Another book roundup! 🙂
Rachel Maddow: A Biography by Lisa Rogak
It seems pretty obvious that Rogak wrote this book without actually interviewing Rachel Maddow. This book felt like I was reading an over-expanded Wikipedia page. No depth or substance & it gave the impression that you were reading someone’s term paper subtitled “What I Learned About Rachel Maddow”. I think Rachel is a brilliant woman and this book felt like a disservice to her.
Hello Habits: A Minimalist’s Guide to a Better Life by Fumio Sasaki
A great read if you are looking to make habit changes in your life but don’t know where to start or can’t find the motivation.
Find Your Path by Carrie Underwood
So this book has a tiny bit of information about Carrie’s life pre American Idol. Then it launches into all the health routines she started to do once she saw what she looked like on TV and realized other people were noticing how she looked as well. In the book, she says she used the negative comments to turn her nutrition around and start a new health regimen. She then goes into a lot of detail about how she accomplishes this. I have seen other book reviewers state this and I will too: if you have/had an eating disorder, this book might be triggering for you. Not only does Carrie use an app to track everything she eats, in addition, she writes everything she eats in a journal complete with how much protein she had that day, how many macros, fat, calories, etc… She doesn’t sit still while watching a television show even though she says that is her “relaxing time” after a long day, because she exercises during commercials. When the show comes back on she sits down, but as soon as another commercial comes on, she is back up doing squats, etc… It was just too much. She works out a lot and also has a personal trainer and a mobile gym for when she is out on tour. *sigh* This is definitely NOT a book I would recommend reading. I like Carrie Underwood as a singer and I enjoy her music. Her book, not so much.
The Eighth Detective by Alex Pavesi
Ugh, bloody awful. I was pulled into the premise of this book which revolved around a book editor sent to interview a reclusive author on a Mediterranean island in advance of the republication of his mystery novel which hadn’t seen a bookshelf in 25 years. In between the book editor interviewing the author and trying to find out why he fell off the face of the earth and what it had to do with his book, every other chapter is an actual story from his book, so there is a lot of bouncing back and forth. And bad writing. It was boring and at the same time frustrating, and the ending was regrettable…for all of us who mustered brain cell usage to get there.
So that’s it from me! What did you read this past month? 🙂
I hate when most things I read in a short time period are not hitting the spot but like everything, it’s a cycle LOL
Absolutely! Hopefully next month, I have better book reviews 🙂
I have immense respect for Maddow, although admittedly don’t know much about her personally, but I feel like she would also be the type of person who would allow an “authorized” bio so it’s interesting that it was written without her aid. Oh man. I’m not a country music fan, although I do know who Carrie Underwood is, but I didn’t realize she was that fanatical about her weight/exercise/food. Undoubtedly, she has had to deal with trolls as a famous singer, but this definitely feels extreme. I remember once reading an interview with Gwen Stefani where she admitted to being hungry all the time and it made me sad. Sorry you didn’t have a better reading month. I had a great one. Lies. I didn’t read a darn thing. But I thought a lot about reading. 🙂 It’s my birthday week next week (if I recall your Dad and I share the same birthday!) and I took the week off. I’m really, really going to try to crack at least one book open! Hope you’re staying cool!
I have a feeling it would have been a much different book had Maddow actually participated in its creation. Some of the items in there made you think, “Why is this relevant? Why is this information in here but not some other information?”
I am not a country music fan per se, but I like Carrie’s songs. I wish society as a whole didn’t put so much pressure on women, famous or not, to look a certain way. It’s obnoxious.
Happy Birthday!!!! And I loved that you remembered that about my dad 🙂 🙂
Yeahhh…Find Your Path sounds like a bit much. I know some of what she does is obviously things people do recommend, but it sounds like she takes it to a level that’s not terribly healthy for most.
Yes, it was definitely a bit much. I didn’t even mention in the blog post where she talks about if you know you are going to an event where there will be a lot of food, to restrict your eating that day in anticipation of said event so that there is no guilt when you are eating. Not good advice, you know what I mean?
If Carrie Underwood wants to torture herself by making every moment of her day about food, that’s on her. But I think putting out a book promoting that lifestyle is damaging to her fans, most of whom don’t have access to her resources so the only things they *can* do is restrict eating and never sit still.
I agree 100%. This “lifestyle” that she is promoting is not healthy.