Book Candy

ShelfNotes Review - Click to visit my blog post!

Dear Reader,

I was extremely lucky to attend a Q&A and signing by Josh Hanagarne at the Hartford Public Library. The book itself had been on my to read list for awhile and when I saw the chance, I grabbed it. Josh is extremely tall, which normally would have people intimidated but his presence was inviting and his lovable sense of humor had me sold. I wanted to dive into the book after seeing him. He spoke of his love of Stephen King, who by chance was doing his own Q&A at the Mark Twain House the next day (Josh was able to grab a position as his bodyguard for that event and arm wrestled Stephen King which you can read about by clicking here or you can read about his Hartford trip by clicking here). The picture I've attached below is one I took from the event:

Getting back to the book, I loved it right from the beginning. If you're at all like me, you'll like this book. It has fond childhood memories of the library, youthful adoration of Stephen King, struggling with the pressure of religious beliefs, finding our what you want to do with your life, and so much more. His experience with King mirrored my own, reading his books at TOO young an age to be appropriate. I'll leave all the hilarious stories about doing so for when you read it, but they're great. I related so much to his childhood memories of the library that it brought me right back. My Aunt used to take me to the library and create fun treasure hunts for me and a friend, magical times I will never forget. Reading his library experiences brought me right back to those moments.

So why did I give this 4 stars? Maybe this book does deserve 5, it probably does BUT a major part of this book didn't really speak to me. He goes into quite a bit of detail on his strength training with kettle balls, something that had little interest to me but I now have a clearer understanding because of it. I'm sure there is someone out there that will love these parts of his book, but it wasn't for me. I also understand why they're in there... it IS his life after all. I don't think you should be weary to read this because you're not interested in this, the parts of the book that go into it are still very interesting. The Tourette's played a large part of the book and will speak to many with the same problems. The book is very inspiring, one part will stay with me forever; "Learning was a reward. And when I came home from school, instead of asking, 'How was school today?' they'd ask, 'What did you ask today?' " I can only hope to someday use this with my own children, it really is the perfect question.

Happy Reading,

AmberBug