ren > Recent Status Updates

this book is so bad

Just finished the second story ‘our lady of the quarry’… usually I don’t understand the appeal of horror as a literary genre as how can you truly immerse a reader to experience the most primal of feelings, just through words.. I appreciate the craft but I don’t usually get it… that story though, I felt pure horror, actual crushing doom as I read the end. Teenage girls are so evil.

I think after this I’m going to find every single thing she’s ever written..

Again, with the next short, ‘encounters’, I’m beginning to think Joyce has a penchant for spoiling childhood innocence… this short also revolving around the dubious malevolence of an older male figure.

At its core, a nicely wrapped ode: a young boy in want of adventure finding the outside world to be less a wild west and more sinister than he expected.

An escape from monotony, but he learns, at what cost?

first story: the sisters

- 1st person + window introduction > detached voyeur capabilities in one’s life.

- paralysis, in death, even amongst the living (aunt+son unable to eat/ talk)

- insinuation of a sickness overtaking the cleric, but no full reveal, cut short dialogue

- death framing the boys life, in mind and physical

- chalice, unable to hold even in death > religion taxing to a paralytic degree?

Israeli propaganda is so absolutely sickening… life under occupation really invades every part of a person’s life and past.

Most deeply angering part of this book was when the Australian emigrated guide assumes the death and rape of the bedouin girl was done by the arabs:

“Such a shame, he adds, that they have such customs.”

To kill and disgrace a young girl and blame it on her brothers and sisters…

(pt2)

- the actual literary values of p1 v p2 text is very different, will write more about this later.

- find it kind of morbidly funny that the crux of this entire novel is an autistic women finding a hyperfixation in her daily tragedies. ‘border’ speech…

… she’s not a vehicle for tragedy but possesses her own anxiously stuttering developed complexity

- interesting philosophical points, posed

crossing into part II:

- i, introspection, i, pondering… shes set as a real person - couldn’t miss this juxtaposition if it slapped u in the face

- borderline mythical touch with the parallels, the howling dog, the exact matching birth and death dates

- the normalcy of terror under occupation: having a gun cocked in ur face isn’t a deterrent to make ur way to work

- she’s autistic. novel = hyperfixation

finished P1, much to think about. very briefly:

- the inescapable omniscience of the desert, reminiscent of the grand poetry of the british romantics but in the haggard heated sun

- he lifted the jerry can, he inspected the room, he, he and he. pointedly impersonal, few if any descriptive words, his days are communicated mainly in unending lists

- the girl, and the one ‘stranger’ quote… men cannot be saved

“I really like your eyes.”
She said it slowly, loud and clear.
“No one’s ever told me that before,” I said. “Ever.”
She kept on looking at me.

also want to add this quote for no reason,

“Not paradise. It’s Heaven.”
“Heaven?”
“Yeah. Heaven, with a capital H.”

Everyone’s like that,” I said. “That’s the thing.”
“That’s the thing,” Kojima said.
“Can’t do a thing about it,” I said, and Kojima broke into a laugh, but quietly. I started laughing too.

We were quiet, and I traced the outline of her marvellous bones and the triangle of muscle in her stomach. What is it about intimacy that makes it so very disturbing?

“Since I was born I had assumed that the world ran on very simple lines, like a larger version of our church.”

nothing special abt the quote i just think it’s cool

why is it literally impossible to find a text file online for this book? also all the copies i’ve found are like £15+ and i don’t have that type of cash wtf… i’ve found a photographed google drive folder with all the pages but like i’m not gonna b able to annotate it all arghhg

“I’m not going to call myself a victim. Women like Taylor find comfort in that label and that’s great for them, but I’m the one he called when he was on the brink. He said it himself—with me, it was different. He loved me, he loved me.”

god, vanessa is still so fucking deluded, begging for love from a dead serial rapist, victim blaming anyone brave enough to get over what happened them unlike her. fucking hell

“I scowl at that. I don’t like the idea of him thinking there are things I don’t understand. “What’s the book?”
He brings it over, the cover still hidden. I grab it as soon as he sets it down. Flipping the paperback over, I see a pair of skinny legs in ankle socks and saddle shoes, a pleated skirt ending above two knobby knees. In big white letters across the legs: Lolita.”

damn didn’t expect that

main character is quite pretentious but i’m guessing that’s the point. she believes she’s her own sole intellectual equal and confines herself (unintentionally) to the category of being a loner bc of this

it’s quite obvious why and how she was targeted by the teacher, and watching it be scarily effective is terrifying

also her favorite artist is fiona apple… self-explanatory

from the reviews i’ve heard the premise is in the likes of lolita or virgin suicides except that its idealistic view of the ‘femme fatale’ experience is quite explicitly scrapped rather than being left for misinterpretation
the romanticisation of predatory relationships is something i’ve always hated so the fact this novel will explicitly address it (i think?) has me looking forward to reading it

yeah… i tried reading some more pages but honestly? i really can’t get into the story anymore. it might be because i left it for so long before picking it up again but i feel very bored whilst reading.
maybe i’m not mature enough to understand whatever deep meaning this book holds? idk, i’ll just read it when i’m 18 instead.

yeah… i tried reading some more pages but honestly? i really can’t get into the story anymore. it might be because i left it for so long before picking it up again but i feel very bored whilst reading.
maybe i’m not mature enough to understand whatever deep meaning this book holds? idk, i’ll just read it when i’m 18 instead.

arghhhh I’m nearly finished but I don’t want the book to end like I love this plot so much and I wish I could wipe my memory and experience it all over again… also we’re finally getting the full (full) full backstory on their you huo and qin jiu and the way all the small clues and hints came together in the end was so cool! wah! i love it!