The art in Seek You has a still life quality which reminds me of the art in Crash Course by Woodrow Phoenix. More disturbing than I expected, especially the separation & socialization part, and the part with Harry Harlow torturing monkeys. This book is also more personal than I expected. Some of the sections seem to take the form of news reports from the world of loneliness or maybe “loneliness HQ”. The part with Harry Harlow experimenting on monkeys reminded me of some of the more disturbing Joe Frank episodes I’ve heard. I’m a little sad that Radtke left out the 2nd half of William Mason’s quote about Harlow (“It's as if he sat down and said, 'I'm only going to be around another ten years. What I'd like to do, then, is leave a great big mess behind.' If that was his aim, he did a perfect job”), but I guess it would be kind of hard to work that in. Of course the most disturbing aspect of Seek You was how familiar it all is; I didn’t want to recognize as much of myself in this book as I did.

Generally heartwarming memoir about growing up Filipino-Egyptian in Cerritos & then growing up some more in Syracuse & Washington DC. Even if Gharib hadn’t mentioned being into zines, I think I would have guessed from her cartoony art style that she was into zines. Incidentally, I didn’t remember that I’d read some of her other work in The Nib (see “The Colonial Roots of Cheese Pimiento”), because the style was so radically different. I really liked the expressive faces & the background cityscapes. It was interesting how Gharib & her family saw leaving her hometown of Cerritos as going to the white people to learn their ways. The little section about microaggressions was interesting, as were the parts about discovering the racism embedded in popular culture. Even in California, we have this Sweet Valley High image of SoCal, but it’s good to keep in mind that there’s way more places like Cerritos there. Eating noodles on your birthday sounds like a great idea; is it appropriating if I do it?

This is a great intro to the history of the Black Panther Party, it’s people & personalities. Emphasizes the influences of other movements on the formation of the Black Panthers, & the influence the Panthers had on other movements in turn. It would be interesting to see the connections between the Black Panthers’ legacy & later anti-racist movements, but that is probably a whole other book in itself. There are definitely many more books to read (or write) about the Black Panther Party, but this one is a good place to start.

The Last Armada is exiting and readable. It uses the story of the Siege of Kinsale to tell about the transition of power from Elizabeth I and James I, the end of Spain's imperial ambitions in Europe, and the beginnings of the British colonization of Ireland. The Last Armada provides a glimpse of the events as they were seen and experienced by people of the time.

I like how it was set in a sort of alternate 50s that had the fast cars and rock and roll, but wasn't horrible for brown people and non-conformists.

A great memoir (and a great birthday present), mostly about the author's parents. There were parts of the book where I forgot that the author was one of the characters! It felt like Thi's parents lived so many different lives, it was even easy to forget that her parents are the same people who at the end of the book are settled with the author in the Bay Area! I also feel like this book dealt well with the historical context of the characters, and so is a good book to read for anyone interested in the modern history of Vietnam.

Good for reading for one who knows historical context & has a critical eye. Ludendorff is a great example to use when illustrating how pre-war attitudes contributed both to the slide into WWI, and to it's continuing for 4 years, even after it was clear there would be no swift conclusion. The book is also a great illustration of the need for goals in life & the dangers of handing political power to military technocrats, & the dangers of war without political aims. Depicts the German political leaders as handing decision-making to the military, and then the military refusing to articulate political goals for the war. Ludendorff held the German militarist attitude before the war that a conflict had to be fought soon, or else their European rivals would be too strong. From what I've read, these attitudes and dynamics were not unique to Germany or the German Military, but were common throughout Europe. This book surprised me in that it indicates how little the German Military leaders realistically thought they could gain from continued war, and how little they seriously considered any peace efforts before the very end of the war in 1918.

More mystery in the Goldie Vanciverse. There have been Soviet spies in previous books, but I felt this one was more Cold War -ish. Maybe it's all the talk of new cold wars (now with China, now with Russia, now with -?) in the news lately. Enjoyed some of the band names.

Might be the most "eventful" volume of the series, making it probably be the easiest and most straightforward movie adaptation of all the Arab of the Futures. This is partially because by this time in his young life, Riad is old enough to be more aware of what's going on around him, and also because the conflict between his mother and father has finally come to the surface. Arab of the Future 4 displayed a harsher view of France than the previous volumes; it seemed bleaker, & more racist & tribal. I wonder if that's because Riad just started noticing different things about France at this point in his life (because he's older, and he's spending more time there), or if there's some retrospective reason for him to bring these issues up. Finally, I found it interesting that young Sattouf forgot & re-learned Arabic whenever he left & came back to Syria. A little bit surprised that this isn't the final volume, but I won't be surprised again. I look forward to reading all of the other volumes which I will expect to see with regularity until either Sattouf dies and thus runs out of new material or I do and thus stop looking forward to anything.

A book about how to recognize and deal with the feeling that you are a fake impostor, and who knows why everyone else is taking so long to see through you. According to the book, it often manifests as crippling perfectionism, or a feverish race to fulfill societal & social expectations. I was disappointed that the book didn't go more into how to deal with perfectionism or perfectionism related anxiety. I was also disappointed that the chapter focused on women tried to use various evo psych fairy tales as an explanation for sexist discrimination against women, & that the chapter focused on men was mostly about men insecure about not fitting into very basic male stereotypes.
Most of the manifestations & symptoms didn't really feel familiar to me, so maybe I don't actually have impostor syndrome and the world is going to find me out any time now!!!