ugh I started grudgingly enjoying Doctor Strange books for the weird humor and magical shit, I don't care about Galactus!!! I don't care about Galactus AT ALL. this book had only TWO PANELS of Bats the Ghost Dog. A terrible ratio for my interests.

mmmmmm I mean I guess for starters I guess I should say I'm not a die-hard Liz Phair fan or anything, but I like some of her music and I've enjoyed reading some of her interviews etc so I figured I'd check out her memoir. But so, not being a HUGE Liz Phair fan some of this was definitely confusing? Each chapter is like a separate essay without really a coherent narrative, which is fine except they also went back and forth in time without clearly stating that would happen? And if I were a person who knew the name of Liz's husband and boyfriends, or the full chronology of her albums, I think I could probably have kept track of time better that way, but...I didn't. So I'm not sure why the decision was made not to just put a year in the title or heading of each chapter? That would have been helpful. Or like, one of the essays is about how vulnerable a particular photo shoot made her feel and yet how great the resulting photos were, and yet despite the book including photos...it doesn't have any of those photos?

I appreciated the emotional honesty here but ended up skimming some of the stories, particularly the ones about her messy love life vs about her career. IDK I know it's sort of common for folks to mention how Liz Phair comes from privilege etc etc like she isn't really an indie artist or whatever, and I think it's shitty to judge her for things like that, or for "selling out" when she began to make more commercial music, but at the same time mostly this felt very...unrelatable.

Perhaps a bigger Liz Phair fan would get more out of this.

It's no secret that I'm a cat person, but still, I enjoyed this animal-themed look at history. It's like a small coffee table book or printed out Buzzfeed list--very breezy and internet-conversational in tone, in the vein of [b:Bygone Badass Broads: 52 Forgotten Women Who Changed the World|35888416|Bygone Badass Broads 52 Forgotten Women Who Changed the World|Mackenzi Lee|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1508951259l/35888416._SX50_.jpg|57405017]. The illustrations are very cute tho in some cases I wished for photos! Oh well that's what the internet is for I suppose!

I wanted to love this and I'm still glad it exists, but sometimes I get frustrated with publishers for not considering teen audiences and their needs? This is marketed as a YA novel, but it's an odd size, more like a picture book than a graphic novel, which is nice for the art but always such a hard sell to convince teens to read. And then, yes, I'm all for having more historical fiction that represents the reality that there have always been LGBTQ people, but I wonder if graphic novel was the best medium for this, esp for a teen audience? It seems to me that it could have used a bit more context? Specifically for Grace, the young trans woman, who is revealed to be trans by growing a beard and making vague references to not wearing dresses when she was younger, and I appreciate that it's not a tragic, deadnaming backstory etc but I also sincerely feel that some young readers could read this whole book and never really understand Grace to be a trans woman? (There are informative endnotes but maybe a preface would have been better? Or a...narrator or something?)

anyWHO though it's a fun adventure story and I think for readers who are themselves coming into the story with a moderate amount of knowledge about transness (and especially for readers who are themselves trans) this will be a good book.

http://www.frowl.org/worstbestsellers/episode-136-the-initiation-the-secret-circle/

this read like a CW show and it made me want to watch the CW show that it in fact was made into. delicious trash.

I liked the conceit of this arc a lot! I was worried about G. Willow Wilson's departure from the series but it seems like it's in good hands.

Hmm. I think here I just run into my usual personal problem with magical realism and magical realism-adjacent (???) works where I'm just like, wait but what's actually happening?

That said I think the art + story works well to depict the blankness and weirdness and scale of West Texas, and the way a roadtrip across such lands might be a good vehicle (ha) for intimacy. Ultimately this was not my particular cup of tea but I am sure that others would appreciate this more.

This is a truly lovely, poetic memoir that's often hard to read due to the raw pain expressed, but well worth it.

LOVED this contemporary realistic book and think a lot of tweens will find it very relatable, while others will find themselves gently learning about micro- (and macro-)aggressions. Izzy/Isabella is a really engaging narrator.

I love the part of this that is just a character study/vehicle for talking about misogyny in media and representation, sincerely love just hearing a character go off about the sexism inherent in superhero movies!

The thriller aspect of this is...fine? Will likely be more engaging for teens who have fresher eyes. (In her author's note she specifically cites Talented Mr. Ripley as an inspiration which is very obvious to a more experienced reader.)