If you're wondering if you want to listen to Lindy West describe movies to you for 7 hours, the answer is probably yes. It's only a no if you're triggered by feminist millennial snark.

The book opens with West describing the best movie of all time, The Fugitive. Every film thereafter is rated in comparison to The Fugitive. This love for The Fugitive despite its lack of women characters and all its other faults. We love what we love, I guess.

The title Shit, Actually, in case you missed it, is a reference to Love, Actually, which West hates, for fine reasons. Other moves she describes include Forrest Gump, The Lion King, Harry Potter, Face/Off (which made me want to go on a Nicolas Cage bender), Twilight, and others. The book came out in October 2020, which makes for many inserted references to Trump's handling of Covid-19. The book is full of outrage you laugh at. White feminism or an effective form of political satire? Can it be both? 

High school sophomore Maybelline Chan (her Taiwanese-American mom thought the make-up line sounded glamorous!) has the perfect brother in Danny, recently admitted to Princeton...until she doesn't. This novel starts off as a deeply felt story of grief for May and her parents, along with May's best friend Tiya and Tiya's older brother, Marc, who had been Danny's best friend. Tiya and Marc even come over and clean the Chans' house, when the family members cease to be able to take care of themselves. 

But May's hiatus from school ends with the beginning of her junior year, and she is confronted with Danny's ghost everywhere she looks, and when a glimpse of happiness rebounds into guilt and pain. Then, to add to the family's trauma, a classmate's racist dad blames "Asians" for the high pressure at their high achieving high school and specifically references Danny. Was Princeton not enough for his parents?

The first part of the book, with its depiction of the unrelenting emotion suicide survivors experience, might be a great book on its own, but what elevates it is how when the narrative moves into centering racism in the community, May is forced to examine her own lack of concern for her BIPOC classmates and their realities. Tiya and Marc are Haitian-American and when they invite May to protest the murder of a Black child, May doesn't show up for them. The rest of the novel is about how May and others stand up. 

--unclear attribution, often associated with Dante. Packs a punch with all the Israel-Gaza both sidesism rampant in the world right now. See also

Favorite book of the year so far! 

We all know the stories about preachers' kids--how they're secretly the most wild in the flock. When we meet Monique, she's not much of a wild child, but she's also not super into church. Her one dereliction is that, despite the purity ring she wears, Mo has tried, on multiple occasions, to have sex with her boyfriend of two years, Dom. She and Dom were childhood best friends before they started dating at 15, and Dom is practically a member of her family already. Everyone assumes they'll get married when it's time. 

Mo's preacher dad and hardass mom put a lot of pressure on Monique to be a good Christian. They want her to be like good girl Sasha, who, as we learn, has secrets of her own. As the story unfolds, we learn about Sasha, about Mo's dad's latest bad boy project Reggie, about Dom, and about Mo, herself. 

The story is maybe a hair too pat, but it's still a sweet coming-of-age tale with compelling teen and adult characters, and even a prodigal daughter. 

This is a memoir by a high-achieving Mexican-American woman who was separated from her parents and brother when she was a teenager because her parents were denied visas to stay in the US.

I listened to the audiobook, read appealingly by the author, Elizabeth Camarillo Gutierrez. She is in her twenties, so the youth in her voice makes plain the reality that her story is one of a child, coming up largely on her own and later, just out of college, taking responsibility for her younger brother as she tries to launch her career. 

Gutierrez was born in the US to parents in the country on a tourist visa. They thought the could renew the visa...and were mistaken. After years of pushing their daughter to be the best in her American education, they wanted her to join them in Mexico, but Gutierrez was too invested in her and her parents first dream--to build a life in America. She takes extreme measures to return to the states, going to high school on her own. She stays with a family that doesn't provide her basic needs, but eventually, after her growling stomach tattles on her hunger, she is awakened to resources for kids growing up on their own. 

Hers is a story of pain and resilience, resilience and pain, gratitude, frustration, and generosity. Gutierrez is a hard worker with natural gifts. Her success against crushing odds makes you wonder how many kids with lesser talent and drive don't get through similar challenges. 

Mara, who is 6'2, is best friends with Quinn, who is about a foot shorter than she is. When Mara decides she wants to play football, having been told by her basketball coach that she needs to play a team sport without getting violent with anyone in order to be reinstated on the basketball team, Quinn says "go for it." Quinn is a leading [some football position] on the team, which hasn't had a winning season in years. Mara's brother Noah, is also on the team. Mara finds that she loves the sport; she can get her aggression out on the field, but what she doesn't predict is that a bunch of other girls will join her efforts. 

At first she keeps her distance from them, especially Carly, the uberfemme basketball teammate she punched to get her place on the team in jeopardy to begin with. Carly is the only out lesbian in the high school, and Mara is closeted. 

Mara's story is about learning to deal with her sexuality, with other women, and the reality that she's not one of the guys, and that Quinn is not really her friend. In fact, Quinn is an asshole. 

just couldn't get into it. stressed. blame the iof

I like the voice and the main character, but it's just too slow. 

The action takes place at a teen scrabble tournament in Malaysia, a year after "Queen of the Tiles" Trina Low died on the table during finals. The story is told by Trina's best friend, Najwa. Other character's include Trina's boyfriend, her childhood bestie, and other Scrabble players who loved, hated, and/or admired Trina. It's Najwa's first time back, and her grief about Trina is still acute. 

You might think all Scrabble players are word geeks, but most of them don't care about word definitions like Najwa does. The words and definitions serve as nerdy-wonderful metaphors for how the story unfolds. 

For a book about child abuse, this is a fun read (listen). I don't know McCurdy's acting work, so I didn't have any knowledge of or attachment to her going in. 

Not compelling enough and too long.