Navigating Solutions and Darkness

Black women are the most incisive, insightful people on the planet (and with good reason - they seem to end up having to deal with an even greater amount of garbage than normal). A lot of the best advice I've gotten in recent times has therefore come from black twitter, and the greatest of them is this: Stop trying to preach to them. They hear you. They just don't want to do it for you.

Photo by  Tim Marshall  on  Unsplash Wild stroke flailing wide  Wistful song shepherding Light-hearted feet dancing  Around the maelstrom/ Is now  Wall of fury/ night's  Fear revealed in silence Keeping its deafening vigil/ Circling  A yawning abyss/ As  Bloody broken ruins tower  Teeter, topple, tarnish  Falling through my outstretched palm Sightless eyes unsurprised  Having known a patient future/ Home  Beckons/ Its toothless gap split  In ghastly smiles since forgotten  The music bids  Adieu/ Time to fade into  Priorities/ into deathless sleep  And memories long obscured 

Title: Captive Author:  Aimee Carter Year of Publication: 2014 Series:  The Blackcoat Rebellion Series #: 2 Goodreads Rating (Avg.): 3.77 Goodreads Rating (Mine): 2 Spoilers Plot Description:  Kitty is supposed to continue pretending to be Lila Hart, but her rebelliousness gives Daxton Hart, the Prime Minister, reason to publicly disown her and send her Elsewhere. In  Captive,  Kitty navigates survival in Elsewhere and continues her efforts to further the Blackcoat Rebellion. The word Blackcoat is unnecessarily grandiose and superficial, just like everything in this book. I mentioned in my review of  Pawn  (Book 1 in this series) that the story could easily have been wrapped up by the end of that book. But Carter sacrifices good writing in favour of world building (and the mandatory YA trilogy) and  Captive  suffers the brunt of that choice. In a word,  Captive is as superficial and redundant as the name Blackcoat ...

Photo by  Maid Milinkic  on  Unsplash Written August 24, 2014 I'm sure you've heard these words before  I'm sure these dreams have come a visiting Dropping in when you least expect them  Come to transport you  Back to a place you used to call home  A place where the roads were paved In the sounds of your footsteps  High heels running home  Feeling breathless and angry  Because they're all gone  They didn't care to wait for you  Didn't let you linger awhile  Sing a few more notes  Before the night takes its window signs down  A place where the air whispers of cinema  Of dreams you breathe in  Ballooning up within you  And you're rising up, up Up along with it  Because the cinema is just down the road All your paths take you  Back into the dreams you had  Of the boy in class who was/ Most definitely an actor's twin  A place where every night i...

Photo by  frank mckenna  on  Unsplash Well. I was going through posts from my old blog to add to the "Throwback" series when I came across  bona fide  evidence of cool-girling. You see, as far as I'm concerned, all girls have this one true best friend, the one to whom you say everything, no matter how dirty or disgusting it is. But after that, surviving the whole best friend minefield is a dicey business, I tell you.  Now, no offence to my guy friends, (and any guy readers)-- because I love you guys... but boys are stupid in a lot of ways. They're good with mechanics, and engines, and directions. But at spotting the obvious, at doing the right thing, at following their heart and when it comes to girls, in general, they are idiots. Period.  But however, guys do know how to have fun. In style. Why? My good friend Pavvi has a theory. She thinks its because they just don't care. I think she may have a point there... because after all, guys have...

Photo by  Mohamed Nohassi  on  Unsplash Attempting to outrun the inevitable is a horrible feeling. When you know there's no escaping it, when you know your efforts to mitigate the fallout will be laughable at best, how do you summon up the motivation to keep running anyway? Is there even a point? Now, I know I'm supposed to challenge my thinking. I'm probably supposed to point out to myself that I cannot predict what will happen. That simply because it has been inevitable in the past, doesn't mean it will be this time. This time could be different, if only I could put in the requisite effort. That is what therapy seems to be telling me. It's exhausting, holding onto hope like that. The urge to curl up and let the storm take over is far too strong, always. And that's how you end up fighting your instincts, your despair, and your depression, all at once. Is failure surprising, in this scenario? Depression feels inevitable to me - even more so wh...

Title:  Pawn Author:  Aimee Carter Year of Publication: 2013 Series: The Blackcoat Rebellion #:  1 Goodreads Rating (Avg.):  3.80 Goodreads Rating (Mine): 2 SO MANY SPOILERS Plot Description:  Kitty Doe lives in a world where everyone takes a test at the age of 17 which evaluates their worth in society. She receives a 3, rather than the average 4 on her test. Just when she thinks she's doomed to a life of menial work, she's whisked off to be a doppelganger for the Prime Minister's dead niece, Lila Hart. As Lila Hart, Kitty is supposed to help stop a rebellion against the current regime - a rebellion Lila had secretly been fostering. Disclaimer: I didn't want to read this book, but it was lying around at home and I was starved for options. Since I was going into this book with no expectations whatsoever, I actually ended up pleasantly surprised at times. It was only after I started reading YA almost exclusively that I came across the ...