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What a beautiful book 🥺 (story and illustration wise). I really enjoyed it. Felt like a barbie movie / Jane Austen mashup.

Let's hope I can remember what happened in the first book because I did not refresh. Living on the edge.

This post is based on some thoughts I had after watching the video "performative readers, ‘book girlies’ & the aesthetification of books", by The Book Leo. It is a great video, I do recommend you to watch it!

But, basically, she gives her thoughts about how nowadays, especially with BookTok and similar, reading is becoming 'a performative act', and an aesthetic created around reading. She also talks about how people judge others based on what they read, like if someone only reads fantasy, then this person is not a true reader, is shallow, and all that blablabla that I believe most of us have already heard one day. And there is also the other extreme of people who follow a certain aesthetic and only read (or at least they appear to read) classics, are intellectuals, and simply put are the contrary of what she called 'book girlies' aesthetic.

Well, all that said, the video got me thinking about my own position as a reader, and what reading actually means to me:

A little background: I am graduated in language and literature, Portuguese and Ancient Greek in Brazil, and now I'm getting my PhD, in Classical Literature. So reading is a part of my job, and a big one. Not only that, but also reading the classics. Iliad, Odyssey, tragedies... and it is tiring. To the point that I took a break from reading as a hobby, and just now I'm getting back at it. And as a hobby, I only read the fantasy romance stuff. Am I less of a reader for it? Comparing to someone that read classical literature for fun? No. My point is: I don't think we should consider less of a reader someone that only read fantasy, romance, or fiction in general. Or think that a person is more intelligent than another because they've read classics only. Coming from a country where the latest researches show that the number of readers is decreasing fast, if you read, YOU ARE A READER. The type of literature doesn't matter. Just read what you like, and think, criticize, take notes, interact with the book you're reading.

Thank you for reading this long post! What are your thoughts on it?