I can’t believe I’m saying this, but the movie was better. I just feel like this book passes a lot of judgement on women that it doesn’t strictly need to. I don’t regret reading it for the experience, but it’s not one I’ll reach for again. 

I inhaled this book. 

This is one of the INCREDIBLY! FEW! Novels in verse that are fantasy, and I was so excited to be given this book for that reason. Romero did an excellent job of giving her readers the information they needed to jump on the ride with her without overloading the poetry with exposition.  I loved the central romance, loved how environmental and vital the setting felt to the story, and loved how Romero tied her story to her own experiences. 

My final star stays in limbo for the core ‘want’ of the character and its opposition feeling a little….vague? I understand the ‘useful degree vs art degree’ struggle is a conflict as old as time and is a very real parent/child conflict, but I struggled to connect with the motivation for both parties, and why its inevitable solution was…sending a girl to Prague to be minimally supervised by the ‘bad influence art aunt.’ I wish this conflict and its result felt more grounded in the book. It’s rare to find a book where the fantasy elements feel more solid than the realism ones, but this is one of them for me. 

Would recommend to a total stranger with feral enthusiasm nevertheless. 

What a supremely necessary and vital addition to the canon of Autistic stories for kids. I was thrilled to discover this novel in verse at my local bookstore, and picked it up immediately. I’m so glad I did. 

Selah’s journey to self-understanding is particularly needed in the sense that it is a story of The Lost Girls, a name given to undiagnosed or late-diagnosed Autistic girls missed by the medical system due to their presentations not aligning with that of the cis, white, male- based diagnostic criteria Autism currently has. Girls struggle to get diagnosed, and therefore struggle to get accommodations and understanding they desperately need. I could see this book being an epiphany for exactly such a girl, and know Selah’s story will be treasured by young readers. 

As a Lost Girl myself, and the child of an undiagnosed Autistic parent, Selah’s experience of being socialized by neurodivergent rules of Normal rang so true to my experiences as a child, and it was a true delight to see. I wish this author only the best, and look forward to seeing what else they put out!

A stunning and quintessential example of the graphic memoir genre. I’m impressed by Kobabe’s ability to explore complicated and messy emotions surrounding identity and sexuality in ways that feel deeply relatable and truthful even to those that haven’t experienced precisely the same thing. 

My only quibble with this is simply in how abrupt the ending felt. I was looking for more closure, but that’s also a personal struggle I have with the majority of memoirs. 

Ohhhhh boyyyyyy.  This was an anticipated release for me, and boy howdy it did not disappoint. I listened to the audiobook, narrated by Sandra Okuboyejo and Angel Pean, and was completely riveted.

This book is brutal. A flawless example of horror that offers the fantastical while remaining rooted strongly in the horror of reality, Delicious Monsters was a creeping, inevitable masterpiece. I fiercely loved all these flawed, complicated, bruised girls, and the ending was  pitch-perfect, even though I ugly cried in my living room finishing the book. 

Sanbury is an absolute hero. The fearlessness with which she handled this subject (I’m including trigger warnings for this one, and she has them listed in the book’s foreword as well) is deserving of the highest praise. I’d go to war for this book. 

Spectacular. Nona the Ninth meets Waterwold. The day I read a Valente book I don’t like is the day the sky turns neon green and cats sing opera. I really appreciated the core project here, the truth Tetley sees and does everything to preserve. Her love for her world is the beauty in the grief of a disappeared past, and is an important reminder that we live in the world we live in, and wanting another one is fruitless if we don’t do what we must to make it.

Insufficient home renovation plot for there to be a whole ladder on the cover. This one wasn’t for me for a whole mess of reasons. 

Perfect.