Books To Remind You How To Never Stop Being Sad

Dear fellow Babblers,

There are several coping mechanisms and treatments out there whose sole purpose is to ease people out of their pain, suffering, sadness – all the pessimism infesting their lives one way or another. There is electric shock waves for the most extreme cases and some Hershey’s Kisses for the light, blue devil tears. One morning feeling like fresh sunny D and by evening aching for that cigarette ? Absolutely. That is what Power Yoga is for. And for those whose sadness turns to seething, rippling anger ? There is that $150 Equinox membership. For the poor souls grieving a loved one comes group therapy. And for the unlucky ones, unfortunate enough to crawl through life in a hazy blur of their own tears, day in and day out there is Prozac, Fluoxetine, medical Marijuana – the whole nine yards. Everything comes to how to be happy. How to live the most fulfilling life possible, hurting the least amount of people in the process of flying ourselves towards self fulfillment.

Sadness has existed in multiple forms and has been addressed and dealt with in countless ways,regardless of how one’s culture may choose to address and identify it. As a book blogger, my main area of interest and concern is on the treatment of mental illness by authors and how they use characters as victims of this serious, yet somehow overlooked illness, how plot is used to unravel and explore all the little yet detrimental symptoms of a mental illness and the ways in which an author’s writing and descriptions of their characters speaks, in and of itself, on mental illness.

As a blogger, writer, editor, academic, active reader, I have met and had several relationships with characters and have, throughout the years have been left with the scars, marks and, in conclusion, love and a certain intimacy with certain characters, their stories and the voices from which they were told. Here below I’m sharing with my readers not the books that I feel are therapeutical and relieve readers of their gloom. Instead these books are what I like to call “How To’s On How To Never Stop Being Sad.” Each and every one has touched my heart in one way or another, never fulfilling it, more often than not emptying it bit by bit. No one is ever in search of sadness but when they, or at least I, find it in between pages it is not a sort of sadness that breaks but rather one that bends, making the heart all the more stronger.  Continue reading “Books To Remind You How To Never Stop Being Sad”

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The Sunshine Blogger Award | 2

Dear fellow Babblers,

Okay. Tell me how in Homer’s jelly doughnut stratosphere this is possible…. Delphine wakes up, spends hours cruising through social media and making new book buddies in God knows what country, island, box. She comments, plans posts, thinks about posts, and reads. And yet here Delphine is to tell y’all “I’M BEHIND!” Time has not been on my side lately and if I have not responded to some fellow babblers comments (as if any of you care, I know you just want me to pay attention to your blog and click that blue glowing “follow” icon) I deeply and from the bottom of my swiss cheesy little heart apologize!

So here I am, after a pillow scream, chips ahoy cookie binge, and cat cuddle session later to provide you with Sunshine Blogger Award take 2! I love the book blogging community for all this fun and meaningless opportunities to learn more about the pretty (or perhaps not so pretty) little faces behind every blogging account. One of my best friends that I’ve managed to make in the short time I’ve been blogging, Noriko at diaryofabookfiend has nominated me for this award. She has been a pleasure to get to know and her posts and comments (she’s one hell of an active blogger *phew* – lemme catch my breath here!) are so charming and a delight to read every time. Wait… Could it be that you, Noriko, are the reason I’ve fallen behind?!?! Yes, her posts are that good kiddos so if you think you know what an amazing book review is stick your head in a toilet and get off your high horse, visit her blog, and only then are you allowed to return for a babble with Señorita Delphine…  Continue reading “The Sunshine Blogger Award | 2”

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Summer Activities That Aren’t Reading

Dear fellow Babblers,

Happy Tuesday! No wait, whahhhhh? You tellin me the lovely gals behind The Broke and the Bookish have gone on a 7 WEEK HIATUS? Whahh ezzzz deees bologna I reeeed???? Quoi?… Ok Delphine, get over yourself, no need to exaggerate the accent here, you’re American, remember?

panicking
Just like most of my fellow book bloggers, I have grown to enjoy Tuesdays for the Top Ten Tuesday meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Now that they’re on vacation, however, I guess it’s that time to do archive-searching and along with all the rest of y’all, re-create new Top Ten Tuesday discussions, or repeat those which have done before.

Today I’ll be doing Top Ten Favorite Summer Activities That Aren’t Reading since:
1. Stephanie at Stephanie’s Novel Fiction is my idol who makes homemade ice cream has just done it.
2. It’s summer so why not ?
3. Yes, book bloggers do other activities other than reading and it’s time to babble about what… Continue reading “Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Summer Activities That Aren’t Reading”

Review: When Dimple Met Rishi | Cliché But That’s Okay!

when dimple met rishi

Title: When Dimple Met Rishi

Author: Sandya Menon

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Publication Date: May 30, 2017

Rating: 4 Stars

 

 

She wept for her hardheadedness, and for a world that couldn’t just let her be both, a woman in love and a woman with a career, without flares of guilt and self-doubt seeping in and wreaking havoc.”

Dear fellow Babblers,

I’ve always been hesitant going into YA just because my experience with the genre is mixed with cliché and unoriginal premises. 2017 has definitely bee so far a year of new reads and explorations. Following my extreme satisfaction reading the contemporary poet, Lang Leav’s first novel, Sad Girls (full review here), I found myself wanting more of the cutting edge nonsense and thrilling “sweep the chick off her feet and then drop her midair” romance that contemporary literature often lacks or deeply tries to go against.
When Dimple Met Rishi is not something I would typically feel drawn to in a bookstore, despite to cute and quirky cover. I went out and bought and read the novel just because I noticed it to be one of the most popular YA novels currently trending. Upon finishing the novel I was at the same time charmed and rather indifferent…  Continue reading “Review: When Dimple Met Rishi | Cliché But That’s Okay!”

The Liebster Award

Dear fellow babblers,

A big ‘ole hug and thank you to Steph at Lost: Purple Quill for nominating me for The Liebster Award. She has officially become the lifesaver to my Friday blog post. I woke up early this morning to go on my usual three hour hike. I like to use the time to come up with new, quirky and fun blog posts to keep you fellow readers awake and on board with my daily ramblings. This morning, however, no matter how hard I racked my brain to come up with something unique to write about, besides participating in yet another weekly meme, I could NOT for the love of Pete and Sue (lol idk) come up with anything! I mean, bookish ideas and topics sure, but I didn’t have much to say about them. Book covers? Reading nooks? Reading habits? Book preferences? Sure, all those are great ideas, but have just become completely and utterly exhausted… Hmm…  Continue reading “The Liebster Award”

Review: Dear Mr. M | When Suspense is Sacrificed for Style

dear. Mr. m

Title: Dear. Mr. M

Author: Herman Koch

Publisher: Hogarth

Publication Date: September 06, 2016

Rating: 3 Stars

 

“A reader reads a book. If it’s a good book, he forgets himself. That’s all a book has to do. When the reader can’t forget himself and keeps having to think about the writer the whole time, the book is a failure. That has nothing to do with fun. If it’s fun you’re after, buy a ticket for a roller coaster.”

Dear fellow Babblers,

I finished Herman Koch’s newest, perhaps bestselling novel quite a few weeks ago. I absolutely loved The Dinner, which I read for a Narrative Theory class I was taking a few months back because of Koch’s mastery of elements which render an event a story. So logically, wandering through the aisles at my locial bookstore and coming across more from Koch, I expected to be once again swept away my his intricate, stellar writing. Sadly mistaken. I have been putting off writing my review for this book mainly because I was not quite sure on how to approach an honest review without influencing my review by my overall perceptions and feelings of the book as a whole. But since I’ve been receiving quite a few requests lately to share my thoughts on Dear Mr. M lets jump straight to the babble…

Continue reading “Review: Dear Mr. M | When Suspense is Sacrificed for Style”

Top 5 Tuesday – Short Babble on Some Longgg Reads

Dear fellow Babblers,

Please allow a special pause, moment of appreciation, kiss-blow, obnoxious holla for our fellow Americans out there… HAPPY 4TH OF JULY! Now, I’m usually not one to go out of my way on holidays – hence I’m sitting at home with the usual – little man, Haruki, iced lemon black tea, with my MAC typing up these very babbles that Señorita Delphine is ever so grateful to entertain you with. However, given all the controversy that has been going on here in the states (lets leave it at that shall we, *ahem, ahem, GET OUT THE WHITE HOUSE TRUMP!* ?), I figured it to be especially important to give a shout out to my fellow Americans out there who have, yes, the corny is coming: “Live the American Dream…”.

4th of july

Continue reading “Top 5 Tuesday – Short Babble on Some Longgg Reads”

July TBR | Babblers Gonna Babble Books

Dear fellow Babblers,

June has been a pretty *meh* month for me. I haven’t come across anything truly worth my babbles. After reading The Circle at the beginning of the month I’m pretty sure the rest of my month of reading was tainted by that despicable piece of craftsmanship (you can find a full review of The Circle here). I spent this afternoon finishing up on Dear Mr. M by Herman Koch and will definitely will be posting a review of it soon to share with y’all yet another one of my readerly sufferings. I wasn’t as impressed as I anticipated. The Dinner is a whole lot better. Dear Mr. M is just a bunch of twists and turns between multiple focalizers spanning the course of several years. The disappearance of a high school history teacher is what’s supposed to draw the narratives together but I found the lack of linearity very difficult to keep up with. *sigh*

june gloom Continue reading “July TBR | Babblers Gonna Babble Books”