essjay's Reviews (635)

Quite possibly the Rainbow Rowelliest book that Rainbow Rowell has ever Rainbow Rowelled. Which, if you've read her other adult fiction, should make plenty of sense. If you haven't, then idk how to explain it. 

Am in a v emo place right now, and cried a few times while reading this. Read half of it in one sitting before bed, then the other half in a second sitting when I got up. 

If you don't like stories where the premise hangs on mis/poor communication, you're probably going to have a bad time with this. But it worked for me. 

Reminded me so much of the pulpy drug store spinny rack thrillers and horror novels that I devoured in the 90s in the best possible way. The ones that really set the tone for what I would love as an adult.

Yes, the who part of the whodunnit was not actually a mystery, but seeing how we get there is part of the fun.

Love a Mean Girls pastiche, especially when it's queer AND violent. Art was great, and I was really rooting for these girls. 

So, Seanan McGuire is quickly becoming my most read author. She's still a few books under Stephen King (who I've been reading for more than 35 years) and I legit don't even know how much of her stuff I haven't read yet but it feels like a lot. Which is great bc it feels like I will p much always have something new from her to read. Everything she writes may not be an instant favourite, but I can always appreciate what she was going for.

Which is pretty much exactly how I felt about The Proper Thing and Other Stories. There WERE some new favourites, and I DIDN'T love everything, but I at least liked and appreciated where each story was coming from. My lowest rating (one story) was 3½ stars.  I gave seven stories 5 stars (this is actually a lie, my notes for one of them simply say "infinity stars sob sob sob"). I tend to hand out 5s for short stories more easily than I do for novels bc short stories are harder to get right, I think. Those seven 5s equal a whole year's worth of 5s for me for novel-length work.

All of the stories in this collection were written in 2016 or later, so there's a lot of heavyness, sadness, and anger here. This may be why I so thoroughly enjoyed this whole book. I just was telling a friend the other night "honestly, if I let go of the simmering ball of rage at my core, I'd probably drop dead bc spite is all that is holding me together." Many of the stories in this collection speak to the rage I use to keep me going, and I appreciate that.

My Favourites

* "Rest Now, My Dear" - the "infinity stars" story mentioned above. I will always love a love letter to libraries and this one hit me right in the space I occupied as a child.

* "Heart of Straw" - my notes for this one just say "yes yes yes yes yes."

* "The Levee Was Dry" - I read this one while waiting for my kids to finish their activity at the library and could not keep myself from sobbing in public. I hated the *idea* of this story, but it was executed to perfection. Then I read it out loud to my 13y/o the next day bc I needed someone to share in my misery.

* "Under the Sea of Stars" - uh, my notes for this one simply say "goddamn."  When I was telling my kids about it, the 13y/o said "why is it always cannibalism with you?" BECAUSE IT JUST IS, OKAY?

* "Love in the Last Days of a Doomed World" - I desperately need to know what happened next/before. Like, as soon as possible.

* "Belief" - my notes say "gonna have to write a letter about this one," and I am. Another story aimed directly at the heart of who I was when I was small.

* "Sweet as Sugar Candy" - another where I'm dying for more in this world.

Some Further Notes

* "Coafield's Catalog of Available Apocalypse Events" (4½) - "legit ELL OH ELL"

* "Good Night, Sleep Tight" (4½) - "you do not fuck with the Violent Femmes fuckin library, man."

* "File and Forget" (4½) - "yes, moar bureaucratic bullshit and corporate espionage, pls."

* "Come Marching In" (4¾) - "Probably liked this so much more bc of having read 'The Sound of Children Screaming' for the Hugo Readalong earlier this week, which started from a similar place but didn't stick the landing like this did." 

* "Foundational Education" (4½) - "yesssss, more SASSwitches, please and thank you"


As you can see, I genuinely loved this collection overall (which is very rare for me with collections and anthologies), so big thanks to Subterranean Press for the ARC. The limited edition illustrated hardback (ah, shit, I forgot to talk about Carla McNeil's outstanding illustrations) will be out on April 30th and the ebook is available now. 




TL;DR: 105 (total score of all stories) divided by 24 (number of stories) equals 4.375, rounding up to 4½

What the fuck even happened with this one. So much of it didn't even make any sense. 

Less actual romance than I was expecting (which was fine with me), but the perfect length for what it was. 

I do not think my library ever had this one when I was a kid, so reading it aloud to my 13y/o meant it was all new to me. Tony is still awful, but I'm glad he's re-thinking his friendship with Rudolph. Will keep reading the new translations as they're released as long as the kid is still interested in them. 

For about the first quarter of this book, I thought I might DNF. There wasn't actually anything wrong with it, I just really struggled to get my mental movie playing. But the more toxic and claustrophobic Zenya's story got, and the less confined Zemolai's became, the more I was able to visualize until I was unable to put it down and read the back half in nearly one sitting. 

I ended up liking this a lot more than I expected to (I’ve been kind of hate reading The Hollows since it ended the first time). I went in knowing literally nothing about it, and given the summary is long as fuck, I’m thinking that’s a good thing bc it probably gives way too much away. Glad I have the first hold on Totality for next month’s release.  

Read this aloud to the 13y/o before bed. We both agree that Rudolph is a shit friend and Tony's only reasons for staying his friend have to be 1. bc he's a vampire and 2. he has a cute vampire sister. If Tony could get away with only being Anna's friend, he'd be better off.