teatimelit

Let’s Talk: The Goodreads Reading Challenge

I love the Goodreads reading challenge. Every year I look forward to seeing the new colour and setting my goal to a high number just so I have something to look forward to. And every year, I get stressed. I don’t know about anyone else, but I am a major mood reader. I find monthly TBRs to be too restricting, and it often leaves me in a reading slump. For that reason, I have a love-hate relationship with the Goodreads reading challenge.

It’s only 24 days into the year, and I am already behind. Like any ambitious Type 3 enneagram would, I set my challenge number to 100 books in the hopes of having another solid reading year. So far this year, I have read an impressive number of books, and that number is three. One of which was a re-read, so it’s not like I challenged myself to consume something new. No, I chose to read something I knew I would enjoy in fear of slumping too early in the year. I bet you’re thinking, Mary, what is the point of this post? And you’re right – what is the point of this post? I just wanted to share some positivity and some insight into how hard it can be to motivate yourself to read. So, I thought, why not share some of my favourite things to do to make the Goodreads challenge slightly easier so you don’t get overwhelmed (like yours truly) and quit!

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Teatimereads February Pick: Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner

Hi all! We hope that January is treating you well so far and that you’re enjoying this month’s read DAUGHTER OF THE MOON GODDESS. Our theme for February is Non-Fiction and we will be reading CRYING IN H MART by Michelle Zauner! We’re really excited to be highlighting a new genre for teatimereads and hope that you’ll join us!

Here is the full summary for Crying in H Mart:

An unflinching, powerful memoir about growing up Korean American, losing her mother, and forging her own identity.

In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humor and heart, she tells of growing up one of the few Asian American kids at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother’s particular, high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother’s tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food.

As she grew up, moving to the East Coast for college, finding work in the restaurant industry, and performing gigs with her fledgling band–and meeting the man who would become her husband–her Koreanness began to feel ever more distant, even as she found the life she wanted to live. It was her mother’s diagnosis of terminal cancer, when Michelle was twenty-five, that forced a reckoning with her identity and brought her to reclaim the gifts of taste, language, and history her mother had given her.

Vivacious and plainspoken, lyrical and honest, Zauner’s voice is as radiantly alive on the page as it is onstage. Rich with intimate anecdotes that will resonate widely, and complete with family photos, Crying in H Mart is a book to cherish, share, and reread.

Links for Crying in H Mart: Goodreads | TheStoryGraph | Bookshop | IndieBound

Content Warnings for Crying in H Mart: Death of a parent, death of a family member, trauma, addiction, cancer

ARC Review: Ophelia After All by Racquel Marie

Ophelia Rojas knows what she likes: her best friends, Cuban food, rose-gardening, and boys – way too many boys. Her friends and parents make fun of her endless stream of crushes, but Ophelia is a romantic at heart. She couldn’t change, even if she wanted to.

So when she finds herself thinking more about cute, quiet Talia Sanchez than the loss of a perfect prom with her ex-boyfriend, seeds of doubt take root in Ophelia’s firm image of herself. Add to that the impending end of high school and the fracturing of her once-solid friend group, and things are spiraling a little out of control. But the course of love–and sexuality–never did run smooth. As her secrets begin to unravel, Ophelia must make a choice between clinging to the fantasy version of herself she’s always imagined or upending everyone’s expectations to rediscover who she really is, after all. 

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Let’s Talk: Book to Screen Adaptations I’d Love to See

Hi, hello friends and welcome back to teatimelit! I love book to screen adaptations, and I think there are a lot of books out there that have serious potential to make good tv shows or movies. While I know that not everything can be made into the next blockbuster hit, I thought it would be super fun today to talk about some of the books I think would make good adaptations. Let’s get into the list! 

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Let’s Talk: 2022 Reading Goals, Content Goals, and Tracking

Hello little sprouts and seedlings! Happy Friday! I hope you’ve been having a lovely 2022 so far, and I hope the rest of 2022 is kind to you. If you’ve been around for a while — or if you just know me in any capacity — you might know that I’m very Type-A, and a big fan of tracking. I made a post last year about my 2021 Reading Goals, Notion & Reading Journal Set Up, and wanted to take some time today to reflect on how that went, as well as share my 2022 goals with you all! 

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Review: Hungry Hearts: 13 Tales of Food and Love edited by Elisa Chapman and Caroline Tung Richmond

A stunning collection of short stories about the intersection of family, culture, and food in the lives in teens, from bestselling and critically acclaimed authors, including Sandhya Menon, Anna-Marie McLemore, and Rin Chupeco.

A shy teenager attempts to express how she really feels through the pastries she makes at her family’s pasteleria. A tourist from Montenegro desperately seeks a magic soup dumpling that can cure his fear of death. An aspiring chef realizes that butter and soul are the key ingredients to win a cooking competition that could win him the money to save his mother’s life.

Welcome to Hungry Hearts Row, where the answers to most of life’s hard questions are kneaded, rolled, baked. Where a typical greeting is, “Have you had anything to eat?” Where magic and food and love are sometimes one in the same.

Told in interconnected short stories, Hungry Hearts explores the many meanings food can take on beyond mere nourishment. It can symbolize love and despair, family and culture, belonging and home.

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Let’s Talk: Audiobooks I Want to Read in 2022

Hi, hello friends! Like most people, I adore audiobooks. I love putting my earphones in and getting lost in a book, all while doing another task at the same time. Due to listening to them at double speed (I physically cannot pay attention to them if they are not on 2x speed), I get through them pretty quickly so I’m always on the hunt for a new one. My personal favourite service for audiobooks is Scribd, and while this post is not sponsored, it’s a service I never shut up about. Their selection is so fantastic, I can almost always find my next audiobook on there. So, I thought it would be fun to go through their library and pick out some books I hope to listen to this year. Be sure to let me know in the comments below if you’ve ready any of these books! Without anything further, let’s get into the list! 

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ARC Review: Dream, Annie, Dream by Waka T. Brown

As the daughter of immigrants who came to America for a better life, Annie Inoue was raised to dream big. And at the start of seventh grade, she’s channeling that irrepressible hope into becoming the lead in her school play.

So when Annie lands an impressive role in the production of The King and I, she’s thrilled . . . until she starts to hear grumbles from her mostly white classmates that she only got the part because it’s an Asian play with Asian characters. Is this all people see when they see her? Is this the only kind of success they’ll let her have–one that they can tear down or use race to belittle?

Disheartened but determined, Annie channels her hurt into a new dream: showing everyone what she’s made of.

Waka T. Brown, author of While I Was Away, delivers an uplifting coming-of-age story about a Japanese American girl’s fight to make space for herself in a world that claims to celebrate everyone’s differences but doesn’t always follow through. 

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Let’s Talk: 2022 Reading and Content Goals

Hello my sundrops! Happy New Year! I hope that you’re having a glorious start to 2022 so far! The year is off to a pretty good start on my end because I was able to take this week off of work, so there has been some lounging and reading!

If we’re being completely honest, I was not vibing with the idea of sitting down and writing a review during my week off. Resting and recharging is important and the end of 2021 really wiped me out! So, when I was thinking of what my first post of 2022 would be, it only made sense to start it off with some of my reading and content goals for the year! Plus, I’m hoping that by posting it here and sharing it with all of you, I’ll be more likely to accomplish these things. We love accountability! 

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Review: The Simple Wild by K.A. Tucker

Calla Fletcher wasn’t even two when her mother took her and fled the Alaskan wild, unable to handle the isolation of the extreme, rural lifestyle, leaving behind Calla’s father, Wren Fletcher, in the process. Calla never looked back, and at twenty-six, a busy life in Toronto is all she knows. But when Calla learns that Wren’s days may be numbered, she knows that it’s time to make the long trip back to the remote frontier town where she was born.

She braves the roaming wildlife, the odd daylight hours, the exorbitant prices, and even the occasional—dear God—outhouse, all for the chance to connect with her father: a man who, despite his many faults, she can’t help but care for. While she struggles to adjust to this rugged environment, Jonah—the unkempt, obnoxious, and proud Alaskan pilot who helps keep her father’s charter plane company operational—can’t imagine calling anywhere else home. And he’s clearly waiting with one hand on the throttle to fly this city girl back to where she belongs, convinced that she’s too pampered to handle the wild.

Jonah is probably right, but Calla is determined to prove him wrong. Soon, she finds herself forming an unexpected bond with the burly pilot. As his undercurrent of disapproval dwindles, it’s replaced by friendship—or perhaps something deeper? But Calla is not in Alaska to stay and Jonah will never leave. It would be foolish of her to kindle a romance, to take the same path her parents tried—and failed at—years ago. It’s a simple truth that turns out to be not so simple after all.

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