Top Ten Tuesday | November 26th, 2019

Hi! What’s up? Hello, my reckless readers!

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

For this Top Ten Tuesday, I thought I would list the top three books I’m grateful/thankful for.

I read a ton of books, especially this year and there are some books that have changed me as a human and made me thankful for my life and some that literally wrecked me. Of course, just thankful for a good read! 

1. Natalie Tan’s Book of Luck and Fortune – I’ve mentioned this book a couple of times. I really loved this book. As a reading experience, it set itself apart with humor and magical realism that I wasn’t expecting by that I really loved. 
2. No Exit – I’ve never read a book that had my heart rate up to fat-burning zone for hours until I read this book. A crick in my neck later, I sat there on my bed saying “OMG” over and over to myself. It’s an action thriller that I’ve never encountered before or since. 
3. Small Little Things – I’m not the heavy book kind of girl. But the subject matter was dear to my heart and I was better for reading it. 

What’s your Thankful Freebie?

Rave Review | Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult

Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult is a book I have owned for a couple of years and never opened. Until now. This book written by a white author was about a black Labor and Delivery nurse who was accused of killing an infant because she was removed from his care by his white supremacist parents. You read that right. Heavy, I know. 

The reason I mention that the author is white is that writing from a black woman’s perspective is extremely hard if you have experienced it. There are small slights that you have to question all the time. Micro-aggressions muttered by colleagues, jokes made by friends, and because you don’t want to be THAT girl, you keep your mouth shut. I believe that Ms. Picoult did her research. Because I felt understood when I read Ruth’s story.

I believe this book did a fantastic job of putting together the differing perspectives and throwing curveballs at me that I didn’t know were coming. I don’t read this kind of dramatic fiction often but I think I’m going to start. As a black woman, I am very conscious about race, as a black woman in an interracial relationship, I am very conscious about race. I identified with Ruth who did all the right things and still got all the looks of her peers that she was going to be doing something wrong or that she wasn’t in charge. 

I think this book is designed to make you feel a little discomfort. I didn’t gasp with realization when Ruth got carded or got her receipt checked or when the manager followed her around the store in the mall. I nodded my head, knowing that these are things that I’ve experienced, but could never really explain because it wasn’t happening to the people around me. I understood when she questioned herself, whether a perceived slight was just an overreaction due to “sensitivity” or if it was in fact, discrimination.

Books like this look you straight in the face and tell you the truth. Sometimes it’s a hard pill to swallow. I think that above all, it was a very well written book and I recommend it wholeheartedly.