Justin Monisit > Recent Status Updates

About to finish this on the ride home: I laughed, I cried, I learned. Audiobook makes what is probably a 10/10 book even better.

Got misty eyed reading that ending. Beautiful beautiful book. This is the book I would recommend to ANYONE - and I will be reading this again eventually way down the line. What a wonderful work of art.

Actually made it further but decided to hold back bc I ran into traffic and I want to restart a pivotal chapter over. But still - DAMN is this audiobook amazing. I don't know how scientifically accurate this is, but the way the author uses humor and explains the topic without dumbing it down for the story to work actually is amazing.

Welp returning to it I can feel my memory slightly diminishing my enjoyment - and I still recognize this book is amazing. And one of the character moments pertaining to college hit WAY too close to home in some way that I've never experienced with any other media. Amazingly profound that it actually took me out of the story because it felt like a personal attack lmao

Technically could have read more in the car but I opted to listen to some podcasts....due to some recent events that distracted me. But still, great stuff. The audiobook narration elevates this so much.

Hating the fact I am about to have the weekends off because I can't listen to the audiobook on the way to work. This is definitely the most excited I've been to read a genre fiction book in a long time.

Alright guys I think I found my new favorite genre: hard sci fi. SCIENCE RULES. Every single chapter has had me on the edge of my seat. Still riding the strong potential of it being a 10/10 book

Managed to sneak a few pages in before sleeping. Awesome book about subject matter that I have absolutely no interest in. Does not manage to be dry because it is so well written.

The worst part about having an 8-5 with a 1 hour commute is that the only way you can experience books is through audiobooks. The good news is that I got to experience the first chapter of this and that alone was amazing and has me excited to drive. The way the science is incorporated into this without making it confusing or dumbing it down is awesome. High chance this gets to be a 10/10 book

So I still don't find military history that interesting - so a lot of this part of the book kind of washes over me. But the undercurrent of being loyal to Ireland while serving America (and fighting to end slavery) is felt.

I could see this being a good Oscar-bait biopic tbh. Charismatic Irish outcast fighting in the Civil War against the Confederates after being exiled to the Penal Colony of Australia. It's pretty much larger than life

Australia section was not as interesting (though... it's literally non-fiction) but still, Great Britain has a lot of apologizing to do. Just in time for the 4th of July

British people were BRUTAL to Ireland in ways I did not expect. Cromwell and Trevelyan deserve a special place in hell. The fact Ireland preserved their culture is just amazing. Expected this to be a fun read but now I just got sad reading the first quarter, but also inspired by Meaghre's words and resilience.

Almost lost my physical bookmark and now I am going to regularly update this so I keep track of all the pages because I don't want to start all over again. But as for the book: it is still good.

This play is overly maudlin and worst of all...boring. Every one is miserable and they try to touch on these subjects from the Holocaust to affairs with almost disrespectful pity to compare it to the protagonist. It's legitimately bad. Only reading through it because I can actually pay attention to it on audiobook while driving.

Expected this to just be a book to pass the time but it turns out these essays are actually interesting. The way they compared rock climbing to a math problem blew my mind. The way that the airplane business in Alaska is actually highly competitive was also interesting. I am not an outdoorsy type at all and I am captivated by this world

The dialogue is just so bad and reminds of Goosebumps - but the prose? Somehow making horrific things seem beautiful? Wild and surprisingly well done. And chapter 28 randomly has one of the most beautiful parent-child conversations ever out of NOWHERE. But the horror is still too kiddy and weird for me to be scared.

Idk why Fahrenheit 451 is Bradbury's most famous book when this already easily tops it in terms of prose. My one big issue is that this is as scary as a Goosebumps book - low stakes thus far and the horror is too kiddy, especially from a kid's perspective (refraining from swears too).

Understanding - Like Flowers for Algernon, but on crack with supervillains. It was good - just a bit too long and loses the novelty of a normal man becoming smarter and gets too absurd. I don't know if it was supposed to be funny or not, and I also don't know what the message was. But it was fun. 8/10

Babylon - HOLY COW. That was an awesome story. Even though it was a familiar Biblical story, the way it was told was so fascinating and tense. Brought life to a familiar tale. 10/10

Have been listening to this on audiobook and it is amazing and raw without being overly sentimental. The final chapter in this almost made me cry. It strips away the myths of valor and comradery about war and instead tells the tragic truth - especially about this war: that war is hell and strips away the humanity of those involved.

Yeah reading this is way better than listening to a bad audiobook narrator. While the storytelling is not strong (starting with a thinly veiled exposition dump), the world is intriguing.

Still a GOAT book, but at the end of part 3 introduces a character way late and has an entire story arc dedicated to them - and idk, wasn't feeling it as much as I was for the other big emotional moments in the book. But everything preceding it? Oh yeah, awesome. Adam Trask is an awesome character

Consider the Lobster - interesting. Not much I haven't thought about already, but it just shows DFW's talents as a writer to effortlessly weave so much information in a way that does not confuse or intimidate the reader.

Up, Simba - America really fumbled the ball by electing Dubya over John McCain for their GOP nominee. Wallace talks about leadership and character and the turmoils of running a GOP primary campaign. He tries to be neutral, but man it just makes me respect McCain even more - and Dubya even more than I already did. Anyways, awesome essay. Very insightful.

Honestly accepting the book's bias and how it's not a history, but a book that talks about the plights of those not often mentioned in the history books. Just got to the feminism chapter and it was great History is much more than political legislation.

How Tracy Austin Broke My Heart - very well written diatribe about a disappointing tennis biography, and then switches it to be a vitriolic diatribe about the futility about writing anything like that. Nice little mini essay