frillish

A recent read...

• reads

Notes on a Nervous Planet

Matt Haig

Goodreads

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐★

Genre: Nonfiction, Mental Health

Summary Thoughts on how to live a better life when modern society brings us constant anxiety

Opening Line A conversation about a year ago: I was stressed out. I was walking around in circles, trying to win an argument on the internet.

This was one of the available audiobooks that I borrowed blindly as nonfiction reading material between other little stories I like to read. Apparently, the author does many of these essay books on different sets of topics, so this one is on an anxious society

There are lots of gem statements here and there that are nice to file away that I really enjoyed. I wanted to share a few here but I’m sure there’s more than could resonate with other readers, too. (I transcribed these from audio so I might’ve misplaced a word or two)

A quote from Ray Bradbury - Learning to let go should be learned before learning to get.

Being kind to yourself and being kind to the planet is the same thing.

Reading isn’t important because it helps to get you a job. It’s important because it gives you room to exist beyond the reality you’re given. It is how humans merge. How minds connect. Dreams. Empathy. Understanding. Escape. Reading is love in action.

We often find ourselves wishing for more hours in the day, but that wouldn’t help anything. The problem, clearly, isn’t that we have a shortage of time. It’s more that we have an overload of everything else.

(On an observation of society’s values.) Happiness is not good for the economy. We are encouraged, continually, to be a little bit dissatisfied with ourselves.

All a writer can do is provide a match, and hopefully a dry one. The reader has to strike the flame into being.

I enjoyed this read a lot, though I think at times it felt a little disjointed and I would lose track of where I was following along. I’d recommend it as a lightweight read (or listen) though since, despite the anxious undertone, it still tries to be hopeful.

We Spread

Iain Reid

Goodreads

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐★

Genre: Horror

Summary Penny, a painter struggling with the realities of aging, moves in to a care residence that doesn't quite seem right. Or maybe, she's just losing her grip on herself and the world.

Opening Line He was an artist. A prolific painter of merit and distinction. He impressed with his boldness and ingenuity. He liked to shock, and bewilder.

This book was very strange and disorienting, which was what I expected after reading the author’s other work, I’m Thinking of Ending Things. That story is really hypnotic and eerie, and this one also continues a sense of creepiness and something being just a bit wrong. It’s not as extreme as his earlier book, but still a fun read

I liked how you can draw a lot of the book’s material back to the themes of aging and fears of how the aging process affects us, but with a horrifying interpretation. I spent some time thinking about this story after finishing it…

Bad Blood

John Carreyrou

Goodreads

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Genre: Nonfiction, Business, Crime

Summary Follow the story of Silicon Valley scammer Elizabeth Holmes of Theranos...

Opening Line Elizabeth Ann Holmes knew she wanted to be a successful entrepreneur from a young age. When she was 7, she set out to design a time machine and filled up a notebook detailed engineering drawings. When she was 9 or 10, one of her relatives asked her at a family gathering the question every boy or girl is asked sooner or later: What do you want to do when you grow up? Without skipping a beat, Elizabeth replied: I want to be a billionare.

Once in a while, I picked up a random book on one of those bestseller or highly recommended lists if they’re available as audiobooks so I can listen to something a little bit different than my usual. This one really surprised me by how captivating the author wrote the account of this crime.

I never typically read this kind of book since I’m not really into business and often get confused by similar topics, but I couldn’t stop listening to it. The whole story is wild and the Carreyrou did such a good job reporting it in a page-turning style. In short, even if this isn’t your usual read, I really recommend reading it if you’re fascinated by the workings of true crime without the murders and gore (but still heartbreaking in its own ways)

The Spite House

Johnny Compton

Goodreads

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐★

Genre: Horror

Summary Eric Ross moves in to Masson House with his two daughters, soon becoming the caretaker of the haunted house, but his own past hasn't stopped haunting him yet.

Opening Line The Masson House in Degener, Texas was like a corpse of an old monster, too strange and feared for most to approach it, much less attempt to bury it. After all, it might be feigning death, or dormant.

I love a haunted “haunted house” story! Apparently, this book is the author’s debut novel, so I would consider reading more from them. The ambiance of this story is eerie! I had a little trouble following the different perspectives of all the characters that it kept swapping between, but I thought the way the author laid out the motives of characters was interesting You keep learning more, especially about a mystery that hides from the beginning. Personally, I think it didn’t quite work out for me, but I still think it was a good read.

(House of Leaves lovers, it’s a little different from that kind of haunted house story, sadly. Still a haunted house story though!)

Holly

Stephen King

Goodreads

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Genre: Crime Thriller/Horror

Summary When Holly is called out from her detective agency's break to investigate the disappearance of a young woman, she soon finds herself deep in a gruesome, disturbing case with a growing number of missing bodies...

Opening Line It's an old city, and no longer in very good shape, nor is the lake beside which it has been built, but there are parts of it that are still pretty nice.

HOLLY… I was so excited for this book when I first heard it was announced, and I was not disappointed!

Like the other books in the Bill Hodges/Finders Keepers series (Mr. Mercedes, Finders Keepers, End of Watch, The Outsider, and If It Bleeds), I think the genre is closer to detective thriller rather than horror, but horror elements are definitely present. It actually got darker than I expected, but I would say The Outsider is the “worst” in terms of difficult to digest (I had to skip certain descriptions/parts in that one).

Since it’s set in 2020, there’s also a heavy political theme and strong effects of how the pandemic affected America and its citizens. The extremely shy and hypochondriacal Holly was actually quite an interesting character choice in the setting of COVID… and her character continues to grow on me from the first book she appeared. I also just loved the recurring characters who appeared and want to give them hugs!

If you like dark crime thriller and enjoyed any of the previous Bill Hodges/Finders Keepers books, Holly is right in line with them. I really couldn’t put it down

Sunday

• daily
• fashion

Hello How are you today?

I finally got a chance to put up the Halloween Sumikko that my dad brought back from Hong Kong for me Right now, I don’t have any shelves, so I put them on my bed ledge. I think they probably like to hide behind the pillows.

Yesterday, we went out to eat Indian food since I was craving it I decided to wear this black skirt from Mars in case I spilled any curry, but of course, I paired it with white so it ended up not being a very curry-practical outfit anyway

I was very happy with this simple outfit, it feels very cute I was so happy to find this Secret Honey top, I think Amber shared a similar one months ago in our server, but I missed that listing and thankfully found this cheap one. It’s very versatile and pretty. The Mars skirt is suuuper short though I really like the design

Finally, I convinced myself to use my Mellfy Memory pochette that I’ve been hesitant to use (the first time you use new things is always the hardest for me), but now I feel very comfortable with it! It’s very small, but surprisingly, I was able to fit all my essentials in it

Apparently, my guy heard of this place from his friends and recommended it immediately!

The food was really delicious, we ended up sharing a curry and samosas as well I was so happy, he also got me a lassi that ended up so refreshing and sweet We definitely were happily stuffed afterwards!

Anyway, I had never been to that plaza before, but I thought it was interesting the apartments across this plaza had so many fully open windows. Is it not typical for people to use curtains in this area? After learning more about curtains last year I’ve become very conscious of thinking about curtains.

Afterwards, we went to Tokyo Central to get groceries and suddenly got a boba craving, and decided to check out Ümacha which newly opened in Mitsuwa. I got a hot jasmine milk tea like my usual and my manz got the top #2, brown sugar milk tea.

We got both with less sweetness Unfortunately, my guy’s drink wasn’t very good and kind of tasted watered down (maybe because brown sugar milk tea is typically VERY sweet, so getting it less sweetness might not have been a good idea…? ), though my jasmine milk tea was really, really delicious and full of tea flavour!

The gashapon store had these new “Still waiting for you” series that were sooo cute… I love these kind of silly melancholic designs We didn’t roll anything this time but it’s always fun to look at what’s new!

The Mitsuwa dangerously has a Daiso that is one of the few stores that remains open quite late, so we went in to see if I could pick up some storage containers for nail charms. I ended up picking these two pill boxes and a looooong tweezer

I finally got time to swatch the I’zemi Pink Flirting set I got from Zillabeau’s sample sale It was pricey, but I’m in awe at how beautiful the colours look and I’m constantly blown away by how easy to use Korean gels are. I’m really excited about this set since it has a few colours I don’t have at all and a bunch of nuance pinks, I think they will be so fun to use

I didn’t swatch the art gels in this set yet but hopefully will do so soon… swatching takes so long but it’s soooo satisfying and practical to see the colours displayed

Recently, I’ve been feeling really overwhelmed, so I cleaned out my spaces. I didn’t take a photo but I also swapped the placement of my bedsheets so it’s white again on top, instead of yellow, to help reduce the visual noise.

It really helps me since I get fatigued from seeing too many things at once I try to clean my desk weekly and rearrange it every other month or so to keep it fresh!

I moved a lot of the boys to this corner