The Confusing World of Book Recommendations

As I sat down to discuss my reading experience from May, I couldn't help but feel a little frustrated with some of the book recommendations that had been made to me. I'm sure you guys are nice people, and I appreciate your enthusiasm for certain books, but please, stop messing with my heart and brain! In all seriousness, I've been fortunate enough to have received many great recommendations over the years, but there have also been some misfires.

One of the series that comes to mind is the one that I started again after a year's wait. You guys kept hounding me about it, and I finally decided to give it another try, only to find myself at the end of the second book with a cliffhanger that left me reeling. I have to admit, I'm not good with reading series that are not finished - they drive me crazy and make me feel like I'm losing my mind! To cope, I recently started an art hobby, which has been a great way to relax and express myself.

I've found an amazing online learning community called Skillshare that has been a game-changer for me. They offer a wide range of courses on creative writing, art, business, graphic design, lifestyle, and even finding your creative voice. I recently started taking some of their inking classes, which have been an absolute delight. One of the instructors, Yuko, is amazing, and her classes are so informative and fun. I've also invested in a few new tools, including a little ink thingy that looks like it was made by a fairy, and a magic wand-looking nib holder that's just perfect for playing around with.

Speaking of which, I did manage to finish reading one book in May - Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner. I listened to the audiobook version, which was narrated by the author herself, and it was absolutely captivating. The story is a memoir about the author's experiences growing up as a half-Korean, half-white woman in a small town in Oregon. It's a beautifully written account of her mother's passing from cancer, and her journey to come to terms with her identity and cultural heritage.

One of the things that struck me most about this book was its honesty - Michelle Zauner is refreshingly candid about the ups and downs of her relationship with her mom, as well as her experiences navigating different cultures and identities. She also talks about Korean food, which I found hilarious and wonderful (it makes me so hungry just thinking about it!). The book is full of pockets of happiness and sadness, but overall, it's a beautifully written and deeply moving account of one woman's journey.

Overall, Crying in H Mart was an excellent read that left me feeling emotionally drained but also uplifted. If you're ready for a sad but ultimately hopeful story about love, loss, and identity, then this book is definitely worth checking out.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enBut what is this book even about?  It's an enemies to...are they lovers?How would I describe what they're even doing?She gets one demon addicted to cannoli?  I am confused by the next book that I read. Hi everyone! I apologize for whatever construction noise you may or may not hear. I'm going to try and  talk over that and tell you about what I read in May. It is already June, if you can believe it.Six months through 2021. How? But I'm gonna start off with a little gentle scolding. I'm sure you  guys are nice people. I know that you guys are, but you gotta stop messing with my heart and my brain.So I'm going to talk about the books a little bit later but so many of you recommended a series  that I was - I started and I kind of was like 'yeah not really into it' so I waited a year. I started  it again because you guys all kept hounding me about it. And I get to the second book,  finish it, thinking it's a duology and it ends on the biggest cliffhanger ever!!! Like, how dare you?! You  guys know how I felt about Ember in the Ashes. I am not good with reading series that are not  finished. They drive me crazy and I'm losing my mind. And I had to literally go out and get myself  a hobby. Like, I felt a reading slump coming on. I went to an art store and I bought a ton of things  that I didn't need. Luckily this video is sponsored by Skillshare. Really quick, Skillshare is an online  learning community that I've talked about many times. Mostly I use them for creative writing  and art but they also have business classes, they have graphic design, they have lifestyle as far as  like organization or even just like finding your creative voice. By the encouragement of a friend  I started some of their inking classes. I'm taking one particular one by this amazing teacher named  Yuko who teaches at the new school for visual arts in New York and she does mostly brush  work but I actually went out and I bought this is -look at this little ink thingy! Isn't it the cutest  thing you've ever seen?! And then I bought this  magic wand looking nib holder. It's been a  lot of fun just playing around with it. I might get more into calligraphy, I don't know. I've just been  having a good time. So if you do want to try out Skillshare, which I highly recommend that you do, I  recommend it all the time - the first 1000 people to click the link in my description box will get  a free trial of Skillshare premium membership and after that $10 a month. So thank you to Skillshare  for sponsoring this. The hobby helped. I still feel like I'm kind of in a reading slump. I'm feeling a  little bit better. I'm still a little angry at you but we're gonna talk about that in a second.Let's just dive into what I read in May. Starting off, I actually made a separate reading vlog about  this. But I read Crying in H Mart and I listened to the audiobook of this. I mentioned it in my  reading vlog but typically for me with audiobooks, I have to listen to nonfiction. I want it to  be very podcasty, like I want a lot of facts and stuff - like short chapters. But something about this  book, especially the fact that it was narrated by the author, it was so captivating and horrifically  sad but just really beautiful. And I highly recommend if you don't feel like you have time  to pick up a book or if you are trying to get into audiobooks and you just aren't sure how - if you  are mentally ready for a sad book, Crying in H Mart the audiobook, I can't recommend it highly enough.Crying in H Mart is a memoir by Michelle Zauner. We learn in the first chapter that her mother has  passed away from cancer and she is half Korean - her mother is Korean, and half white, her father is  Jewish American. And she was raised in a very small town in Oregon. The beginning of the book is really  just talking about adolescence and like growing up with the relationship with her mom being a little  bit difficult and also just the relationship with people around her being difficult. I love  the fact that she was very honest - like I think if you're writing a memoir about your mother who died,it might be easy to not want to write the bad things, but she painted like a very realistic  picture of a mother-daughter relationship. And then, you know, and she talks about going back to Korea  and her experiences there and during this entire time, she's talking about Korean food because her  mother's love language is food. And so it's just - it makes you so hungry!! It was excellent.And then we do meet the point in the story where her mother is diagnosed and it goes through  that diagnosis and how to deal with a sick dying parent. I can't even go into it without crying  but like it was very beautifully done, very sad, but it was filled with so many pockets of like - it wasn't just a wall of like doom and gloom, it was, there were these pockets of  really happy things like she was able to plan her wedding with her mom. I don't know, I can't even - Ican't talk specifics, but it was very beautiful and it was a great way to start off May. Highly  recommend Crying in H Mart. Okay now we're going to talk about the series that I'm so angry with you  all about. So I mentioned in one of my first videos I ever posted on this channel about a year ago  -I did a \"tier ranking of the bad boys of YA fantasy.\" All of you guys requested that i rank  Séverin. Séverin from Gilded Wolves. And I had said that I had only read a few chapters and then I had  to put it down and I like ran out of time whatever -it was so all I know about Séverin is - he's a good  guy and he really treats his friends like family. I give him a lot of points because of his garden.  He's a good shrug. He's a so far so good shrug. So keep that in mind - I was gonna read this a year ago  and if I had, I would have had to wait like over a year for the third one to come out. Now I've saved  myself by only reading it now. That I only need to wait a couple months. Think about that next  time you want to like tell me what to read. Think about my heart, okay? It doesn't - I'm not a patient  person. So anyway, Gilded Wolves is an unfinished series, it will be finished in September of this  year. It takes place in Paris in the 1800s so the imagery immediately is very very cool.  This world has a magical element to it and this is called forging. And so there are just  people who are born with this ability to forge and it's either by material or you can forge  kind of mental? And so what happens is you have all of these cool little devices  that are created by these people with these magical forging powers. For example, one of the main characters, he has a forging ability that is specific to botanical things  and so he gets hired by everyone in Paris to make these like amazing gardens he can just  coax the flowers into doing anything he wants. I don't know, it's just, it was a very cool  magical system that I really appreciated. And along with this forging, it is somehow related  to the tower of Babel. What am I trying to say?The plot is hanging, hanging by a thread in my  head by the way. I'm gonna forget it any second now. But basically in the Bible there is a story  of this civilization that wanted to get as close to god as possible and have like all the knowledge  and power of god, so they kind of like started building this tower and god was like \"excuse me,  no\" and he like knocked it down. And so in this book, there are all of these fragments left  from that tower that have spread all over the world and it kind of allows like this - forging  is sort of a gift passed down from god, they have like an itty bit of god in them  if that makes sense. That's the thing with the story that I didn't super love is that the world  building was a little complicated and that's the reason why I like the sequel more but essentially  we learn a hell of a lot about this world and then there is a heist which is great because Ithink that the all the characters are very unique and there's a lot of good banter. I've heard people  compare to Six of Crows just because it is like a heist with six or so characters but I would say  like the world is totally different, the feeling is totally different, the fact that it is in like  Paris and all this stuff. I don't know, I can't explain it well because I actually didn't love  the first book. It was like an okay good time I'm glad that I got through it,but the second book, the sequel, Silvered Serpents is so good, chef's kiss. I loved it so much better.So I think Gilded Wolves, I had to get through it in order to understand the characters and to  understand the world building - I thought it was good, I'm not saying it's bad, but once you're into  Silvered Serpents, it's like you can slip right into it and just run with the story and this one  actually takes place in Russia. And they're kind of not really on another heist....how would I describe  what they're even doing? There's like a little adventure. I can't really, I can't describe it.  any better than that. I thought it was really great, I love the character development of some of these  characters, they're wonderful. And the ending - oh god it's like ah!!! The ending was so good but it was  such a cliffhanger to the point where I literally shouted and I was angry and I have only felt  that way after reading Six of Crows and not having Crooked Kingdom on hand. Obviously Silvered Serpents  touched a nerve because I really need to know what happens and I'm waiting until September - and be  warned if you are going to start this. And if you recommended it to me...how dare you? But thank you  also. I am confused by the next book that I read. So it was Kingdom of the Wicked and I have seen this,  I don't think I've really seen it on booktube but I see it all the time on bookstagram and I put it  on hold- I was on hold for like 12 weeks, I think like a very lo- maybe even 16 weeks! I'm not sure  why to be honest. Like, it was okay, but I wasn't - I don't know. I was expecting, like they built it up  so high. Again, I didn't have any clue what it was about but like so many people were talking about  it that I was like \"this must be a groundbreaking book what's going on?\" It takes place in Sicily and  90% of this book - and I'm not complaining, this is not a complaint - 90% of this book is like in-depth,  super detailed imagery of Sicilian cooking. Oh my god. Like, I was so hungry after reading this!Crying in H Mart is talking about all this amazing delicious Korean food, in Gilded Wolves one  of the characters is like obsessed with baking and so every page they're talking about like  sugar cookies and cake and all this stuff and then I read this book and it's like every kind of pasta  dish imaginable. So much garlic. This was just the month of hungry reading honestly. Anyway, it  takes place in Sicily. Our main girl is one of... twins, she has a twin sister. And her grandmother  is really superstitious. They are like kind of undercover witches. Witches are not really welcome  in this town. So they keep it on the down low, but her grandma alludes to these kind of stories  of the Mother Witch did something to the devil and now he's super pissed and like the legend is that  the princes of hell are gonna come back and like take their revenge on the witches, but she's really  skimpy on the details because she doesn't really want to tell her grandchildren. Anyway, how do I  say this without spoiling it? It's an enemies to...Are they lovers? What would we call this? It's an enemies book. There is a very tragic thing that  happens in the book and our main girl has to kind of rise to the challenge and solve  this mystery and she ends up summoning a demon in order to do that and everything just kind of goes  crazy from there. I can't really give you more than that - there's a lot of dealings with  all the different princes of hell. She gets one demon addicted to cannoli. It was a fine fantasy  but I just, it didn't hit me hard. I cared more about the scenes about the food then I cared about  the plot. And there was supposed to be a plot twist at the end but I did not feel the twist whatsoever.I don't know, it just it it just lacked something. There has to be a sequel so  I will read the sequel because, like with Gilded Wolves, sometimes the sequel is better than  the first one. I wouldn't recommend going out and buying it straight away. If you can wait,  wait for it at your library if it's available. I was tempted to buy it because the wait was  so long and I thought that it was going to be so good that it was worth it, but I'm glad  that I waited because I just - once again it was like 90% a pasta book, which was fantastic.And then like a little bit of witches and demons. Kingdom of the Wicked. Okay next up - not to be  a super downer but I'm gonna talk about a did not finish. I almost always finish my  books, like it's very rare for me to put a book down and I don't think I'm gonna return to it  to be honest. Like, with Gilded Wolves, I knew it was just like a timing thing but this one,I don't think, I'm - I feel no reason to read more. And that is called the  Mask of Mirrors. And I thought I was gonna love this because it takes place in a world that feels  very much like Venice, it's like a lot of canals it's a lot of like - I don't know. I love - The Thief  Lord is one of my favorite books, so anything that takes place in Venice or like a Venice-esque  place, I'm in. But what is this book even about? We meet our main character when she is a child  and she is a pickpocketer for this gang boss and she ends up poisoning her boss  and running away and disappearing. And so our story starts quite a few years after this. Like  I don't even really know how to explain it. The names and a lot of the titles and the words  feel very like Latin, like Roman? And it honestly was making it really difficult to  keep things straight because sometimes people were called by like a title and then some people  were called - I don't know, it was just, there was a lot of names going on and I didn't  really understand like the hierarchy. This is hit or miss for me but the author was really  dedicated to giving us a good mental map of the city, so there would just be pages of us  walking through the city and like \"so we walk here and we pass this gate and then if you walk  a little bit further there's this place and then you walk a little bit more and there's this gate\"Sometimes I love that, sometimes I don't - this was a case where I didn't because I was very confused.Even the names of the places sound like names of people. So they would be talking about Gloria  and I'd be like \"who is Gloria?\" and then I'd be like \"oh that's the market place\" like it was just -  I was confused 90% of the time. And what is going on is, there's all these different families like  these kind of nobles. Our main girl has come back to the town where she was a pickpocket  and she is basically a fraud. She is dressed up as the daughter of  someone's estranged sister and she knocks on their door and is like \"hey I'm related to you,  can we hang?\" and I think her end game is basically she just wants to fake it and be this person for  the rest of her life? Like, I don't know what her end game is to be honest. She's just here  trying to get into this rich person's house. So as she's playing it up and trying to  get on her aunt's good graces, we also learned about this guy called the Rook and he is kind of  like a Robin Hood character. If I continue to read, I'm pretty sure I already know who the Rook is.It just like, I feel so bad that I can't really tell you the plot because I don't  know the plot. And I was 250 pages in. I was like, if I'm at this point  and I don't know what's going on, I'm gonna put it down. There's also, oh my god, there's so much  mythology going on - like there's a lot of tarot kind of things and like she tried to explain  really deeply what like each card meant in the tarot deck. So much detail that I couldn't do it. So  if you loved it, I feel like I could have if it was just watered down a little bit. So like I'm  not saying it was a bad book, it was just my little brain could not process it. Okay I'm editing this  portion and I decided to look Mask of Mirrors up on Goodreads and the reviews are just making me  feel a little bit dumb. They're basically saying like it's an adult fantasy so it's really complex  and i loved it and blah blah blah. Literally it might just have been that my brain is small.So I guess never say never, maybe I will return to it one day but it was just a little too much  for my soft little brain, yeah. All right. It is a did not finish for May, so  Mask of Mirrors. And last but not least, I read Caraval. And I don't know if this is like a good  example but it felt like Spirited Away in a sense. Caraval is about a world that is not explained -  the world is not explained, but it seems to be just like a bunch of island nations, I guess?In this world, there is this carnival I suppose that happens maybe once a year. But it recently  has kind of stopped because somebody died there. But it's apparently just this incredibly magical  legendary performance and they talk about it as if it's a game - so it's kind of like immersive  theater. So if you're into that, definitely read this. You can choose to play in Caraval  or you can just watch. At the end of the game,you get some kind of prize and so for seven  years our main character has been writing to Master Legend is his name, who runs Caraval.And she's been begging for an invite. Finally after seven years she does get an invite but  trigger warning - her father is incredibly physically abusive and controlling  and she's basically like \"well I can't go, like even though I have a ticket now and I've wanted to go  for my whole life, if I leave he's going to really hurt my sister\" Like, anything that she does, her father knows that she'll just take whatever consequences but if he hurts her sister  that makes our girl behave because she doesn't want her sister to be in pain, right? And so  she's basically dead set on not going until her sister meets this sailor boy. I'm not gonna tell  you what happens exactly but they end up getting to Caraval and Caraval is super magical but  immediately you get bad feelings, like this is not a happy fun place - this is a scary place.They're constantly reminding you that like you can't trust your eyes, you can't trust any of your senses, don't  get too caught up in the game, remember it's just a game because if you don't remember it's a game  you're gonna go crazy and like you aren't gonna be able to leave. It's just, it feels like very  bad news. She continues to play the game for a very important reason that I can't tell you.  Here's the thing - it was a fun read. Like, while I was reading it, I really liked it and then  immediately after, I looked back and I was kind of like \"did I like it?\" Because I actually didn't  love the ending. And it's technically a series - and this could be like a bonus or not- it could  have been a standalone. There is an epilogue that gives you the opportunity for the story to expand  but I think I'm just gonna stop here. I'm not interested in the other two books. So I'm  gonna treat it as a standalone. And so overall, it was just a fun quick read. It was definitely like  a younger young adult book, I would think. It was a fun time, my brain had fun looking at what was  going on I guess. And I read it pretty much in one night, I think. I'm not sure if it's worth  all of the hype, it was not a wasted read. Definitely get it at your library if you  can. Where is - my hold on, I need to get my iPad. And I'm actually rereading Six of Crows right  now because I am going to be joining someone on a podcast to talk about it so that's what I'm  currently doing and I'm in a lot of emotional pain. But I got a lot of books on hold just this week  and so I'm going to be reading the Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri, House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland.  I have no idea what that's about. I think I just saw someone recommend it, I don't know. And then  The Chosen and the Beautiful. Oh wait and it hasn't downloaded but I also got Ace of Spades -  oh cause that's on Libby, that's why. So I have just got a great June coming. And yeah I will  see you guys next time. What am I doing? If you have any book video recommendations, anything  that you would like to see me do, please let me know because I'm kind of unsure of whatto do for this month, what should I film? So any recommendations are welcome. And thank you  again to Skillshare for sponsoring this video. Again, the first 1000 people to click that link  in the description box will get a free trial of Skillshare premium membership. I'm going to be  playing around, I'm so excited to be playing around with these nibs. Also in Six of Crows,  Wylan - I forgot about this - but he takes out his calligraphy set to start drawing a map of  the Ice Court and Jesper said something about like \"got enough nibs?\" and I was like - I have a nib now! I  have a nib!!\" Enough of that. I will see you guys next time, thank you Skillshare. Pray for my soul,I'm gonna be starting Crooked Kingdom probably today. I will see you guys later, thank you always.Bye!\n"