aimiller's Reviews (689)

A solid collection and a decent introduction to Wilde's writing. There's a pretty wide spread here, from his short fiction to poetry to essays and some playwriting. I do think it would benefit from some more intensive contextualization ("The Soul of Man Under Socialism" for example would benefit from a little more context than was provided even in the endnotes.) But I do think it's a good introduction overall to Wilde's writing, and maybe paired with some more context would be really useful. 

Okay so the good stuff about this book: the science is fascinating, I learned a lot, and I frankly really strongly agree with Hart. I did before I read the book, but his arguments about pleasure are pretty compelling. He's able to tie together both the science and the racist history of drug criminalization (and the criminalization of Black people through drugs.) 

The major thing that kept this from being five stars, for me, was the way Hart uses "responsible" in his argument for who should get to use drugs freely. "Responsible" means nothing in this text; he never clarifies exactly who he thinks is "irresponsible," though he suggests that people with psychiatric illness should not use drugs (despite the VERY COOL fact that he drops that heroin is potentially AS effective at treating psychotic symptoms as anti-psychotics, with fewer side effects--which would suggest to me that perhaps people with psychosis would benefit from using heroin.) (Disclaimer I'm not a doctor and I'm not telling folks who experience symptoms of psychosis to use heroin.) 

This specter of responsibility hangs over this book, and given the classist, racist implications of "responsibility" that have been wielded against poor people and people of color in this country, I don't think it fits with his argument. It's a bad softening of his argument, and it creates this tension between drug users who he deems are "responsible" and users who don't fall into that category. What differences are there between someone who uses drugs as self-medication for mental illness and Hart, who says in the text of the book that he uses drugs instead of going to therapy (because of the racism of mental healthcare.) I understand why he doesn't use the description "self-medication" (because he's trying to resist a medicalization of his own drug use,) but it definitely sounds like that's what he's doing. How do we address that? How do we validate it? How can drug users "in the closet" show solidarity with drug users who cannot be in the closet, outside of "coming out"? These are all questions that are raised for me by his differentiation, and none are really answered by the book. 

I do definitely recommend people read this, especially because the discussion about the legalization of drugs is compelling and something to seriously think about. I just think some of his framing raises more problems than he addresses, and I found it a really big gap in the book. 

A really solid collection from a pretty wide variety of authors; many of the stories are pretty good and the few I didn't love are pretty skippable. I especially enjoyed the pieces by Darcie Little Badger and Daniel Heath Justice! But overall a very good anthology, and one I'd recommend to any people interested in sci-fi/fantasy and in diversifying who they read in those genres. 

I received a copy of this through LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program, and I am grateful to the publisher for the opportunity to read it. 

This was a solid noir mystery, with a fantasy spin. It suffers from a tension of worldbuilding, I think--set in a historical fantasy, there's like just enough background info to set it up but maybe not enough to feel like I have a grasp on the world. (Also: orc racism is a yikes, though I don't know that Schlichter goes full species eugenicist here, just a history that carries through.) I liked the characters for the most part, mostly his fairy assistant; it did feel a little bit like there was more in this world left to be explored, so I might even read a second book if it was a series. But if like fantasy noir sounds like your jam, I think you might enjoy this! 

Just incredible. I don't know if this is the best place to start for people looking to get into PIC abolitionism (I would say as a true intro text, Angela Davis's Are Prisons Obsolete?< for a truly basic starting place about why prisons are bad,) but this tackles so many different topics and is such a clear call about how to organize and what the values we need to stick to as prison abolitionists. The section about transformative justice in particular is incredible, as as the examples of experiments that people are engaging in as alternatives to carceral structures. 

I really just want to thrust this book at every person I know and demand they read it, and I can only hope they get half as much out of it as I have. Will be a reread very soon, and many times after that. 

What a way to round out an excellent series. I think the plot of this one felt a little more convoluted than any previous of the Watch books--I periodically went "oh is this the end?" and then no, it was not, but I think it's also Vimes at his most competent, and it was nice to not have the "Sir Terry's Patented Benign Racism" in such a huge role as it has been in other books where we incorporate other species into "sentience" etc. 

Mostly I want to go right back to the beginning and experience all these books over again, but this, like many other Watch books, was a fun and delightful romp. 

This was a fascinating and by turns gorgeous and humanly frustrating; the characters are so, sometimes painfully real, and Schulman manages to render every character in stark light. The titular Maggie Terry's struggle through not just her addiction but a whole new reality on the other side of rehab, a new world full of gentrification and loss of love as well as the troubling past of her career as a cop, really strips bare the consequences of refusing to talk to one another, on all sides--and while that in its more trope forms I know can be a turnoff for many readers, in this case it's so painfully realistic that it's not Plot Convenient but more just... how people are when they're traumatized and socialized in a world that so rarely allows for honest conversation. Definitely recommend. 

There is a lot to unpack here. Let's start with two percent of the way through the ebook, where a character of color's skin is described with food terms. Then, self-conscious (but don't worry, fully benign!) racism on the part of the main character, then the graphic description of a sexual assault. And it just. Kept getting worse and worse. The fact that it ends

with a LITERAL IT GETS BETTER VIDEO IN THE TEXT

was. Too much for me.

I'm not sure if this book is listed as YA on this site due to a bunch of bad tagging (which happens!) but it's wildly graphic and I would have to really know a kid to recommend they read it, and even then I don't know that I would. 

It was just too much and kept getting worse and worse, until I was left like. Stunned by the ending because it seemed so surreal and like a joke. I understand this book was written probably with good intentions, but it was just. So bad. 

folks, we've hit a sweet spot. Yes this has some of Sir Terry's Patented Benign Racism, which makes me roll my eyes, but then yknow makes up for it with the ending. (But also good god please Sir Terry.) It also has things I LOVE--Vimes being competent even when he doesn't know all the clues, Vimes having People to Protect (the addition of Young Sam is the smartest thing Sir Terry ever did to keep me personally reading,) Sybil being a badass and also competent, The Colon and Nobby Show... It's just like a beautiful mix of so much that I already love about these characters, all rolled up into one. 

Just a real delicious payoff of all the previous Watch books I've read, a delightful fun time, and a good ending that made me feel good. 

A deeply accessible and incredibly necessary book explaining both what mutual aid is, what it isn't, and how to best organize in a group to do the mutual aid work. Honestly the latter chapters should be read by anyone trying to intentionally develop a community; doing so requires we develop our skills to interact with one another and use skills that we aren't used to exercising because we aren't used to working with people in that way. 

Really strongly recommend this for everyone, whether or not you're already involved in mutual aid projects. So much of this is so necessary right now, and will only become more and more necessary in the future.