Tiffanie Drayton’s memoir of her life in America told through the metaphor (sort-of) of an abusive relationship with a narcissist. Despite this, I found her memoir hopeful, optimistic, & at times very funny. Really paints a picture of being a black girl growing up in New Jersey, Houston, & Orlando during the 90s & early 2000s. Gives negative reviews of where she lived in Houston, her hoity-toity private school in Orlando, living in 2010s New Jersey, & America. Gives positive marks to Trinidad, Tobago, growing up in 90s New Jersey, & having a friend who’ll use their yearlong pass to Universal Orlando to get you and 4 other friends in for free. Part of her optimism is discovering that there’s more places to live in the world than white America, which the Covid years especially vindicated. 

 Third entry into the John-&-David-verse. Expands the idea of the unreliable narrator. Perhaps an attempt to explain how some see a savior where others see a used car salesman. I rate the ratio of cosmic to body horror as about 1:1. Has the most thorough exploration of Dave & Amy's relationship. A surprisingly fast read. Like This Book is Full of Spiders, What the Hell Did I Just Read is kind of a novelization of the card game Fluxx, with whatever MacGuffin the characters are pursuing constantly changing (usually as they are about to catch up to it), & the story ending abruptly when the author (presumably) runs out of cards to play.  Jason Pargin should definitely look into making a John Dies at the End Fluxx, especially after the next book comes out in the fall.  

 Graphic (& graphic) family history of survival under the Khmer Rouge. The large cast of characters presented in the beginning of the book was a little intimidating, but once the narrative starts, it is relatively easy to follow & keep track of everyone. Really captures the apocalyptic nature of the “Year Zero”. How much post-apocalyptic fiction was inspired by the Cambodian Revolution? Veasna is really good at drawing evil menacing children. Year of the Rabbit is full of small details that make me curious about aspects of Cambodian history that are outside the scope & experience of one family. For instance, the chart at the beginning of chapter 19 indicates that the Khmer Rouge may have killed over half of their own party during their years in power, making me wonder about the party’s inner workings. This is a book to draw one down countless rabbit holes. 

 Becky Chambers’s “City Novel”, such as Mieville’s Bas-Lag novels, or Chabon’s Yiddish Policeman’s Union. Can also be compared to the Dispossessed, in that it depicts a sort of communist “ambiguous utopia”, but without the revolutionary anarchism. Record of a Spaceborn Few focuses more on a resource-poor, communist society’s integration into a futuristic capitalist society. Can also be compared to Kim Stanley Robinson’s Aurora (but with more, better characters) & Le Guin’s “Paradises Lost” (but with less plot). Like all the Becky Chambers books I’ve read, plot takes a backseat to character & setting development, which works for me. Something about this series scratches some of the same itches as Niven’s Known Space, but lacks some of Niven’s hard to stomach 1970s hobbyhorses (e.g. overpopulation, libertarianism). Finally, I must note that Record of a Spaceborn Few is the first Chambers novel I've read that I could not find any Futurama references in. Unless choko is supposed to be Slurm?

 Very readable memoir of the beginning of World War 1 in Austria-Hungary. The structure & pace of the narrative would lends this book to a movie adaptation. It reminded me a bit of Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket (Moldovan was a figure somewhere between the drill instructor & Joker). I can also imagine reading this book for Kagan’s Central European History class at UC Davis (so many years ago now), in which we did read Jakob Walter’s “Diary of a Napoleonic Foot Solder”. Walter’s memoir has many similarities to Moldovan’s: They are both some of the only memoirs by foot soldiers from these conflicts (in Moldovan’s case, the 1914 Galician campaign); they were both written later in their authors’ lives; & they were both only discovered and published decades after they were written. The Burning of the World is full of the author’s perspectives (implicitly & explicitly told) on the late Austro-Hungarian Empire’s class structure, ethnic politics, & cultural life, in addition to his recollections & thoughts on his army service. Moldovan’s part in the battle of Rawa Ruska seemed to be part of an attempt by the Austro-Hungarians to maintain a defensive line in an area the Russians were bombarding. Bela noted abandoned and obliterated Austro-Hungarian positions & soldiers (living & dead) as he and his troops took up their positions, which were in turn themselves obliterated &/or abandoned hours later. It was interesting how it was kind of expected for officers to have personal servants, or to treat the soldiers as personal servants, even in the middle of a battle. Bela also displays the attitudes of urbanite Hungarian polite society towards ethnic minorities, & the lower classes, including the odd collection of ideas surrounding the figure of “the peasant” (e.g. “closer to the earth”) in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The introduction by the translator/editor/grandson of the author is worth reading, providing the story of how this book came together along with historical & biographical background. The endnotes are also very worth flipping to. 

 When I heard that the sequels to Annihilation pretty much explain all the mysterious, unexplainable stuff, I was prepared to be disappointed, but Authority keeps the J.G. Ballard vibes going, but leaning more toward Super-Cannes than Drowned World. Also has kind of a neo-noir mystery feel & references John Le Carre’s Karla trilogy. I can imagine Authority being a good choice for KVMR Nevada City’s “Word in Edgewise” science fiction reading show. 

 Great memoir of Kobabe finding eir non-binary identity & Spivak pronouns. Answers the age old question of “why do we perform gender, anyway?” with a resounding “no”. The family relationships are very heartwarming. Maia’s chill parents once again makes me ask “why exactly do people hate hippies?”  Hating on hippies kind of seems like a handing a win to the BS-ers & advertisers who co-opted hippie lingo. Explores the idea of gender & what it means to be non-binary. The analogy of gender as a landscape with mountains & wild forests leading down to a seashore felt very Le Guin-ian. The art sometimes reminded me a little bit of Alison Bechdel’s. My only minor quibble is including Patricia Churchland’s idea about biologically male or biologically female brains suggests a biologically determinative view of gender, which feels to me a little like using biology to get permission to be queer, which we really shouldn’t have to do. Whatever the biological facts, why should gender identity or sexuality need a reason? Humans create the social constructs, we should do whatever we want with them. Maybe it's not for me to say. Anyway, it’s no wonder that the book-banners are trying to ban this book, because it is eye opening & will be a classic. 

 Part police abolition manifesto, part memoir of how author Derecka Purnell’s police abolitionism has developed (abolitionroman). Claims that it is not a “how-to” manual for Police Abolition, but instead presents many examples of present day & historical movements & organizations that were or are using abolitionist principles. The various chapters deal with both basic questions about what is abolitionism, & presents abolitionist solutions to problems such as sexual violence & interpersonal violence. The final chapter is about what is generally termed environmental justice, & includes Black environmentalists during the 20th & 21st centuries. Becoming Abolitionists refers to many different activists & movements in the space of less than 300 pages (& makes no claim to being a comprehensive history), so the end notes are vital for further reading & information. 

 A short but jam-packed history of the 1919-1920 Polish Soviet war, covering military, diplomatic, political, & historiographical aspects. The style is sometimes dated, but the book is a very quick read. I picked up this book because it was cited in the Wikipedia article about the 1919-1920 Polish-Soviet war. I was curious if there are parallels between then & the Russian-Ukrainian war & also because I wondered how it was that horse cavalry played such a major role in a war that took place right after the First World War, which is widely seen as the end of horse cavalry in warfare. The latter question is answered pretty well in the 1st 50 pages (the distances involved in the war, & shortages of modern weapons such as artillery & even bullets on both sides). The book took longer to answer the 1st question (the answer is “not really”), which is unsurprising considering that it was written 50 years before the question could be asked. White Eagle Red Star has a lot of commentary on the state of historical memory of the Polish-Soviet War, taking issue with both Soviet & Polish “apologists”, & with other western European historians & commentators. Reading this makes me want to read more about the Russian Revolution, & especially about the Ukrainian Anarchists, who got a brief mention on page 119. I like the Polish pronunciation guide at the beginning; maybe I’ll copy it for future reference. 

 Super quick reading E-pistolary office cyberpunk horror-comedy. Reminded me a bit of other recent office-set weird novels, such as The Other Black Girl, I Am Not A Wolf, & Ling Ma’s Severance.  Several People are Typing could have been much bleaker than it was. This book makes me glad that my work doesn’t use slack, & that they’ve never cared if people work from home permanently. I was kind of on the edge of my seat towards the end.