I love this little book. In addition to being clear and concise, Janis Bell’s grammar guide focuses on common mistakes I still make. In each explanation and each example, she writes as if she had read my mind. What I have found most effective is the way she teaches us to remember certain conventions such as when to use who and whom or lie and lay. It’s a must-have grammar reference.
One word to describe Barry Jenkins’s epic film has to be resilience. It takes resilience for a gay black boy who lived with a poor, single, drug-addicted mother to become a tough-yet-sweet young man. It’s an aesthetically delightful watch.
Allen’s poignant memoir recounts the troubled life and tragic death of her young cousin Michael Allen. At fifteen, Michael found guilty of carjacking and sentenced as an adult to eleven years in prison. While serving his time, he fell in love with Bree, a transgender. Released at twenty-six, Michael struggled to move on. The tumultuous relationship with Bree ended his life. In addition to her personal story, Allen provides insightful account of the injustice system of incarceration in America, particularly toward black males. It’s a devastating, informing read.
By combining William Strunk, Jr., and E.B. White’s The Elements of Style and Williams Zinsser’s On Writing Well, Ms. Lamb offers an indispensable guide for business writings including emails, résumé, and proposals. I tend to read books on grammar and writing every now and then just to remind myself the craft of the English language. This one is a good refresher.
In her debut poetry collection, Daley-Ward strips the complexity of sensuality, mentality, and spirituality down to its bone. By cutting straight to the human sufferings, her poems are powerful yet accessible. Even though I don’t read as much poetry as I should, I appreciate the simplicity in her prose. Here are a few of my favorites:
battle
Loving someone who hates
themselves
is a special kind of violence.
A fight inside the bones.
A war within the blood.wine
It’s never too late to be wise.
See how your spirit has been
fermenting.lesson
The difference between attraction
and compatibilityhow it kicks you in the belly every
now and then.
Holy fuck! Park Chan-wook’s The Handmaiden is a mind-fucking thriller. So violent yet so erotic. So bizarre yet so beautiful. So twisted yet so sensual. I have never seen lesbian sex this vigorous. The film is two and a half hours, yet not a second is wasted.
In her concise, compelling book, Wachter-Beottcher lays out the danger and the insensitivity of biased algorithms, alienating online forms, and harassment-friendly platforms in the tech industry. As designers and developers, we put too much assumptions into the users without understand their circumstances. We place cleverness over clarity. As demonstrated examples after examples in the book, the results of these poor-designed decisions are unfortunate and tragic. It’s an important read for those of us who truly care about our users.
Huber de Givenchy’s words to live by:
Life is like a book: one has to know when to turn the page.
By Hiếu Minh Nguyễn
Convinced she’s in hell
my mother wakes me & begs to be taken
to the lake. Wailing in prayer on the kitchen floor
her skin itching with heat, a flame seizing for god.
I believe her. One day, we will all know when suffering comes
to play the instrument of our bodies. Her song, a single note
a copper kettle whistling for mercy. From the blue-black sand
of McCarrons, I watch her disappear
under the night water. Moonlit rings
spill from her absence.
This morning the boys glued their eyes to the TV and wouldn’t pay attention to what their mom was telling them. She went up to the TV and turned it off. Suddenly the hook came to me and I started to sing, “Dad threw the TV out the window, the window.” They looked at me weird so I pulled out my phone, searched on YouTube, and found the tune immediately. My oldest boy found it funny while my middle one got mad. That song brought back so much memories of my early years in the U.S. I borrowed a kid cassette from the local public library and that particular tune caught my attention even though I barely understood all the words. I also loved “You’re in Trouble.” I am now listening to the entire album on a Friday morning while working.