Just keep swimming 🥽
July reads, August book pick and the perfect LRD.
Lately, life has been feeling like one long game of catch up. Catching up (or at least trying to) with friends between mismatched summer travel schedules, catching up on missed workouts, catching up on the latest catastrophic news headline, catching up on unprocessed feelings. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think someone signed me up for a never-ending marathon as a cruel practical joke. And while I’ve been busy playing catch up, the days are swiftly moving by, leaving me with a quiet desperation to savor the remaining long, warm summer nights we have left.
This time of year, I’d typically be singing from the rooftops with excitement for Leo season but my birthday has come and gone with little fan fair. Very unlike me! Birthdays are a sacred event but this one felt like more of a blip than a celebration. I’ve shrugged it off for the most part, turning my attention to the new year ahead, but I’d be lying if I said that there wasn’t a piece of me that wishes I’d made a bigger deal of myself. Lesson learned in day 4 of 34: take up space, unapologetically!
Now…on to book things!
Zeal x Morgan Jerkins
🌟🌟🌟🌟.5
Hands down, one of my favorite reads of the year. It starts off a bit slow but when it picks up, baby does it pick up! Morgan Jerkins is a master world builder and weaves together an incredible story spanning generations of love lost and destined to be. The characters are vivid and their history is raw. Starting in 1865 deep south and ending in 2021 Harlem, Zeal is a reminder that you can’t really know where you’re going until you know where you’ve been. Family history is our most precious possession and we must do what we can to preserve it, no matter how incomplete the picture. The pages read like something out of a diary and evoke a sense of familiarity that resembles a coveted family heirloom being returned to its rightful owner.
If you’re a fan of long-lost loves, scandal and the human will to survive against all odds, give Zeal a read!
August Book Pick: Great Black Hope x Rob Franklin
If you haven’t seen this book cover floating around then you must be living under a rock! Everybody and their mother has been talking about Great Black Hope by Rob Franklin and while I’m only 75 pages in, I understand why. I’m eager to see where Smith’s penchant for poor decision making lands him. Will you join me?
Summer Stunner
Lastly, I’m DEEPLY obsessed with this dress from SIR. They say every woman should have a go-to Little Black Dress fits them like a glove and I’m here to campaign for the LBD’s sister: the Little Red Dress! I felt so incredibly sexy in this dress. So much so I really didn’t want to take it off at the end of the night. Clothes should help us feel like the best versions of ourselves and I truly hope to fill my closet with more garments like this in the future.