trouvaille

  Summary: The Scarlet Letter tells the story about Hester Prynne has a child out of wedlock when her husband isn't in town. When the society discovers this, she is branded with a scarlet A and she has to undergo public shaming. She refuses to tell anyone who the father of the child is. But then Roger Chillingworth arrives who the reader later discovers is Hester's husband, and he makes it his life goal to find out who the father of her child his.  Background: Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in 1804 in Salem, Massuchusetts (so cool, right?). One of his ancestors, John Hathorne actually a lead judge in the Salem Witch Trials and that is why Nathaniel turned his surname from Hathorne to Hawthorne - so he could distance himself from that ancestor. After he graduated from Bowdoin College, he returned to Salem and that is where he wrote The Scarlet Letter in 1804. After the book was published, protests broke out in Salem as many of the inhabitants believed that the book portrayed t...

  Summary: Spin the Dawn has been described by some as a mixture of Project Runway and Mulan. It is about Maia Tamarin, a young girl who dreams of becoming the imperial tailor - as a woman, she knows that will never happen. But when an official of the emperor summons her sick father to take part in a competition for the position of imperial tailor, she disguises herself as her brother who came back from war. She knows she will put her life in danger by pretending to be a boy for she will be executed if her secret comes out, but she does it so her father won't have to do it. She has to take part in challenges against other tailors who are much more experienced than her. Secrets, lying, backstabbing and magic are in the air as she struggles with the complicated challenges. And to make matters worse, she grabs  the attention of the court magician - something you really don't want when you are in disguise. For the final challenge, she has to sow three gowns from the laughter of th...

Recently, I have been reading a lot of Japanese books (which have obviously been translated – I can’t read or speak Japanese) so there is a possibility that you will be seeing more Japanese content on the blog. And I know I have been quiet for a while. I am so sorry. I don’t really have an excuse except that i have been busy with my studies and then it was the holidays so my mind was just on a totally different mind space. But I am back. If you are new, feel free to read my only other post. So let’s continue with my first book review for this blog. I hope you enjoy it!!! This book kind of caught me off guard. I have read books about musicians and the stress of playing in front of a huge audience. A book like  An Equal Music  comes to mind. But never have I read a book about the piano tuner. I feel like as someone who has played piano before and a few other instruments, you just don’t really think about the piano tuner. It is something in the background that happens, but you ne...

    About The Book Series   Ready For The World - Driver’s Education: All Brandon Delacruz is asking out of his young life is popularity, riches, and the girl of his dreams. But what he does have are good grades, a ten-speed bicycle, and his two lifelong friends, Josh and Ally, at his side. And together, they’ll navigate their way through the rigors of high school life. But unlike high school, real life doesn’t come with study guides. Brandon realizes that the girl he’s always dreamed about has been there all along. And as he untangles his feelings for Ally, something tragic happens to her family that changes everything. Now, Brandon will spend the rest of the year balancing his romantic feelings for Ally and his life-long friendship with her while also dealing with tough teachers, classes, and toughest of all, meeting the Filipino parental standards. Brandon will learn that the world moves pretty ...

  About The Book Series   Ready For The World: Driver’s Education Ready For The World: Driver’s Education follows the story of Brandon Delacruz, a fifteen-year-old Filipino American teenager trying to make his way through life during the late 1980s. What Brandon wants out of life is simple: a cool car, a chance to be one of the cool kids at school, and most of all, a cool girlfriend. But instead, all he has are his loving family and his lifelong friends, Josh and Ally, to help him get through the minefield of high school life.  As he looks for ways to get the car and status, Brandon fails to realize that the girl he’s been searching for has been there all along. But before he and Ally can explore a new relationship, a tragedy occurs that changes their lives. And now Brandon will have to find a way to balance his deep friendship with the excitement, trepidation, and complexity that young love brings...all while trying to keep his grades up. Ready For The World: Superstar T...

Welcome to my blog! Hope you enjoy it here :) Here is a list of all my social media links if you want to see more content: Instagram Pinterest My Blog Twitter While you're here go check out some of my recent blog posts. Want to know more about the story behind the name?  trouvaille Go look at the different categories:  Book Reviews Bookish Things Movie Reviews Quick Thoughts

    Hey, lovely people! This post is a bit overdue, especially since it is already the 15th of August and I have already started to read some of the books on my August TBR. But anyway here we go.  Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen So I'm reading this book with Brooke from  @whisperingwoman  as part of her Classics Club. It's such a great idea. Every week we read a certain amount of chapters together and then every week there is a resource pack with chapter summaries and analyses and extra reading material (usually academic articles). This is such a great way to read Jane Austen, because the language used in the book can sometimes feel intimidating and if you are not entirely sure what just happened in a chapter, the resource pack helps so much.  And we also have a Whatsapp group so we can encourage each other to keep on reading.  Book summary: I am sure most of you have either heard of Pride and Prejudice, watched the movie or read the book but for tha...

"Teach her that the idea of 'gender roles' is absolute nonsense. Do not ever tell her that she should or should not do something because she is a girl. 'Because you are a girl' is never a reason for anything. Ever." - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions Today (9 August) in South Africa it is Women's Day. On this day on 1956, 20 000 women (of all races) marched together to the Union Building in Pretoria to petition against South Africa's pass laws. The women stood silently for 30 minutes and then they sang the following protest song: Wathint' Abafazi Whatint' imbokodo! which translates to Now you have touched the women, you have struck a rock! As a women myself, I feel like it is obvious why this day is so important to me. In the past women were seen as objects, someone who belongs in the kitchen, someone who is submissive to men, someone whose only job is to be a mother and she shouldn't tr...

Hey beautiful people! I am currently hosting a buddy read. I promoted it on Instagram so you're welcome to comment on here or  contact me on Instagram or Pinterest. For those of you who don't know what a buddy read is, it is basically an online book club where people in the group read the same book together and encourage each other to read more and then when you finished reading it, you have an online discussion about the book.  So currently we have made a Whatsapp group to chat and get to know each other better and on which we could also talk to each other about the book we are going to read. Currently we are voting for a book and then we are going to start reading. So all this is very exciting and I would love for any of you also to join us. So please contact me if you are interested. Here is a link to my Buddy Read post on Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/p/CDEiabjAmJv/

This virus has been going on for a while and I figured it should be time for me to write the generic Covid 19 post. So here I am. I know most of us is either in self-isolation, lockdown, quarantine or just social distancing. Here in South Africa we have been put in lockdown for 21 days. Hopefully it will end after the 21 days. As an introvert this isn’t as hard for me as it probably is for some of you. I like being on my own and not going out. Of course, the fact that I do not have the option of going out and that I am trapped in my house with the rest of my house is quite hard for me. So I know there are extroverts who need stimulation from others, not just their families and they crave to go outside. I would just like to let you know that I believe that you will make it. You are going to be okay. And if any of you feel depressed, anxious or just need someone to talk to, you are welcome to contact me. Instagram or Twitter. So we have been put in a bad situation, but I feel we shouldn’...

These last few weeks, I decided that I am going to follow my dreams. I guess that this is pretty much a talked out topic on this blog. But I have come to the realisation these last few days how hard it actually is. And I felt obligated to talk to you guys about it. So I decided that I am going to follow my dreams, immediately. Now. And apparently I decided that nothing was going to stop me. And of course I didn't think it was going to be easy, but I didn’t think that this intense fear would overwhelm me. I realised to reach my dreams, you have to start at the bottom. You have to take that step and put yourself out there. So people actually can see you and your talent. And help you to reach your dreams. So my dream is to be a writer, journalist. Something in that general direction. And the first step is to join my campus’ newspaper. But saying you are going to do something and actually doing it, is very different experiences and very different confidence levels. But I was actually a...

“Don’t be pushed around by the fears in your mind. Be led by the dreams in your heart.” – Roy T. Bennett Today someone talked to me about choosing a word for your year. Basically it is a word which sums up your goals and what you wish for 2020. I have heard examples like, ‘create’, ‘survive’, ‘revival’ and more. After hearing this concept being thoroughly discussed I felt that I should also try and choose a word. And almost immediately the word popped up in my head. Dream. But what does this word entail? What does this word say about my future? What does it say about the year I wish for? So that quote from Roy T. Bennett came to mind. Everyone dreams, but the thing that actually stops that dream from coming true is your fear. It may be about insecurities, feeling that you’re not good enough to actually reach your dream. So this word isn’t just about dreaming, because everyone dreams. But it is taking action so you can actually reach your dreams. It is taking the risk that you have alwa...

“I realized I was afraid of living without him.” How to describe this novel in one word? Love. Even though at first this novel doesn’t seem like a love story or romance novel, this can be described as one of the greatest love stories ever told. The plot of the story twists and turns. And this gnawing feeling presides in your gut and you know, that Will and Lou are meant to be. You are not just seeing things. This is a love story and it is only in the last few hundred pages that when Lou actually tells Treena that she thinks she loves Will, that we can exhale with relief. This book is gripping. A page-turner. It is one of those books which you cannot put down even though it is one o’clock in the morning and you have a class at eight the next morning. You just want to keep reading. You have to know what is going to happen next. You need to know when Louisa is going to proclaim her love for Will and you need to know if her love is going to save him. But I am going to stop writing now. I d...

Calling all music lovers and musicians! You will love this book. As a musician myself, I loved this book. Get ready to relate to Michael Holme (the protagonist). For this book review I am using a different format – feedback would be appreciated. Here is Vikram Seth’s novel  An Equal Music  available on Amazon if any of you are interested in the book. About the author:  Vikram Seth is an Indian novelist and poet, most known for his novels  A Suitable Boy  and  An Equal Music.  He has received several awards like the WH Smith Literary Award and the Padma Shri for Literature & Education. Setting:  The setting of this book is mainly in London, but also briefly in Vienna and Venice. It takes place in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Type of narrator:  First person narrator. Summary:  Michael Holme is the protagonist of this novel. A 30-something male who plays the second violin in a successful string quartet called the Maggiore Quartet. He...

It is common knowledge that over the past few years Taylor Swift’s image and music changed. This documentary tells the story of what led her to this change. You see all these people gossiping about celebrities, spreading rumours – horrible rumours-, saying awful thing about a girl who just wanted to follow her dreams. You hear these rumours, you see people enjoying someone else’s pain. And you realize how horrible the human beings can be. Just for a split-second. But then you have to move on with your life. You don’t know this celebrity – her existence almost seems like a fantasy. Like she is just part of an aspiring writer’s elaborate plot for their next novel. You don’t think about the horrendous feelings this person is going through. We get anxiety attacks if we think someone is saying something of us behind our backs. But a pop star we look up to, is called annoying, people are screaming about how they hate her. Yet we can’t spare two seconds to contradict these people. We go with ...

Normal People by Sally Rooney. A love story between two unlikely people, Connell and Marianne. They are polar opposites – Connell is popular and Marianne is a loner. All they have in common is that they live in the same town. Throughout the novel, their on-and-off relationship shows the reader that opposites really attract. Somehow their different circumstances and situations does not stop them to be pulled together time and time again. Even when they are just friends, the reader can sense that they still have feelings for each other and that their other relationships are not going to last long. Or at least that is what I craved the whole book through – for them to finally to be together and to label their relationship something other than ‘casual’. Because their love is anything but casual. Rooney stirs up something in each of us by making us crave that one person who truly knows us. A raw connection between two friends/lovers. If you haven’t read this wildly popular book yet, get rea...

Welcome to my blog - something lovely you discovered by chance. So if you happened to find my blog, it can be seen as nothing else but fate. The word trouvaille means to discover something lovely by chance, a happy accident. You probably did not mean to find my website but here you are reading this post and discovering the wonders that is filled in this website. It might seem conceited, but from the moment this idea for a blog formed in my head I was filled with excitement. Because I wanted to make this blog filled with everything I ever wanted to read in a blog. I wanted people to be excited and happy with the content they read, I wanted to create a warm, glowing feeling inside their hearts. Almost like when you drink hot chocolate on a cold winter's day and you can feel the hot liquid flowing through your entire body and leaving you with this happy feeling.  Welcome to my blog! And I hope you enjoy every blog post just like I have enjoyed every moment I wrote those blog posts....