“What if the part you so achingly want to fix, change, banish, or destroy is the part that is fundamentally you?” (Tremblay 217). When Art Barbara was in high school he was not cool. A loner who listened to metal, he decided to start a extracurricular club for volunteer pallbearers to help at poorly attended …
“Religion, I believe, is one of the ways we attempt to answer the two Great Questions that ache within us all: ‘how shall we live,’ and ‘what happens when we die,’” (Bernstein 11). Since Midnight Mass came out last fall I’ve watched it four times with no plans of stopping anytime soon. I haven’t watched all of …
“Fear makes us blind, and we touch each fear with all the avid curiousity of self-interest, trying to make a whole out of a hundred parts, like the blind men with their elephant,” (King xvi). I haven’t read nearly as much Stephen King as I ought to have, but I’m trying to remedy that. My …
“Here’s the problem with horror movies: Everyone knows what’s coming next but actions have momentum, every decision an equal and justified reaction. Just because you know you should, doesn’t mean that you can, stop,” (Khaw 109). A group of five friends travel to Japan for a wedding in a long abandoned Heian-era mansion. The mansion is …
I received this book from the author in exchange for an honest review. “From baby teeth to virginity, to live is to regularly suffer loss,” (LaRocca 1). Mara is grieving after her father’s sudden death and is surprised when her cruel mother welcomes a new guest into their home who claims he will protect them. …
“We were sisters. We felt each other’s pain. We caused each other’s pain. We knew the smell of each other’s morning breath. We made each other cry. We made each other laugh. We got angry, pinched, kicked, screamed at each other. We kissed, on the forehead, nose on nose, butterfly eyelashes swept against cheeks…We possessed …
“Change is good. Change is necessary. Change is needed,” (Jackson 3). After her mom accepts a new job in Cedarville, Marigold and her blended family move from sunny California to midwestern Cedarville. Mari misses her home but after everything that happened and the mistakes she’s made, she knows she needs a change. Aside from the …
“He didn’t see what she did, and she could never really tell him what was really wrong – that it had all been a mistake: She didn’t know how to be a mother; why had that ever seemed like a good idea?” (Stage 4). Seven-year-old Hanna loves her Daddy. He understands her better than anyone …
I received this book from The Next Best Book Club in exchange for an honest review. “Death was all around us, constantly. Why was it so easy to ignore? Why didn’t people go mad, everyone terrified and helpless, blind to when or how death would visit them, or what world stood beyond the threshold? Were …
CW: Animal abuse. “How many generations of women had delayed their greatness only to have time extinguish it completely? How many women had run out of time while the men didn’t know what to do with theirs? And what a mean trick to call such things holy or selfless. How evil to praise women for …
Sarah O'Connor 