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nuhafariha
Thank you to Amazon Crossing and NetGalley for the Reader's Copy!
Restrained yet emotional, Keiichiro Hirano's elegant "A Man" unfolds like an intricate origami. Peeling back layers and layers of small dialogue, detailed backgrounds and subtle actions, it tells the story of fidelity and infidelity among Japan's middle class. As a struggling businesswoman meets a handsome stranger, their worlds are more colluded than originally thought. A perfect accompaniment to an afternoon at home.
Restrained yet emotional, Keiichiro Hirano's elegant "A Man" unfolds like an intricate origami. Peeling back layers and layers of small dialogue, detailed backgrounds and subtle actions, it tells the story of fidelity and infidelity among Japan's middle class. As a struggling businesswoman meets a handsome stranger, their worlds are more colluded than originally thought. A perfect accompaniment to an afternoon at home.
Thank you to Lake Union Publishing and NetGalley for the Reader's Copy!
Set in the early 19th century Oakland California, Laila Ibrahim's "Golden Poppies" is an excavation of race, gender and privilege as we follow the adventures of the Wagoner women. Though Sadie Wagoner is a white woman of considerable means and Jordan Wallace is a Black schoolteacher in Chicago, they have more in common than either realize. As Sadie grapples with her families' intricate history with slavery in the South, Jordan learns to trust in her long lost cousin.
Boy did this novel make me tired. Tired to the very core. Jordan and Naomi and all the wonderful Black characters in this novel carried the plotline on their shoulders, from providing medical care to Sadie in her time of need to sheltering her from her abusive husband to feeding her mother in her old age. And, as Jordan astutely notes early on in the book, even though the Wallace family is no longer slaves, they are still serving the needs of the Wagoner family. I'm also tired of the narrative of innocent, dewey eyed white women suddenly waking up one day and "realizing" racism is a thing. Sadie and her mother grew up on a literal plantation. They cannot be blind to the perils of the Wallace family, especially if they call them family. It's exhausting.
Well written, dramatic historical retelling, just might be too tired of the same narratives repeating themselves over and over again.
Set in the early 19th century Oakland California, Laila Ibrahim's "Golden Poppies" is an excavation of race, gender and privilege as we follow the adventures of the Wagoner women. Though Sadie Wagoner is a white woman of considerable means and Jordan Wallace is a Black schoolteacher in Chicago, they have more in common than either realize. As Sadie grapples with her families' intricate history with slavery in the South, Jordan learns to trust in her long lost cousin.
Boy did this novel make me tired. Tired to the very core. Jordan and Naomi and all the wonderful Black characters in this novel carried the plotline on their shoulders, from providing medical care to Sadie in her time of need to sheltering her from her abusive husband to feeding her mother in her old age. And, as Jordan astutely notes early on in the book, even though the Wallace family is no longer slaves, they are still serving the needs of the Wagoner family. I'm also tired of the narrative of innocent, dewey eyed white women suddenly waking up one day and "realizing" racism is a thing. Sadie and her mother grew up on a literal plantation. They cannot be blind to the perils of the Wallace family, especially if they call them family. It's exhausting.
Well written, dramatic historical retelling, just might be too tired of the same narratives repeating themselves over and over again.
Race blindness is nothing new in medicine. It is this persistent idea that we form diagnoses for patients solely based on the presenting symptoms. But symptoms don't occur in isolation, they occur in conjunction with current day life, with political climates, with systemic issues. And oftentimes, system issues such as police brutality can lead to increased paranoia in Black males which is then read as "aggressive schizophrenia". This book is utterly brilliant and painstakingly etched out from archived medical records, medical advertisements, primary interviews and analysis. I loved every second of it. If I had a critique, it would be that Dr. Metzl doesn't go far enough. It is not only schizophrenia that has become racialized over time, but also diagnoses like "conduct disorder" or "antisocial personality disorder".
Thank you to She Writes Press and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!
Available August 4th 2020
From the sultry slow swing of New Orleans to the hustling streets of New York City, Corie Adjimi creates a series of short stories unlike any other. Focusing on the female psyche, Adjimi captures the light and humorous as well as the deeply philosophica. The women in these stories come from all backgrounds and storylines and Adjimi coordinates the dance between them. I enjoyed reading this collection!
Available August 4th 2020
From the sultry slow swing of New Orleans to the hustling streets of New York City, Corie Adjimi creates a series of short stories unlike any other. Focusing on the female psyche, Adjimi captures the light and humorous as well as the deeply philosophica. The women in these stories come from all backgrounds and storylines and Adjimi coordinates the dance between them. I enjoyed reading this collection!
Creating Indigenous Property: Power, Rights, and Relationships
Angela Cameron, Val Napoleon, Sari Graben
Thank you to University of Toronto Press and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!
Available September 16th 2020
This was a tough book to read through, though it means Professor Cameron definitely did her work. Rooting her work in Indigenous female thought, Professor Cameron teases out the complications and philosophies guiding indigenous people's relationship to land. She contrasts Indigenous land treaties to modern day Canadian law, and the conflict that arises when the two don't see eye to eye. What made it difficult for me, as a layperson with little knowledge of indigenous philosophy or property law, is the dense language and construction of the book. I often found myself rereading the same sentence to figure out the meaning and rereading paragraphs to figure out the context. Perhaps, I am not the ideal audience for this work at the time, but I did enjoy getting an understanding of a new area of knowledge!
Available September 16th 2020
This was a tough book to read through, though it means Professor Cameron definitely did her work. Rooting her work in Indigenous female thought, Professor Cameron teases out the complications and philosophies guiding indigenous people's relationship to land. She contrasts Indigenous land treaties to modern day Canadian law, and the conflict that arises when the two don't see eye to eye. What made it difficult for me, as a layperson with little knowledge of indigenous philosophy or property law, is the dense language and construction of the book. I often found myself rereading the same sentence to figure out the meaning and rereading paragraphs to figure out the context. Perhaps, I am not the ideal audience for this work at the time, but I did enjoy getting an understanding of a new area of knowledge!
Thank you to BookBaby and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!
Available July 21st 2020.
A short monologue, "Illegal" contains the ponderings of a man at the pinnacle of his career pontificating about the harrowing journey he had to take to make it in America. Being a fellow immigrant, I empathize deeply with Laz Ayala's story. I know how difficult even filling out the basic visa applications can be, how rigid the renewal schedules are. However, underlying this extraordinary journey, is a sense of "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps" mentality, a "if I can do it, so can you" mentality which I want to parse out. It's not that these mentalities are bad, they certainly have their value in motivating the population. It's that an immigrant life, or a human life, should not have to be equal to capital to be worthwhile of entry.
At one point, Ayala states, "Of course there should be a lawful immigration system." Personally, I disagree. Lawful for who? As we clearly see in the US today, the law only applies and works for a certain population and disadvantages all others. What is the purpose of establishing these clear borders? What is the purpose of then enforcing these boundaries at the cost of human lives? Can there ever be a lawful immigration system? What would it look like? Who would be the enforcers and how can we breakdown the power differential between the enforcer and the enforcee, between the border patrol and the immigrant, between the UCIS worker and the refugee begging at his door? These are questions I wish Ayala delved into, though perhaps they are slightly outside of the scope of the book.
Available July 21st 2020.
A short monologue, "Illegal" contains the ponderings of a man at the pinnacle of his career pontificating about the harrowing journey he had to take to make it in America. Being a fellow immigrant, I empathize deeply with Laz Ayala's story. I know how difficult even filling out the basic visa applications can be, how rigid the renewal schedules are. However, underlying this extraordinary journey, is a sense of "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps" mentality, a "if I can do it, so can you" mentality which I want to parse out. It's not that these mentalities are bad, they certainly have their value in motivating the population. It's that an immigrant life, or a human life, should not have to be equal to capital to be worthwhile of entry.
At one point, Ayala states, "Of course there should be a lawful immigration system." Personally, I disagree. Lawful for who? As we clearly see in the US today, the law only applies and works for a certain population and disadvantages all others. What is the purpose of establishing these clear borders? What is the purpose of then enforcing these boundaries at the cost of human lives? Can there ever be a lawful immigration system? What would it look like? Who would be the enforcers and how can we breakdown the power differential between the enforcer and the enforcee, between the border patrol and the immigrant, between the UCIS worker and the refugee begging at his door? These are questions I wish Ayala delved into, though perhaps they are slightly outside of the scope of the book.
Thank you to BookBaby and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!
Available July 21st 2020.
A short monologue, "Illegal" contains the ponderings of a man at the pinnacle of his career pontificating about the harrowing journey he had to take to make it in America. Being a fellow immigrant, I empathize deeply with Laz Ayala's story. I know how difficult even filling out the basic visa applications can be, how rigid the renewal schedules are. However, underlying this extraordinary journey, is a sense of "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps" mentality, a "if I can do it, so can you" mentality which I want to parse out. It's not that these mentalities are bad, they certainly have their value in motivating the population. It's that an immigrant life, or a human life, should not have to be equal to capital to be worthwhile of entry.
At one point, Ayala states, "Of course there should be a lawful immigration system." Personally, I disagree. Lawful for who? As we clearly see in the US today, the law only applies and works for a certain population and disadvantages all others. What is the purpose of establishing these clear borders? What is the purpose of then enforcing these boundaries at the cost of human lives? Can there ever be a lawful immigration system? What would it look like? Who would be the enforcers and how can we breakdown the power differential between the enforcer and the enforcee, between the border patrol and the immigrant, between the UCIS worker and the refugee begging at his door? These are questions I wish Ayala delved into, though perhaps they are slightly outside of the scope of the book.
Available July 21st 2020.
A short monologue, "Illegal" contains the ponderings of a man at the pinnacle of his career pontificating about the harrowing journey he had to take to make it in America. Being a fellow immigrant, I empathize deeply with Laz Ayala's story. I know how difficult even filling out the basic visa applications can be, how rigid the renewal schedules are. However, underlying this extraordinary journey, is a sense of "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps" mentality, a "if I can do it, so can you" mentality which I want to parse out. It's not that these mentalities are bad, they certainly have their value in motivating the population. It's that an immigrant life, or a human life, should not have to be equal to capital to be worthwhile of entry.
At one point, Ayala states, "Of course there should be a lawful immigration system." Personally, I disagree. Lawful for who? As we clearly see in the US today, the law only applies and works for a certain population and disadvantages all others. What is the purpose of establishing these clear borders? What is the purpose of then enforcing these boundaries at the cost of human lives? Can there ever be a lawful immigration system? What would it look like? Who would be the enforcers and how can we breakdown the power differential between the enforcer and the enforcee, between the border patrol and the immigrant, between the UCIS worker and the refugee begging at his door? These are questions I wish Ayala delved into, though perhaps they are slightly outside of the scope of the book.
Thank you to Harper Collins Publishers and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!
Available 28th July 2020 in paperback.
What a timely, haunting piece! I remember learning about Korean store-owner Soon Ja Du and the Black schoolchild she murdered, Latasha Harlins. I remember the divisive discussions it sparked among my Asian American classmates, the sense of unease as we all sought to distance ourselves from the racism that is present in our community.
Cha expands the narrative forward to consider their future offspring. In an almost Shakespearean drama, the characters in "Your House Will Pay" re-enact the events of that fateful day. The seeds of mistrust, doubt and racism are planted unknowingly in the minds of Grace and Miriam Park, daughters of Yvonne Park who murdered a young Black teenager, Ava. Now, as Yvonne is the subject of a targeted shooting, the daughters must come together and grapple with these poisonous trees in their past. Along the way, we see cycles of intergenerational trauma and irreparable damage caused by the system of US policing and incarceration in Korean American and Black communities.
"Your House Will Pay" is not an easy story to sit through, just like reckoning with your own racist history is not easy to sit through. Cha's unremitting yet gentle exploration of the events, her ability to show both the pain felt by Ava's family and the Parks, shows us a way forward in these tumultuous, racially charged times. Ultimately, we are all victims of a racist statehood and the only way to move forward is to dismantle it within ourselves, our communities and, eventually, our society.
Available 28th July 2020 in paperback.
What a timely, haunting piece! I remember learning about Korean store-owner Soon Ja Du and the Black schoolchild she murdered, Latasha Harlins. I remember the divisive discussions it sparked among my Asian American classmates, the sense of unease as we all sought to distance ourselves from the racism that is present in our community.
Cha expands the narrative forward to consider their future offspring. In an almost Shakespearean drama, the characters in "Your House Will Pay" re-enact the events of that fateful day. The seeds of mistrust, doubt and racism are planted unknowingly in the minds of Grace and Miriam Park, daughters of Yvonne Park who murdered a young Black teenager, Ava. Now, as Yvonne is the subject of a targeted shooting, the daughters must come together and grapple with these poisonous trees in their past. Along the way, we see cycles of intergenerational trauma and irreparable damage caused by the system of US policing and incarceration in Korean American and Black communities.
"Your House Will Pay" is not an easy story to sit through, just like reckoning with your own racist history is not easy to sit through. Cha's unremitting yet gentle exploration of the events, her ability to show both the pain felt by Ava's family and the Parks, shows us a way forward in these tumultuous, racially charged times. Ultimately, we are all victims of a racist statehood and the only way to move forward is to dismantle it within ourselves, our communities and, eventually, our society.
Thank you to Harper Collins Publishers and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!
Available 28th July 2020 in paperback.
What a timely, haunting piece! I remember learning about Korean store-owner Soon Ja Du and the Black schoolchild she murdered, Latasha Harlins. I remember the divisive discussions it sparked among my Asian American classmates, the sense of unease as we all sought to distance ourselves from the racism that is present in our community.
Cha expands the narrative forward to consider their future offspring. In an almost Shakespearean drama, the characters in "Your House Will Pay" re-enact the events of that fateful day. The seeds of mistrust, doubt and racism are planted unknowingly in the minds of Grace and Miriam Park, daughters of Yvonne Park who murdered a young Black teenager, Ava. Now, as Yvonne is the subject of a targeted shooting, the daughters must come together and grapple with these poisonous trees in their past. Along the way, we see cycles of intergenerational trauma and irreparable damage caused by the system of US policing and incarceration in Korean American and Black communities.
"Your House Will Pay" is not an easy story to sit through, just like reckoning with your own racist history is not easy to sit through. Cha's unremitting yet gentle exploration of the events, her ability to show both the pain felt by Ava's family and the Parks, shows us a way forward in these tumultuous, racially charged times. Ultimately, we are all victims of a racist statehood and the only way to move forward is to dismantle it within ourselves, our communities and, eventually, our society.
Available 28th July 2020 in paperback.
What a timely, haunting piece! I remember learning about Korean store-owner Soon Ja Du and the Black schoolchild she murdered, Latasha Harlins. I remember the divisive discussions it sparked among my Asian American classmates, the sense of unease as we all sought to distance ourselves from the racism that is present in our community.
Cha expands the narrative forward to consider their future offspring. In an almost Shakespearean drama, the characters in "Your House Will Pay" re-enact the events of that fateful day. The seeds of mistrust, doubt and racism are planted unknowingly in the minds of Grace and Miriam Park, daughters of Yvonne Park who murdered a young Black teenager, Ava. Now, as Yvonne is the subject of a targeted shooting, the daughters must come together and grapple with these poisonous trees in their past. Along the way, we see cycles of intergenerational trauma and irreparable damage caused by the system of US policing and incarceration in Korean American and Black communities.
"Your House Will Pay" is not an easy story to sit through, just like reckoning with your own racist history is not easy to sit through. Cha's unremitting yet gentle exploration of the events, her ability to show both the pain felt by Ava's family and the Parks, shows us a way forward in these tumultuous, racially charged times. Ultimately, we are all victims of a racist statehood and the only way to move forward is to dismantle it within ourselves, our communities and, eventually, our society.