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speculativebecky
The Reckonings is an essay collection broadly encompassing themes of justice. Johnson touches on her experience being kidnapped and raped and her vision for justice for the perpetrator of that horrific violence. She writes about rape culture, school shootings, the death penalty and white privilege, and delves deep in essays on nuclear waste and Hurricane Harvey. Johnson’s writing is always beautiful, and she writes with great care and nuance.
I feel like I absorbed a lot reading this essay collection. It was a weird mix of easy and tough to read; Johnson is so eloquent and thought-provoking, but reading about disasters and the state of our world was often overpoweringly heartbreaking. It was in turns a good and bad pairing with the current world situation, I was upset and inspired and all over the place. That said, I’m really looking forward to discussing this book and I think I’ll be chewing on it for a long time to come.
I feel like I absorbed a lot reading this essay collection. It was a weird mix of easy and tough to read; Johnson is so eloquent and thought-provoking, but reading about disasters and the state of our world was often overpoweringly heartbreaking. It was in turns a good and bad pairing with the current world situation, I was upset and inspired and all over the place. That said, I’m really looking forward to discussing this book and I think I’ll be chewing on it for a long time to come.
The worldbuilding of this novel is SO EXCITING! The implications for the world of both the invading alien life form and the appearance of sensitives are explored in brilliant detail, and I was buzzing as Thompson built up the bones of this world both familiar and foreign. Kaaro’s backstory is woven through the current day timeline, and the one struggle point is that the past timeline didn’t proceed chronologically and at times this was confusing. I was flipping back and forth a lot to piece things together, fortunately that’s one of my favorite reading experiences and Thompson PAYS OFF the investment. When the details crash together and the picture clears as to how we got to the circumstances of the present day, it was completely rewarding. Kaaro is a great character, a little hard to like at times, and really easy to love at others. I enjoyed him and the entire cast.
I had a bit of a slow start since I often feel conflicted about committing to books outside of my too-many-buddy-reads, but once I got going this book consumed me. I loved reading it and I am so excited to continue the series!
I had a bit of a slow start since I often feel conflicted about committing to books outside of my too-many-buddy-reads, but once I got going this book consumed me. I loved reading it and I am so excited to continue the series!
This is a book that is difficult to discuss without spoilers, even to describe the wide range of emotions I felt while reading feels unfair to a reader who’s not yet experienced it. An intense and thought-provoking read, my thoughts are swirling and I think they will not stop for a while. I feel I have been dragged down deep ensnared in its unrelenting claws, and I admit, I love a book that tries to drown me. I know not everyone is going to like this book but yeah, I recommend it.
Okay I’m going to need all of you to read this book. I loved it so much!
Here and Now and Then by Mike Chen is a time travel novel with a ton of heart, it follows Kin, a former time traveling secret agent. His agency has a ton of strict rules about proper time travel protocol, you can’t even get in a line to buy food in case you make someone late and cause rippling effects in the timeline, so you’re definitely not supposed to settle down and start a family when you get stranded in the past for eighteen years. But Kin did that, and now his happy life with his wife and fourteen year old daughter are in jeopardy when his future finally shows up to “rescue” him.
I know a lot of us are looking for captivating slump-busters right now, and this was a book I just did not want to put down. I read all 320-something pages in one day and it was a work day to boot. My expectations for what was coming next kept getting flipped and I fell so in love with Kin and his family. Fair warning, this book has a lot of sad bits and I shed many a cathartic tear. Don’t read when you want something totally light and fluffy, do read when you want something action-packed that will also sear through your soul.
I often like to attend panel discussions at book conventions with variations on the theme “Visions of Positive Masculinity”, and this is very much a book I’d recommend as modeling that idea of a non-toxic masculinity. Kin’s love for his family, and specifically his daughter, is the through line of this novel, and it’s a beautiful thing to see the way Chen explores that relationship and Kin’s identity as a father. Plus, while the emotional stuff was the best part of this book, the time travel narrative was also excellent. I never felt like the logic fell apart and I have a high bar for a successful time travel story.
Here and Now and Then by Mike Chen is a time travel novel with a ton of heart, it follows Kin, a former time traveling secret agent. His agency has a ton of strict rules about proper time travel protocol, you can’t even get in a line to buy food in case you make someone late and cause rippling effects in the timeline, so you’re definitely not supposed to settle down and start a family when you get stranded in the past for eighteen years. But Kin did that, and now his happy life with his wife and fourteen year old daughter are in jeopardy when his future finally shows up to “rescue” him.
I know a lot of us are looking for captivating slump-busters right now, and this was a book I just did not want to put down. I read all 320-something pages in one day and it was a work day to boot. My expectations for what was coming next kept getting flipped and I fell so in love with Kin and his family. Fair warning, this book has a lot of sad bits and I shed many a cathartic tear. Don’t read when you want something totally light and fluffy, do read when you want something action-packed that will also sear through your soul.
I often like to attend panel discussions at book conventions with variations on the theme “Visions of Positive Masculinity”, and this is very much a book I’d recommend as modeling that idea of a non-toxic masculinity. Kin’s love for his family, and specifically his daughter, is the through line of this novel, and it’s a beautiful thing to see the way Chen explores that relationship and Kin’s identity as a father. Plus, while the emotional stuff was the best part of this book, the time travel narrative was also excellent. I never felt like the logic fell apart and I have a high bar for a successful time travel story.
I finished Black Leopard Red Wolf by Marlon James yesterday and I feel like I’ve lived a lifetime inside this epic oral history fantasy novel, and yet I don’t really know what to say about it. I can’t figure out how to quantify why, but this book never fully grabbed me, even as I dedicated nearly the entire weekend to traversing its pages. There’s this feeling of “I’m so excited to be reading this” that just didn’t ever hit, and I don’t know if it’s worth it to pick apart why that might be the case, or just chalk it up to the current moment not always being an ideal reading atmosphere.
James writes huge stories, and I feel kind of hungover on this book, very much reminiscent of my days post finishing A Brief History of Seven Killings. The structure of this novel, where Tracker narrates aloud before an offscreen inquisitor, was exciting, as was the centering of a cast dominated by diverse queer Black men. The power struggle that eventually unfolds was intriguing, and I think some of where the book lost me was that Tracker kind of doesn’t care about all that, which makes him a somewhat less engaging character to follow though this story, even as I came to care so deeply for him and ached alongside his pain.
James writes huge stories, and I feel kind of hungover on this book, very much reminiscent of my days post finishing A Brief History of Seven Killings. The structure of this novel, where Tracker narrates aloud before an offscreen inquisitor, was exciting, as was the centering of a cast dominated by diverse queer Black men. The power struggle that eventually unfolds was intriguing, and I think some of where the book lost me was that Tracker kind of doesn’t care about all that, which makes him a somewhat less engaging character to follow though this story, even as I came to care so deeply for him and ached alongside his pain.
Cook Korean: A Comic Book with Recipes by Robin Ha is a delightful introduction to Korean cooking, packed with information about Korean ingredients, culinary history, and dozens of illustrated recipes.
Ha is a Korean American designer and cartoonist who discovered a passion for cooking Korean food as an adult. She always thought cooking was beyond her skillset, but nostalgia for her favorite dishes led her to discover that they were much easier to make than she’d though, and suddenly cooking was fun. Ha bases this book around her conviction that if she can master Korean cooking, anyone can, and I found myself believing her.
This book is such fun to read, delightfully illustrated, and suffused with Ha’s passion for Korean food. I appreciate that she frequently includes notes about one could modify recipes with ingredients that might be easier to find in America, or just to use a different protein, building up the reader's confidence with experimentation. She gives background about each cuisine and recipe, discussing for example when certain foods are eaten in Korea, all of which gives the reader a much more comprehensive picture of Korean culinary culture than just a simple list of recipes.
Ha is a Korean American designer and cartoonist who discovered a passion for cooking Korean food as an adult. She always thought cooking was beyond her skillset, but nostalgia for her favorite dishes led her to discover that they were much easier to make than she’d though, and suddenly cooking was fun. Ha bases this book around her conviction that if she can master Korean cooking, anyone can, and I found myself believing her.
This book is such fun to read, delightfully illustrated, and suffused with Ha’s passion for Korean food. I appreciate that she frequently includes notes about one could modify recipes with ingredients that might be easier to find in America, or just to use a different protein, building up the reader's confidence with experimentation. She gives background about each cuisine and recipe, discussing for example when certain foods are eaten in Korea, all of which gives the reader a much more comprehensive picture of Korean culinary culture than just a simple list of recipes.
I stayed up late last night finishing Porochista Khakpour’s memoir of her life of intermittent unexplained illnesses, culminating in an eventual diagnosis of late-stage Lyme Disease. And now the usual conundrum - how do you talk about a book review after someone shares so deeply their life story? I was quite moved by Khakpour’s story, and I appreciate that she’s sharing a narrative that’s as yet still unresolved. I gather the original intention of this memoir was for it to be a story of post-remission triumph, but instead it wove itself into an extensive backstory with no concrete conclusion. Though she notes she stripped the story bare of details extraneous to her specific experience, I learned viscerally the experience of struggling with undiagnosed illness and the anguish of being dismissed by professionals as delusional about her physical symptoms. Khakpour speaks important words too about how race and gender factored into her experience of care. I’m grateful for this book and to Khakpour for sharing so personally a multifaceted journey with all its loose ends intact.
This novel follows the creation of a frankensteinian monster made from the corpses of victims of terrorist attacks and other violence on the streets of Baghdad. He becomes animated by the soul of another victim of violence, and named Daniel by an old woman who believes him to be the long awaited return of her lost son. But it seems he becomes a new person all his own, motivated by the various desires of justice and revenge against all the criminals responsible for the deaths of his component parts. Complicating things, his body parts fall off as he avenges their spawning crimes, and he must continue to replenish himself with the pieces of new victimes or risk ceasing to exist.
This fascinating premise gives rise to an unpredictable tale, dense with characters each struggling through their own stories. I felt some fatigue at the many characters and how each confuses the narrative, yet I found this book easily captured me. The ideas were less science fiction and more social/political, which put me on somewhat uneven footing especially given the unfamiliar setting, but I quite enjoyed getting outside of my comfort zone with this book. Saadawi tackles multiple themes, and I especially appreciated the bits musing on the nature of good and evil and innocence. A book unlike any other I’ve read, I’m glad I picked it up.
This fascinating premise gives rise to an unpredictable tale, dense with characters each struggling through their own stories. I felt some fatigue at the many characters and how each confuses the narrative, yet I found this book easily captured me. The ideas were less science fiction and more social/political, which put me on somewhat uneven footing especially given the unfamiliar setting, but I quite enjoyed getting outside of my comfort zone with this book. Saadawi tackles multiple themes, and I especially appreciated the bits musing on the nature of good and evil and innocence. A book unlike any other I’ve read, I’m glad I picked it up.
The Narrows reminds me of George Eliot’s Middlemarch, kicked up to 100 miles per hour. It’s the story of a place, Monmouth, Connecticut, aka The Narrows, and of about a dozen characters hurtling towards one another and their inevitable collisions. Petry has a unique and powerful writing style, her characters’ inner monologues spill out onto the page, running back over themselves again and again, the way the mind does as it splices together memory and the current moment. An incisive look at race in 1950’s America, I won’t soon forget this sharply drawn cast of characters, or the way this small-town epic story made me feel. Petry is an extraordinary writer, and this book is a masterpiece.
