First off, I received this book through LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program, and I'm grateful to the publisher for the opportunity to read this book.

This is a really good little memoir; if you've read others by activists like Zinn (Rebecca Solnit's Hope in the Dark, for example, or the memoir by Staughton and Alice Lynd,) you basically know what you're getting into, but it's still really solid and I think probably important for a lot of folks to read right now (hence, in some ways, the reason for the reissue.) Zinn comes across as both kind of soft and clearly self-ware, and some of the things he says here are really beautiful. There are things I would have liked more out of the book, but I can't exactly demand them here, and I admittedly haven't read his other works. Overall though I really enjoyed this, it's a really fast read, and I encourage folks interested in hearing his insights to read it!

This was read as a part of my ongoing 'read lesbian classics' books, and I will say it sure was a Lesbian Book, in a similar way that Price of Salt sure was a Lesbian Book--though obviously because it was written far earlier, the shifting location of sexuality as a category is something to track and think about here. This edition came with a fairly decent primer in the history of understanding the novel amongst queer and trans folks, so I'd recommend that alongside reading it for sure.

This was definitely interesting for tracking the way that certain tropes have followed queer people across time, as well (especially narratives of suffering and death.) It's also pretty racist (openly uses the n-word) which I don't think folks mention often (though that introductory essay does mention it, so that's got it going for it.) But overall clearly interesting to read and think about, just not overall my super cup of tea for fun.

Just so lovely and a deeply beautiful book. Simpson manages to create such rich worlds within such small spaces, and there's a flow to all of the work in this book that is soothing even as it interrogates trauma. The love is so present and real in it, and it's definitely a work I'm going to revisit multiple times.

BOY this was so delightful; I wasn't sure what I had gotten myself in to, but this was just delightful. Really diverse, and the dialogue was just FUNNY and all of the characters had their own rich inner world. The plot itself also DEEPLY sucked me in and I knew I had to finish it as fast as I could to get to the end. It's so well-paced, and I can only strongly recommend this. So, so much fun to read.

OH MY GOD. So this book just blew me away; normally it takes me a while to get into books, especially if they have like fantasy words, but this just sucked me in and took me away. I raved about it before finishing it, which is pretty rare; it just really got into me and when I hit the 75% mark I absolutely couldn't put it down. The story is woven so masterfully; the threads are amazing separated and then when they come together, I almost yelled out loud. I cannot recommend this strongly enough; I know a LOT of people who want to read it, and I will say PLEASE DO.

Just a solid fantasy read with a LOT of interesting world components, and it's got plenty of twists and turns to keep you going. The tension built a little too long for me, and I have two (2) major beefs that might be spoilers, so proceed with caution; nonetheless, the last hundred pages I HAD to read (I'm writing this at 1 am because I just finished and didn't want to wait to write it) so it's certainly gripping at the end. The characters are compelling even when sometimes they're infuriating (I yelled "you IDIOTS" a LOT) and the ending was deeply satisfying even as it left openings for the future.

Anyway, welcome to Here's My Beef:

1) the whole system of "half-breed" and allomancy being passed down genetically and so basically through the rape of skaa women was um Gross to me, and I'm going to be open about the fact that I'm uncomfortable with that being a central world-building tenant. This is revealed, granted, in the first 30-odd pages where there are multiple discussions of rape attempts, and I get that it's like a Dark Gritty World but also please don't.

2) the entire romantic plot drove me BANANAS and I hate Elend and I hated that Vin fell in love with him and I hate that we got chapters from his POV where he basically was like "wow because i have a crush on this skaa girl clearly skaa are hashtag just like us" and I hate that he didn't die. Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

A solid collection and introduction to indigenous sci-fi. It's worth noting that at this stage, this functions maybe more as a kind of potential space for foundations for indigenous sci-fi, rather than necessarily a place to explore new works or authors; there's been a huge amount of work put out after this (especially in the young adult arenas) that might be worth checking out if you're looking to avoid, say, Sherman Alexie's work. Nevertheless, Dillon's analysis and introductions are very solid, and the excerpts are great places to move towards the larger works. I definitely came away from this with many more books and stories to look for. I couldn't necessarily name a "favorite" among these--they were all so different and interesting and good, and I think you get a good taste of the number of different themes and kinds of stories.

Just a really incredible exploration of enslaved women and their relationship to white women enslavers; Glymph just bulldozes the hell out of all historiography that tries to claim white women enslavers were somehow more sympathetic or not as deeply entwined in slavery, and also manages to explore this deeply fascinating moment where slavery is falling away and waged labor is beginning to take its place, and what that means for each of the actors involved--how Black women were actually more capable than white women at negotiating wages, etc., because they had a sense of what work looked like per day than white women did. Just super fascinating, really accessible, and didn't feel repetitive. Strongly, strongly recommend.

I went in expecting a kind of typical trans memoir (given that this one is now something of a classic) and yeah, there's definitely some of that, because Boylan's life matches up fairly neatly with a lot of narratives about trans people. She's very reflective, though, and very self-aware of how it might read to other people. (Sometimes it felt a little name-drop-y, but I would say generally not enough to be annoying.)

My least favorite part of this book was the time spent on her wife's struggle, which is interesting given the opposite reaction most (I'll just GUESS cis people's) reactions that Boylan notes in the afterword. I will say I deeply appreciated her wife's note at the very end, because I think it cleared up a lot for me re: that being a moment in her life that was hard but not impossible. Obviously this is colored by the fact that I am a trans person who has done a social transition, and have also had to hear how people around me were so good for accepting me, etc., so if you're trans and that narrative of how good it is the people who loved us before we came out are just for continuing to love us, wait until the end because I do think her wife does a solid job of brushing that aside.

My FAVORITE part, though, is how funny Boylan is in this. Trans people are funny, and I loved seeing her little jokes about transition because they felt so genuinely trans in a way that is to me distinctly different from cis humor. Those little moments--and they are little, though I wouldn't say the book is overall like dark or whatever--were like a breath of fresh air, and I'm really glad.

A solid collection; Taylor manages to hit up many subgenres within sci-fi, and also make First Nations issues clear. The stories kind of all have the same voice (which makes sense, since he's written all of them) but I would say the plots are different enough that they don't all feel the same, necessarily. Some are very funny, and some are deeply moving (the one about the man in space whose grandfather has died in particular jumps out at me) and some are tense. It's a short, solid collection for sure. I also LOVED the note in the acknowledgements re: (not) using Kanien'kehá:ka stories and what that means, and I'd encourage writers to read that and think about it, for sure. If you like sci-fi, and you want a little taste of a bunch of different flavors of sci-fi, this is definitely recommended.