So, to be perfectly honest, I'm not sure this is going to fit in our normal review format. I'm pretty sure that anyone who has clicked on this particular post is already going to be a fan of Hamilton, so there's no point in hiding spoilers (and to be fair, any spoilers are technically more than 200 years old so I think we're past the point where we need to "hide" the more titilating moments.
This book takes all of the songs, adds Lin Manuel Miranda's footnoetes (which are amazing if you care about rap, hip-hop, fun facts or joy), as well as sections taht explain how the show was written. Obviously, the songs are what you would expect (I cried while reading some of them, the same way I do when I listen to them...), the footnotes give you a small insight into Lin Mauel Miranda's writing process which was phenomenal. He covers everything from his musical inspirations to the original lyrics, to just general fun facts.
The more memorable parts were actually the section before each song. The sections focus more on how the show was made: the process of writing the songs, finding the right actors, adjusting sections to make them more powerful, figuring out the choreography. Basically the sections focus on the magic of storytelling on stage.
This is the point where I fully admit that I have listened to the soundtrack more times than I can count, and that Sam and I occasionally text each other segments of songs to keep each other interested at work. This is a book that should only be picked up by people who are in love with the show, or are interested in the process of getting a show on Broadway.
It doesn't change the fact that learning about cast dynamics and how the techies worked together was endlessly fascinating (again, I must admit I did theater when I was younger so yet again this hit every happy bone in my body), but there were also sections that were a little bit heartbreaking (of course, at the end of the book, surrounded by songs about losing children and having trouble with dealing with teh life after that). I cried so many actual tears.
This book is 4 out of 5 shots, mostly becuase while I unabashedly love this, it doesn't change the fact that this is definitely a book meant for people who already love Hamilton, (and I can't believe that I forgot to mention the pictures. They were AMAZING. For anyone who can't imagine the show and want a very basic framework for what it looks like, holy shit get this book.).
To read this book, go for a Sam Adams. Because it's literally referenced in the show, also Sam Adams is a founding father so BAM.
What I drank: WHY
YOU ASKIN ALL THESE QUESETIONS. WHAT DIDN’T I DRINK? WHATCHU BEEN DRINKIN
EH?!?!???
SPOILER FREE ZONE
Let me tell you.
About the one and true goddess. About the fire and the sword, dat ass and dat
Mohawk. About the heart and the soul. Good people I’m here to tell you about
Kitai today *choir hums*. Shidddd I just typed her name and got a body chill.
So. So. Sosososo bae.
anyway Codex Alera is an epic fantasy series about a quintessential
frontier farming family thrust into the maw of war and destruction. Count Bernard,
his sister, her nephew, Tavi (da GOAT) have to battle the natural spirits that
abound adjacent to them at the edge of
the wilderness. They encounter “barbarians” of all type:
the marat—pretty human but real closely spiritually linked
to certain animal groups, horses, (these giant ass wombats called) gargants,
and wolves.
Icemen – sound it out, that’s what they are.
The canim—an incredibly complicated race of dogpeople who
hate regular humans, aka “demons.” More on ‘em later…
The series features and capitalizes on your typical
political strife, but it’s complicated by their “crafting”. No, theyre not making
belts and fuggin wallets; by “crafting” they are harnessing natural elements
such as earth, wind, fire and water to (IAMCAPTAINPLANET) make their lives
easier and to make war. These wilde spirits or “furies” create the name of this
series and every non-barbarian not named Tavi has them (except for Kitai. I
haven’t forgotten her, I just teared up when I brought her up the first time.
And again now that I mention her. Meet me in the spoliers. Sweatergawd). His
aunt and uncle, his classmates, and errybody’s lovers, bastards, and slaves are
potential players in the complex game of chess that arises. When an alien foe
forces the disparate characters to untie, hilarity and beautifully explicit
warfare ensue.
So I’m only allowed to talk about the first novel in this
series since this post is ostensibly is about the series entirely. Suffice to say that this is a great first
edition in a six-nivel series that kept me engaged, interested, and guessing
what happened next. Page after page, book after book, I wanted to know how
these mofuckers were gonna use these furies to defeat the mofucking Huns on
some Mulan shit. Trust when I say: Tavi and crew GOT DOWN TO BIZNESS.
SPOILERS FOR THE REST
OF THE GODDAM SERIES:
I read all six of these books In like 3 weeks. I couldn’t
stop. Between the incredible but always believeable progression of the
characters’ development and the fucking manic progression of these massive
battles, I didn’t notice the pages flying by, and at each back cover I reached
eagerly for the next. Young Tavi is a G. I “knew” cuz Sam Kept asking me, “hows
tavi, hws tavi” and I was like “HEY SHUTUP” and she was all “ok no spoilers boo
but the marat are lit”. I was all like
hey. I’m writing a post, STFU!. So. Um. Yeah. As the First Lord (old ass
Obama) sees his power and influence fade, his political enemies and other fuckers attack
that vacuum UNTIL HE GODDAM FIRES A VOLCANO OFF ON THEM!
That inst me being drunk and exaggerating bc that’s not a
thing I do ever, nuh uh. It’s a real example of thekind of power these people
can bring to bear on their enemies.
That shit was cute until ppl realize that the vord are a
fucking problem. They are a parasite that turn niggas into to superhuman zombies.
They reproduce mad quickly and make a zombie out of anyone they capture.
Replete with mutated spiders and giant rhino fucking elephant murder machines
with scythes for hands, they are a P.R.O.B.L.E.M. It sucks and it’s scary but, spoilers, the
canim come through clutch (despite hating humans for centuries) because of
Tavi’s brilliance and the good guys win.
HOWEVER COMMA THE
TAVI-KITAI TEAM IS THE SQUAD.
(They are relationship goals to the max, and regardless of
whether tavi is breaking into the world’s most secure places or fighting a
legion of zombie-used-to-be-people-actualy-probably-alien warriors or freeing
slaves and breaking barriers, she remains bae. She’s flirty and brilliant and a
daring and a tactician and good with knives and I’m wet and she’s strong and.
Maybe she’s unnatainable.
Do I care?
OBVI NOT. Do I imagine her with a permanent snapchat doe
filter? Yes).
I flip-flopped in the final battle between being hella
impressed and amused at how much it felt like a Dragon Ball Z episode. People
are flying about willy nilly and throwing fuggin balls of fire at each other
around amountain and in a hurricane and it’s madness. Kitai and Tavi’s
connection make them an unstoppable tandem of feels and brawn and my Gaws do
you catch yourself rooting hard for them in their battle for the fate of
mankind.
Regardless of the satisfactorability (yeah I said it) of
that final battle, what doesn’t change is how I feel about these few characters
that survive annaihalation and their relationships. Effective, affective stuff
throughout
Writing style:
Each novel progeresses in a similar manner; though it’s
predictable, I never tire of it. The climax of each is within 90 or so pages of
the novel and the momentum that is created beforehand is inexorable. Within
each of these novels I found myself furiously page-turning, readyyy for how
this problem might be solved and how.
These characters similarly evolve, sometimes satisfactorily,
sometimes not; all I know is the style of these novels is what kept me coming
back. They had a rhythm and a relentlessness that I hadn’t seen before and I
want to find again, badly.
Rating: 4.69
shots of everclear, just cause you’re gonna be blown away and might be a vord-zombie by the end
Pairing: your surprise favorite drink. For me it’s a
“Sweet Baby Jesus” peanutbutter stout because I
didn’t wanna like it but found myself missing it because the new beerz I
tried after it aint have no girth, no body, and because I imagine it’s what
Kitai tastes like. Sue me.
What I Drank Prior: a 12 pack. Yes. I am a young skinny 27 yo woman and I am still functioning.
Spoiler-free overview:
So there's this chick named Serafina. She's weird. No one knows she exists except her dad. This middle-grade novel is wonderful. Basically people start going missing and she has to figure out why. I love it.
Spoiler-free thoughts: Characters: I love them. All of them. They're so real. They have these real life problems and insecurities that don't jsut "go away" after a pep talk. That's one of my biggest pet peeves is when mental ilness just goes away. ANYWHO these caracters are well done (dude i'm super drunk).
Plot: While the plot was benign and childish it was supposed to be. This is middle grade. THink of HP 1 through 3. Problem, puzzle, heroes solve, heroes win. That's this book. BUT it was executed in a way that was pretty unique. Pretty great.
Writing Style: Also pretty great. Nothing super literary but also awesome in some ways. I have plenty of quotes written down because they make me happy and stronger. I efel like middle grade does that more than other genres do. anyway READ IT.
What to pair it with: Something warm. A Hot Tottie for example. I looooooved this. super warm and fuzzie.
Rating: 4/5 Shots only because it was predicatable. I TRULY loved this book. read it please
Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco What I drank prior: at least 8 beers and a half bottle of wine. you think i'm lyin? it happened. Spoiler-free Overview:
Hokay, so. Obviously this is about Jack the Ripper. He's a scary dude. This YA retelling is about the girl that tries to take him down. She's a girl, in 19th centruy england, trying to learn how to be a medical examiner and do autopsies. SHe's all like, teach me bruh. Her uncle's like.... K. Dad doesn't like it. Mysteries happen, she tries to fix it.
Spoiler-free thoughts:
You guys, i wanna like this book. Stalking Jack the Ripper sounds super duper fun. But its basically a mystery that you can predict from the beginning.
Characters: Okay, fine. I LOVED the characters. Like legit, all of them are wonderful. Kerri does a great job developing characters that I fell deeply in love with. and it makes me really really embarrased that i did.
Plot: Look. THe plot was super predictable. It just was. I was talkin with parker about it and i knew before the 50% mark who Jack was. sorrrryyyyyyyyy
Writing Style: I liked that they had photos of various points in the story. They helped me figure out what was going on. ALSO, her wtriting style was good enough for me to fall in love with the characters. So. Yeah.
I HAVE NO SPOILER THOUGHTS BECAUSE IT WAS PREDICTABLE
What to pair it with: Miller lite. Its fine. Like, it will do the job, it will get you drunk, but its not great.
Quick notes. I drank plenty of wine, and a little bit of beer, and a gin drink before writing this. Also I technically read this book for a book club and talked through a lot of my feelings already with my friend Emma (THANKS EMMA!) so this might be a little more intelligble than normal (though no promises).
Spoiler Free Plot:
So this book is about the people who come back from their fictional worlds... the harry potter once he's kicked out of hogwarts, the Pensieve children after Narnia. It's a school for all of the people who no longer fit into the normal world. They are separated into high logic and high nonsense (rules versus nonsense?) and the great thing about this book is that all of the worlds are the slightest bit creepy. It's the sort of thing where if you aren't perfectly suited for hte world it's going to strike you as fucking strange (a la there's a world where everyone runs on rainbows and a spider world which thank you but NO!!!!!!). Nancy, our main character, has come from the Land of the Dead, where it's expected that you can keep preturnaturally still... She comes back to a world full of colors (as opposed to the mostly black and white world she spent so much time in) and has trouble adjusting. This book suffers from a few of the more traditional "I'm not like other girls" issues as well as the "most of the boys are meatheads." Basically it suffers from the kind of boring archetypes that you see in a lot of books which I think is mostly due to the fact that this book is less than 200 pages long. In the end the book is fascinating more for the world that it builds. I wanted to know so much more about the various fantasy worlds that the kids were rushed into, and how someone who wasn't perfectly suited to a world would be treated.... There was a lot to think about here that I really enjoyed. Honestly, there was a whole murder plot, but I found that a lot less interesting than the background detaisl..
Basic info. Nancy came from the Land of the Dead. She makes friends with Sumi, who comes from a High Nonse3nse world, as well as Kade (a logic world), Jack (Jacqueline) and Jill, twinse who went to a world that seems to be made up of monsters (think a world with dracula and the scientist who created Frankesnstein) as well as Christopher (who makes cbones dance? it's kind of awesoem and definitely a bit weird)... my favorite thing is that the fairy worlds are all a little bit off. Likethey sound like awesome places to be, except for a detail or two... The worlds are perfectly suited for the people who went to them but woudlnt' work for anyone else... It's kind of fantastic. Because I always felt that Narnia woudl have been fine with whoever made it through the wardrobe, where as these people did seem perfectly suited. Spoiler-y Explanation:
So there's this whole murder plot but it;s pretty easily figured out. Becuase there's less tahn 200 pages everyone given a name is either going to be murdered, the murderer or part of the gorup solving the murder. That does make it a little less interesting because it's pretty easy to figrure our who is the murdered (surprise surprise it's the creepiest girl's sister because it's slightly off of a red herring? Honestly not the most interesting course. Of course it's someone who came from a super creepy world...)
Still the explanations are what get you. There are details about a murdered girls world, where the leader of the world was using all the magic she had available to keep a door open in the girls home, which she would have foudn during a break but never had a chance becuase SHE WAS FUCKING MURDRERED. Honestly, this books biggest problem is that it easily could have fit in an extra 100 pages to give more details and I would have loved every page of itl!
Rating:
I loved this book if only for all the questionst aht it borught up about the world that it existed in. I wanted to know everything about the minor characters. I wanted to dive into the different worlds and understand the difference bbetween high logic and high nonsense and the difference between wicked and honest worlds and the axies of rhyme and reason and all the ridiculous stuff that his book brought up. I wanted to know about the other schools (for the people who didn't want to return to their worlds, and what the non-truamatic people dealt with while they were there). I want to exist in this world to see what would happen to the people once they grauduated. I literrally want a whole series of books in this world, which is why I give it a 4.5 out of 5 shots. Drink:
This book needs something appropritately whimsical. Honestly, the main character is obsessed with pomegranate juice so I feel like it needs to incorporate that... Maybe a Pomegranate Cosmo. The thing that fancy people order but slightly different because, pomegranate. I'm gonn have to keep thinking on this and might add an update but I feel like Pomegranate Cosmo fits this one.
The Regional Office is Under Attack! by Manuel Gonzales What I Drank Prior: All of the beers and then some wine. Sufficiently drunk I promise. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? (my friends say thats mean)
Spoiler-free Overview:
ok so I'm gonna try really hard to explain this book. So, tehre are two POVs... One on the Regional Office's side, the other tryna take 'em over. Thigns happen. Its basically an office that is under attack from the very people that it trained in the first place. Its crazy. Legitimately crazy. Robot hands? Super powers? Weird fuckin oracle shits? All of it.
Spoiler-free Thoughts:
Okay, so i finished this book and was liek "what the actual fuck just happened?" DId the quote go in the right spot there? not completely sure. BUt that's how i feel about it. The book was weird AF but so good.
Characters: Okay ,so there was thsi character named Rose and she's basically me. LIke, i copied and pasted some of her thoughts into a chat with Parker and he was like "yup, das you" and i had some trouble dealing with that. its tough having someone else in your mind. Its just odd.
Plot: Okay, so I'm reallly and truly not sure the plot. Is that.... weird? I loved it. I loved that i finished this novel not knowing what the plot was. Its weird.
Writing Style: It was wonderful. I loved it. ITs one of those things you write in a highschol yearbook "you rock don't ever change"
Spoiler Thoughts:
All I have to say is two things:
1. The hostage situation was legit terrifying.
2. And so was the arm moving on its own.
That's all.
What to pair it with: Loopy vodka shot. The vodka that tastes like foot loops? only because this book is WEIRD AF.
Rating: 4.5/5 Shots. ALL of the shots. they only lost .5 shots because i still have no idea what happened only that i loved it. That sounds horrible but i LOVED it.
