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starfishstar) wrote2020-10-19 11:14 pm
starfishstar) wrote2020-10-19 11:14 pm
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Bookwormish, 3rd quarter of 2020
My favorites from July through September! (Once again I'm going to attempt to be succinct at this, let's see how that goes...)
VERY TOP BOOKS
Call Them by Their True Names: American Crises (and Essays) by Rebecca Solnit – I feel the same way about Rebecca Solnit that I feel about Ta-Nehisi Coates: The things she writes rewire the pathways my brain travels – about politics, society, humans. Brilliant.
Seraphina by Rachel Hartman – A reread, but I still cherish this book to forever. This portrayal of finding self and self-esteem and a place in the world – in the midst of dragons and intrigue and humor, no less – is one of my favorite things.
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor – I read this at some point as a kid, but I clearly retained little, and it proved very much worth a reread. This book pulls absolutely no punches about the depths and depravity of American racism. It's also a marvelous portrait of a family. I don't think I realized as a kid that there's a whole series of books about the Logan family. I'm now reading my way through all of them!
Darius the Great Deserves Better by Adib Khorram – This was so marvelous! I liked Darius the Great Is Not Okay a whole bunch, but I would venture to say this sequel is even better. (Please write a third one, Adib Khorram!)
Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler – Talk about books that rewrite your brain... I have not stopped thinking about this eerily on-point portrayal of a near-future in which the world is well on its way to falling apart. One of those books where I just kept thinking, How did she know?? I've also started listening to Toshi Reagon and adrienne maree brown's podcast about this book. I'm only a couple episodes in, but I can tell it's going to be very, very good.
MORE TOP BOOKS
Open Me Carefully: Emily Dickinson's Intimate Letters to Susan Huntington Dickinson, edited by Ellen Louise Hart and Martha Nell Smith – These are the scholars who unearthed/restored many, many of Emily Dickinson's letters that had been posthumously censored to remove references to her beloved sister-in-law and friend, Susan. (This is the book that inspired the wonderful Emily Dickinson movie with Molly Shannon, "Wild Nights with Emily"!) The editors don't go quite so far as to weigh in on the question of whether Emily and Susan were in fact "intimate" in the way we would understand it today, or if it was simply a very close and romantic friendship. But regardless, the whole sequence of letters was beautiful to read, as we follow from a young Emily spilling over with praise for her beloved, to an older Emily becoming more and more the deep and esoteric philosopher-poet we know.
American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang – I've seen this graphic novel recommended for so long, and I can't believe I've only now read it! Go into it without knowing too much about it; the twist really is fantastic.
Look Both Ways: A Tale Told in Ten Blocks by Jason Reynolds – I'm beginning to think there's nothing Jason Reynolds can't do. (He wrote Long Way Down, among many other powerful works.) This new book is a set of slightly interlinking stories, each of them moving in all kinds of different ways.
The Land by Mildred D. Taylor – One of the prequels to Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry that I've now discovered! And likewise so powerful and moving. Even though I know how it ends, because I've read the book that comes after, I was so, so invested in whether or not Paul Edward would succeed in getting the land he dreams of for his family.
The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness – Wow. I keep forgetting that Patrick Ness is another one of those authors who can do anything. Come for the cute premise of "what were all normal kids doing, while the Chosen One in all those YA fantasy novels was saving the world?" but stay for the searingly insightful and very, very real portrayal of the last year of high school and coming of age.
EVEN MORE GOOD BOOKS
If I Ever Get Out of Here by Eric Gansworth – I was drawn to this because it's an own-voices YA novel from not only a Native American author, but a Native American author from right here in my neck of the woods: the author was born and raised at the Tuscarora Nation. It's the story of a brief but transformative friendship between two very different teenage boys, who bond over their love of the Beatles. For the first third or so of the book, I thought, "this is fine," but by the end of it I was so moved I cried.
A Country Year: Living the Questions by Sue Hubbell – A thoughtful reflection on a life lived in balance with (and awe of) nature, on an Ozark farm. I handed this one to my dad after I finished it, because it's by a beekeeper, and he used to keep bees. :-)
Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore – Sequel to my beloved Graceling; I know opinions are much more mixed on this one, but I found myself a lot more forgiving of it on reread. I do still think Cashore made some considerable missteps in the execution of it: e.g., trying to structure the book as a mystery when, well, there isn't really a mystery. We know what happened. The story is about the aftermath of what happened, the long, hard work of recovery from collective trauma. But there's a lot to love here, and I can see it all the better on reread, when I already know the plot and thus can set that aside and just focus on the characters. (Much like how I felt about the final Raven Cycle book, in fact!)
Harriet the Invincible by Ursula Vernon – Oh, for goodness sake, how is this so charming?? It's a fun, feminist Sleeping Beauty retelling, in which the lead character is a feisty hamster princess. Who rides off on quests on her trusty steed, a quail.
The Sparsholt Affair by Alan Hollinghurst – This is that unusual sort of book that consists of little moments and tiny character observations, nearly everything that happens taking place before, after, or otherwise outside the big events that would usually be considered the "plot." It's wonderfully done, though. I was never not engaged in these tiny moments and the larger whole they created.
From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg – Another one I'd read as a kid, but only retained snatches of it. I picked this up again because Rachel Hartman (whom I ADORE, see Seraphina above) recommended it in a review, calling it "subtle." It is!
The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin – Finally, a Le Guin novel that engaged me! Hallelujah! I've been blown away by some of her short stories/novellas, and liked a bunch of her nonfiction, but none of the novels really stuck with me and I felt guilty about it. But this one held my interest – an Earth-based science fiction (rather than being in space/other worlds) about what it would mean to actually have the power to change the world overnight.
HONORABLE MENTIONS
The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and Her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women by Mo Moulton – Dives into the lives not only of Sayers (author of the Lord Peter Wimsey books) but also several of her contemporaries at Oxford, as they were shaped by and helped to shape the enormous societal changes of the 20th century.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot – I finally read this classic of long-form journalism; it's the story of Henrietta Lacks (whose biopsied cancer cells became one of the most important cell lines in medical research), but even more it's the human story of her descendants.
Opposite of Always by Justin A. Reynolds – A very sweet time-travel love story; despite the sci-fi premise, the realistic-YA-ness of it shines (much like Patrick Ness' book above!) and I thought the author did an impressive job of keeping the story engaging, even as it inevitably had to retread a lot of the same events due to the time-loop premise.
Genesis Begins Again by Alicia D. Williams – The accidental theme of this quarter seems to have been colorism... Between The Land, Dread Nation and Genesis Begins Again, not to mention having attended a virtual reading by the amazing Elizabeth Acevedo, where she talked about colorism in the context of her novel Clap When You Land, not to mention the state of everything in the US, this has all felt extremely topical. This one is written by a teacher (who clearly had her students in mind!) about a dark-skinned Black girl learning to love and believe in herself, despite the racism and colorism she faces constantly. (BTW, Dread Nation by Justina Ireland isn't listed here only because I just can't get into zombie stories, even if they're clever alternate-history Civil-War-era zombie stories... But it's a good book!)
The Trespasser by Tana French – I've admired and devoured Tana French's whole Dublin Murder Squad series, but somehow I found myself a little wearied by this this, the sixth and final(?) in the series. Something about the way the characters uniformly bring so much intensity to even the most minor things? That's not to say it's bad, though! Even a less-favorite French novel is still a very, very well-written novel. And I listened to the audiobook, which, yeah: cliché though it is, I'm still perfectly happy to let an Irish accent tell me a story for 20 hours.
Witchmark by C.L. Polk – This alternate-Edwardian-England-with-magic tale is little uneven, plot-wise; and okay, fine, the main relationship probably counts as insta-love; but goshdarnit, it was so charming! It felt like being wrapped up in something cozy and warm.
.
VERY TOP BOOKS
Call Them by Their True Names: American Crises (and Essays) by Rebecca Solnit – I feel the same way about Rebecca Solnit that I feel about Ta-Nehisi Coates: The things she writes rewire the pathways my brain travels – about politics, society, humans. Brilliant.
Seraphina by Rachel Hartman – A reread, but I still cherish this book to forever. This portrayal of finding self and self-esteem and a place in the world – in the midst of dragons and intrigue and humor, no less – is one of my favorite things.
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor – I read this at some point as a kid, but I clearly retained little, and it proved very much worth a reread. This book pulls absolutely no punches about the depths and depravity of American racism. It's also a marvelous portrait of a family. I don't think I realized as a kid that there's a whole series of books about the Logan family. I'm now reading my way through all of them!
Darius the Great Deserves Better by Adib Khorram – This was so marvelous! I liked Darius the Great Is Not Okay a whole bunch, but I would venture to say this sequel is even better. (Please write a third one, Adib Khorram!)
Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler – Talk about books that rewrite your brain... I have not stopped thinking about this eerily on-point portrayal of a near-future in which the world is well on its way to falling apart. One of those books where I just kept thinking, How did she know?? I've also started listening to Toshi Reagon and adrienne maree brown's podcast about this book. I'm only a couple episodes in, but I can tell it's going to be very, very good.
MORE TOP BOOKS
Open Me Carefully: Emily Dickinson's Intimate Letters to Susan Huntington Dickinson, edited by Ellen Louise Hart and Martha Nell Smith – These are the scholars who unearthed/restored many, many of Emily Dickinson's letters that had been posthumously censored to remove references to her beloved sister-in-law and friend, Susan. (This is the book that inspired the wonderful Emily Dickinson movie with Molly Shannon, "Wild Nights with Emily"!) The editors don't go quite so far as to weigh in on the question of whether Emily and Susan were in fact "intimate" in the way we would understand it today, or if it was simply a very close and romantic friendship. But regardless, the whole sequence of letters was beautiful to read, as we follow from a young Emily spilling over with praise for her beloved, to an older Emily becoming more and more the deep and esoteric philosopher-poet we know.
American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang – I've seen this graphic novel recommended for so long, and I can't believe I've only now read it! Go into it without knowing too much about it; the twist really is fantastic.
Look Both Ways: A Tale Told in Ten Blocks by Jason Reynolds – I'm beginning to think there's nothing Jason Reynolds can't do. (He wrote Long Way Down, among many other powerful works.) This new book is a set of slightly interlinking stories, each of them moving in all kinds of different ways.
The Land by Mildred D. Taylor – One of the prequels to Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry that I've now discovered! And likewise so powerful and moving. Even though I know how it ends, because I've read the book that comes after, I was so, so invested in whether or not Paul Edward would succeed in getting the land he dreams of for his family.
The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness – Wow. I keep forgetting that Patrick Ness is another one of those authors who can do anything. Come for the cute premise of "what were all normal kids doing, while the Chosen One in all those YA fantasy novels was saving the world?" but stay for the searingly insightful and very, very real portrayal of the last year of high school and coming of age.
EVEN MORE GOOD BOOKS
If I Ever Get Out of Here by Eric Gansworth – I was drawn to this because it's an own-voices YA novel from not only a Native American author, but a Native American author from right here in my neck of the woods: the author was born and raised at the Tuscarora Nation. It's the story of a brief but transformative friendship between two very different teenage boys, who bond over their love of the Beatles. For the first third or so of the book, I thought, "this is fine," but by the end of it I was so moved I cried.
A Country Year: Living the Questions by Sue Hubbell – A thoughtful reflection on a life lived in balance with (and awe of) nature, on an Ozark farm. I handed this one to my dad after I finished it, because it's by a beekeeper, and he used to keep bees. :-)
Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore – Sequel to my beloved Graceling; I know opinions are much more mixed on this one, but I found myself a lot more forgiving of it on reread. I do still think Cashore made some considerable missteps in the execution of it: e.g., trying to structure the book as a mystery when, well, there isn't really a mystery. We know what happened. The story is about the aftermath of what happened, the long, hard work of recovery from collective trauma. But there's a lot to love here, and I can see it all the better on reread, when I already know the plot and thus can set that aside and just focus on the characters. (Much like how I felt about the final Raven Cycle book, in fact!)
Harriet the Invincible by Ursula Vernon – Oh, for goodness sake, how is this so charming?? It's a fun, feminist Sleeping Beauty retelling, in which the lead character is a feisty hamster princess. Who rides off on quests on her trusty steed, a quail.
The Sparsholt Affair by Alan Hollinghurst – This is that unusual sort of book that consists of little moments and tiny character observations, nearly everything that happens taking place before, after, or otherwise outside the big events that would usually be considered the "plot." It's wonderfully done, though. I was never not engaged in these tiny moments and the larger whole they created.
From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg – Another one I'd read as a kid, but only retained snatches of it. I picked this up again because Rachel Hartman (whom I ADORE, see Seraphina above) recommended it in a review, calling it "subtle." It is!
The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin – Finally, a Le Guin novel that engaged me! Hallelujah! I've been blown away by some of her short stories/novellas, and liked a bunch of her nonfiction, but none of the novels really stuck with me and I felt guilty about it. But this one held my interest – an Earth-based science fiction (rather than being in space/other worlds) about what it would mean to actually have the power to change the world overnight.
HONORABLE MENTIONS
The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and Her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women by Mo Moulton – Dives into the lives not only of Sayers (author of the Lord Peter Wimsey books) but also several of her contemporaries at Oxford, as they were shaped by and helped to shape the enormous societal changes of the 20th century.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot – I finally read this classic of long-form journalism; it's the story of Henrietta Lacks (whose biopsied cancer cells became one of the most important cell lines in medical research), but even more it's the human story of her descendants.
Opposite of Always by Justin A. Reynolds – A very sweet time-travel love story; despite the sci-fi premise, the realistic-YA-ness of it shines (much like Patrick Ness' book above!) and I thought the author did an impressive job of keeping the story engaging, even as it inevitably had to retread a lot of the same events due to the time-loop premise.
Genesis Begins Again by Alicia D. Williams – The accidental theme of this quarter seems to have been colorism... Between The Land, Dread Nation and Genesis Begins Again, not to mention having attended a virtual reading by the amazing Elizabeth Acevedo, where she talked about colorism in the context of her novel Clap When You Land, not to mention the state of everything in the US, this has all felt extremely topical. This one is written by a teacher (who clearly had her students in mind!) about a dark-skinned Black girl learning to love and believe in herself, despite the racism and colorism she faces constantly. (BTW, Dread Nation by Justina Ireland isn't listed here only because I just can't get into zombie stories, even if they're clever alternate-history Civil-War-era zombie stories... But it's a good book!)
The Trespasser by Tana French – I've admired and devoured Tana French's whole Dublin Murder Squad series, but somehow I found myself a little wearied by this this, the sixth and final(?) in the series. Something about the way the characters uniformly bring so much intensity to even the most minor things? That's not to say it's bad, though! Even a less-favorite French novel is still a very, very well-written novel. And I listened to the audiobook, which, yeah: cliché though it is, I'm still perfectly happy to let an Irish accent tell me a story for 20 hours.
Witchmark by C.L. Polk – This alternate-Edwardian-England-with-magic tale is little uneven, plot-wise; and okay, fine, the main relationship probably counts as insta-love; but goshdarnit, it was so charming! It felt like being wrapped up in something cozy and warm.
.