Art is to live & to live is art.
book reviews and book releases.
Hi! I have been MIA, mainly becuz uni is well, uni, but it’s finally Ramadan break! and i can finally write down my unfiltered thoughts in my little unfiltered, sometimes unhinged, sometimes “why-are-you-blabbering,-nobody-asked” corner of the internet(here), hi.
To be honest, doing STEM degree really takes a toll on your creativity. All i can think about is plasma proteins and blood clots- oh and albumin (insert rolling eye emoji here). But apart from my short sarcasm detour, doing a STEM degree really leaves you with little to no creative space, hours on end, i am memorising chemical reactions and physiological functions of the liver ( my dad saw my coursework and he was making fun of it, i swear to God, this man has no care for his liver nor my incessant nagging). So, in order to prevent my brain from crashing out and continuing to spiral down chemical staircases, i chose to fill up every waking minute (break between classes, walking to classes, sitting on the floor doing nothing but reading between classes, have a midterm? read a book because for some utter weird reason, reading calms my nerves) with reading.
I have read 4 books in the last three months and here are the breakdowns and my review of each:
but first,
I started a reading journal (drumrolls, please). I was inspired from this booktoker known as willowbiblio, she does the most beautiful and informative reading journals and so there has been a meek attempt at starting my own reading journal.
Never let Me Go
Kazuo Ishiguro
“We took away your art because we thought it would reveal your souls. Or to put it more finely, we did it to prove you had souls at all.”
I have been waiting to read an Ishiguro novel for a long time, i finally got my hands on Never Let Me Go 2 months ago. To say this book had been a confusing, yet phenomenal journey would be basic. I was very confused & lost in the first few chapters, trying to understand the world of Tommy, Ruth & Kathy. On the other hand, Hailsham was very easy to decipher, very simple to picture, as if i had already been to Hailsham. The further i made into Ishiguro’s world, the more i felt like a student at hailsham. I am sorry but no i cannot be a student at hailsham, i do not have the capacity to understand what it is to be brought up like any other normal person, with dreams and hopes and romanticised futures but then, to be revealed that you are not nurtured to join a fast-paced world to chase your dreams, but a world where you are the catalyst to support that fast-paced dream but of someone else, someone who is supposedly your replica, someone who you could be but aren’t. So no, i cannot be a student at Hailsham. I couldn’t think of passing, completing only because i have sold myself to save someone else, someone who isn’t even in the spectra of the people i love.
This book deals with identity, friendship, love & most importantly it questions, what it is to be human. Apart from the ethical conundrum on cloning, it makes you wonder and ask the questions of life itself, of purpose and identity, of people who are brought up with the idea that they aren’t human, looking human and feeling like an human are two different things.
As the gallery entails and as madam so clearly states later to kathy and tommy that the purpose of their creativity was to prove the existence of their souls. After all, creativity isn’t just an expression of art but it is also the way our soul speaks, paints over what we can’t put into words and fixes something broken inside us that science and math cannot. Art is to live & to live is art.
“Memories, even your most precious ones, fade surprisingly quickly. But I don’t go along with that. The memories I value most, I don’t ever see them fading.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go
As Long as The Lemon Trees Grow
Zoulfa Katouh
“كلُّ ليمونة ستنجب طفلاً ومحال أن ينتهي الليمون
Every lemon will bring forth a child, and the lemons will never die out”
― Zoulfa Katouh, As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow
Hands down, one of the best books I’ve read. Katouh has made me cry, laugh, feel excited & rageful, feel woeful and disgusted all in one. As long as the lemon trees grow is Zoulfa Katouh, a canadian-syrian author’s debut novel. It showcases the blood, sweat & tears that Syrians face daily. Katouh, in her book, clearly states that every information here is written, printed to paper, embedded between white lines are honest and true. There was a truly a boy who said and i quote, ‘When I die, I will tell God everything’. There were truly many families, many Kenans & Salamas and many Doctors, pharmacists and soldiers trying to keep their people alive, but there’s only one land, one soil, one apex holding the people of Syria together.
I am known to be a die-hard fan of historical fiction for it talks about the people before us, connects our soul to theirs, if you’ve read my review on A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini you will know how big of a historical fiction fanatic i am. This book was a cherry on top, along with the violence and trauma, there comes the beautiful twist of imagery and hallucination.
Meet خَوْف. Khawf. Fear. Angst. ভয়. peur. timor.
Katouh’s character dynamics as well as her character, Khawf added the perfect roundup this book needed. (For those of you who wants to read this book, please read asap, i am this close to giving away spoilers) Khawf’s lessons and his perspective of life in Syria and his constant attempts at saving Salama from impending trauma is not just a demand for admiration but also assurance and encouragement. (i highly recommend seeing inside out prior to reading this book, don’t ask me why, just watch)
The writing, the plot outline, the imagery, the description. and the tiktok that pushed me to get this book, all of them are worth it. please, please, please read it.
“When I die, I'm going to tell God everything.”
- Zoulfa Katouh, As Long As the Lemon Trees Grow
1984
George Orwell
“The best books... are those that tell you what you know already.”
― George Orwell, 1984
Those of you who have heard me yap about Animal Farm knows that i wish George Orwell was alive to see what the fascist and autocratic regimes of the world is doing, i need to ask him, did he write a fictional story that warns nations or did he leave a blueprint for war?
1984 might as well have been a non-fiction for all i have read and seen. it is very hard to believe that this book isn’t a historical manuscript or a blueprint left for the autocratic regimes to follow around the world, this book may be categorised as fiction, but i assure you, that each and every word he typed fell like a revealition to what i already knew and saw.
1984 - July 2024, Palestine Genocide, Syrian & Lebanon genocides, Ughyr muslims genocide are just the ones that make it to the front page only because there are too many lost souls to cover, to many mouths to shut, to many people to mysteriously kill. While reading this novella, i could picture every word being written, every description being explained, every horror and every torture and the reason behind it playing in my minds eye with commentary from that one youtube video i saw of a soldier’s daughter’s story on the Pilkhana Murders.
everything that happened to julia and winston felt like it was happening infront of me, their fear of expressing their thoughts, winston’s reluctance in beliving 2+2 = 5, a small attempt to preserve his identity, his authenticity and julia’s recklessness, unwavering determination to live life on her terms not because some party wants you to or says so. While i write this, i am grappled with a fear of ‘what if something happens to me because i wrote this, just a thought, a word, a small gesture, a reluctance to follow the wrong rules, what if i am next. even months after august i feel horror creeping in my bones’ That is what leaders of the world have done to the world, that is what it has achieved, fear. Khawf.
1984 is the perfect example of what we stand against, what happens in real life, what happens underground, behind bars and mysterious disappearances.
“Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing.”
― George Orwell, 1984
and finally,
Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde
Robert Louis Stevenson
“It is one thing to mortify curiosity, another to conquer it.”
Am i 140 years late to join the Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde fandom? I must be. One thing i love about my uni is it’s incredible bookshop. On the very first day i bought two books - All the light we cannot see and Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. I am so glad i did, i only need a good excuse to buy more books but thank god i bought it before i went on a book buying ban.
After reading heavy books on heavy topics, this was a very fun read and i devoured it in one day. It has been quite a long time since i finished a book in a day. Middle-school Subha could’ve finished this in one sitting but uni Subha’s reading speed has took a turn down the “i-am-ashamed-i-cant-finish-a-book-in-one-sitting-anymore”.
Stevenson creates the perfect blend between duality and explores themes such as good vs evil, the ‘yin-yang’ symbol if you will, of human minds and nature. Dr. Jekyll, a kind reputated scientist, a little cuckoo in the head and his alter ego, Mr. Hyde played a perfect role in analysing the dimensions of human behaviour over time and memory. It interconnects the good and the bad, much like the ‘yin-yang’ symbol - a japanese symbol showing the interconnection of good vs evil - and paints a beautiful gothic imagery that peeks into the human mind while also studying it.
I loved how fast-paced this book is, how easy it is to get into and how hooking the writing is. This left me wanting a sequel to this book.
And that was my review on the books i’ve read in the last three months, i hope you liked them and are eager to read them.
Apart from the books i’ve read, i’ve also got around 18 books on january only, here:
i got most of my books from nilkhet - never let me go, 1984, as long as the lemon trees grow, human acts, death in the clouds, passenger to frankfurt, reappearance of rachel price and the second book of the naturals series - Killer Instinct ( i love crime novellas) and lastly All the light we cannot see.
Books I am excited about -
Frederick Backman’s latest book - my friends releasing on May 20, 2025.
i have read two of backman’s books: A man called Ove & Beartown. Both of which were my top reads of 2024. I can’t wait to read this one as well as anxious people.
Suzanne Collin’s latest book - Sunrise on the Reaping released just 10 days ago, on March 18, 2025.
If your childhood did not have hunger games in it, we can’t be friends. I am excited to read Haymitch’s point of view, speaking of which, i might even reread the series, let’s see.
As always, read what your heart desires and thank you for being with my jumbled up thoughts till the end.
much love,
subha.
