October TBR

It’s spooky season bitches! This month I’m reading spooky books, as well as a variety of other things! Let’s get into it!

1. My Best Friend’s Exorcism by Grady Hendrix: It’s horror week on Goodreads (add me! goodreads.com/avejam) and I’ve had this book forever so I decided it’s finally time to read it. I love me some 80s themes and I love me some demons, so I’m looking forward to it.

2. This Will Only Hurt A Little by Busy Phillips: Initially I was going to only read horror books in October but then I got the audiobook which is read by Busy so I decided it needed to be moved up on the schedule. I love Busy Phillips so I’m sure I’ll love this book.

3. The Butterfly Garden by Dot Hutchinson: Spooky book #2! I got this book at a thrift store because I had heard of it and I liked the cover. I think it’s about a guy that collects women in a garden? That could be totally wrong though. I don’t know where I got that information so I’ll let you know whether or not that’s correct.

4. Witch Hat Atelier Volume 2 by Kamome Shirahame: I have a new apartment that has a new bathtub and I need a manga to test it out…plus what’s more halloween than witches?

5. Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero: I’ve had this one as long as I’ve had “My Best Friend’s Exorcism” and it is also spooky themed so I thought this month should be the month!

6. American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis: This one was on my tbr back in May but I never got around to it, so I’m hoping to get to it this month but only if I have extra time.

And that’s the list! I know I said I would post it on Saturday and I didn’t and I also know it’s almost the middle of the month but I am TRYING okay. What are you reading this month?

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September Wrap-Up

It’s finally fall everyone! Which means I am spending all my spare time inside drinking tea and wrapping up my yearly reading challenge! we’re starting October at 38 out of 50 books so without further ado, here’s what I thought of the books I read last month!

1. Where’d You Go, Bernadette? By Maria Semple:

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I’m a little late to the party on this one because everyone else read this book back in 2016, but I wasn’t really reading at that point in life okay!? Anyway, When I went to see “Once Upon A Time In Hollywood…” (great film) a few months back, they showed the trailer (yes, I do show up to movies early for the trailers) for the movie adaptation starring Cate Blanchett and the book was once again placed at the front of my mind. I picked up the audiobook at my local library and finished it within a couple of days. It was good. It was enjoyable and interesting but there was something about Bernadette that bugged me. Even though she is a redeeming character, and finds herself by the end of the book, I am still a huge advocate for the fact that having a mental illness does not mean you can do whatever you want and hurt the people you love, which Bernadette did and received a shockingly large amount of forgiveness on her family’s part. Looking past the character flaws, I really enjoyed the artifact/document compilation style, as well as the narration of her daughter. Overall I gave it 3/5 stars and I do intend to see the movie.

2. The Mermaid Chair By Sue Monk Kidd:

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OH BOY. I don’t even know where to start on this one. It was the last of my summer reads and as far as southern island imagery goes it’s great…but that’s also where any greatness in this book ends. Maybe it was just because I had high expectations from “The Secret Life of Bees,” or maybe it was because I’ve never been married, but I thought all the characters in this book were childish, and selfish. Jesse is a 40 year old woman who has for some reason never bothered to realize she’s her own person? So she needs to sleep with a monk? For like independence or something? Also, her mom clearly needs serious medical help but Jesse’s just like “no she’s fine,” causing her mom to sever off ANOTHER finger. I was rolling my eyes, through the whole book. I don’t recommend it, unless you need reassurance that you shouldn’t cheat on your spouse…2/5 stars.

3. Carry On By Rainbow Rowell:

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I read the book this series is based off of, “Fangirl,” probably back in the year 2014. It’s a YA romance, and that’s why, even though it’s been on my shelf for awhile, I still hadn’t read Carry On. I knew it was going to be a slow burn YA and I thought I had grown out of it by now. I am here today to say…I have not…at all. I started it on a Friday and finished it 2 days later because I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN. Rainbow Rowell has such a strong writing style when it comes to keeping you turning the pages. It is perfectly paced and the romance is definitely cheesy but not to the point, that it covers all other story lines in the book. The characters were lovable but also flawed, and representing of all groups. It is an LGBTQ+ themed book which gives it even greater merit in the current world climate. This book was just so fun. I haven’t read anything this quickly since middle school, and I was reminded of just how much I like sitting on the couch for twelve hours straight hanging out with book characters, plus it was a great palette cleanser after reading so much true crime lately. 5/5 stars.

4. Wayward Son By Rainbow Rowell:

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Good thing I didn’t read “Carry On” 4 years ago when it came out because I was able to pick up the sequel that just came out last month right when I finished the first one. I read this one in two days too. I loved this one for all the reasons that I liked the first one but also because it represented real relationships very well. Communication is hard and the fact that Rowell uses that difficulty to contribute to her story lines is entertaining and once again keeps you turning the page. I just want these boys to figure out their feelings and be happy! Hopefully it won’t take another 4 years to get a third book. 5/5 stars.

There they are! All female authors in the month of September, so that’s cool. Check back Saturday for my October TBR!

Chaos Walking Trilogy Review

Head’s up everyone! This review contains a lot of spoilers for the “Chaos Walking” trilogy! So if you want to avoid that, click off this page now!

The last time I read a series, it was adult fantasy and was also one of my all time favorite series, the “Shades Of Magic” trilogy by V.E. Schwab. I can’t even tell you what the last YA series I read was. It was probably “To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before” or something. I have read so many YA apocalypse/distopia that I hated, that I’m not even sure what made me pick up Patrick Ness’s “The Knife Of Never Letting Go” in the first place. I am however very thankful that I did.

When I read the synopsis, I was feeling pretty “meh” about this one. The first book follows “almost a man,” Todd Hewitt as he escapes his hometown on New Earth, a planet that humanity escaped to once the o.g. earth’s end was inevitable, where everyone can hear each other’s thoughts and there are no women. He runs into a girl along his way named Viola Davis who crashed in a scout spaceship from a new group of settlers from the old planet earth. They end up running together, and adventure ensues as the two escape a crazy preacher, and an army. This plot develops into what becomes a civil war in the second book, and a global war in the third. I thought it seemed like a lot, but having read Ness’s “A Monster Calls,” I was hopeful.

Out of all three I think the second book was my favorite. The addition of Viola’s perspective made for an intriguing dynamic and a break from Todd’s hick dialect. I also really enjoyed the first one. The third one I could give or take, it was still well developed and entertaining but I also thing this series would have been just as powerful as a duology. In “A Monster Calls,” I was amazed by Ness’s use of metaphor, which is also found in the “Chaos Walking” trilogy. I also was impressed by Ness’s powerful character development, practicality, and themes. The development of Todd and Viola throughout the series is a big one because they are right at that young teen age where they essentially go from being children to being adults. Todd and Viola’s growth from everything they know being wrong, is enthralling and also very accurate to real life despite being on a more severe scale. I also appreciated the attention to the fact that people should not be comfortable with killing other people! I feel like a lot of times in the dystopian genre particularly. (*cough*, “The Hunger Games,” *cough*) people are murdering people and then just not having any emotions about it at all. I don’t care if they had to do it to survive, or whatever, they should still feel some residual guilt or mental turmoil over it, ESPECIALLY when they’re not doing it of their own free will. If they don’t feel torn up after that, then they’re just a straight up sociopath (*cough*, Katniss, *cough*, Everdeen, *cough*.) But I digress.

In “Chaos Walking” almost all the characters are constantly questioning where they stand morally and I appreciate that greatly. I also appreciated the awareness Todd had of his own masculinity and the fact that he had to keep it in check. For once toxic masculinity did not ruin the party because for once a straight male character was raised by two gay men and not a total piece of shit. (I mean toxic masculinity ruined the party for every other character in the book, but still.) This brings me to another thing that I really liked about this book. I went through the first two books thinking “wow, I can’t believe that he’s never going to mention that Todd’s guardians Ben and Cillian are totally gay for each other and that’s why they were able to save Todd from the toxic masculinity of this town.” Then in the third book, HE DID. And it wasn’t a big deal. It was never a secret from anyone because they can all see each other’s thoughts, they just never mentioned it because no one in this whole society thought it was a problem, and I think that is an amazing choice on Patrick Ness’s part. The whole book is so solely focused on the divide between men and woman and our two main characters are so starkly different in their thoughts on gender from the rest of the world that it’s impossible to miss the point that is being made.

A lot of other issues with gender are brought up with the pretty much genderless race of aliens. It is made clear from very early on that they are much more united than the humans, thinking as one entity instead of individuals. Thankfully it is also seen that lack of individualism in a society can cause problems of it’s own, when half of the race is left behind in slavery. Ness really covers all his bases. Overall, this trilogy is the greatest depiction of very real societal flaws that I have ever seen in a YA book. Which is crazy, because you would think books catered to youth would want to provide some kind of thought on their world. I think a lot do, and that it just ends up buried under a pile of flaming love triangles.

In the end I gave them all 4 out of 5 stars because they did of course all still have YA aspects to them. That flaw is completely based on personal preference, and I think if I had read it back when I was 12 or 13 it would have been put on the favorites shelf. The only plot aspect I really didn’t like was the whole power of love thing Todd and Viola had. It was fine in the more adult relationships, like Ben and Cillian. Todd and Viola’s relationship however, especially in the first two books, seemed very juvenile, so I had to suspend some disbelief there. I also was left with some questions at the end of it all, like: “What about Todd’s dad?” or “What happened to the Mayor’s wife?” or “Can I have a whole spin off series about what happened to that human/alien couple from the short story at the end of book two?” Other than that I thought this series was amazing. For anyone who read the book that wants to know, my favorite character was absolutely Davey Prentiss who is being played by FUCKING NICK JONAS in the upcoming film so I cannot wait to see my sweet baby boy come to life.

I hope you all enjoyed this, kind of all over the place, review. This month is going to be pretty heavy on reviews of movies and books, so if you like these kinds of posts make sure to sign up for email notifications! Now get off the internet and go read this trilogy!

I’ll Be Gone In The Dark Review

If you remember my tbr from earlier this month, you’ll remember how excited I was to read Michelle McNamara’s book, “I’ll Be Gone In The Dark. Well I have read it and I am back now to review it for you. Let’s get started.

Okay, so before I even opened this book, I already had a huge emotional attachment to it. I had listened to multiple podcasts about the book, and I had also been following the fairly recent capture of “The Golden State Killer,” who was arrested shortly after the publication of “IBGITD” (that’s what I’m going to call it from here on out.) So like I said I had very high hopes. I usually go into my books knowing hardly anything but I went into this one with lots of prior knowledge about the crimes and also the author.

The book is split into three different sections. Part 1: information about the GSK (Golden State Killer), Part 2: Michelle’s experience working on the case, and Part 3: Information from Michelle’s research assistant who helped finish the book after McNamara’s death, an afterword from her husband, and a letter from Michelle to the GSK. This arrangement works well and despite having so many different pieces, flows with surprising ease. I love the fact that they decided not to try to recreate McNamara’s writing style to finish the book because it truly couldn’t have been done. McNamara writes with an emotion and style that is rarely found in true crime. It’s the perfect amount of detail without reading like a report. Her descriptions of California are incredible and she has just the right amount of bluntness in the sections that describe the actual killings. Billy Jensen and Paul Haynes did an incredible job piecing together her research and the parts of the book they had into a complete book of Michelle’s work.

I would not recommend this book if you are at all squeamish about murder. The GSK was a real horror show, and definitely not for the faint of heart. Any gory bits are written with tact and respect but if you are just beginning to delve into true crime, I wouldn’t start with this. It has a novel quality but is packed to the brim with information. The addition of maps, pictures, and a list of the detectives and criminologists that are present throughout the book, make the whole thing a real experience. This book took me the longest to read out of my books this month, and that was mostly because I felt I needed to absorb everything. I annotate all my books but if anyone tries to borrow this one, they might have a hard time reading the book under all my hand scribbled thoughts. I think that’s a sign that a book is good. If it takes up your whole brain.

If you haven’t guessed by now, I gave this book five out of five stars. It has been added to my list of all time favorites. I only had one grievance about the book and that is that it’s not really THE book. The whole time I read, I couldn’t stop asking myself if this was the book Michelle McNamara wanted me to read. I think it is definitely close. It was put together by people that knew her very well, but there was still so many things that she wanted to put in and unfortunately didn’t get to because of her untimely death. I wish she would have been alive to see how well it did, and see him get caught right after her book came out. I admit I teared up at the end when reading the afterword written by her late husband. In it he says she was “quietly, effortlessly, original,” and I think that shows in her writing and in her commitment to finding the GSK.

The GSK was a true monster. As Michelle states in one of my favorite lines, “the act…was arousal alchemized to hate, a vicious punishment meted out by one judge: his corroded brain.” In summary this is a book about a monster written by a hero. She helped so many victims through her work, and helped to solve one of the biggest unsolved cases in America. Although her time with us was short, she achieved more than a lot of people in this world ever will. I think this book is a treasure. It could have been lost to time, forever sitting on a dusty hard drive. I considered reading this a privilege and it is a book I will not soon forget.

If you want to see what I thought of the rest of the books I read this month, make sure to check back on Monday for my February wrap-up post!

February tbr

Books to read this month.

Hello and welcome to February. That’s right folks it just keeps going. Time. It’s crazy. Anyway this is a tbr for the the month of February. We have some more actual books this month (as opposed to graphic novels and manga) so get ready. Okay here we go.

1. The Knife Of Never Letting Go – Patrick Ness: I’ve started this one and so far I’m really enjoying it so far. I read “A Monster Calls” by Ness when I was younger and really loved it so I decided to try this series. I am usually very hesitant when it comes to series’ because they are a commitment and I am even more hesitant when it comes to YA, so this book was a risk for me and so far, I am not regretting it. It’s also supposed to come out as a movie next month so that’s some convenient timing on my part.

2. Snot Girl: California Screaming – Bryan Lee O’malley and Leslie Hung: YEA VOLUME 2! I said less Graphic Novels, but we both know I need at least one graphic novel. I love this story so much and the art is amazing. I can’t wait to find out what happens next in this series.

3. I’ll Be Gone In The Dark – Michelle McNamara: I AM SO EXCITED TO READ THIS BOOK. I have heard so much about it from My Favorite Murder and various booktubers. I plan to read this one while visiting home next week. I also plan on making this the review of the month.

4. Soppy – Phillippa Rice: Hooray! seasonal pick! I felt bad reading so many books about murder and the apocalypse this month considering it’s Valentine’s Day in fourteen days, so I threw in this little book of joy to round it out. This barely counts because there are so few words, but I’m counting it so there. Happy Valentine’s Day bitches!

5. Love Poems – Pablo Neruda: I bought this little book because it was adorable and once again, if a book is a light shade of pink then there is a 90% chance I will buy it. I like that it’s pocket sized and I also like that it has both the translated poem, and the original Spanish version, because I can’t read Spanish but I sure do like to look at it.

6. Sad Girls – Lang Leav: My last pick for the month is another victim of my weird obsession with buying books just for their covers. This serious problem means that I don’t really know what it’s about but I’m sad and a girl so I’m hopeful. I’ve heard mixed reviews so we’ll see.

Those are the books I’m reading this month! what are you reading this month??? If you have any interest in joining a book club, contact me on my Instagram @avejam_

January Wrap-Up

Hello! and welcome to my January reading wrap-up! I am proud to say that I finished all of the books on my January tbr. Thanks insomnia! Here are my final ratings and thoughts on the books I read this month.

1. Killing and Dying – Adrian Tomine: I already spoke about this one in the tbr because I had already read it and I stick with that initial review. I loved the drawings, loved the story line, my only complaint was that it was so short. I gave it 4 out of 5 stars on Goodreads.

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   2. Saga Volume 1 – Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples: I figured I was going to like this one and I definitely did. I read it in one night, so it’s definitely a quick read. The illustrations are beautiful and the story is great. The world however is built very quickly so if you like a slow burn this is not it. It is very much a “jump in and figure out the logistics later” kind of book. Once again 4 out of 5 stars.

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3. Fresh Complaint – Jeffrey Eugenides: To read my review of Fresh Complaint click here! My first 5 out of 5 stars this year.

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4. Deadman Wonderland – Jinsei Kataoka and Kazuma Kondou: I knew I would like this. In fact I loved it. Everyone always wants to bitch at me about how manga isn’t really reading, well you can shove it because this book is great and it never won’t be. I bought the second one so you have that to look forward to. 5 out of 5 stars.

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5. Not In Kansas Anymore – Christine Wicker: This book was good. It made some really thought provoking points about religion and spirituality and I especially liked the anecdotes throughout. However there were so many subject wound into one that it all felt a little convoluted. I would have rather read a shorter book on one subject than this compilation of way too many. If the book would have just been about Wicca or Hoodoo I would have loved it, but I could do without the faeries and furries. Plus the whole thing reads kind of like a 1950’s crime novel. It’s very reporter/detectiveish? (If that makes any sense.) Whatever it’s called it’s distracting and definitely took some getting used to. I gave this one my lowest rating of the year so far, 3 out of 5 stars.

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That’s 5 books done for the year! No ratings under three yet so things are looking good. I’m very excited for next month’s books, so check back friday for a new tbr! What did you read this month?

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/65373656-avery-jam

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January 2019 TBR

Hello! and welcome back to averyjam.com – your favorite, poorly updated website. I’m back today with a tbr for January. I really want to try to read more books that aren’t for school this year, so without further ado, here are the books I plan to read in January!

1. Killing and Dying – Adrian Tomine: So I have actually already finished this one. I’m starting the year off with some graphic novels and short story collections just so I can gain some momentum before picking up the giant books on my reading list. Graphic novels are some of my favorite books to read and I picked this one up on a whim at the book store a while back (if a book has any shade of light pink on the cover I’m probably going to buy it). It has some heart squeezing, bittersweet story lines, and really nice illustrations. I’m a little sad it took me so little time to get through it.
2. Saga Volume 1 – Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples: Like I said, I love graphic novels and this one has been recommended to me by quite a few trusted sources. The art is gorgeous and I think the story line will be too. It has quite a few installments, so if I like it then it will keep me occupied all year.
3. Fresh Complaint – Jeffrey Eugenides: Eugenides is one of my all time favorite authors, (the author of one of the books that changed my life; Middlesex) so I was thrilled when he released this short story collection back in 2017. I’ve been wanting to get around to it since I bought it. I plan to do a full review of this book once I’ve read it, so stay tuned.
4. Not In Kansas Anymore – Christine Wicker: My mom gave this book to me last Christmas, so I figured it was time I get around to reading it. It’s a nonfiction book about witches and the like so I’m sure I’ll enjoy this one.
5. Deadman Wonderland – Jinsei Kataoka and Kazuma Kondou: This is one of my all time favorite animes and I’ve owned the first book in the series for a little over a year now. Once again this should be a quick read to kick off the year.This tbr is significantly shorter than ones I’ve done in the past, but I’m coming out of a reading slump and I wanted to set a goal that was attainable. I’ll let you know what I get through and what I did or didn’t like at the end of the month!

Seeds: poetry collection

Overgrown

Sometimes my brain gets too crowded and my thoughts start pouring

out of my ears.

They land on my shoulders and drip down my skin to embed themselves

along my spine.

A thought pressed under my skin to sit against my vertebrae and to grow

among goosebumps.

Mushrooms crawl up my back nourished by my bone marrow.

Vines crawl over my shoulders to wrap around my ribs.

Thorns stem from my collarbones to make sure no one can get in

to the body garden grown from my thoughts.

The hair on my arms stands on end as it turns into blades of grass.

My fingers sprout dandelions

and forget-me-nots sprout from my toes.

My breasts grow bleeding hearts

and honey drips from my nose.

Bees live here now, and beetles and moths.

They crawl around my stomach lining,

up my throat,

and out my mouth.

My heart slowly turns a tulip bulb and my brain’s a clump of poison ivy.

Ring Around The Bathtub

If you ran your hands down, they would roll along small hills

Bump bump bump bump

The contours of my back bone

Weak, warped, and sharp like knives

Don’t cut yourself on my lethal body

Let the water run down the stretched translucent canvas

Blue lines painted in textured brush strokes

Paint running down the shower drain

Humanity swirling down the shower drain

Clumps of hair clogging the shower drain

Dark spiders plucked out of my skull

Leaving paste white bone showing

Through the hole in my head.

Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk

Beat up sneakers hit the pavement

In an uneven rhythm matching the beat

Flowing through the earbuds

That no one else can hear

Chilled wind painting a blush

Over her freckled face

Kicking rocks across the street

Sleeves pulled down over her hands

Walking into the corner gas station

Going to the very back of the store

And getting the chocolate coffee in a can

Pulls her debit card out of her pack of camels

She takes a cigarette out at the stop light

Cups her hand around her lighter

To keep it safe from the breeze

She inhales deeply

Nicotine fills her lungs

Cigarette smoke clouds her thoughts

The taste of ash sticky on her tongue

Mentally feeling her body rot

She cracks open the can of coffee

And swallows the sweet syrup

Inhaling the caffeine her body runs on

Ashing her cigarette on the ground

Caffeine and nicotine

Cigarettes and chocolate milk.

Recurring Ache

the knowing,

you’ll never be mine is the hard part.

The absolute sureness that I will never touch your naked back.

Connecting the constellations of freckles along your spine,

The knowledge that I will never hold you

or kiss your tear stained face when you cry.

I’ll never get to see the sun hit your body just right

as your laying next to me with your eyes closed.

Never get to run my fingers through your hair

until it gives me all your secrets.

The ache

that sits in my ribs for you nestled right next to my heart.

House Guest

I hate that my body has learned to accommodate pain

It walks into me and I ask it if it would like a glass of water.

I exhaust myself trying to figure out what it needs

Doing everything I can to keep it from becoming enraged and taking over again

@baby_caleb

After a full blown facebook investigation

I found your Snapchat and added you.

And you added me back

Your Facebook is depressing

You’re a real sadboi ™

See: that’s an example of the correct use of you’re and your

Which according to Facebook, you don’t understand

But you’re real cute

Even though your teeth are crooked

It’s ok mine have a gap

I want to tell you I’ll be your friend

I want to tell you I think your the most beautiful boy

I want to tell you that it could be worse.

You could be me.

In person I said

“I have annoyingly thick hair but it falls out in clumps from anxiety”

I don’t know why I said it but you said

“Me too”

I want to tell you a lot of things but instead

I just asked if you had to work today.

You haven’t opened my message yet

Satan’s Poster Child

The disgust in your voice when you say the words “cancer stick”

As if you think it can change me.

As if I didn’t already know

The concern in your eyes as you explain the importance of your god

My blank eyes staring back at you

So you can look through and see the hollow soul.

I bet they tried to tell Lucifer how to live too

Your help is judgement

Making me fall farther from your heaven

Satan’s poster child.

Heaving through hell and back

Long black nails curling around your throat

If you tell me one more time

I’m gonna die young

I already fucking know that and I wish it would happen today

So please climb up on your precious pedestal

I’m fine in fire

Sitting on my throne of cigarette cartons and bic lighters

Onyx horns protruding from my skull

Dressed in ash and lingerie

Making you all uncomfortable as I

Cry freely for no goddamn reason.

Coffee Convo

Ok, so it’s not really a coffee this time. It’s actually a green tea with honey and an asiago bagel but that’s only because it’s 8,000 degrees here today and I couldn’t be bothered to drink anything that wasn’t refreshing. It’s only May and I’m already so over sun. I mean I’m not asking for 7 foot snow again, I would just like it if it was always 60 degrees and cloudy.

Since I am posting regularly again I figured I should give you a bit of an update and since I haven’t done a coffee convo in a hot minute, I figured I would share my asiago bagel with you all.

For starters, I am turning 20 in a few weeks which feels bizarre. A lot of me still feels like I’m only 14 and the other part of me is coming to terms with the fact that my sister graduates in a couple days. YES MAISY JAM HAS A HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA. I’m honestly probably more proud of her than I was of myself. She works insanely hard and is also incredibly smart in ways I have never been and I can’t wait to see where her life takes her now that she has been released from prison/the public school system.

Summer has also officially begun which means lots of plans are being made. I am making a trip to Idaho over the 4th of July with my family as well as trying to figure out all of the logistics of moving, which, if everything goes to plan, should be happening in late August.

My asiago bagel and green tea.

I’m trying to find time to spend with all the people I’ve known for years as well as make connections with new people and it really brings to light just how many people come and go in your life. There are people that I still have genuine love for that I haven’t seen in years. It really puts into perspective how much time we set aside for things that don’t give us the love that family and friends give. We put work, money, and material things over interactions that could change our lives and that’s crazy to me.

I haven’t been reading hardly at all this year, which is frustrating because there’s so much I’ve been wanting to read. I think I need to work more on prioritizing the things I love over the things I have to do. I put work over a lot of things, and while I do generally like my job, My life has taught me that I need to make time to do things I like because, I don’t get to re-do life, and I should probably spend it doing things I love.

I’m also working on not caring what other people think about my life. I generally don’t care what others think when it comes to the way I look or act, especially when it comes to strangers. Lately though, I’ve been focusing on not needing validation from the people I’m close to. Even the people I love aren’t going to understand me and I need to accept that and be ok with it.

These are just a couple things that have been thinking about lately. If you have anything to add, I always appreciate your comments and messages, and if you want to see more photos like the one in this post, please follow me on instagram @avejam_ . Thank you for reading and you will hear from me on Monday!

– Avery

13 Reasons Why: Season 2 Review

WARNING: THIS BLOG POST CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE 1ST AND 2ND SEASON OF 13 REASONS WHY. IT ALSO CONTAINS DISCUSSION OF THE SENSITIVE TOPICS DISCUSSED IN THE SHOW. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.

13 Reasons Why is Netflix’s original series that came out last year and released their second season about a week ago.

The first season was based on the book of the same title by Jay Asher and tells the story of Hannah, a girl who kills herself and leaves behind 13 tapes, each one for a different person at her school, that chronicle the events leading to her suicide.

Due to my fragile mental state, I usually refrain from watching shows that deal with suicide, but my mom had gotten me the book 5 years earlier and I had loved it. I enjoyed the first season and thought it stayed very true to the book. However the first season ended where the book ended so I was curious to see where they would go with the second season.

The first thing I will give the show credit for is it’s “bingeability” I finished the whole season in about 5 days. The show definitely keeps you engrossed and on the edge. This isn’t necessarily always for the best though. Throughout the season, the characters are faced with disaster after disaster and even when things are looking up it only lasts for about half an episode before everything once again comes crashing down. It gives the show an over all feeling of hopelessness which is not ideal for a show based around suicide.

Speaking of the shows themes, much like season one, the show faced a lot of backlash for it’s graphic depictions of rape and suicide as well as the way people deal with it. A lot of viewers say the show depicts suicide as a way that’s offensive to those that have suffered suicide attempts. Here’s my take on it: the show focuses on one story of one person. The show never claims that this is typical of all suicidal people or that all people with these experiences behave this way. The fact that the show even uses something that is so often tiptoed around as a main theme is something to be commended over the logistics of how Hannah comes to kill herself and leave the tapes. As a survivor of a suicide attempt I don’t find it offensive at all and I appreciate the shows boldness with this and other topics. The show also provides a very large selection of resources for people struggling with these topics.

The best part about this season by far was Jessica Davis’s recovery from her rape. The compassion her friends show her and how she works towards owning her experience and getting professional help is very refreshing throughout the shitshow everyone else is enduring. This, as well as Sky’s example of the person who deals with suicidal thoughts in a healthy way by going to a mental facility, brings the high-strung, emotionally charged show down to a more comfortable level.

Which brings me to the thing that annoyed me the most about this season. While every character is dealing with their mental illnesses and their problems, not once is anyone ever concerned about Clay’s vivid hallucinations. He spend half the show talking to a dead girl but somehow he’s just helping everyone else? Hallucinations are a very real symptom of mental illness and it’s annoying to see a show that’s trying so hard to shine a light on these symptoms, just brush this one under the rug.

It’s pretty obvious at the end of this season that Netflix is shooting for a third, and while the second season was engrossing it seems to me the show has completed what it was meant to do. The creation of problems at the end seemed unnecessary and it seemed like the show was just fishing for a problem that could be considered bigger than Hannah’s suicide.

Overall, the second season was well written and engrossing with all the actors once again giving incredible performances. While not as good as the first season the second season holds strong on its own. Can the third?