Ghosts Keep Breaking Up With Me
September 25, 2019
I want to talk to you about ghosts. To be fair, I pretty much always want to talk about ghosts because I love spooky things and ghosts are my favorite spooky thing of all. I will always prefer a ghost story to a cryptid story, an alien story, or whatever else scary thing we could chat about (although I do like most scary things and would like to hear about them!) Ghosts are just my jam, I suppose.
Last week, I was at a dinner party with some closer-than-acquaintances-but-not-super-close friends, which I always enjoy because I’m a big fan of friends and becoming better friends with people I already know. After a bit, the conversation turned to spooks and after sharing favorite horror movies (we were all pro horror movie, which was great because sometimes one non-horror movie fan brings the whole vibe down. (Not that you have to like horror movies, just don’t get weird about it and go all ‘I don’t know how anyone can watch those things’ cause it’s weird and we all have our own preferences???)), we moved on to “…. have you ever seen a ghost?”
This moment is always fraught. It’s all well and good to talk about horror movies which we all agree are fictional but belief in ghosts (or the supernatural or God or what have you) is extremely personal and easily all over the board. Now me? I believe in ghosts. I don’t know if I believe they look like people and can chat with you but I believe there is something and sometimes I get weird feelings I can’t dismiss. This is an opinion that doesn’t always go over well.
Sometimes your roommate goes “Me too! Here is a wacky ghost story from my childhood” when you’re four glasses of wine and three hours into a class dinner on a college trip to Italy. Sometimes your friends don’t have strong feelings either way but are happy to let you spout your nonsense about how once you were on a tour of the Queen Mary by the old swimming pool and your feet got splashed despite the fact that there hadn’t been water in the pool since 1968(!!). And sometimes you share that story and your friend-but-not-really-close friend goes “I think it’s all in people’s heads” and then talks about how amazing science is for the next twenty minutes.
He did not mean this in a mean way! I did not take it that way, either! I am fully aware that he is a big science person and that was probably how he was going to answer the question. But I still felt a bit silly, like I was exposed as a sham or something. I believe in science, too. I’m a big fan of all the stuff science has been doing for the past few millennia. But I also don’t believe that absolutely everything in the world can simply be explained by science. Isn’t that boring? Shouldn’t there be more to the world?
Maybe that’s silly, I don’t know. All I know is that I believe in ghosts and it’s cool if you don’t. But let’s both agree that we are excited for Spooky Season to begin.
Book Corner
The plot set up for this book is so interesting. There’s a tiny town in upstate New York that is cursed. If you live there, you cannot leave. If you’re away for too long, you get the urge to kill yourself until you’re back. The originator of this curse, Katherine van Wyler, was a 17th century citizen who was killed for being a witch … and still hangs out in the town. She’s decrepit, dressed in rags, and has her eyes and mouth sewn shut. And sometimes she’ll just appear in your living room. When some local teenagers try to figure out how they can convince the town they should have more internet access (which is heavily monitored so the outside world doesn’t find out), things start to … change.
I was in the moment I heard old terrifying witch lady watching you eat dinner in the 2010s. That’s such a weird image! I’m sold! And over all the book is pretty darn spooky and goes in directions you’re not expecting. The author is dutch and the book was originally published (and set in) in the Netherlands. When the English rights were bought, the author used the opportunity to rewrite it to be set in America, change some names and change the ending, which is a cool idea. There’s a weird amount of mentions of breasts (and not in sex scenes, in scenes I would not expect breast mentions) which is a thing that jumps out at me and I felt the need to add but I did enjoy this book. Content Warning: gore, animal death, teen death, assault
Fake Blood is just really cute, you guys. A boy wants to impress the girl he likes so he pretends to be a (twilight-esque) vampire. Unfortuantely, she wants to slay vampires and there might be another vampire he is very much confusing right under their noses.
This book was pretty darn cute. The art’s super fun and the setting of St. John (which is in my neck of the woods) was a bonus for me as I kept recognizing scenery in the background. I really enjoyed a few little world building touches (the Hemo App made me giggle) and it’s a good book for a middle grade audience. It felt maybe a touch too light for me? But ultimately it was sweet and worth checking out.
Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up with Me by Mariko Tamaki & Rosemary Valero-O’Connell
I want to talk to you about Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me. There will be light spoilers because the ending really didn’t sit right with me. If you don’t want to be spoiled, feel free to scroll down to the next section.
Here’s the thing: this book is gorgeous. The art is absolutely beautiful, the character designs are on point, and I could be enchanted by just looking at it for hours and not mind. I totally understand that it shows how relationships can be toxic (and not just ones with men in them!) and how important that is for a young audience. But ultimately, I came out with a sour taste in my mouth all because of how the best friend, Doodle, was treated.
Y’all, Doodle got a raw deal. She had a best friend (Freddy, the main character) who chucked her to the side any time her shitty girlfriend said boo. And yes, that’s true to life. Doodle had some really horrible things happen to her and her best friend wasn’t there to talk it out with her. And ultimately, Freddy abandons Doodle at her moment of most need to go to Laura Dean. This is what pushes Freddy over the edge to finally dump Laura Dean (good!) but she still ultimately sacrifices a promise she made to Doodle in order to do it. It isn’t Freddy’s moment of need that pushes her over the edge but her friend’s. And honestly? I think Doodle shouldn’t have forgiven her. Another lesson of the book should be that your actions have consequences and that if you’re a really crap friend, sometimes you lose that friendship. It would be sad but I feel like it would be more true to life, a stronger message, and truer to Doodle’s character.
It’s a beautiful book and I’m glad I read it but I have no sympathy for Freddy. Sorry, kid. These are the lessons you have to learn to be a good person.
Today’s Youtube Video is the entirety of the play The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals. I’m a big fan of Team Starkid, the theater company started by folks my age when they were in college that has been going strong for 10 years now and puts out fun parody and genre bending plays. They always put a recording of their shows up on Youtube a few months after their run so everyone can enjoy and I’m a huge fan. This was last year’s show and is about a normal man named Paul, a man who works an office job and doesn’t like musicals. Well, unfortuantely for Paul, one night a meteor hits his town and the next morning, people start …. singing and dancing. It’s a very clever breakdown of both the musical form (the I Want Song is called I Want You to Want to Want) and a take on an invasion of the body snatchers type horror story. Because if everyone is singing and dancing a choreographed number? Well, you know that implies a hive mind. I love this show to death and highly recommend it!
Jamie wishes you the best of weeks~
Have a great week and weekend, my lovelies!
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