. It’s important for people to understand that those thoughts and feelings are completely normal. But then she goes on to tell a story: A magazine or website or something of that nature put her on a list of the most beautiful curvy and bigger women in Hollywood. Again, that’s awesome. Except that Kaling then says that she looked through the list and saw people twice her size and thought, “why am I on a list with these heifers?” What a horrible thing to say.

I understand that she’s a comedian and was just making a joke. But why would you spend your career trying to be a role model for plus size women and then bad mouth them at the same time? That’s not right. And while I love Mindy, I think she’s hilarious, a phenomenal writer, and a really great role model, I also think she should’ve left that part out of the book.

We all say things we don’t necessarily mean, or say things that might sound a little bit cruel without meaning it to, but that doesn’t mean that it’s okay to tell people to love their body and stop shaming each other for how they look and then call them a “heifer” – that’s just mean.

I feel like the majority of the book was written to get people to look at her as a regular human, but she just went about it the wrong way. I completely understand telling your audience that even the most confident person will still look in the mirror and want to change something. What I don’t understand is giving your audience that message, and then adding to their insecurities by telling them that if they’re bigger than a size ten it’s okay to make fun of other people and call them fat.

And look, as I’ve mentioned before, I LOVE Mindy. I think she’s awesome. But that doesn’t mean that I’ll always agree with what she says.

SOOO, after that long rant, I would like to point out some things I thought were awesome in the book:

  • Kaling talking about her anxieties. This was helpful since, as I mentioned before, I’ve been having a lot of panic attacks recently.
  • Kaling discussing her thoughts on marriage, love, sex, and friendship. A lot of celebrities don’t delve into their personal relationships as much as she did and I thought that was an amazing way to feel closer to your audience and for the audience to feel closer to her.
  • Learning her keys to success.
  • How to make it in Hollywood! (Spoiler: no one knows the answer. It’s all about luck)
  • Her time with President Obama.

I very much recommend reading this book, I just suggest you take what she says at face value and not idolize her and take what she says as gospel. Because everyone is different, and no one should feel like they’re being made fun of for how they look.

Hopefully I’ll be writing more soon. I have about 10 different blog ideas that I’m super excited to write about. So stay tuned!

Until next time,

Rachel

e-mail: rachel@booksandcleverness.com