Rapture of the Deep by L.A. Meyer Bloody Jack book 7 of 12 Continuing my re-listen of this series. In this installment, Jacky is tasked by British Intelligence to use the brand-new scientific intstrument, the diving bell to recover Spanish gold lost off the Florida Keys. As usual, full of memorable characters and fun hijinks. There isn’t a bad book in this series, but I think this one is not my favorite. The pirates of the Caribbean stuff is good though. I do love Jacky and Jaimy’s starcrossed love, but I also think Jaimy is not my favorite of Jacky’s league of devoted men. 4.5/5 moray eels
New Books Read
Del Rey
The Light of the Jedi by Charles Soule The High Republic book 1 of 8 (the novels, not the graphic novels) CW: death This book scratched the itch I had to live in the world of Star Wars when the Jedi were in their golden age. This is the first book of the High Republic series. There are lots of helpful reading order guides if you were also overwhelmed when looking at the list of Star Wars novels. When a transport ship carrying immigrants to the Outer Rim collides in the hyperlane, remnants of the ship are thrown out of hyperspace at light speed. Before the emergencies can decimate several Outer Rim systems, the Jedi must do what they can to help and figure out how this catastrophe happened. I enjoyed this. It has the feel of the movies, where you’re following several groups of characters and hopping around. You can almost imagine the screen wipe transitions between chapters. I enjoyed getting to meet new Jedi, especially the non human ones. The ensemble cast did make it a little hard to really fall in love with any one character, though I did like them all. I did think more Jedi died than needed to. We’ve already seen that in Episode III. I don’t need more of that. I did really like whenever they said “We are all the Republic;” just makes me feel nice in this era of political division. 3.75/5 lightsabers
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin*** **Book Hangover Alert Broken Earth Trilogy book 1 of 3 CW: abuse, manipulation, murder of children, prejudice Incredible. I don’t know how to blurb this book, so I’m going to let you read the back cover copy when you go buy it. Or don’t even bother, because the back cover copy doesn’t really do it justice either–just read it. Fascinating world and innovative magic system. Super interesting use of 2nd person POV. Pacing and unfolding of the narrative was very well done. Super ready for the next one. Luckily, they’re all out. 5/5 stones
HarperCollins
Godkiller by Hanna Kaner*** Fallen Gods book 1 of 3 CW: death of parents I wanted to like this more. I’ve been meaning to read it for a long time because I absolutely love the cover. And it’s possible that reading it during and after I finished The Fifth Season made me like it less by comparisson. In a world filled with as many gods as their are worshippers, but in a country where god’s are outlawed, a Godkiller attempts to help a child who is bound to a god. I felt the POVs weren’t very strongly differentiated. It felt like the author had written it in omnicient third person and then was told they had to change it to limited third and label all the chapters. I think the omnicient third could have worked, but because each chapter was labeled with a character’s name, I was annoyed when we head hopped or when I forgot whose head I was supposed to be in. I also thought Elo had way more chemistry with the king than with Kissen. Loved the disability rep. Thought the world was interesting, but I don’t know, it just fell a little flat for me. 3.5/5 shrines
Simon & Schuster
I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy*** CW: eating disorders, abuse, grooming Very difficult to put down. I feel like I need to create a little Venn diagram of the themes of memoirs I’ve read. This one hits on childhood fame and Hollywood, eating disorders, abusive parents, and grief of losing one’s mother. Former child actress and star of iCarly, Jennette McCurdy explores her feelings after the death of her mother, untangling complicated feelings of love and grief and realizing the abuse she suffered. The vignette style had punch and kept me reading, but felt slightly disjointed at times. I would be interested to know if Jennette ever spoke more with her father or her brothers about her mom’s behavior and impact on their homelife growing up. I was shocked (as I always am in memoirs like these) that no one stepped in or stepped up or seemed to recognize the abuse happening. Why did they let Jennette’s mom behave like this for so long? So many people failed her. 4.5/5 therapists
Tor Books
The Subtle Art of Folding Space by John Chu*** This was a really fun little sci-fi. Maintainer of the physics of the multiverse, Ellie discovers a secret cabal of Maintainers trying to alter physics and thereby rule it. I won’t pretend I followed the stuff about physics. But I really enjoyed Ellie and Daniel and his creating food out thin air. And really the story was about Ellie’s relationship with her sister, not physics. 3.75 skunkworks
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be lying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read The Fifth Season for a classic of the fantasy genre written by one of the greats, who happens to be a Black woman. Read Godkiller for excellent disability rep including ambulatory wheelchair users, amputees, and Deaf indivudals. Read I’m Glad My Mom Died because I think it will make you more empathetic. Read The Subtle Art of Folding Space for queer and Asian rep in sci-fi.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
My Bonny Light Horseman by L.A. Meyer **Book Hangover Alert Bloody Jack book 6 of 12 Continuing my reread of this series. This is one of my favorites out of the series. In this book, Jacky is recruited as a spy by British Intelligence. She’s back in disguise, this time as a messenger in Napoleon’s army. Just as charming and full of hijinks as the other books in the series. I’m particularly fond of her French Clodhoppers and Captain Bardot. 5/5 legions of honor
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman Dungeon Crawler Carl book 1 of 8 I made my dad start listening to this on a road trip we did to Missouri. He liked it, but thought there were too many rules and things to remember. I won’t review it again. But you can refer to my original review here. 4.5/5 achievements
Yearling Newbery
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle* If you had asked me if I remembered this book, I would have said not really. But then I relistened to it and I actually remembered basically all of it. It’s a weird one, but a good one. It’s a classic for a reason. Meg Murray and her prodigy brother Charles Wallace must travel across space and time to rescue their father. The novel deals with authoritarianism, assimilation, coming of age, and more. 5/5 beasts
New Books Read
We Fell Apart by E. Lockhart* We Were Liars book 3 of 3 CW: Institutionalization Though these books technically all stand alone, I would still read them in publication order. When Matilda receives an email from her famous and estranged father, whom she has never met, she travels to his crumbling castle on Martha’s Vineyard to uncover the secret of the family she has never known. I really enjoy these books. They have a really nice modern gothic feel to them. I will say, however, that the voice for all three books kinda sounds the same even though there is a different protagonist for each one. 4/5 paintings
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett* **Book Hangover Alert You know me, I love a Victorian inspired voice, an epistolary novel, and footnotes. This book was everything I wanted. Cambridge professor of dryadology Emily Wilde heads to the far north to study the faeries of that region for her encyclopedia. But when she discovers the town is plagued by Fae who steal girls, Emily must put her theories into practice. Very cozy and fun. Loved the academic take on faeries and folklore. 5/5 small ones
Forgot to take a picture of the cover of this book so please enjoy this picture of my cat instead.
Winter’s Orbit by Everina Maxwell*** CW: domestic violence Everything I wanted as more. I binged this in two days. Pitched as Red, White & Royal Blue meets Ancillary Justice, which was spot on. Big fan of the world, the characters, the romance, the yearning. The only thing I didn’t love were the names of all the characters. Just didn’t really roll off the tongue. I’ve already forgotten all of them. 5/5 arranged marriages
No Body No Crime by Tess Sharpe Very enjoyable. Like reading an action movie. PI Mel is sent to find the girl she’s been in love with since she was 16, who disappeared without a trace at 18. She’ll uncover the secret that’s kept Chloe in hiding for all these years. This was a fun, easy, fast-paced read. There were moments where I thought some of the action and the bad guys were a little unbelievable, but if it had been an action movie, I totally would have accepted it, so not sure where that resistance came from. 3.75/5 peacocks
Hyperion Avenue
On Earth as It Is on Television by Emily Jane* We listened to this one on a road trip. I was trying to find something everyone would like and I think I succeeded. After aliens arrive in ships that hover over 12 (? maybe more, I can’t remember) major cities, then mysteriously depart, humanity must grapple with the implications. The novel follows 3 families in the wake of the visitation. This book has: rowdy children, humor, talking cats. It was a good time. 3.75/5 cats
Longmans
She by H. Rider Haggard* CW: racism, misogyny I read this for research. It’s a good example of the male quest romance genre. Holly and his adopted son Leo travel to Africa searching for the truth of Leo’s history which was hinted at by an ancient pot sherd left to him by his father. I liked the voice (though if you’re not into Victorian lit you probably won’t). I liked the adventure. It did drag through the middle. I did not like the racism or misogyny, obviously. Something interesting about the male quest romance is that it was a reaction to the successful novels by women that dominated the first half of the 19th century and were mostly about women and domestic affairs and romance (Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters, George Eliot). These novels center men’s relationships with each other and often have few to no women in them (think Treasure Island, Journey to the Center of the Earth). I was fascinated by the love triangle between the two men and She, especially because their bond to each other was just as strong if not stronger than their bond with She (and proved to be the bond that won out in the end). She is also evil and demonstrates why a matriarchal society will never work (allegedly). I also appreciated the frame narrative, the footnotes and the ‘editor.’ 2.5/5 lions
Not for the Faint of Heart by Lex Croucher*** **Book Hangover Alert A very fun Robin Hood inspired sapphic romcom. Robin Hood’s granddaughter who was raised in the Merry Men must confront whether the organization still lives up to it’s mission when they kidnap a healer with more romantic views of the famous Merry Men. Very funny. Good characters, good banter, nice queer representation. I didn’t need the one sad thing that happened to have happened, but I guess it’s fine. 4/5 arrows
Psychopomp & Circumstance by Eden Royce*** A nice little novella I picked up at the library as a treat. After her estranged aunt’s unexpected death, Phee must take on the arrangement of her funeral. It’s a lovely little meditation on grief and family, and it’s set in a very intriguing fantasy alternate Reconstruction era. Would love to read more set in this world. 3.5/5 caskets
Funeral Girl by Emma K. Ohland What do you do if you’re terrified of dying but you live in a funeral home and your parents are funeral directors? Oh, and also, you can raise ghosts. That’s Georgia’s life. And when a boy from her school dies in a tragic accident, she raises his ghost looking for answers about the afterlife, but gets a little more than she bargained for. This is a nice YA book. Really nice themes of friendship and grief and death. 3.5/5 scrapbook pages
Collins Crime Club
The Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie* Miss Marple book 1 of 12 I have to be honest, I’m not sure my full attention was on the audiobook while I was listening to it, but I did still enjoy this. After a murder occurs at the vicarage (who’d have guessed, right?) a dear old lady who never misses anything solves the murder. Now as premises go, that’s excellent, right? And the mystery was very fun and the ending was quite satisfying. I think the thing that didn’t quite work for me was the POV. The story is told from the first person perspective of the Vicar. And he’s like fine. It would be more interesting to be in Miss Marples’s head, but if we were in her head, then we’d know from the start that she’s the smartest person in the town and we’d lose that subversion of expectations. Curious about the POV for the rest of the books in the series. Are they all told by the Vicar? Other people in town? Does Miss Marple get to narrate one? More research is necessary. 3.5/5 exploding crystals
*This book only includes straight white cis people.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be laying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read Winter’s Orbit for queer rep in sci-fi. Read Not for the Faint of Heart for a queer Robin Hood retelling. Read Psychopomp and Circumstance for Black characters in fantasy and an alternate Reconstruction era.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
Setting Free the Bears by John Irving* CW: war, death, animal death and abuse Have been wanting to read this one for a while because I love bears and it’s been a while since I read a John Irving book. In 1960s Vienna, two young men hatch a plan to set free the animals of the Vienna zoo. The book is a coming of age story about grief and generational trauma and war and friendship. Struck me as a bit gay. I did enjoy this. It has the absurdity of other Irving works, including a wild and ridiculous death. I didn’t think it was as funny as some of his other books, and the middle section about Siggy’s family history did drag. But I loved the final image of the bears. 3.5/5 bears
Orell Füssli
The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss* CW: death of animals When a family is shipwrecked on a deserted coastline on their way to colonize Australia, they set up their home in the jungle instead. It is rather fun, although apart from the shipwreck they experience absolutely no hardship whatsoever. They are cheery and industrious about the whole thing and are never upset that they will never see another human again. This does get a bit tiresome after a while, so the middle drags until the 10 years later epilogue which has more action than the whole rest of the novel. I also didn’t love that they had to shoot absolutely every animal they encountered, even when it wasn’t threatening them and they didn’t need more food. Would have been nice if at least one of the children was a girl. Also, I know this was published in 1812, but Wyss clearly had no idea what flora and fauna actually might be found on a South Pacific island and so included whatever he wanted. I’ve heard there’s another edition that includes conflicts with natives, which sounds probably racist, so I’d recommend this edition. 3/5 kangaroos (for some reason)
Del Rey
Throne of Jade by Naomi Novik Temeraire book 2 of 9 I’m currently obsessed with these. In book 2, Laurence and Temeraire travel to China to try to resolve diplomatic tensions which have arisen since Temeraire was a Chinese dragon taken by the English navy. I love to see Laurence and Temeraire’s relationship develop, and it was fun to see more of the world and the way dragons are incorporated into Chinese society. I think I liked it just a smidge less than the first one, just because there’s a little more conflict between Laurence and Temeraire, and I just love them so much. 4.5/5 jewels
The Malady of Death by Marguerite Duras* I was going to get rid of this book without reading it because I didn’t think it looked that interesting, but then I saw it was only 60 pages and had large type. I thought I could read it in less than an hour, and I was right. I was also right that it wasn’t that interesting. It tells the story of a man who hires a woman to try to teach him how to love. The prose is at times lyrical and lovely, but the man was predictably terrible and the woman had no personality. Which was perhaps Duras’s point, that you can never learn to truly love something you don’t see as more than an object. But I’m not interested enough to think that hard about it. 2/5 unnamed characters
Lady Tremaine by Rachel Hochhauser* CW: rape (off page), incest, death I loved this. I love a Cinderella (or any fairytale) retelling. Through the eyes of Lady Tremaine, we see the familiar story anew, exploring what a mother will do to better the lives of her daughters. This version is historical rather than fantastical, and explores feminist themes of motherhood. 5/5 falcons
Tor Publishing Group
The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow*** CW: death Another banger. I love Harrow’s work. This is probably my second favorite of her books after The Once and Future Witches. The myth of Sir Una Everlasting, Knight of Dominion is the founding myth of Dominion society and the research subject of veteran and scholar Owen Mallory, but when a rare and mysterious manuscript appears in Owen’s office, he’ll discover just how important this story is, and how history may be rewritten. Spanning centuries, this is a fated love story that explores how important propaganda is to an authoritarian regime. I love Harrow’s prose. 5/5 yew trees
Bantam Books
Jackal by Erin E. Adams*** CW: racism, serial murder I keep reading thrillers because I want to like them, and then I don’t like them that much. I almost put this book down after the prologue because I hated the writing style of the prologue. The majority of the rest of the book was better though. Young Black girls have been going missing every summer in this Pennsylvania town on the edge of the woods. When her best friend’s daughter disappears, Liz must unravel the mystery and why everyone has been looking the other way for years. I liked the idea a lot, especially the themes of systemic racism. I didn’t love the execution. I don’t mind fantastical elements in thrillers, but I like to know whether that is likely in the world of the novel. I hated the sex scene, I had to skip it. 2.75/5 hellhounds
Catapult
I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself by Marisa Crane*** This book was a bit of a downer, which is absolutely not a fair assessment for a dystopian book about grief. In a world where those who have “hurt others” are assigned an extra shadow, and subsequently shunned and discriminated against, a woman must learn to raise her child in the wake of the death of her wife. Because childbirth was the cause of her wife’s death, the child is assigned a second shadow at birth. This was a really lovely meditation on surveillance, grief, right and wrong, and what it means to hurt someone. It was a bit depressing though. And I’m not a parent, so maybe this criticism is irrelevant, but the child read older to me than the age she was described throughout the book. 3.75/5 scorpions
The Bewitching by Silvia Moreno-Garcia*** I loved this. In three parallel timelines, women from three generations investigate a vanishing by a malevolent witch. I loved all the witchcraft elements and the way the three stories were braided together. I did guess who the witch was, but I’m not mad about it. 5/5 bird talismans
Books I did not finish
Harper Voyager
The Improvisers by Nicole Glover*** CW: murder It always makes me so sad to DNF books. I really really wanted to like this. It’s a companion to a series, so maybe I should have tried the series first, but this is supposed to be a stand alone. I loved the idea of a prohibition era smuggler and trick pilot solving magical murders with the help of her family’s funerary business. That is SO up my alley. But I just wasn’t that into it. I didn’t feel like I was connecting with the characters and I didn’t feel the need to find out the solution to the mystery.
*This book only includes straight white cis people. There was gay subtext in Setting Free the Bears.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be lying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read Jackal for an examination of systemic racism. Read The Everlasting to learn about how propaganda weaponizes nationalism in service to authoritarianism. Read I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself for a queer dystopian exploration of grief and surveillance. Read The Bewitching to see Mexican folklore and queer characters in fantasy/horror. Read The Improvisers to see Black characters in historical fantasy–maybe it will hit for you.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
Number of books by women, trans, and nonbinary people read this year (only counting new books read): 73
Number of books by BIPOC this year (only including new books read): 30
Number of books by disabled authors this year (only including new books read)*: 3 *This can only include authors I know are disabled. More on the list could be and I might not know.
Turn Right at Machu Picchu by Mark Adams* I’m planning another trip to the Inca Trail so I reread this book. Adams does a good job balancing his personal travelogue of his trek in the Sacred Valley, history of Hiram Bingham’s expeditions, and history of the Incas and the conflict with Pizarro. He also covers current controversies over the Incan artifacts in Yale’s care. Very readable. 3.5/5 llamas
I know this cover isn’t the same style as the rest of the series. It hurts me too, but this one is signed.
Bloody Jack by L.A. Meyer * **Book Hangover Alert Bloody Jack book 1 of 12 CW: attempted rape, war, death, plague This is one of my all time favorite books from one of my all time favorite series. Orphaned in London in 1799, little Mary Faber joins a street gang but when the leader of their gang is killed, Mary rechristens herself Jack and joins the crew of HMS Dolphin as a ship’s boy. The series follows Jacky’s historical hijinks and escapades including but not limited to naval engagements, piracy, finishing school, horse racing, spying in the Napoleonic wars, and so, so much more. Even though we’ve all heard it before, my family and I listened to it on a road trip. I cannot recommend the audiobook highly enough. Katherine Kellgren does a superb job with these books including all the voices, dialects, and songs therein. 5/5 kites
Curse of the Blue Tattoo by L.A. Meyer* **Book Hangover Alert Bloody Jack book 2 of 12 CW: attempted rape Book 2 follows Jacky at finishing school in Boston after she’s discovered to be a girl. And if it doesn’t sound like she could get in much trouble at school (compared to in disguise as a boy in the Royal Navy) well, you’d be wrong. This is maybe one of my least favorite books in the series but there aren’t any bad books in the series. 4/5 sheepdogs
New Books Read
Six Days in Bombay by Alka Joshi*** This was one of my Book of the Month books. I enjoyed it. When an influential Indian artist dies mysteriously in a hospital in Bombay in 1937 where nurse Sona works, Sona must undertake a quest to clear her name from suspicion and return several paintings to the artist’s friends. It was interesting to read a historical fiction set in India shortly before partition with an Anglo-American protagonist. 3.5/5 paintings
Teo’s Durumi by Elaine U. Cho*** **Book Hangover Alert The Alliance book 2 of 2 CW: gore, serial murder I’m obsessed with this duology! I’m dying for someone to make it into an action series. It would be so good. Framed for the murder of his family, Teo must clear his name and bring the perpetrators to justice with the help of his ragtag crew of misfits. It has a very cinematic, space opera feel and I just adored it. 5/5 skin suits
Henry Holt and Company
Flamer by Mike Curato*** CW: homophobia, religious trauma, suicide attempt I like to celebrate Banned Books Week all month long. This graphic novel follows Aiden, a closeted teen, at Boy Scout camp as he comes to terms with his sexuality and his own internalized homophobia. I really liked the art in this graphic novel. Several really gorgeous panels, and I really loved the color palette choices. 3.5/5 canoes
Viking Press
The Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson*** **Book Hangover Alert A nonfiction book about the craziest museum heist I’ve ever heard of. Johnson traces the crime: the theft of hundred’s of rare, historical, and endangered bird skins from an outpost of the Natural History Museum in London. Why would you steal bird skins from a museum, you ask? For the bizarre and niche hobby of salmon fly tying. Johnson excavates the community’s problematic obsession with using endangered bird feathers in the art form. This book was so wild. I can’t recommend it enough. 4.5/5 birds of paradise
Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo*** **Book Hangover Alert CW: homophobia, racism The second book I read for Banned Books Month, and it was excellent. Set in the 1950s in San Francisco’s Chinatown, Last Night at the Telegraph Club follows Lily, a teenager trying to navigate her sexuality and culture as well as racism and the Red Scare. It’s such a loving book with interesting and nuanced characters. I really loved getting to read a historical fiction book in this time and place, as it’s not one I’ve read about before. 4.5/5 male impersonators
Viking Press
We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson* **Book Hangover Alert Just a lil something spooky for Halloween. The Blackwood sisters live with their ailing uncle in their estate on the outskirts of town, shunned by the villagers for a tragedy that killed the rest of their family six years ago. But are the girls as innocent as they seem. Jackson is such a master of atmosphere; I really have no idea how she does it. I’m also a big fan of Mary Katherine, the unreliable narrator of the story. 3.5/5 black cats
A Thousand Times Before by Asha Thanki*** CW: domestic violence, religious conflict, colonialism I said above I’d never read a historical fiction set in the partition of India, but I read two this month. This book is a family saga that follows three generations of women in India during and after partition. A magical tapestry allows the women to pass down their stories and histories and gives the woman from the current generation the power to create change through art. I loved the concept of this book, but I felt the pacing was off. I wanted to be into it, but it dragged. 3/5 tapestries
Flat Earth by Anika Jade Levy* **Book Hangover Alert CW: suicide attempt This one is an early release. I heard Levy speak at the Aspen Literary Festival and her humor convinced me to buy the book. I enjoyed this. It was weird, but good. I’m struggling to write a blurb for it that makes sense. I felt like this book captured what it feels like to be alive right now. To have lived through Covid, to be surviving under capitalism, to be watching America’s descent into fascism and still be trying to live your life. Set in New York City in the near future, “Flat Earth is a story of coming of age in America, a novel about commodification, conspiracy theories, mimetic desire, and the difficulties of female friendship that’s as sharp and sardonic as it is heartbreaking” (I took that from the Penguin Random House blurb). I’m not sure I would say I liked it, but I can’t stop thinking about it? 3.5/5 documentary films
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison*** **Book Hangover Alert CW: rape, misogyny, racism, death of animals, incest, child sexual abuse, n-word The last book I read for Banned Books Month. You know, I had resisted reading this one a bit because I always feel like Morrison’s books are kind of a bummer. (Very important, obviously! But not happy books.) But I actually really liked this one–although, that’s not to say it wasn’t a bummer. The book orbits Pecola, an ‘ugly’ black child who longs to have blue eyes. I thought the choice of POV was super interesting as well as the engagement with the themes of whiteness and internalized racism and beauty standards and the way these systems self perpetuate. Morrison also writes some beautiful prose. 4/5 blue eyes
*This book only includes straight white cis people. Perhaps unfair to give this designation to Turn Right at Machu Picchu and The Feather Thief. The later Bloody Jack books are more diverse, but these first couple are pretty white and straight.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be lying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read Six Days in Bombay to learn about India before partition and the experience of being Anglo-Indian at that time. Read Teo’s Durumi for an Asian-inspired sci-fi with queer characters. Read Flamer for a queer coming of age. Read The Feather Thief to consider the impact humans have on the earth. Read Last Night at the Telegraph Club for untold queer, Asian history. Read A Thousand Times Before for more about Indian partition and queer history. Read The Bluest Eye to learn about internalized racism and the insidious value placed on whiteness.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien* Such a comforting reread in these trying times. I think The Two Towers is still my favorite book of the series, but of course this one is good too. I love Merry and Pippin’s friendship in this one, which I think is shown in even sharper relief because they aren’t together for most of this book. Once again, the book is split into ‘what everyone else is doing’ first, and then ‘what Frodo and Sam are doing.’ I also forgot how much more stuff there is after they (spoiler) destroy the ring. I did also listen to the appendix this time as well, which I think I skipped the first time I read this book. 4/5 fell beasts
New Books Read
Atria Books
The Paleontologist by Luke Dumas CW: abduction of a child, murder This one was fun! A spooky thriller set in a run down museum, it’s a little Night at the Museum meets Jurassic Park plus a murder mystery. Paleontologist Simon Nealy returns to the Hawthorne Museum where his sister disappeared in their childhood determined to finally figure out what happened to her. But the museum is haunted by the ghosts of prehistoric beasts. Can Simon help all these restless souls find peace? Overall I really enjoyed this. Good tension building and fun concept, although I did predict the murderer almost immediately and I did feel like I had a few unanswered questions by the end. 3.5/5 dino ghosts
Joseph Henry Press
Out of Thin Air: Dinosaurs, Birds, and Earth’s Ancient Atmosphere by Peter D. Ward and David W. Elhert I read this as research for a future project, though it was perhaps not very helpful for that. I still read the whole thing though because it was interesting. The authors’ main argument was that the level of oxygen in the atmosphere on prehistoric Earth was the main driver of speciation. They argued that in times of low oxygen, there was more species diversification, then in times of high oxygen levels, those species which had developed very efficient breathing were able to grow much larger and dominate. I thought their arguments sounded convincing, though I don’t know that I know enough about chemistry or geology to comment. This book also came out in 2006 and I don’t know if there are any updates to the research since then. It did not answer the question of whether humans could have breathed the atmosphere in the Permian, which was not necessarily in their research purview, but it is an important question to me. 3/5 species
Random House
The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro* I had kind of a hard time getting into this one. In a post-Arthurian Britain where no one can retain long-term memories, an older couple named Axl and Beatrice set off in search of their son. I read in Maggie Stiefvater’s review of this book that it reminded her of Susanna Clarke’s Piranesi though she found Piranesi “warmer and sadder.” I would agree with that assessment. I liked the exploration of memory and grief and conflict, but it didn’t fill me up or unmoor me the way Piranesi did. 3/5 she-dragons
W. W. Norton & Company – I really dropped the ball with this one. I could have photographed the copy I read in the museum in front of a bear diorama, but I didn’t
Eight Bears: Mythic Past and Imperiled Future by Gloria Dickie*** I always try to read something on-theme in the museum so this was my latest nonfiction pick. Dickie writes about each of the eight bear species we have on earth with clear-eyed compassion. Each chapter focuses on one bear species where she charts the ecological and social threats to each species. I learned a lot from this book, and I hope everyone reads it so we can work together to save these wonderful animals from extinction. 4.5/5 bears (duh)
The Lighthouse at the Edge of the World by J.R. Dawson*** CW: mass shooting, death, grief, suicidal ideation **Book Hangover Alert I loved this. Full disclosure, Jen was my mentor at Drexel’s MFA program, so I am a little biased. This book is a Sapphic Orpheus and Eurydice retelling set in Chicago. After losing her sister in a mass shooting, Charlie finds herself able to see ghosts–but not her sister. Searching for her sister’s spirit, she stumbles upon a lighthouse at the edge of the lake run by the Ferryman who ferries souls to the underworld every night. But Charlie finds more than she bargained for in the Station Master’s daughter Nera. It was so excellent. I loved the multi-POV narration. I loved the world. I loved the concept. I loved the remnants scattered throughout the narrative. I loved the prose. 5/5 remnants
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman Dungeon Crawler Carl book 1 of 8 These books are all the rage right now. And for good reason. They are really fun. When the Earth is turned into a huge mining site for extraction by the Borant Corporation, all surviving humans are thrown into the Dungeon, a real life video game beneath the Earth’s surface televised for the whole Universe. Carl and his ex-girlfriend’s cat Princess Donut must team up to survive the Dungeon. It’s a little Hunger Games meets Squid Games meets Ready Player One. Perfect for fans of DnD. It was really fun, and I highly recommend the audiobook because the narrator was excellent. 4.5/5 achievements
Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor*** The Nsibidi Scripts book 1 of 3 This was so fun! A Nigerian inspired fantasy, Sunny, an albino American-Nigerian living in Nigeria, discovers she’s a Leopard-person gifted with magic. She joins her peers to learn to control her magic and the young Leopard-people must discover the secrets of the Black Hat serial killer menacing children near their village. I loved the developing friendship between Sunny, Chichi, Sasha, and Orlu. I thought the world was really cool. I started a new tag on StoryGraph for books about Magic School that Aren’t Hogwarts. So if you’re looking to fill that void without supporting a terrible person, check this one out! 3.5/5 juju knives
*This book only includes straight white cis people. Once again the classics, which is unfair but still true.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be laying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read Eight Bears to learn more about these wonderful creatures, conservation, climate change and what humans can do to reverse the detrimental effects we’ve had on the environment. Read The Lighthouse at the Edge of the World for Sapphic fantasy and Jewish representation in fantasy. Read Akata Witch for Nigerian inspired fantasy.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien* The Lord of the Rings book 2 of 3 **Book Hangover Alert I forgot that this book is in two parts, one about the rest of the fellowship and one about Frodo and Sam, and does not go back and forth between them like the movie does. This movie also starts and ends in a slightly different place than the book. Otherwise it’s very faithful. Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli are on the trail of Merry and Pippin who were kidnapped by orcs but then rally the ents into resistance in Fangorn Forest. Frodo and Sam continue on toward Mordor, enlisting the unwilling and devious help of Gollum. I haven’t yet reread the third book, but I still think this one might be my favorite. I also love to see the developing friendship between Legolas and Gimli. 4.5/5 ents
Macmillan
Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne* I’ve read this book before, but it was kinda fun to reread it with the backdrop of all the Victorian scientific history I’ve been reading lately (who knew context helps you enjoy something more fully??). Verne was really just excited about geology, like everyone else was at the time so he wrote this adventure novel that talks about rocks probably way more than today’s average reader would be interested in. After finding an account of a man who (you guessed it) claimed to have journeyed to the center of the earth, Dr. Lidenbrock and his reluctant nephew Axel follow in his footsteps down a volcano in Iceland to uncover the secrets hidden under the rocks. This was also fun to read right before I went to Iceland. Overall, I enjoyed it much more than when I read it originally for school in the summer before 8th grade. Of course I have to critique the lack of female characters. And after Axel’s sweetheart Gräuben says she wants to come on the adventure! Axel didn’t want to go! Take her instead! 3.5/5 prehistoric monsters
New Books Read
Doubleday Anchor Books
Darwin’s Century by Loren Eiseley* Yet another book about Victorian scientific history. This one was cited a bunch in Taylor’s and Dolnick’s books so I went ahead and read it too. It was pretty good. Mostly focused on what paved the way for Darwin’s theory of evolution (he argues Darwin wasn’t a one of a kind genius who came out of nowhere with this crazy idea). 3/5 barnacles
Delacorte Press
We Were Liars by E. Lockhart We Were Liars book 1 of 2 **Book Hangover Alert A good fast paced read. I really enjoyed this one. Cadence Sinclair comes from a privileged family and spends every summer on a private island near Martha’s Vineyard. But after an accident the summer she was 15, Cady is struggling to remember what happened and no one in her family will tell her. My one critique is about how the prose sometimes devolved into poetry. I just think prose doesn’t become poetry just because you put some line breaks in it. I think the author would have been better off writing lyrical prose than half-baked, partial poems. Do a novel-in-verse or a novel of lyrical prose, but don’t try to do both. 4/5 dogs
The Sunshine Court by Nora Sakavic All for the Game book 4 of ? **Book Hangover Alert CW: abuse, trauma, brainwashing, sexual assault, assault, suicide The way Sakavic has her fandom by the throat. Taking place after the original trilogy, this book is from the perspectives of Jean Moreau and Jeremy Knox as Jean unlearns how to be a Raven and learns how to be a Trojan instead. We love to see that healing journey. And I’m also loving meeting all the new characters. Sakavic has always had a knack for writing extremely lovable, flawed, complicated characters. 4.5/5 ravens
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Hild by Nicola Griffith* The Hild Sequence book 1 of 2 CW: slavery, incest I wanted to like this more than I did. I just really like the cover tbh. Historical fiction set in the seventh century in Britain, young Hild must navigate the complicated politics of kings and lords vying for power to gain what power she can as a young woman. Griffith’s prose is really nice, but I struggled to get through this one. I liked Hild and Begu and Cian. I’m not sure what it was that made it hard for me to get into. There were a lot of characters and difficult names–it was almost like reading a high fantasy–and they were hard to keep straight. 3/5 prophesies
Delacorte Press
Family of Liars by E. Lockhart We Were Liars book 2 of 2 This one was good too. I think not quite as good as the first one, but still a quick, easy, enthralling read. It’s a prequel, set before the events of the first novel, but has spoilers for the first one, so read it second. This novel follows Carrie, Cadence’s aunt in her seventeenth summer on the island, exploring the secrets her family keeps and the relationships of the three sisters. It helps to explain how Cady’s mom and aunts ended up the way they are. I liked the voice in the first book, but this book had the exact same voice, even though our narrator is a different character. Would have loved to see some variation in the voice. 3.5/5 ghosts
The Golden Raven by Nora Sakavic All for the Game book 5 of ? **Book Hangover Alert CW: abuse, trauma, brainwashing, sexual assault, assault I didn’t realize there was going to be more than one book about Jean Moreau. I should have waited to start any of them until all 3 were out. But alas. When I finished the first one, I immediately read this one. And now I wait. Still enjoying these. Sakavic’s prose is so readable, if a little unpolished and repetitive. 4/5 Trojans
Atria Books
My Friends by Frederik Backman*** CW: child abuse, domestic violence, sexual assault (mentioned), drug use, drug abuse Nobody does funny-sad like Backman. I adored this. By like 5 minutes in I was crying and laughing and then that continued for the whole novel. When homeless teen Louisa breaks into an art auction in order to see her favorite painting in person, she could never imagine that she’d meet the artist (in an alley behind the auction, while running from authorities who think she was there to vandalize the painting). And when the artist passes away the next day, Louisa could never have foreseen he’d leave the painting to her. Now Louisa’s got a priceless painting and no idea what to do with it except follow the man who gave it to her, the artist’s best friend to learn the story of the artist and the painting. As unpredictable as real life, the story is fantastically human, full of love and heartbreak and friendship. Rarely do I ever see a book that celebrates or captures true friendship the way this book does. Possibly my new favorite Frederik Backman book. 5/5 farts
Thames and Hudson
When Life Nearly Died by Michael J. Benton* Another one I read for research. This is about the Permian mass extinction event, the largest mass extinction in history. It gives a good amount of background on some of the other extinctions as well, especially the KP event and the history of our understanding of mass extinctions. It was very interesting. I won’t pretend to understand all the geology and paleontology at work here, but overall I thought Benton did a good job of laying out his argument and evidence in an understandable way. Though, I don’t plan to set my novel near the end-Permian event, so not sure how relevant this actually was to my research. 3/5 Lystrosauruses
The Mayor of Maxwell Street by Avery Cunningham*** CW: racism, n-word I enjoyed this. Hungry for a change at being a serious reporter, Nelly, a young Black woman from a well-to-do family, takes an assignment to find the Mayor of Maxwell Street, a shady figure who seems to run all of Chicago’s underworld. But is Nelly in way over her head? With her charmed life on the line, Nelly must decide what she’s willing to do for her freedom. I thought this one was fun, but I’m not sure I was completely satisfied by the ending. 3.5/5 glittering parties
*This book only includes straight white cis people. We know those classics are just going to be straight white cis people. It’s probably not fair to label the history books with this label, since the gender and sexual identity of the researchers isn’t relevant, however, women, people of color, and LGBTQIA+ individuals have long been excluded from scientific research. I’m not labeling the We Were Liars books with this designation, not because they’re not almost entirely straight white cis people, but because there is some critique of race, class, and heteronormativity. I don’t have any idea if there were people of color in Britain in the seventh century, so maybe this isn’t fair for Hild either, and there is a whiff of homoeroticism in this book, but there could have been more.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be laying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read My Friends because it will make you a better person. Read The Mayor of Maxwell Street for a 1920s historical fiction focused on the Black community of Chicago.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien* What a nice comfort book to read in these trying times. When Frodo’s uncle leaves him an enchanted ring, Frodo is pulled into a struggle to save middle earth. Peter Jackson’s movie is excellent and that is in part because he had great source material. A classic. It was nice to visit Tom Bombadil again too. 4/5 barrow-wights
New Books Read
The Heavenly Tyrant by Xiran Jay Zhao*** Iron Widow book 2 CW: see content warning from the author at the beginning of the book I won’t do a little summary of this book, because I don’t want to spoil the first book. This book was good, but I wouldn’t say I really enjoyed it. The first book was fun. I loved how Zetian, Shimin, and Yizhi interacted with one another and how they took on the establishment. In this book they almost don’t interact at all, which I found disappointing. I liked the examination of Laborism and the continued themes of feminism, especially how Zetian is learning her own shortcomings as a feminist. But the first half of the book dragged a bit. Still fascinated by the world. I’ll probably still read the next book. 3.5/5 suits of spirit armor
To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods by Molly X. Chang*** Gods Beyond the Skies book 1 I love when authors thank each other in their acknowledgements. It was a coincidence that I happened to pick this book and Heavenly Tyrant up at the library at the same time, but I loved seeing both authors thank each other in the acknowledgements. Ruying has the power to pull the life force from someone’s body, but she is one of a conquered people. When a conquering prince discovers her power, Ruying is forced to become his personal assassin to save her family. But the prince is charismatic. He seems to want peace and unity between their people as much as she does. As Ruying is drawn in by his promise of peace, she must learn to trust herself to do the right thing for her people. I enjoyed this. I liked seeing Ruying’s character develop throughout the book. 3.5/5 blessings from Death
Tor Nightfire
Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle*** **Book Hangover Alert This one was fun. Screenwriter Misha made it in Hollywood by writing queer horror movies, but then the studio tells him he has to kill off his gay leads right at the culmination of their relationship. Despite being closeted in his hometown in Montana, Misha is ready to stand for his principles until he starts being menaced by monsters from his own movies. Are these crazy stalker fans or something more sinister? I really enjoyed this. Great tension building. Important themes about technology and art and capitalism (spoiler: this book is anti-AI) that I was left thinking about long after the story ended. My one critique is that I hated the dialogue tags. This is probably just a personal quibble. 4/5 horror monsters
The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater*** **Book Hangover Alert CW: ableism, Nazis, racism Stiefvater’s adult debut is a sparkling historical fiction with elements of magical realism. After Pearl Harbor, the US government requisitions several luxury hotels to house Axis diplomats and foreign nationals in the hopes that if the diplomats are well treated, the American diplomats in Germany will be as well until a prisoner swap can be arranged. Hotel general manager June must figure out how to host the enemy, keep her staff under control, and balance the mineral water springs that flow beneath the hotel which return the same energy they are given. I can’t say enough good things about this book. I don’t feel like I explained it very well, but just trust me, you should read it. Gorgeous prose as always. Interesting and compelling characters. Magical and ethereal setting that fills you with longing. I adored it. I also loved seeing the themes of disability in this book, especially a consideration of the way Nazis were persecuting disabled people, which I think often isn’t talked about enough. My only caveat about this book is that you should not read about a luxury hotel while staying at a budget hotel. Lends itself to too much comparison. 5/5 dachshunds
Indiana University Press
Earth Before the Dinosaurs by Sébastien Steyer A book I read for research. This book has gorgeous illustrations. It went a little more in depth on evolutionary history than I needed it to. I really just wanted to know what kind of animals were alive in the Carboniferous and Permian periods. 3/5 dimetrodons
Camp by L.C. Rosen This was a very fun, easy read. Randy has been coming to queer camp as a theater kid for several years now, but this year he has a plan to catch the eye of butch gay boy Hudson who has never so much as looked at him. All he has to do is give up theater, his friends, his style, and everything he loves about camp. But when Hudson looks at him in his new masculine clothes, it’s all worth it. Or is it? I enjoyed this. I read it very fast. I did think maybe there was some trauma that didn’t really get fully addressed and it did seem like there was kind of a lot of sex for a YA book. I try not to be a prude (and I am and 100% against banning books), but I do think sexual content in YA books should be approached differently than in an adult book. 3.5/5 painted nails
Books I didn’t finish
University of Chicago Press
Time Travelers: Victorian Encounters with Time and History edited by Adelene Buckland and Sadiah Qureshi This book was just a little more niche than I needed it to be. I read it as research for a novel I’m thinking about, but a few of the essays were more academic and focused than I wanted. I read the essays that interested me and skimmed the rest.
*This book only includes straight white cis people.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be laying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read Heavenly Tyrant to learn about Laborism, overthrowing fascist regimes, and the subjugation of women in many different government systems. Read To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods for a fantasy inspired by the true events in Manchuria during WWII under Russian and Japanese subjugation. Read Bury Your Gays for queer rep in horror (with a happy ending!) and a critique of AI and the commodification of art. Read The Listeners to learn more about the Nazis and disability. I’m not marking Camp as a Book for a Social Conscience, not because it doesn’t have good representation, or because you shouldn’t read it, but just simply because I don’t think it will make you a better person if you read it. Which again doesn’t mean it isn’t good.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
Holes by Louis Sachar **Book Hangover Alert Felt compelled to read this again the other night so I did. A great book to binge. I just think this book is perfect. And the movie is also perfect. I love the way the storylines all interlock and come together. After being in the wrong place at the wrong time, Stanley is sent to Camp Green Lake, a juvenile correctional facility where he digs holes all day in the hot sun. The book explores the fates of Stanley’s ancestors and the local history which all converge on Stanley and what he may or may not find buried in the dry lakebed. 5/5 yellow spotted lizards
New Books Read
Henry Holt
The Time Machine by H.G. Wells* The narrator attends a dinner party where the hosts claims to have invented a time machine. He relates his adventures in the far future and his guests are unsure what to believe. I read this as research for a project I’m thinking about. I just wanted to see how Wells approached the time travel aspect of the novel and the frame narrative. Those things were both interesting. I wasn’t that interested in Wells’s future world and future people. I couldn’t figure out if it was racist or it was a critique of racism. 3/5 crystals
The Ornithologist’s Field Guide to Love by India Holton* Love’s Academic book 1 of 2 So silly and fun. A Victorian historical fiction, this one also a lite fantasy and a romance. The Ornithological Society puts on a competition to catch a rare bird and win Birder of the Year (and also tenure!). Beth Pickering is determined to win, but handsome, roughish Devon Lockley keeps getting in the way, and there’s something more going on–a conspiracy, a rigged contest, dangerous magical birds threatening the public–and only Beth and Devon, working together can figure out what’s going on. The focus was on the romance and the humor which both worked beautifully. I would have liked a little more world building. The dangerous magical birds were fun, but I was curious if there were other magical animals? How prevalent magical bird attacks are for the general population? If it’s possible for humans to use magic in this world? I also was kind of expecting there to be some real bird facts, but no, just bird puns lol. 4/5 magical birds
Tor.com
The Empress of Salt and Fortune by Nghi Vo*** The Singing Hills Cycle book 1 of 6 A nice little fantasy story. The structure was kind of interesting and used artifact type things at the beginning of each chapter to unite the present day storyline of a scribe who is hearing and recording the life of an older woman who had worked for the empress. I do really enjoy Vo’s prose. 3/5 magical birds (a theme this month?)
Counterpoint Press
The Crime Without a Name: Combatting Ethnocide and the Erasure of Culture in America by Barrett Holmes Pitner*** **Book Hangover Alert CW: fascism, genocide, ethnocide, racism Fascinating. A linguistic and philosophical examination of the United States’s particular brand of fascism and racism. Holmes Pitner argues that we do not have the language to describe our own history and traumas and therefore cannot fully understand, process, or move forward from them. He proposes the word ethnocide to describe when a people’s culture is destroyed, but the people themselves are not (think Native American boarding schools or the Trans-Atlantic slave trade). Holmes Pitner does a good job of breaking down his argument and explaining it very clearly. He also has some interesting ideas about how to build culture in a non-exploitative way. Should be required reading for everyone. My only qualm was that it was published in 2021, when Holmes Pitner clearly had some hope about moving past Trump with Biden’s presidency, so reading it now in the year 2025 is somewhat disheartening. 4/5 ofrendas
Bloomsbury Publishing
House of Flame and Shadow by Sarah J. Maas* CW: torture, slavery, fantasy racism Crescent City book 3 of 3 (?) I did not love this one. I think Maas’s style is a bit repetitive, though clear and easy to read. (I counted 3 “the column of her throat”s in this book, one “the column of her spine.” Wasn’t counting “his/her mouth kicked up at the corner” but I should’ve been.) This is the third book in the Crescent City series and to me it felt like the last, though my roommate thinks there will be more. I don’t need more. I liked the first one, which was kind of a murder mystery (so on brand for me). And I remember thinking the second was pretty good too. But I wasn’t crazy about this one. It was too long, for one thing. Maas has a lot of characters and POVs, which is something I like doing myself, but I don’t feel like her characters are different enough from each other. All the women seem the same and all the men seem the same. I also thought the world building was a little shaky. I like the idea of the fantasy creatures and magic in a technological city where people are using phones and cars, but I don’t think the development of technology makes sense. I would assume humans invented it because they can’t use magic, but the technology is all powered by magic, so that doesn’t make sense and it isn’t explained (unless I forgot from an earlier book??). There’s also kind of a weird blending of Christian and Norse mythology that just feels kinda haphazard. And finally, it’s a white savior narrative (or a “save the poor, ugly, powerless, downtrodden humans who can’t save themselves narrative” even though absolutely none of the main characters are human). 2.5/5 shifters
Disney Hyperion
The Chalice of the Gods by Rick Riordan **Book Hangover Alert Percy Jackson and the Olympians book 6 of 8 Still delightful. In his senior year of high school, Percy must get three letters of recommendation for college by completing quests for the Gods. When Ganymede’s chalice goes missing, Percy, Annabeth, and Grover must track it down. Lower stakes than most of the other books in the PJ universe, but still clear stakes and motivations. Nice to see the way Riordan keeps developing characters we all know and love so well, and lovely to see the gang back together. 4/5 cups
The Weaver and the Witch Queen by Genevieve Gornichec*** **Book Hanover Alert CW: slavery, death, child abuse Ugh. This was so excellent I don’t know what to do with myself. After an ominous prophesy ties together the fates of three girls in circa 900 Norway, Gunnhild runs away from her abusive mother with the seeress who made the prophesy in order to become a witch too. Ten years later, the farm of her two friends is attacked by witches and one of them abducted. Gunnhild swears to help Oddny find her sister and the two women must join the hird of the future king of Norway I don’t feel like I did a good job with that summary, but please believe me that it’s really good and you should read it. Really nice prose. Great world building and immersion in the narrative. Compelling characters. And I did read this right after House of Flame and Shadow and I was thinking a lot about the place of smut and sex scenes in novels and I wasn’t crazy about any of the smut in HOFAS. I didn’t think it was particularly arousing or narratively satisfying. There is only one real sex scene in The Weaver and the Witch Queen and it’s not at all explicit, but I found it SO much more effective. It was subtle but still arousing as we’d been building up to this moment for half the book with the tension between these characters. It was just really well done. 5/5 sparrows
Delacorte Press
Small Steps by Louis Sachar Holes book 2 of 2 Can’t compete with the masterpiece that is Holes, unfortunately. Taking place after Camp Green Lake, the story follows Armpit as he tries to get back on his feet after his stint in the juvenile justice system, taking small steps toward a better future. His plans for a quiet life are threatened by a ticket scalping scheme run by X-Ray, another former Camp Green Laker. I did enjoy this, although the sense of impending doom was almost enough to make me stop reading. I really just wanted Armpit to be happy and safe after all he’s already been through. I would also have appreciated seeing X-Ray’s perspective which we don’t get in the novel. I feel like I would have had more empathy for him if we’d gotten to be in his head sometimes. But as it was written, I just felt like X-Ray was dragging Armpit down. 3.5/5 counterfeit tickets
Tor Books
Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson* This was so fun. I’ve been meaning to read something by Sanderson for forever (can I call myself a fantasy fan if I haven’t read anything by him??), so I asked a friend where I should start. She said Mistborn or Tress. I put Mistborn on hold at the library, but this one was available, so I ended up reading this one first. Tress is an ordinary girl on an ordinary island, but when the boy she loves is captured by the Sorceress, she must leave the Rock and sail the spore sea with pirates to bring him back. I really enjoyed this. I enjoyed the world and the concept of the spores. I loved the narrative voice of the story which was very funny and a unique way of telling the story (from a side character in this story, though a character that appears in Sanderson’s other works, I gather). The story was a pretty simple fairy tale but done in a refreshing way. 4/5 spores
Dragonfruit by Makiia Lucier*** CW: animal death, slavery, parental death A really nice fantasy inspired by Pacific Islander mythology and culture. A seadragon egg can provide a wish, but at what cost? Hanalei is exiled from her island after her father steals an egg to save her life, at the cost of the princess’s. But the princess’s son is still looking for another egg to save his mother and Hanalei may be the only one who can help him. I really enjoyed this. My only beef with it was that spiders don’t blink. They don’t have eyelids. The author says twice that the spider character blinks. Which is a dumb tiny thing to be annoyed by. Also, fair warning, one of the animal companions died, and I was mad about it. 3.5/5 fruit bats
Peachtree Teen
Hell Followed with Us by Andrew Joseph White*** CW: gore, body horror, religious trauma, death, dysphoria, transphobia, homophobia, genocide I don’t know, this book was kind of a bummer. Not that it wasn’t good and maybe necessary for some people. But it did not improve my mental state to read it. In a near-future post-apocalypse, religious fanatics have spread a plague to nonbelievers, decimating the planet. Benji, a transman and carrier of the final weapon of the religious fanatics escapes the colony in a search for freedom. He finds a community of queer kids resisting the Evangelicals but there’s only one way for them to truly be free. It was incandescently angry (justifiably so). It did have too much gore for me, and I also think I would have got more out of it if I had some religious trauma or even any religious background. Somebody needs this book but it isn’t me. 3/5 monsters
*This book only includes straight white cis people. The Time Machine was written in 1895 so we’re not surprised. The Ornithologist’s Field Guide to Love is just a historical romance with no representation (I guess there was one gay kiss). Yes, I know House of Flame and Shadow has a couple of gay characters and a couple characters that are not white. But none of the main couples are gay or not white. None of the smut is gay or diverse. Tress of the Emerald Sea might have included a few nonwhite, characters, I don’t really remember any of the descriptions. Everyone was straight and cis as far as we know.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be laying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read The Empress of Salt and Fortune for LGBTQIA+ rep and Asian inspired fantasy. Read The Crime Without a Name to learn about fascism and racism in America. Read The Weaver and the Witch Queen for LGBTQIA+ rep in Viking historical fiction. Read Dragonfruit for a Pacific Islander inspired fantasy. Read Hell Followed with Us for LGBTQIA+ rep.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
Number of pages read this year: 43,795 My goal this year was 45,000 words on StoryGraph, and while I didn’t quite make that goal, I feel it’s important to point out that I read a LOT of things that weren’t on StoryGraph this year including but not limited to scholarly articles, student essays, Paper Dragon and Under the Sun submissions, writings by my workshop team members, MY OWN NOVEL (so many times. I’ve read it so many times) so if you count all that, I’ve definitely surpassed that goal.
Number of new books read this year: 101
Number of books reread this year: 22
Number of books by women, trans, and nonbinary people read this year (only counting new books read): 66
Number of books by BIPOC this year (only including new books read): 31
Number of books by disabled authors this year (only including new books read)*: 8
*This can only include authors I know are disabled. More on the list could be and I might not know.
True Biz by Sara Nović*** Book Hangover Alert** CW: discrimination, ableism, audism Still fantastic. I went to an author event where Nović spoke about this book, and it was so good. I felt like I had to read it again. I still really enjoyed it. You can refer to my previous review, so I don’t repeat myself, but here are some things I didn’t note last time: I liked the formatting choices for the dialogue. I just took a class on dialogue, so I was hyperaware of the dialogue as I was reading. Especially since so much of the dialogue in this book is sign language, I thought Nović’s choices were really effective. 5/5 cochlear implants
December New Books Read
Devil Is Fine by John Vercher*** Book Hangover Alert** CW: grief, racism Following the death of his teenaged son, the unnamed narrator inherits a piece of land from his estranged white grandfather, intended for his son. When the land turns out to be an old plantation, full of buried secrets, and the narrator stops being able to distinguish reality, he must confront his grief and his inherited trauma. This was so good. I don’t even really have anything else to say. It was just really good. I liked the way the book is constructed as the narrator speaking to his dead son. I like how meta it is. I liked the magical realism. The narrator is flawed and a bit annoying, but still very compelling. As someone who works in museums, I loved the engagement with the ethical question of the role of museums when dealing with human remains, especially those of slaves. 5/5 jellyfish
Remember You Will Die by Eden Robins*** Book Hangover Alert** CW: death, homophobia This book was really cool. We love an experimental form. Told entirely in obituaries, Remember You Will Die weaves forward and backward through time to tell the story of an advanced AI and her daughter, missing and presumed dead. The way the obituaries connect and tell the story not just through what they say, but also what they don’t say, was really cool. 4/5 obituaries
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens* It’s winter, so Dickens season. This book has been on my to read shelf an embarrassingly long time. Probably at least a decade. Set during and before the French Revolution in London and Paris (the proverbial Two Cities), the story follows Dr. Manette and his daughter and critiques both the bloody methods of the revolutionaries and the excess and greed of the upper classes that led to the revolution. I enjoyed it. This book has more plot than many of Dickens’s other books, but less vibes. I kinda like the vibes more, I think. None of the characters in this book are very memorable the way the characters in David Copperfield or Oliver are. Not to say it isn’t good, because it is. I just thought I would like it more than I did. 3/5 guillotines
Indiana University Press
Feminist, Queer, Crip by Alison Kafer*** CW: ableism, forced sterilization, institutionalization I read this in preparation for my class on accessible futures. It’s really good. Kafer examines the idea of the future and where disability fits into imagined futures. She deconstructs the idea that there is no place for disability in the future. 4/5 ableist billboards
Holiday House
Aces Wild by Amanda DeWitt*** Book Hangover Alert** I loved this. When Jack’s mother, a Vegas casino tycoon, goes to jail for her shady business practices, Jack is sure rival casino owner is behind it–I mean, she’s not any shadier than any of the other casino tycoons in Vegas. So Jack calls in reinforcements–his best friends, a group of teenaged asexuals he met online–to pull off a heist that will save his home, his mom, and put the right person behind bars. This was so fun, and we love to see that ace representation! 5/5 blackjack hands
A Jingle Bell Mingle by Sierra Simone and Julie Murphy Christmas Notch book 3 of 3 CW: grief Randomly read this without reading the first two books because I didn’t realize it was a series. It’s okay though, each book focuses on a different couple so you don’t necessarily have to read them in order. Though I certainly would have had a better introduction to the characters if I had done that. In the first chapter I was like wow that was a lot of people and names, and I feel like I was supposed to know who they were. In Christmas Notch retired pop star and famous sad boy Isaac Kelly and part time porn star and part time screenwriter Sunny Palmer are both on a deadline. He needs to write one last album for his record label and she needs to write the screenplay to a new Christmas blockbuster. The only problem is he hasn’t been able to write music since his wife and muse died and she’s hit a dead end tracking down the story of a Christmas miracle that happened in Christmas Notch. So they decide to team up: Isaac will help Sunny research this miracle, if Sunny helps Isaac find a new muse. Except maybe he’s already found one: her. Overall I enjoyed this, though it was too spicy for my tastes. And the town’s Christmas mystery wasn’t really too much of a mystery. But Murphy and Simone do a great job writing fun, compelling characters even if they do suffer from the perennial problem of romance novel characters: being stupid, insecure, and unable to see the love interest is into them. 3/5 photo booths
Grand Central Publishing
Born Both: An Intersex Life by Hida Viloria*** A nonfiction memoir charting the life of activist Hida Viloria and her work to end Intersex Genital Mutilation and gain equal rights and recognition for those born intersex. I definitely learned a lot from this memoir. If your only exposure to intersex experiences is Jeffrey Eugenides’s Middlesex, you should read this. Eugenides isn’t an authority. 3.5/5 motorcycles
The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year by Ally Carter* This was a very fun holiday read. Two antagonistic mystery writers are invited to the Scottish mansion of prolific mystery writer Eleanor Ashley for Christmas with her family. When Eleanor disappears from a locked room without a trace, Maggie and Ethan must learn to work together to unravel the mystery of her disappearance. I liked it more than The Jingle Bell Mingle, mostly I think because it was a mystery, not just a romance, and it wasn’t as spicy. Very fun. Good banter, good construction. Nice character arc for Maggie. 4/5 mistletoe plants
The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong A cozy fantasy. Teller of small fortunes Tao travels from place to place, telling only small fortunes, trying to avoid the notice of the kingdom’s magefinders, who recruit magic wielders to serve the crown. Tao joins up with a rag tag band of misfits looking for the vanished daughter of a mercenary for hire. This book was kind of nice. It was cozy fantasy, but unlike Legends and Lattes, there didn’t really seem to be much of a goal for the main character. The ending was excellent though. Very heartwarming, very lovely. Not sure the book earned it though. 3/5 fortune cookies
Gregor the Overlander by Suzanne Collins* This book has been on my to read shelf since maybe 2009 or 2010 (sometime before Mockingjay came out but after I’d read Hunger Games). Very embarrassing. When Gregor and his two year old little sister fall through a grate in their New York City apartment’s basement, they fall in to the dangerous world of the Underland, where giant bats, cockroaches, spiders, and rats live in fragile peace with the humans of the Underland. Gregor must join a quest to save the Underland and maybe even save his father, who had disappeared several years before. Collins really knows how to write a narrative that you are comfortable finishing in one sitting. You just want to keep turning the pages. Her work is so easy to read, it doesn’t even feel like you’re reading. Anyway I really enjoyed this. I mostly grabbed it to finally get it off my to read shelf. I wasn’t expecting to like it that much now that I’m not in the target audience, but now I’m thinking I might just read the rest of the series. 4/5 crawlers
Books I didn’t finish in December
AK Press
Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements edited by Walidah Imarisha and Adrienne Maree Brown I wanted to like this. I picked it up because I was looking for a short story to teach in my class and this collection looked like exactly what I was looking for: science fiction stories of hope written by intersectional writers of color. But I didn’t really like any of the stories. And I did want to keep reading, because maybe there were some good ones and I just didn’t get to them?? Anyway, the editors said they asked people across social movements to contribute, which is a cool idea, but they also added that many of these people had never written fiction before, and I was like oof, I can tell. The best stories were Terry Bisson’s and Levar Burton’s, but both of those were excerpts from novels, not stories commissioned for this anthology, so I would recommend just reading them on their own in their entirety. 1/5 futures
*This book only includes straight, white, cis people. A Tale of Two Cities is an old book written by a white man so we’re not surprised. The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year is just a book that has no diversity. Gregor the Overlander has no romance, so maybe not all the characters are straight. They are all white though.
**Book Hangover Alert indicates the kind of book that will leave you full up on love. Satisfied, but wishing the book never had to end. You’ll be laying on the floor with no idea what to do with yourself (other friends have called this feeling Good Book Depression or say that certain books necessitate Floor Time). This is the kind of book that gets its teeth in you and won’t let go easily. After the last page you’ll be thinking about this book for a long time. You’ll bother all your friends trying to get them to read it so that you won’t be alone in your Hangover.
***This book is part of my Books for a Social Conscience series! Read True Biz to learn more about the Deaf community. Read Devil is Fine for a look at the legacy and trauma of racism and slavery. Read Remember You Will Die for LGBTQIA+ representation in sci-fi. Read Feminist, Queer, Crip for an intersectional look at the future through a disability studies lens. Read Aces Wild for ace representation. Read Born Both to learn more about one of the pioneers of intersex activism and the discrimination that community still faces.
Reads marked as part of the Books for a Social Conscience series will regularly address topics like race and racism, colonialism and post-colonialism, LGBTQIA+ experience, feminism, BIPOC experience, social and political issues, history, identity, class, disability experience, immigration, gun violence, poverty, colorism, environmentalism, and more! The goal of these books is to diversify the stories we’re reading, grow our empathy for those who are different from us, and amplify voices who are often silenced.
