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daisy 🦋🌈

@daisreads

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📍glasgow, scotland
📖 books & kittens aplenty 🐱

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sun-kissed library cats 🧡🍂 by @daisreads

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a year ago

What It Feels Like for a Girl by Paris Lees 💛

Wow wow wow… this is a memoir you all NEED to read. I’m completely hooked, and I’m pretty sure I heard @paris.lees say in an interview that this is the first of three. I’m so hoping that is true. What It Feels Like for a Girl is hilarious and heartbreaking all at the same time, and you can just feel the warmth and light of Paris from the pages.

Paris Lees writes this coming of age memoir with unflinching honesty and revisits pivotal moments of her adolescence as a trans woman which cover a range of difficult subject matters including grief, bullying, homophobia and transphobia. However, her story is also full with love and friendship which radiates out of the pages.

With everything I’ve read which is written in a local dialect, I convince myself it’ll be a struggle to read and every time I’m completely wrong. This added so so much to the way this memoir is recounted and really shows the importance of the setting.

I’d really love to see more people picking up this memoir. It’s been on my list for ages having followed Paris Lees and her work for years (but I did wait for the paperback…). I’ve included some of the quotes I wrote down along the way:

“I reckon it does ya good to tell yersen yer beautiful. Gorra believe in yersen an' that. Coz if ya don't, no other fucker will.”

“I’ve always felt like I've had this light inside of me, that other people are tryna put out. I know it sounds corny, but I don’t know how else to explain it. But the thing is, it's ma job to protect this light. So I can't let 'em win, I can't let 'em extinguish it.”

“The thing that gets me the most is knowin' that every second for the rest of ma life is gonna take me further away from this moment, from 'er bein' alive. That I’Il grow older, an' I'll change, an' I'll always be travellin’ away from now. It's like bein' on a spaceship an' watchin' the earth get further away, knowin' you'll never be able to go home again.” by @daisreads

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4 years ago

💘⚡️2022 FICTION FAVES⚡️💘

here we go !!!! part one of my favourite books of the year 🤠 now I’ve currently read 157 books (…) so I think a top 12 of my fiction picks is pretty reasonable ?? I absolutely cannot narrow it down any further - read all of these !!!!! spoiler: my number 1 of the year is gonna be The Island of Missing Trees 🫶

pictured:
💫 Mayflies by Andrew O’Hagan
💫 Against the Loveless World by Susan Abulhawa
💫 The First Woman by Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi
💫 Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie
💫 The Bread the Devil Knead by Lisa Allen-Agostini
💫 Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
💫 The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak
💫 Mr Loverman by Bernardine Evaristo
💫 Love in Colour by Bolu Babalola
💫 The Colour Purple by Alice Walker
💫 Love After Love by Ingrid Persaud
💫 The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw

Are any of these on your faves of the year list?? What were your 2022 highlights? 💫❤️

#2022wrapup #bookstagram #booktok #bookstagramuk #bookstack #bookreview by @daisreads

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25

4 years ago

August reading 🌳🐚✨

A very busy month going back to work after the summer holidays, and I managed 8 books this month! 📚

August reads:
1. John of John by Douglas Stuart
2. Last Night in Brooklyn by Xochitl Gonzalez*
3. We Need To Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
4. La langue des choses cachées by Cécile Coulon
5. The Alchemist by Paul Coelho
6. In Meadowlight by Sussie Anie*
7. The Correspondent by Virginia Evans
8. Timor Mortis by Richard Coker*

My highlight of August was definitely The Correspondent which I’ve already posted about. I also gave 5-stars to We Need to Talk About Kevin which is one of those books I’ll be haunted by forever, outstanding writing.

What were your August highlights? 🫯

*kindly gifted by the publisher by @daisreads

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23 days ago

The Correspondent by Virginia Evans 🤍

I finally got around to this booksta fave after waiting patiently for the paperback. I absolutely adored this delicate and beautiful story, told through a series of letters and emails sent and received by our protagonist, Sybil.

The Correspondent takes a simple but difficult to execute concept, and pulls it off extraordinarily. Without any spoilers, I cried at the end of this book which is a huge deal for me as a real non-crier. There was something so special about the relationships between characters, and being able to create that depth through only letters !! Truly amazing stuff.

Have you read The Correspondent yet? 💫 by @daisreads

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10

a month ago

recent hardback bookmail 💌

Forever grateful to be sharing silly thoughts about books on here, and to the lovely publishers who get in touch to offer review copies.

Although, I am now incredibly good at saying no to proofs and finished copies! I know what my reading habits are like and I work full time, so I’m much better at being realistic and would rather a copy went to someone else to enjoy.

This also makes it much more special when I have some room to say yes, and a book sounds irresistible. These lovely hardbacks have arrived in the last month or so:

⚡️ In Meadowlight by Sussie Anie @phoenix_bks
⚡️ Rate this Book by Benji Wilson @newmodern_books
⚡️ Timor Mortis by Richard Coker @newmodern_books
⚡️ Sky City by Jacqueline Crooks from @jonathancapebooks @vintagebooks @vintagebooksinfluencers
⚡️ Last Night in Brooklyn by Xochitl Gonzalez from @bloomsburypublishing

Have you read any of these? 💌 by @daisreads

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10

a month ago

July wrapped 💌 swipe for more wedding & cats 🐈‍⬛

I was a little bit busy getting married at the end of July, but I did manage 9 books before wedding week took over!

1. Kin by Tayari Jones
2. Flesh by David Szalay
3. My Friends by Hisham Matar
4. Eurotrash by Christian Kracht
5. Love and Rent by Jo Cheetham*
6. The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah
7. Going to Meet the Man by James Baldwin
8. I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue
9. Short War by Lily Meyer*

My only 5-star read this month was The Great Alone by Kristen Hannah. I’ve posted about this already but I continue to find Kristen Hannah such a reliable author. She can do no wrong in my eyes, and her stories are always crafted so beautifully.

What were your July highlights? 💌

*kindly sent by the publisher by @daisreads

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11

2 months ago

best day of my life 🩷💍💫 by @daisreads

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37

2 months ago

recently read 💙⚡️

I’ve polished off quite a few books so far in July while I’m making the most of teacher summer holidays & the unbelievable weather.

My Friends by Hisham Matar is rated extremely highly on goodreads. It follows the key friendships of protagonist Khaled, from his adolescence in Libya, to student days in Edinburgh and then life in London. I enjoyed this, but wasn’t blown away by it!

Eurotrash by Christian Kracht was a world of books purchase influenced by seeing it all over book insta last summer. It’s more of a novella coming in at under 200 pages. I had imagined it as a light and quick read, but it deals with some very heavy topics such as being descended from a Nazi family, mental illness and dark pasts. It wasn’t really for me.

Love and Rent by Jo Cheetham kindly sent to me by @phoenix_bks . I really enjoyed this - such a juicy story which was hard to put down. It was full to the brim of frustrating, useless blokes, but gorgeous female characters made up for their incompetence.

The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah is set in remote settlements of Alaska in the 1970s. As usual, Kristen Hannah captures time and place effortlessly, and crafts spectacular characters who we can laugh with and cry about. This was an emotional rollercoaster, as all her novels are. It was an easy 5-stars, and maybe one of my all time favourites of Kristin Hannah.

Have you read any of these? 🧡💫 by @daisreads

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0

2 months ago

Kin by Tayari Jones 🤍💫

And Tayari Jones is back with another hit novel. I’ve always been totally spellbound by Jones’ storytelling and I secured Kin from the library so I could experience it sooner than waiting for the paperback.

Kin transports us to 1950s and 60s America, setting a beautiful tale of friendship and struggle against the backdrop of segregation. Annie and Niecy are brought up together, and separate as young women to tread very different paths. As ever, the storytelling was so intricate and Tayari Jones creates whole families of believable characters who you become quickly invested in.

“All I need is for you to love me. And however you love me, I will love you back twice as hard.”

“What you have the same isn’t what binds you. Hearts grow strings because of what you know that’s the same, what happened to you that’s the same. And when what you want is the same.”

An American Marriage is a timeless story about relationships and their complexities. We follow the marriage of Roy and Celestial, and the trials and tribulations they face in a modern marriage in America.

“She was letting me know that all of this - the little girls holding up the train of her gown, my morning jacket, even the ring in my pocket - was just a show. What was real was the dance of light in her eyes and the quick current of our blood.”

Silver Sparrow is still my favourite of Tayari Jones’ novels. It is set in 1980s Atlanta, and tells a story from the alternating perspectives of the two families of James Witherspoon. He has two daughters of the same age by two different mothers, and as a result, a secret family and a public family. The plot is a ticking time bomb, building to an obvious climax of the secret being discovered.

“And this is how it started. Just with coffee and the exchange of their long stories. Love can be incremental. Predicaments, too. Coffee can start a life just as it can start a day. This was the meeting of two people who were destined to love from before they were born, from before they made choices that would complicate their lives. This love just rolled toward my mother as though she were standing at the bottom of a steep hill. Mother had no hand by @daisreads

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2

3 months ago

June reading 🦋⚡️swipe for kittens 🫧

I had an excellent reading month in June & managed 11 books along with a few DNFs! I rediscovered the library too, which I find definitely boosts my time spent reading when I have a deadline for returning a book.

1. The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy
2. How Korean Corn Dogs Changed my Life by Alice Amelia*
3. Katabasis by R. F. Kuang
4. The Mushroom Tapes by Helen Garner, Chloe Hooper & Sarah Krasnostein
5. Heart the Lover by Lily King
6. Bitter Sweet by Hattie Williams*
7. Celestial Lights by Cecile Pin
8. Theroux the Keyhole by Louis Theroux
9. Vladimir by Julia May Jones
10. All Her Fault by Andrea Mara
11. Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe

My 5 star reads were Heart the Lover and Celestial Lights. I read these each in one sitting & I’d really recommend both if you are needing something easy to get into after a reading slump.

There were a couple that I wished I hadn’t picked up, but I did persevere with anyway. Louis Theroux’s lockdown memoir was a tough and pretty boring read, and I’m not sure why he chose to publish it. The Mushroom Tapes also worked better as a documentary, than this quite random podcast transcription published as a book…

What were your June highlights? 🦋

*kindly sent by the publisher by @daisreads

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12

3 months ago

last three reads 🧡🍊

I was in such a reading slump in May & things have definitely turned around now (thank god!!). I have flown through my last few books & absolutely loved them.

All three of these gorgeous, orange novels were totally unputdownable and I consumed them in near enough one sitting each time. Three really special reads with expertly crafted characters & plots.

🍊 Heart the Lover by Lily King. This one is everywhere at the moment, especially after being on the Women’s Prize shortlist. I adored this love story which created such deep connections between characters, especially as this is a relatively short read. It was my first Lily King but certainly won’t be my last.

🍊 Bitter Sweet by Hattie Williams. This was such a frustrating tale of a twenty-something publishing PR assistant finding her feet in London, and falling into the most toxic of relationships with an author, 30 years her senior. This one will leave you shouting at the protagonist, and begging her to listen to her gorgeous friends.

🍊 Celestial Lights by Cecile Pin. I read Wandering Souls a couple of years ago but I think Celestial Lights is my preference of the two. This is set against a space / astronaut backdrop which usually I must say isn’t for me, but this novel was so tactful and delicate in its portrayal of space that it landed perfectly for me (pardon the pun). The craftsmanship of each character and the strains put upon them to make the right decision for themselves and their families felt so real throughout. I adored this cast of characters & their development from childhood onwards.

Have you read any of these books? 🧡💫 by @daisreads

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11

3 months ago