Meghan > Recent Status Updates

I just heaved the biggest sigh after a stint of breathless reading. It's SO GOOD. The origin story of the comic book is as good as the origin story in the comic book.

"Sammy performed the rapid series of operations--which combined elements of the folding of wet laundry, the shoveling of damp ashes, and the swallowing of a secret map on the point of captured by enemy troops--that passed, in his mother's kitchen, for eating." There are many details in this book, often seemingly inconsequential, that paint such a picture that it takes my breath away.

It's intense and I sometimes need to take breaks, but it's so damn good and doesn't pull a single punch.

My goodness. I have been so hungry for a book just like this for a long time. Also, I'm starting to recognize a writing style that feels like the 90s, although I can't pin down exactly what it is... at this point it feels like a vibe more than anything.

It was surprisingly satisfying when von Neumann started to lose his mind. His daughter says "I asked him, point-blank, how he used to be able to contemplate, with total equanimity, the killing of hundreds of millions of people in a nuclear first strike against the Soviet Union, and yet he could not face his own mortality with any sense of calm or dignity. 'That is entirely different,' he replied." And that's why.

In true nonfiction fashion, slowly but surely.

"All that maddening, unthinking optimism."

"Rosie the Riveter, celebrated during the war, was now expected to resume her feminine role and let the men handle the heavy lifting. But in many cases, that quintessential American wartime woman had gotten a taste of what it was like to be out on her own, earning a little money and enjoying a few of the finer things I bought." The transition of women's roles from the 40s to the 50s is such weird, wild stuff to me.

HAHAHAHAHA! This book is wild.

A villain that is also a great fuck is a very powerful villain indeed. This is a car audiobook for me and I have done my fair share of yelling at the speakers. The writing about early motherhood is pretty amazing.

It is CRAZY reading this while the L.A. fires are happening. But I feel like I say something like that every time I read an apocalyptic book.

This audiobook was a pretty good listen from the beginning, but I’ve been enthralled since Petit came back on the scene. This poor tortured obnoxious baby stirs up a lot of emotion in me.

All the kids in this book recall lessons taught to them by their fathers as they work to survive. It’s interesting.

This one holds up, although as my husband says, Mama Bear can be pretty preachy and Papa is kind of a buffoon. But with a preschooler, we discuss screen time all the time, and I think this book gets the message across well. I managed to work in the example of overusing our phones tonight too, and she nodded very seriously like it all made sense. This helps us initiate that important conversation.