13 Moons Reading Challenge 2024
Okay SO I've been struggling to read a lot during the last few months, which means that I could have gone a little bit behind schedule, ops. Good news is I'm going back on track! Here are two moons I haven't posted yet, and as my reading duties go on and I come up with reviews, I'll post them too. I'm taking my time because you know, reading should be fun, not stressful.
The idea behind the reading challenge is of course by @readnburied <3
Reading goal for now — Penumbral Lunar Eclipse: 13 books
Read a book from an author which is new to you: The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien. ☆☆☆☆
I wanted to include at least one book by Tolkien in the list of my first one hundred books read - a silly goal I reached a bit ago (thank you goodreads I guess?). I admit I had never read anything by Tolkien before The Hobbit, but I knew that during summer I would've rarely had time to read: I needed something enterteining, full of action, easy to read and fast-peaced, something to make me want to read even during the months when I feel the most exhausted. I needed to go far away with my mind, I needed comfort to cheer me up, adventures that I knew were good-ending. And yes, Bilbo was so good at lifting my spirits. This book was so funny to read, I loved the way everything is described and the way Bilbo is truly the undercovered hero that this adventure needs. This was a rather light reading, with some important themes nonetheless, and I was glad I decided to read it. You can bet my journey with Tolkien won't stop here. The best part is that now I can enjoy every Hobbit movie, comparing movie and book for the first time — I don't actually remember a thing about those movies, probably never even watched them completely. It's gonna be fun.
PS: just a moment of appreciation for the map in my book which is the same used in the first film, just translated in italian! I screamed when I saw that ngl
A Paperback: Malinverno, by Domenico Dara. ☆☆☆☆☆
This book was perfectly unexpected. I chose it randomly from a bookstore; it was a beautiful day of some months ago, I was with a friend and we had nothing else to do but study and wander around the city. This friend of mine kept making jokes because all the books I chose were blue or violet-covered. And yet, blue is my favourite colour, my eyes are naturally attracted to stuff with that dark shade: I don't know if blue chose for me that day or if I truly felt attracted to this book. The outcome didn't change, I bought it and I can say it has been a good series of coincidences: I loved this book. Reading it was painfully comforting, I saw people inhabiting a little village in Italy, but I saw poetry among them, I saw some of the tragedies that life creates. I pondered death, walked through a cimitery and read about someone who sees life a little bit like I do. Someone who breathes books like I've wanted to do for a lifetime, someone who feels loney like I often do these days. I'm not Astolfo Malinverno, but a bit of him is inside me, too.
And then a lot of books are inside this one book, there's mundanity, there are stories that are unique and the same within the mankind, misteries that only exist because humanity lives and carries footprints with her.
It was not a perfect novel - I'd have something to say about a few scenes towards the end - but all those pages made me cry so much I forgot what it felt like, staying up late at night because you just can't keep your eyes off your reading, sobbing through tears, "right", heartbreaking tears, because deep down you know the story couldn't have gone differently.
Right now, this book just has everything I needed to read, so it's a five stars for me. Fun fact about this: I give my rating as soon as I finish reading, pondering what I felt - there's no way that a book capable of making me cry so much throughout the whole story, always hitting right in the heart, with such a good poetry-like style of writing and an ending that truly felt inevitable, is not worthy of five stars.
[ Okay I finished my rant about this book. It's my blog I get to yap about what I want. ]