Seventeen-year-old Felix Love is a trans, biracial high school senior at an expensive private art academy in Brooklyn, New York. He's taking a summer program to try and build up his painting portfolio to apply to Brown in the coming year- but of course he is competing against another boy who goes to his school, his wildly talented on-campus rival. Felix is shaken and horrified when someone posts up a whole gallery of photos of himself pre-transition, labelled with his deadname, in his school's lobby. He jumps to the conclusion that it was his rival, and starts up an elaborate plan to catfish him on instagram and get revenge. Felix's best friend, Ezra, who comes from an ultra-rich family and isn't very motived in class, is dubious of this plan. The plot thickens when someone starts DMing Felix transphobic messages, and when several crushes and breakups occur within Felix's all-queer friend group. I both enjoyed this book and was frustrated by it. I was annoyed by how much of the story hinged on instagram usage, and at times I struggled with Felix's often very negative attitude. I did enjoy the storylines of Felix's continued exploration of his identity and also his growing self-confidence in art-making. But I think this is a YA book I'd have liked a lot more when I was still a teen. And oh, how nice it would have been, to have a book about an artsy trans teen when I was one, and didn't have any language with which to describe myself.

Mara is a strong-tempered, athletically gifted, closeted queer high schooler in the rural town of Elkhorn, Oregon. She was banned from the basketball team after she punched a teammate, and the only way to earn her way back into the coach's good graces is to successfully play another team sport for a season without getting into any fights. Everyone expects Mara to coast through a season of girl's volleyball, but instead she decides to try out of the all-boys football team. Her older brother Noah and her best friend Quinn already play football, so that means Mara will get to hang out with them and have a good time trying something challenging and new, right? No. Immediately, things begin to get complicated. Mara didn't feel like she was making a political statement, but then four other girls also decide to try out for team, Mara's mom gets upset at her, Noah's not sticking up for her on the field, and Quinn is being jealous and weird. Plus, one of the girls who decides to join football is Carly- the only out lesbian at Mara's school, and coincidentally, the girl who Mara punched.

I LOVED this book. I devoured it in three days. It's so deeply rooted in place, the rural and small-town setting influencing all of the characters, the choices they feel they can make, the things they try to hide. The book features a mid-30s queer mentor who I deeply related to. All of the girls who join the team are very different from each other, and have distinct (and occasionally conflicting) motivations for signing up. Their growing friendship is one of the joys of the book. Each character feels true and real, and I left the book rooting for all of them. I hope there's a sequel on the way!

A gorgeous, bittersweet retelling of The Great Gatsby that in my opinion far outstrips the original. The author places a new character, Jordan Baker, a Vietnamese-American adoptee, into the upper level of the social circles of glittering 1920s New York. Jordan went to high school with Daisy and so knows most of her darkest secrets, some of which are very dark indeed. For this world isn't just post-war and mid-Prohibition, but also one full of magicians and demons. Many wealthy men are rumored to have sold their souls to hell for some advantage or another, Suffragettes keep imps on leashes, and many people have a touch of some supernatural power about them, including Jordan. She has money and the right education, but she's also queer and foreign; she's always invited to the best parties, but generally keeps to the edges of them. She gets pulled into the fateful tangle of Jay Gatsby, Nick Carraway and Daisy Fay, and her keen observations make me care more about the outcome than F Scott Fitzgerald did. But most of all I cared about Jordan, and want more stories about reclaiming her heritage and her magic.

I picked this book up after listening to a good podcast interview with the author on "Bad With Money". It's conversational and easy to read, and organized in such a way that you can easily skip around and read only the parts you need. I just learned form this book that there is such a thing as a SEP IRA, an IRA account specifically designed for self-employed people. Useful!

A short and sweet comic about cooking, family, and friendship. Cici connected with her grandmother in Taiwan over their love of food and flavors, and she'd heartbroken to leave her grandma behind when her parents re-locate to Seattle. She wants her grandma to come visit as soon as possible, but plane tickets are very expensive. Then Cici sees a local cooking contest for teens with a $1000 prize for the winner. In true Great British Bake Off style, most of the contestants end up rooting for each other, and even becoming friends. Cici's main conflict is with her father, who thinks she should spend the time she uses practicing for the cooking contest to study for school tests instead. At school Cici navigates being a recent immigrant and some culture clashes, but ultimately her bright spirit and determination win through.

Fantastic, as always. I just love this series and I've been recommending it to everyone! In this sixth installment, Murderbot helps Station Security solve a murder case on Preservation Station. This one is a novella, about 4 hours in audiobook format, and extremely satisfying.

Jason Reynolds re-mixed Ibram X. Kendi's Stamped From The Beginning into this accessible and well-written history of racist and anti-racist thought aimed at teen readers. Beginning with European slave trading in the 1400s and continuing to the present-day Black Lives Matter movement, this book helped clarify for me the segregationist, assimilationist, and anti-racist mindsets and how they've developed in America. The book focus on several major intellectuals: Puritan minister Cotton Mather, Thomas Jefferson, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, scholar W.E.B. Du Bois and anti-prison activist/writer/teacher Angela Davis. The Angela Davis sections contained the most new material for me, and sharpened my interest in reading some of her work. I listened to it as an audio book and greatly enjoyed Reynold's beautiful delivery throughout.

I remember seeing this book prominently displayed in bookstores and in the library when it came out, and I was in junior high. But somehow I never read it until now, in the context of a particularly loud and organized wave of book bannings and challenges. This book, which deals with themes of sexual assault, has been banned and challenged ever since it was published. It tells the first person story of Melinda, a high school freshman, who was raped just before the start of the school year at a party. She called the police, but didn't stay long enough to see them arrive, and told no one about what happened to her. She enters high school as a social pariah; all of her elementary school friends have abandoned her, and she slowly sinks deeper and deeper into silence and depression. Yet, the book isn't all heavy- it contains a dry observational voice with flashes of sharp humor and deep insight. The short chapters keep the story moving briskly through the school year, until Melinda is finally able to speak up for herself. I listened to the 20th anniversary audiobook and really enjoyed the narrator, Mandy Siegfried, and the introduction written and read by Ashley C Ford and afterward written and read by Jason Reynolds. This is an important book, and a good book, and it lives up to its reputation!

I listened to this as an audiobook and really enjoyed it! It's a short, fast paced story but it packs a punch in strong characters and strong themes. Castle, aka Ghost, is a junior high student with a major trauma in his past, a lot of anger, and a natural talent for running. When he catches the eye of an Olympic runner turned track coach at a local park, Ghost gets recruited to a local running team. He's never been on a team before and faces unexpected challenges and opportunities. The question is whether he can stop running from his past, and instead run towards his future. I'm definitely planning to listening to more of the series.