readingpicnic's reviews
475 reviews

The audiobook performance by the author was great, and when I finished the audiobook this morning, I was left wanting more (maybe I should pay for his substack). Lots of messy queer partnerships, questions of racial and sexual identity, dealing with internalized homophobia, and honesty about mental health struggles. The chapter that's going to stick with me most is the one about grappling with a sexual assault and trying to forgive oneself for not understanding that's what it was at the time--feeling anger at oneself for having continued to interact with the person that harmed you in a benevolent way after it happened because it hadn't quite clicked yet. I've had similar anger at myself, so it was honestly really helpful to see the author verbalize this process of acknowledgement and forgiveness that we did not have the knowledge or understanding that we do now. Me when a self-help book actually helps me with something :0

Geez, it’s like this book was made for me—it’s just a culmination of everything I’d want from a book, and I only read it on a whim because the author’s doing a reading nearby. This book has a delectable mix of magical realism and unreliable narrator, similar to Bunny by Mona Awad. This main character had so much going on at once and swirling around in her noggin, so her breakdown is very understandable: dealing with the trauma of surviving a violent attack, her marriage to a boring white guy growing dreadfully closer, being haunted by her dead bird grandmother, having near constant hallucinations, and reconnecting with her estranged trans sister. I’d say the stress levels I experienced are similar to my experience watching Shiva Baby. Currently crying thinking about the rekindling of the relationship between these two sisters; it was so beautiful and really fucking funny.

This is such a devastating book, but I’m so glad it exists. The compassionate approach that the author takes towards severe mental illness and the honest thought processes of working towards this view is a point of view I don’t see very often. This book really hit hard as someone who has a lot of mental illness in my own family from both sides, but especially my mom’s side since her brother committed s*icide when she was in high school. I beg you to check the trigger warnings for this book, especially if you’ve lost (or almost lost) someone close to you to s*icide or dealt with s*icidal thoughts yourself, but it is so well written and has incredible narration from the author. The advice for living with the grief of losing someone in this way was very helpful I think, as this book was very well researched due to the author being a journalist who wrote extensively on how the mentally ill are treated in the US, but also contains personal advice on living with grief from some of her living siblings and people she connected with during her lifetime of research. I’m so glad I picked this up; thank you for the recommendation @bridgetish, this is why you’re my favorite booktoker.

The narration for this was incredible, and I liked that the author added little notes to introduce each essay and is honest about his thought processes at the time of writing them. I do think there was some repetition I noticed across some essays, such as saying almost the same thing twice while talking about Carly Rae Jepsen in different essays, but other than that, this was an incredible and impactful read. I liked how music was woven throughout the book and how he was unafraid to turn a critical eye towards musicians and the punk scene. I can see some similarities between this book and Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher Catapult, Counterpoint Press, and Soft Skull Press for a free digital ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
I tried to stick this one through, but I realized that I was forcing myself to keep going and not enjoying myself. There isn't much story to this memoir, and it was a lot more philosophizing on love and definitions of different words than I expected it to be. The writing was also a bit inaccessible to me; I'm not sure if it was too poetic or convoluted? It didn't feel like it was saying anything new to me either. The book was incredibly slow moving, and I felt like I was trudging through, so I have decided to put this aside for at least now. The mixed media nature of this book was cool though with its photographs, photography, and art sprinkled throughout. 

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher Grove Atlantic for a free digital ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. 
This book started off very strong with setting up the family dynamics that largely stayed throughout the whole book, which moves slowly through the family’s lives and deaths. Ollie is a strong personality that kept my interest the whole book, even when she wasn’t always present. There are lots of conversations and ponderings on how your childhood home environment traumatizes you in less obvious ways that influence how you react to situations in adulthood. I will say that Amy was a very passive voice in this story that didn’t do much for me personally; she was Nick and Ollie was Gatsby in terms of Ollie feeling like the MAIN character who everything revolved around. Since the book is called Shred Sisters, I would have preferred for Ollie to have been more of a character than she was—it seemed like she was mostly defined by her mental illnesses and manic episodes, only really settling down when becoming a mother, which was…a strange way to resolve the book I think. I’m personally wary of books where motherhood is posed as a solution to a character’s life problems. There was also some casual fatphobia thrown in with the main character feeling glad and superior that her ex and his wife gained weight, and I can’t tell if that’s just an in-character thing for her to think??? The storytelling method also put me off quite a bit with the character occasionally speaking with insight from the present tense and commenting on moments of her life, which I wasn’t the biggest fan of. It began to feel like the jumps in time were essentially “and then this happened, and then this happened, and then I got a different lover, and then…” which I got tired of after a while. Again, I really enjoyed the beginning, and I wish that the book had stayed there longer (or for its entirety). A dual pov with Ollie also would have been interesting. Overall, I think the movement through time in this story wasn’t executed very well, and I lost interest towards the end.

Erotic, but also deeply sad. The dreary, crumbling cemetery setting of most of the novel works so well towards creating a bleak atmosphere. This book wasn't the sapphic romance I initially thought it would be. It centers more on persecution and murder in an ever-changing and unfamiliar world in the vampire's case, and being a single mom and drifting away from everyone while grieving her ever-ailing elderly mother in Alma's case. I do think I preferred the vampire's chapters over the latter half of the book and found them more interesting; Alma's chapters dragged for me at times and it didn't feel like much was happening.

I don’t really know how to rate this book—I wanted to finish it and get away from it as soon as possible, but it was also great writing. This is perhaps the most fucked up and perverse book I’ve ever read, and it was very hard to read. I found myself reminded of Omori, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, and I Saw the TV Glow while reading this. I was having trouble getting into it for a while, but around page 100 I couldn’t put it down. Mónica Ojeda really knows how to explore fucked up childhood, dealing with trauma in complex ways, taboo topics, and questioning gender and sexuality in the most graphic of ways. Jawbone is probably my favorite book of all time, so I don’t regret reading this, but I do think some of the descriptions in this book are going to haunt me forever. Also my partner said this book had some of the most disgusting code they've ever seen lol.

Thank you to NetGalley and Oni Press for a free digital ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
This book was so MESSY and GAY. I've never read something that so succinctly captures the experience of every lesbian in an isolated area knowing each other and having canoodled in some way or another. I feel like I was just whispering "oh my god, please stop" for the entirety of this book, but I also could not tear my eyes away.  Some of these girls need a time out, I swear to god. The art style is so delectable, which could be to blame for me not giving myself a break from this stress! All of that to say, this book was also incredibly hilarious and messy, and I had a great time reading it.
I haven't seen such creative use of panels and bleeds and layering and breaking the walls of panels since reading the manga Our Dreams at Dusk, and I adored how visually stunning it was. One scene that really entranced me was when Molly was running while crying--just so fucking cool. The author's choice of color was so playful and bold, and I was just in awe. I loved that the author included a little bonus explanation behind their choice of color in this book. This is the messy lesbian rep we need!!! 5 stars, no notes.