Hello, lovely humans!!!
Gosh, I’ve missed writing these. I know it’s been a while, but let me catch you up. Last time we talked, it was April, and I finished my first year of college. I went home sad to be leaving my friends but excited to be greeted by my family and hometown friends. I had a crazy busy summer. I turned 20, saw Taylor Swift live in concert, went to the Outer Banks with my family, Michigan with my friends, and nannied two little girls throughout. I spent a lot of time reading, watching movies, binging television, and listening to music (per usual) but I have a ton of highlights and recommendations to share with you. Let’s get started :)
Movies
106/100
I watched 44 movies this summer and hit my goal of 100! I spent a lot of time at the theater with the two little girls I nannied, but I also went multiple times with my friends and family. The girls and I saw The Little Mermaid, The Super Mario Bros Movie, and Elemental together. I saw Asteroid City, Barbie, Oppenheimer, and The Haunted Mansion with my friends and family. Barbie/Oppenheimer was THE blockbuster duo of the summer and I have nothing but 5 stars to give out. I expected to love Barbie, but I was not expecting to love Oppenheimer as much as I did! I did not expect a movie where men talked at me for 3 hours would keep me entertained, but god was it phenomenal. Never have I ever loved a movie’s score as much as I loved Ludwig Göransson’s score. I literally ascended out of my body while watching. As for Barbie, it was amazing perfect wonderful, and just what we as a society needed. I saw it with my mom and it was even more special <3 I was dazzled by the production design and expected nothing less from Greta Gerwig's writing; I was laughing the entire time. I definitely need to rewatch it and catch everything I missed the first time around, but I think it is safe to say that loving pink and embracing girlhood is back in style and I could not be more grateful.
Some notable films I watched outside of the theater included:
Bound – Gay film noir!!!!! YUP!
Whiplash – Lots of yelling. Not my fav, but well done.
Uncut Gems – Also a lot of yelling. Ending was fantastic, getting there was painful.
But I’m a Cheerleader – Gay satire!!! Yay!!!
The Princess Diaries – Rewatch with Mom. We made friendship bracelets in bed on my birthday for the Taylor Swift concert the next day :)
Mamma Mia! Rewatch with Mom and Dad in prep to leave for the beach!
Anaïs in Love – French comedy! Gay! Ending was so good!
Judas and The Black Messiah – I cried so hard. I knew nothing about the Black Panther Party before watching this film and I knew nothing about what this story would entail. All I knew was that Daniel Kaluuya and LaKieth Stanfield were in a movie together and I love them. Did not expect to literally bawl my eyes out. Kaluuya and Stanfield did an amazing job, I definitely recommend this movie to everyone.
Red White and Royal Blue – The book was better! I desperately wanted to love this more seeing as how much I loved the book, but they did a decent job adapting it. Watched it with my friends so that made it more fun and there were definitely cute parts. Overall, I just wanted more.
Follow me on Letterboxd to see more of my reviews!
https://letterboxd.com/graciekate/
Books
38/50
I read 23 books this summer! Even I can’t comprehend that number and how I did it, but boy, did I love it. When I set my goal for 2023 as 50 books back in January, I felt I was a little in over my head, however, I was determined to make it happen. It wasn’t that I was just trying to hit a number of books, but I actually wanted to expand my repertoire and read a wide variety of books over the course of the year. I can confidently say I’ve done that, I am 8 books away from my goal as I am writing this :) I can’t even tell you how I chose the books I read this summer, I literally just picked up random ones at the library and dove right in. Here are my top 5 from the summer:
1. I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
I won’t explain this one. Just read it. It is amazing.
2. Delilah Green Doesn’t Care by Ashley Herring Blake ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
Best romcom I have read in a while! Miss. Emily Henry just wasn’t doing it for me with Happy Place, but Ashley Herring Blake saved the day! I definitely think I was too used to straight romance, and I needed some sapphic representation to shake things up. I LOVED Delilah’s character. This and No Rings Attached are my fav sapphic romances I’ve read to date, definitely check them out.
3. WordSlut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language by Amanda Montell ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
WordSlut is a sociolinguistics book EVERYONE needs to read!!! This book opened my eyes to how we as a society gender language and Montell’s feminist lens really breaks these concepts down into bits that are digestible. This book really showed me how we have to acknowledge what our words and phrases mean in a larger context, especially when we are using language to harm or oppress women.
4. No Rings Attached by Rachel Lacey ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
As mentioned above, a wonderful sapphic romance. I’m going to say two things and two things only: fake wedding date and there is only one bed!!!! Enjoy :)
5. Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
This one was hauntingly beautiful. It was slow, but I was involved from the get-go and wanted to know how it would end. The story details the lives of Leah and Miri. Leah arrives back from a submarine mission gone wrong, and Miri, her wife, is left to figure out what happened in that vessel and where her wife has gone. Goodreads writes that this story is about falling in love, loss, grief, and what life there is in the deep, deep sea. Armfield has a way with words and crafts these intricate and heart-wrenching sentences that stick with you for a while after you read.
Television
Heartstopper
Oh, Alice Oseman, how I love you. I didn’t think she could make this show any cuter, but somehow, she prevailed. I was obsessed with how season two spent a lot of time showcasing pure, authentic, and intentional queer love. This is the representation that is needed in the community sans drama, broken hearts, and an overall hypersexual tone. This season was focused on observing healthy relationships between the characters, seeing them work through difficulties in a mature and rational way, and further developing characters and introducing new identities to the cast. In my queer theory class, when discussing asexuality, I immediately connected our discussion to Isaac in Heartstopper. Oseman successfully introduces Isaac, an aromantic, asexual character to her repertoire and we get to see his life through his eyes and how he comes into his identity throughout the season. The blog post linked below further explains this idea and details how Isaac grows throughout the episodes. If you need something lighthearted and wholesome to watch, check it out! I love this show and everything it stands for!!!! Streaming on Netflix.
https://www.autostraddle.com/the-subtle-aroace-gaze-of-heartstopper-season-two/
Atlanta
Starring Donald Glover, Atlanta follows college dropout and music manager Earnest “Earn” Marks (Glover) and rapper Alfred “Paper Boi” Miles (Brian Tyree Henry) as they navigate a strange, seemingly otherworldly Atlanta hip-hop scene. Atlanta also stars LaKeith Stanfield!!!! as Darius, Earn and Alfred’s eccentric friend, and Zazie Beetz as Vanessa “Van” Kiefer, Earn’s on-again-off-again girlfriend and the mother of his daughter (Wiki). The show gives the sense that something is “wrong” but none of the characters can put a finger on it and neither can viewers. Strange, comical, and thought-provoking, Atlanta is definitely worth the watch. Streaming on Hulu.
Beef
I now present to you the most A24 show you could ever ask for. I mean A24 literally A24ed the heck out of themselves on this one. It stars Steven Yeun and Ali Wong as Danny Cho and Amy Lau, two strangers whose involvement in a road rage incident escalates into a prolonged feud (Wiki). At no point during any of the episodes did I have any idea what was going to happen next. I absolutely LOVED this show. If you’re looking for something odd, fast-paced, and hilarious, check this one out on Netflix!
Never Have I Ever
This show was one that I’ve had so many people tell me I needed to watch, but I always thought it was a little too juvenile for my taste. But here I am! I stand corrected! I absolutely loved this show, I breezed through all four seasons within a month because all of the episodes are around 27 minutes. The show was written by Mindy Kaling and that should’ve been a clue as to if I was going to like it or not- she is so freaking funny. It follows Devi Vishwakumar, played by Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, and her tumultuous journey through high school. Devi’s character is SO messy, but such a great representation of being a teen girl in the 21st century and a representation for South Asian women, who are largely excluded from media representation. If you need a good laugh, give this one a watch. Streaming on Netflix.
Music
The one thing I haven’t been doing recently is making a playlist each month with the music I’ve been listening to, however, I can pull together a few tracks and albums I had on repeat!
Albums
Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), Marginalia, 1989, Lover, Harry’s House, The Barbie Soundtrack, Renaissance, Folklore, and SOUR.
Tracks
ALL OF THE SNTV VAULT TRACKS, “This Love”, “New Romantics”, “Dance The Night”, “Hits Different”, “Girls Make Me Wanna Die”, “Blindsided”, “Superman”, “As It Was”, “AMERICA HAS A PROBLEM”, “Cruel Summer”, “August”, “Deja Vu”.
“Cruel Summer” was probably my most-listened to track this past summer. The two little girls I nannied absolutely loved it and we would literally play over and over driving to our destination. We’d scream it with the windows down, our hair blowing, and the sun on our faces. It was so fun and definitely a core memory for both me and them :)
I saw Taylor Swift live in Pittsburgh (night two) on June 17th, and our surprise songs were “seven” and “The Story Of Us.” I kid you not, I about passed out when she started singing both of these songs. Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) came out a little under a month later and hearing “The Story Of Us” recorded was extra special. I fell in love with all of the vault tracks, my favorite is definitely “I Can See You”, then “Electric Touch” and then “Timeless”. I cannot express enough how much this album means to me as I grew up listening to it. Hearing it 13 years later after growing into myself was so endearing.
That’s all folks! I am so happy to be back in business and writing again. Sophomore year has gone swimmingly so far. I am so happy where I am in life, and really grateful for the privilege to be alive at such a great time in history for media on all fronts. See y’all soon!
With so much love,
xoxo Grace