papercraftalex's Reviews (368)

The art style was so beautiful and it had the potential to be an amazing story, but the pacing is so off and it needed to be longer.

This was a beautiful poetry collection. I learned about Farrokhzad in Literary Witches and I'm greatful for that book for showing me her work. She is a master with imagery. I can't comment on if the translation was well done, but Ostriker truly made the words come off the page and helped me understand Iran a little bit better.

There was a lot of information in this book and it was interesting to see the history of unions and the author's experience with unions, but it unfortunately could not keep my attention for long. It wasn't written in the most exciting way. The art was beautiful and truly added to the story. 

A very short and succinct read on residential schools. It's important to read and share these stories.

White Tears/Brown Scars was a deeply uncomfortable and necessary read. Hamad explores so many facets of womanhood, history, and feminism and shows many examples of how white women have prioritized their whiteness over true feminist solidarity while telling women of color that they were breaking the sisterhood through discussing racism. I'm not a woman, I'm nonbinary, but I was raised as a woman and I'm perceived as a woman so this was still an important read and let's me reflect on how I interact with woman of color. This is a must read for anyone wearing the feminist label. 

Horribly written and author is an ableist, misogynist asshole

This collection was truly a beautiful glimpse at Blythe Baird's life and emotions. She shared so much with the audience as a way to destigmatize issues and normalize them. She talks about mental illness, mother issues, abortion, eating disorders, and toxic friend groups. It's instagram style, but very unique. Her voice is perfect for this generation.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Rethinking Gender is a great graphic guide to challenge our perceptions of gender and explain not just trans identities but also to get the reader to reflect on how gender roles have been created and forced upon us. There are many great quotes from people all across the gender spectrum and I love that the author gave people space to talk about their identities rather than stepping over them. It's a great collection for teenagers and young adults, whether they're questioning their identity or not. It's easy to read and well organized. There were a few typos that I hope will be fixed at the time of publishing, but it didn't impact the reading experience very much. Overall, I highly recommend. 

I was given this book in exchange for an honest review.

This was such a beautiful collection. Gomery creates vivid pictures with her words and the poems were entire stories in their own. My favorite in the collection was one of her iterations of "Here" where she compared spotted lattern flies to immigrants. It was a very creative analogy, as Gomery is prone to. I think some of her poems went over my head. They are so rich that it feels impossible to fully understand on the first read, but it something I would enjoy reading again.

My only problem is that some of the poems weren't formatted well; it was just a big block of text and it didn't bode well to the story telling. 

I received an advanced reader's copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.