Folklore Book Tag

April 23^rd is World Book Day. It was first established by UNESCO in 1995 as a day of celebrating the joy of reading for enjoyment.

In 2019 I marked World Book Day by putting up a 420 inspired book tag 😉 and last year I marked the occasion with a 1 Star Goodreads Book Tag. For World Book Day 2021 I decided to go with one of the folklore book tags I came across last year shortly after Taylor surprise-released the album on day two of Leo season.

I loooooovvvvve me some Taylor Alison Swift. She is my favourite artist OF! ALL!! TIME!!! and if you read the blog you know I have been falling in love with folklore the more I listen to it after not liking it for all of last year 😐 Now I listen to folklore wayyy more than I listen to evermore and so I could not be more excited for today’s book tag.

Without further ado:

1. the 1: a book with an ending that left you speechless

I’m doing good, I’m on some new shit
Been saying “yes” instead of “no”
I thought I saw you at the bus stop, I didn’t though

I have thought long and hard about this as I wanted to go with a different book from what I put up for my first ever book tag, naturally a Taylor Swift book tag, but I keep coming back to Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn as I am yet to read another book with a reveal as shocking as this one.

In my Taylor Swift book tag I tagged the book under “… Ready For It? A reveal you did not see coming” and wrote that I could not wait to watch the HBO adaptation starring Amy Adams. Turns out I was excited for nothing as I tried it out last year but called it quits after two episodes because it was such a fucking snoozefest.

2. cardigan: a book that makes you feel happy and sad all at once

To kiss in cars and downtown bars
Was all we needed
You drew stars around my scars
But now I’m bleeding

3. the last great american dynasty: a book with a fascinating and extremely well-told story

You just knoooww that the first science fiction written by a black woman is bound to be a fascinating and extremely well-told story.

4. exile: a book you wish you hadn’t read

I think I’ve seen this film before
And I didn’t like the ending
You’re not my homeland anymore
So what am I defending now?
You were my town
Now I’m in exile seeing you out

I cannot get over the fact that this song was cowritten by Joe Alwyn under the pseudonym William Bowery. Just, wow 🤩

That said, 2020 will go down as the year I read the most 1-star books as I read SIX 1-star books last year. To make matters worse, four of them were back-to-back reads and three of them were part of my first four reads of 2020. Aki what a poor AF start to my reading challenge!!!

I read The Postmistress by Sarah Blake followed by I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You by as book one and two of the year!! You can check out their reviews in my 1 Star Goodreads Book Tag that I put up on this day last year.

In October I read We Were The Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates followed by Straight Up and Dirty: A Memoir by Stephanie Klein. The former is THE MOST BORING BOOK I HAVE EVER READ IN MY LIFE! and this is what I had to say about the latter:

The other 1-star reads were Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner (also in my 1 Star Goodreads Book Tag) and Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously by Julie Powell (HAAATED!!! that one).

But if I were to pick just one book for this prompt it would be:

5. my tears ricochet: a book that made you cry uncontrollably

And I can go anywhere I want
Anywhere I want, just not home
And you can aim for my heart, go for blood
But you would still miss me in your bones
And I still talk to you (when I’m screaming at the sky)
And when you can’t sleep at night (you hear my stolen lullabies)

6. mirror ball: a book that feels like it was written just for you

I’m still a believer but I don’t know why
I’ve never been a natural
All I do is try, try, try

This book came into my life when I thought my mum was dying and it was exactly the pick me up I needed at that difficult, painful, heartbreaking point in my life.

7. seven: a childhood book that makes you feel nostalgic

And I’ve been meaning to tell you
I think your house is haunted
Your dad is always mad and that must be why
I think you should come live with me
And we can be pirates
Then you won’t have to cry
Or hide in the closet

My childhood reading is defined by the Sweet Valley books, Enid Blyton, Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. I read those books like my life depended on it. For this prompt I will go with Nancy Drew as I started watching the series in February this year:

When I started watching the TV show I was not sure I would stick with it because it is sooo different from the books. Bess turns out to be British, George is Asian American, Ned is black… I am all for diversity but I would be lying if I said it did not take some getting used to. That was not the reason I was not sure I would stick with it though. It was the Riverdale vibes in the first episode that put me off because Lawd knows Riverdale sucks major balls. Luckily it is nothing like Riverdale and a few episodes later I was hooked.

Also, I was today years old when I learnt that the name Carolyn Keene is actually a pseudonym 🤯

8. august: a book that reminds you of summer

Back when we were still changing for the better
Wanting was enough
For me, it was enough
To live for the hope of it all
Cancel plans just in case you’d call
And say, “Meet me behind the mall”
So much for summer love and saying “us”
‘Cause you weren’t mine to lose

I watched this at the cinema when it came out in 2005 and I will never forget the scene where Blake Lively’s character was playing football and later took off her jersey and shook her hair out in all its long blonde glory. I remember thinking I want to be as sexy as fellow August baby Blake Lively when I grow up, never mind she is only 22 days younger than me. Lol.

9. this is me trying: a book that deals with loneliness and sadness

They told me all of my cages were mental
So I got wasted like all my potential
And my words shoot to kill when I’m mad
I have a lot of regrets about that
I was so ahead of the curve, the curve became a sphere
Fell behind all my classmates and I ended up here
Pouring out my heart to a stranger
But I didn’t pour the whiskey

10. illicit affairs: a book that gave you a book hangover

Look at this idiotic fool that you made me
You taught me a secret language
I can’t speak with anyone else
And you know damn well
For you I would ruin myself
A million little times

Update: I found my Atlas in said vast minority 😌🥰🤩😍

11. invisible string: a book that came into your life at the exact right time

Bad was the blood of the song in the cab
On your first trip to LA
You ate at my favorite spot for dinner
Bold was the waitress on our three year trip
Getting lunch down by the lakes
She said I looked like an American singer

This was the book that reignited my love for reading. I have loved reading for as long as I have been able to do so but there was a point in my life shit got really hard and I stopped reading. Last year I learnt that trauma can affect your desire to read and that explains why I fell out of love with reading for ± 10 years. Not that I did not read a single book in those ± 10 years, but I would read no more than a dozen books a year and that is significantly low for me. And then I came across Popsugar’s 2015 reading challenge in mid-April, meaning I was almost four months late, but I still managed to read 52 books that year. The Night Circus was my book 1/52 and for me it will always hold a special place in my heart as the book that reignited my love for reading. The next two years I did the reading challenges from Goodreads and read 55 books in 2016 and 54 books in 2017. I have not participated in any structured reading challenge since 2018 because the prompts have not interested me and after my mum died I was unwilling to participate in anything that would ultimately feel like a chore. So since 2018 my reading challenge has been to read at least 30 books a year and this year is no exception.

12. mad woman: a book with a female character you adore

What do you sing on your drive home?
Do you see my face in the neighbor’s lawn?
Does she smile?
Or does she mouth, “Fuck you forever”?

I have said many times before that my two favourite fictional characters of all time, literary or otherwise, are Arya Stark and Katniss Everdeen. For this prompt I will go with Arya Stark because:

Fun fact, Arya Stark is one of George R.R. Martin’s wife’s favourite characters too. She apparently told him that if he kills off Arya she will leave him. Same girl, same! Lol. After watching The Long Night (S08E03) I wrote a pseudo love letter to Arya Stark in a post titled Not Today (duh!) that you can check out here if you have not read it yet.

13. epiphany: a book that is haunting

Only 20 minutes to sleep
But you dream of some epiphany
Just one single glimpse of relief
To make some sense of what you’ve seen

I did NOT enjoy this book. At all! But the TV adaptation is hands down one of the best shows I watched last year. 11/10 would recommend.

14. betty: a book couple that fills you with yearning

But if I just showed up at your party
Would you have me? Would you want me?
Would you tell me to go fuck myself
Or lead me to the garden?
In the garden, would you trust me
If I told you it was just a summer thing?
I’m only 17, I don’t know anything
But I know I miss you

Another winning Taylor Swift–William Bowery collaboration 🤩

This prompt easily goes to Noah and Allie from The Notebook:

My reason for this though is more because of the movie and less not at all because of the book. It is a truth universally acknowledged that the book is always better than the movie, but Sparks is the exception to this rule as the movie versions of his books are almost always better than the source material.

15. peace: a book character you’d die for because you love them so much

And you know that I’d swing with you for the fences
Sit with you in the trenches
Give you my wild, give you a child
Give you the silence that only comes when two people understand each other
Family that I chose now that I see your brother as my brother

Lol there is absolutely no book character I would die for because I love them so much, but if you wanna get technical about it then I volunteer as tribute for Katniss Everdeen.

16. hoax: a book that you thought you were going to love but didn’t

Stood on the cliffside
Screaming, “Give me a reason”
Your faithless love’s the only hoax
I believe in
Don’t want no other shade of blue
But you
No other sadness in the world would do

Once again I want to say Sex and the City because after watching the entire TV show twice I was sooo confident I would love the book but it turned out to be a stinking pile of 1-star RUBBISH!!!!!!!!!!!!! so instead I will go with:

I did not hate it per se, if anything I rated it 3 stars. It is just that I was expecting it to be a fire flames read but it did not hit the spot AT ALL!!!