My long-pending book list

It is day 6 of online classes and I hope you all are surviving! I am sorry I missed the Zoom call, I meant to virtually attend, but I accidentally overslept. I think being at home has made me more unproductive than I previously was. Though my workload has unfortunately doubled to more readings, longer responses, and heightened levels of stress. But on the bright side, the semester is almost over and hopefully, we will survive this pandemic! 

I have been reading a lot of news about Covid-19. The amount of news coverage is very overwhelming and constant, which is both good and bad! I have been avoiding my workload and trying to think about something other than Covid-19, I started rereading James Baldwin’s If Beale Street Could Talk. I read this book last summer, and I remembered loving it, though I seem to fail to remember what it is about. I read Go Telling on the Mountain in high school. Baldwin is a literary genius, I wish I read more of his books, unfortunately, I have not. I plan on doing so eventually. I know I have a long-pending book list! I recently finagled someone’s HULU account and I saw If Beale Street Could Talk, but before I watch it, I want to reread the book first. What type of English major would I be if I watched a movie before I read the book? 

Anyways I found the cover of the book (pictured below) very appealing. I like how the top half was in black and white and the bottom half was the sky. It looks like the little boy was jumping onto the clouds. I do not like the book blurb, just because I think the cover is so perfect the blub takes away from it. I also think that if you must include a blurb it should be on the back. Having a blurb on both the front and back is too much unless it was done in the way Ta -Nehisi Coates did it. I feel like you need to have a really powerful person for the blurb to make an impact. This blurb was done by The Philadelphia Inquirer and that name really means nothing to me, whereas Coates blurb was done by THE Toni Morrison (and as you all know to me that makes all the difference).

(Spoiler contained in the following paragraph)

I have only read the first chapter and the last page, but I really enjoyed it so far. “I look at myself in the mirror” (3) was the first line and “and, from far away, but coming nearer, the baby cries and cries and cries and cries and cries and cries and cries and cries and cries, cries like it means to wake the dead” was the last line (197).  The first and last line of a book is always what hooks me and I found these two lines very powerful. The beginning hooks me because it is so simple, yet it makes me long to know more. The line makes me wonder what happened for a baby to cry “like it means to wake the dead”.