Drey's Reads
-
Drey’s Take on Little Dog’s Letter in “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous”
“I am thinking of beauty again, how some things are hunted because we have deemed them beautiful. If, relative to the history of our planet, an individual life is so short, a blink, as they say, then to be gorgeous, even from the day you’re born to the day you die, is to be gorgeous only briefly.” Little Dog in On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous A couple of years ago, my friend, Ike, recommended Ocean Vuong’s “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous” to our book club. Someone had recommended it to her, and she thought it would be a good novel to provoke conversation in our little group of four. This…
-
Drey’s Take on Chinonso’s Odyssey in “An Orchestra of Minorities”
I was first drawn to “An Orchestra of Minorities” because of Chigozie Obioma’s name. I had never seen an Igbo name on the window shelves of a book store. I had thought that the name of the book was Obioma’s name, his name is bigger than the name of the book on the front cover. I immediately went into my school’s bookstore and picked up the book to read the synopsis of the book. Imagine my surprise when I read that the story was to be an intricate blend of Igbo spirituality with Greek tragedy. Needless to say, I had to get the book. However, I didn’t read it until…
-
Drey’s Take on Gifty’s Valley of Tears in “Transcendent Kingdom”
It’s a sunny day in October. I have just ended my walk, the first after a few weeks of intense studying. I am in my safe space–a bookstore. I walk through the rows of books and release the tension of MCAT prep and job hunting while retaining the pressures of the uncertainty of my life decisions. I use money I don’t have to buy a book as a reward for taking the exam that has brought many tears and sleepless nights. I continue to wander the bookstore while the stack of books under my armpit grows bigger than the allotted book I promised myself. I fell in love with Yaa…
-
Drey’s Take on “Brave New World”
I love the finishing pages of a book. It’s almost as if the narrator or protagonist realizes they have a limited time left on earth and begins to drop gems and life lessons before they pass on. And in Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World,” it IS a matter of life and death. “The world’s stable now. People are happy; they get what they want, and they never want what they can’t get. They’re well off; they’re safe; they’re never ill; they’re not afraid of death; they’re blissfully ignorant of passion and old age; they’re plagued with no mothers or fathers; they’ve got no wives, or children, or lovers to feel…
