Bossypants by Tina Fey

This was a good read. It was a well put-together book, great for jumping into whenever I had a few spare minutes for a few pages here and there. Also great for traveling, as it's funny and light-hearted, doesn't require too much concentration to take it in. Fey told funny stories about her childhood, adolescence, all the way into her post-graduate years touring with an acting & improv group, to her time working her way up on SNL, and being the big boss at 30 Rock. What endears Tina Fey to fans and readers, I believe, is her ability to stay grounded, humble and even unaffected by her own fame and acclaim. When she wrote of her accomplishments, she wrote about the stressful or awkward parts in getting there, so you know she's a real person who worked for her success and experienced normal everyman/everywoman stuff like anxiety and weight struggles. But she never dwelled on any of those things in a "I went through a bad time" way - instead she retold them, reflecting on the humorous aspects of her struggles and dilemmas. She talked about professional lessons she learned and the good bosses she had, and talked very little crap on people whom she didn't like.

Fey's positive and amused outlook and poised writer's voice were refreshing in a world of celebrities who all seem to "write" their own books at some point. You can tell Fey is actually a writer, and the stories which were included in the book were short, sweet and to-the-point. It felt appropriately concise and entertaining. This was a story about her life, yet she didn't seem to self-indulge ever. My favorite parts of the story were when she told of her lessons learned from SNL creator Lorne Michaels, and about working with Amy Poehler, who is my all-time favorite SNL actress and comedy actress. Perhaps though, my very favorite thing about this book, was the way Fey delivered her brand of feminism, through humorous musings, without coming off entitled, bitter or bitchy. Choice excerpt: "My unsolicited advice to women in the workplace is this. When faced with sexism or ageism or lookism or even really aggressive Buddhism, ask yourself the following question: "Is this person in between me and what I want to do?" If the answer is no, ignore it and move on. Your energy is better used doing your work and outpacing people that way. Then, when you're in charge, don't hire the people who were jerky to you....don't waste your energy trying to educate or change opinions. Go "Over, Under, Through!" and opinions will change organically when you're the boss. Or they won't. Who cares?...Do your thing and don't care if they like it."

1984 by George Orwell

I had been meaning to read this dystopian novel for years. Just one of those books that I'd heard smart people speak of often, that I knew was important in literature. However, I knew nothing about it before I read it. I try to have as little background information as possible when I read a book for the first time. It lets me better imagine the work at its time of initial composition, publishing and release, and the author's perspective when writing it. Anyway, it took me a long time to read 1984 because the setting and descriptions were the opposite of romantic and it was pretty void of any kind of humor, which are the types of themes and elements I gravitate towards in literature. The reading of the actual text was kind of torturous for me. HOWEVER, this book was super uncanny and disturbingly poignant to read in 2013. In this story, the government literally is always watching what its people are doing. Similarly, in 2013, I noticed such a rise in the ways people's lives were captured and published by themselves and others. For example, I hate the way that now people's facebook pages are used by news stations in order to reveal information about someone in a news story. I feel like there's a true invasion of privacy now that didn't exist even several years ago. I come across places which have security cameras now which I would never expect to have a security camera. And I know that most cameras were installed for safety reasons, but still...it's like...you're always being filmed wherever you go. Big brother really IS watching! Anyway, irregardless of the uncanny accuracy of Orwell's predictions for the future of our society, I liked the love story within. It gave the plot a nice bit of suspense and was the only reason I kept reading. I was very close to putting the book down and never picking it back up at several times, but the love story was interesting. It's not that I didn't like this book, it's just not supposed to be "likeable"...it's not supposed to be one where you could read it again and again. It is supposed to scare you, supposed to move you to worry about what's going on in our world with the government. Anyway...ever since reading 1984, I've been thinking about books and technology in a whole new way. And that is a huge sign of a good piece of art for me--if I continue to think of it long after I've read/viewed/consumed it. So what to say in conclusion? This was a book everyone should read, even if only once and it takes you an entire year to complete it. (I'm not ashamed that it took me a whole year to actually finish it haha).