Pink Triangle

This one of the other book I chose that was nonfiction trio I checked out. It is also under the category of gay studies I field that I not familiar with as well as history which I am familiar with especially in the early 20^th century. I was first interested in this book because I saw that the spine was light pink which isn’t a color you usually associate with a nonfiction book. After I read the back of the book I decided to check out it because it was about Nazi Germany a subject I am both familiar with and very interested in. I especially wanted to read it because it was focusing on a minority group that I little or no knowledge of what happened in the Holocaust.

When I started to read I thought the author, Richard Plant would automatically describe and report the events that happened in the Holocaust. But instead he first described the men that were influent in Hitler’ Cabinet that were involved in the Homosexual affairs of Germany and how they were connected in it. The first chapter describes Roehm the SA leader and a well-known homosexual. It started off with his rise to power and how deeply closely he was connected with Hitler to the point that he called him by his first name Adolf. But then it detailed of how he fell for power not because he was homosexual but that he was too ambitious of wanting his SA to replace the current then ends with him being betrayed by his friend Adolf by being kidnapped and killed by a SS guard for not killing himself. And why all of this so important because of this that happened specially the fall of Roehm this translated to homosexual in Germany that they weren’t safe anymore  if a powerful men like Roehm was taken down so mercilessly.

Then the book went into a longer passage that featured Himmler one of the most dangerous men in Hitler’s cabinet because he was the one who organized the Holocaust. The book went in a indebt study of why Himmler hated homosexuals well a few of the reasons was that he thought it was an illness, it decreased the amount of children being born and another “”explanation” was that he thought that homosexual were inferior is because they were no better than women making them unfit warriors. He was a very peculiar men that one with his Nazi idealism of superior Aryan race. What a twisted philosophy I just don’t understand people with such a superior complex over others but I suppose he was a little men who was tired of being left behind hah, pathetic and repulsive.

Finally the later chapter then described the treatment of gays in the camps. When I read it made me understand why there isn’t many written works of their treatment. Because they had a smaller number and as well a shorter lifespan of any of the groups and they received the most terrible beatings. They were also out casted, received worsen labor work and they were horribly experimented.

This book is so great because it goes into a subject not many are willing to into. It talks about many things that people mostly wish to forget for it horrors but the book goes on, the author goes and writes the side of the story not many are familiar with and urges us not to forget those who were discriminated for the way they are as like many who suffered from the death camps.

Nickel and Dimed

The most recent book I just read was Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich. I choose this particular book because I had a sudden urge to read nonfiction so I picked up several nonfiction one that was about Ku Klux Klan another about homosexual in Nazi Germany and a memoir about minimum wage which is this book I am blogging about, Nickel and Dimed.  I first heard of this book back in my sophomore year it was part of the reading list we were supposed to choose from to read for our nonfiction reading choice. I am glad that I choose this book because it gave me an insight look on minimum wage and how it affects the lower middle class.

When I first started reading the book I thought the author was a young and ambitious journalist who jumped into an adventure with such courage to write great stories. But instead I find myself with an educated woman who planned this assignment so she is able to this carefully and she didn’t set out write great stories she discovered people and hardships they endure and the ignoring of the upper class of how not everyone is enjoying that American prosperity we so fully enjoy. In these book I discover all the people she meets and gets to know and how they struggle to make end meets and the judgment that is given to them as well as the fact they are invisible to society. Also from reading these it made me think how much we humans crave to be noticed and that we really wanted to be congratulated for the effort we put into things. Maybe that is why many don’t quit such awful jobs because the craving to be thanked is just to strong. It also made me thing that were very dependent on our sociability towards others because we truly don’t want to be alone and that might be another reason why many don’t move on to a higher paying jobs because we don’t like being alone and friendless.

Reading these book just made me want to be better in school because I want to end up in a job that I enjoy doing and really good at. Because I don’t want to be one of those who are just working to survive I want to live life and make some kind of contribution to the world even its just something as small as positively influencing just one person its proof I did something that helpful through something I enjoy.

Dr. Seuss

Here it is my first children book blog. I am finally doing one because frankly I was stressed and good children book puts me to ease for remembering the good all times when we had recess, easy math and nap times. The children book I am blogging is actually a group of books of the same other I just decided to read (not for myself but to my younger siblings). Can you guess which author it is? It is the amazing, the rhyming doctor himself, Dr. Seuss.

 The ones I just read recently was the all-time favorite The Cat in the Hat, Fox in socks, The Foot book, that special Green eggs and Ham also Horton hears a Who, and finally and the first I have ever read it but I definitely have seen it as movie format The Lorax. I didn’t own and surprisingly couldn’t find how the Grinch stole Christmas but I think I have the movie so I am satisfied with that.

What so great about Dr. Seuss’s books is that the message in what they say in the books are simple but also are great advice for both children and adults alike.  These messages in the book were lessons for young children could also be used as lesson for adults as well. Some of the messages of the book are really memorable and were said in a way that will stick with us. Like that quote from the Lorax “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not”. That quote is easy to untangle because its basically saying if we want to change something we have to take stand and actually try to change. That kind of message is something is the kind of advice we should really remember when we are adults and want to take a greater part of shaping our lives. Other great messages in dr. sues is also in the Lorax is that we really need to protect our environment because this is the only home we have and if we don’t take of it then we may just lose it forever. Another one I distinctly remember is in Green Eggs and Ham when the that one grumpy creature finally admitted that he liked green eggs and ham it shows us that you try something before you judge it and in our society today we are really judgmental and we should really expand our views we might just like what we find out there.

So yes even if you are a grown adult you should remember the lessons you were taught in Dr. Seuss because they are great advice. But if you don’t remember than just refresh yourself with some Dr. Seuss books there great tools for learning great life lessons.

Twilight

 Not so long ago I read all the Twilight saga books including the novella and encyclopedia. I don’t normally read this kinds of books, like books that are romantic in nature I usually am an adventure, fantasy, sci-fi and other kind of reader. So it really took me by surprise that I really enjoyed reading all the books because I only read them because it seemed like everyone was reading them so why not. When I was reading the books I was expecting something graphic in the books I wasn’t hoping for it if that is what you think is just a few years ago my mom banned me from reading the books and at that time I was reading more graphic. But I wasn’t so much interested in the romance as I was with the world that Stephanie Meyer created.

 I have read other vampire books and I favor Meyer’s vampire because they are the most beautiful, powerful yet bestial I have yet seen in any other. I really like how she made her vampires seem like superheroes with their supernatural gifts like minding reading, precognitive skills or emphatic powers. Because she made them a superior species than humans in every way and also really cool. I also really admired the fact she used a real setting and myths of that place for her book. Because the sense that the events of the book could really happen. I also liked the Quileute m legends she incorporate and the werewolf’s she used. But what I really like about the werewolf was that they weren’t real werewolf but instead they shape shifters who transformed into wolves. Because shape shifters are more threatening adversaries than werewolves, and because they are supernatural monsters 24/7 meanwhile werewolves are only for one day a month. Also they retained their human minds while in wolf form and not became bloodthirsty monster. This nominated them as human protectors because they won’t eat us like vampires and werewolves. So the Quileute were misnamed because they are defiantly are not werewolves but shape shifters. But there are werewolves in the twilight world there just called children of the moon and I have been nearly hunted to extinction by vampires.

My real message of these blog is appraise Stephanie Meyer to a well thought supernatural hidden world. Because now finally understand the reason why the Twilight saga is so popular and not with the ultra-hot actors in the movies but the storyline itself. I congratulate you miss Meyers for your success with Twilight and I am now a fan of yours and no longer diss twilight ever just the really obsessed fan girls (or boys) because really those girls are just plain crazy.

Insignia

I have recently finished the second book of the Insignia trilogy, Vortex by S.J Kincaid. These books got me so hyped up I got into trouble because I kept giggling when I was reading them when I should have gone to bed but I couldn’t help it there were so addicted even Veronica Roth said so on the first book cover page. These books were the first of the sci-fi genre books I started this school year and I will do more sci-fi genre for the foreseeable future. But what I really want to say on these books is that I really enjoyed them.              

What I surely liked about these books is the main character, because he is such a messed up kid who doesn’t really belong in that time period his in. That is because Tom, the main character isn’t exactly sane he has major violent and psychopathic impulses. I don’t mean he is a kind of psychopath that burns ants and mutilate puppies. Tom is a berserker he enjoys war games and winning them like how most boys are in these day in age. Ok backtracking right now let’s first talk about the setting he is in, Tom is from the not so distant future where World War 3 is happening right now. About at these moment you are asking yourself on why I am saying that this berserker doesn’t belong a wide spread war well that is because it’s being in space by drones controlled in space. And how is Tom involved in theses WW3 when he is 15 years old kid.  Well the American government needs his talented video game skills to work on the drone for the war to win as well his viciousness that he use to win any scenario.

                When Tom gets recruited he doesn’t get the mandated psych test because honestly the general who scouted him didn’t believe he would pass much to the denial of Tom. He’s vicious nature doesn’t really show until later in the book when the other young recruits are in a war simulation with holographic bodies. But when the pain nullifiers shut down and everyone is feeling the pain being simulated instead of signing off like everyone does Tom stays and fights the enemies who hacked on the simulation. He successfully kills most of the real enemy hackers until he faces off with Medusa the best of the other side. What Tom say next really cracks me up because when Medusa asks why he didn’t run away like the others Tom says he wanted to fight with Medusa and that he was obsessed with Medusa in a really creepy and stalkerish way .Unfortunately he died but he was still so happy to fight with Medusa. Another crazy thing he does in the second book was when he was in a simulation with his team his weak and insecure team leader put in a simulation where he and his teammates are in a raft simulating feeling dehydration and insane hunger as they faces of the other team who were simulated into sharks and they had to kill each other. Tom came up with the idea to kill up with the team leader because he want joining with the others in the simulation instead he pops in and check once in a while. So he does kill the team leader and feeds him to the shark as bates so he and the others can kill the sharks. It would have worked if he wasn’t pulled out of the simulation. But his actions was insubordinate as well as malicious but as Tom argues it was a simulation and the whole point of the simulation was to win but the pain receptors were on so there team leader felt dying so yeah…..

                Those were two of my favorite parts of those two books and they really made me laugh. The real reason why I really like Tom is his personality, because I am one of those villain empathizers so antiheroes or heroes with seriously dark personality really appeal to me. Main characters with heroes complex or high morals sometimes bore me I really into heroes who have terrible, horrible but honest personalities.

A Great Character

One of the greatest American literary characters is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Jay Gatsby. He was really laid back and polite didn’t want a single trouble from anyone. I think he would make a great friend because he has that air of dependability. But what amazed me the most was most of everything he did when he obtained his riches was create an air of intrigue for one single woman he faithfully loved years before. That was one of the traits I both loved and hated about because I see the integrity of his character as well as his foolishness. Because Daisy, the women he was in love was already married (but not happily) and had a child. But even all that he still loved her and offered himself again to her. But Daisy stayed with her cheating husband and being confused on which of those two, Gatsby or her husband she really loved. She was a completely an incisive and childish character as well as her husband just as Nick said in the book. I mean she didn’t even go to Gatsby funeral and I really don’t get why Gatsby was in love her any other women would love to have that kind of guy to love them back like Gatsby. But other than his infatuation with Daisy he was a well accomplished man who came from nothing, surviving through war and still be able to make himself into something without losing his integrity. It was too bad he died that was probably the most surprising ending of a book I have read so far this year. But he was a great character no the greatest of the American literary story so far.