i love when i have the presence of mind to review short story collections story by story as i go.
story 1: girl by jamaica kincaid everyone has read thii love when i have the presence of mind to review short story collections story by story as i go.
story 1: girl by jamaica kincaid everyone has read this story before, i think, but that doesn't make it any less good when it comes up again. rating: 4
story 2: recitatif by toni morrison some stories should have handle with care warnings on them. i can't believe i'm expected to have this and the normal responsibilities of my daily life packed into the same set of hours. rating: 4.5
story 3: the richer, the poorer by dorothy west sisters :) rating: 3.5
story 4: fifth sunday by rita dove the drama of it all! rating: 3
story 5: who we are by camille acker everything i could say about this, like "perspective can do so much!" and "the ending of this is insightful!" is very corny so i will not. rating: 4
story 6: the lesson by toni cade bambara this is about teaching kids about the power of economic inequality, and if i learned one thing from my years of babysitting, it's that there's nothing quite as fun as radicalizing children. rating: 3.5
story 7: dance for me by amina gautier goddamn. high school, y'know? what a hellscape. rating: 3.5
story 8: bad behavior by alexia arthurs it do be so tough to be a girl. rating: 3.5
story 9: melvin in the sixth grade by dana johnson the thing about a story that perfectly brings you back to elementary school feelings is that they suck and i hate it and i don't want to feel them, actually. rating: 3.5
story 10: everyday use by alice walker if there is one lesson to be taken away from this month of reading, it's that i need to read more alice walker. rating: 4
story 11: we're the only colored people here by gwendolyn brooks "But she was learning to love moments. To love moments for themselves. ah so lovely. rating: 4
story 12: seeing things simply by edwidge danticat i haven't mentioned until now that each of these stories are divided into sections by theme - innocence, belonging, love. this one is self-discovery and it is perfectly that. rating: 3.75
story 13: in a house of wooden monkeys by shay youngblood rad title, rad author's name. well this was out of the ordinary!!! rating: 3.5
story 14: reena by paule marshall another thing i haven't mentioned until now: this book has discussion questions at the end of each story. it is very sweet and it does actually help me to think through each story before moving onto the next, which i sometimes struggle with when it comes to collections like this. rating: 4
story 15: how it feels to be colored me by zora neale hurston this is marked as the epilogue, which is odd but interesting! nobody can write like zora neale hurston. rating: 4.5
overall i don't know when the last time i read an anthology like this was. i have read a lot of short story collections of late, but one where all the stories are by various authors and were published already...maybe i never have except for school? regardless, it was a great experience, and i think did wonders for my Black History Month project. there are only so many authors i can get to otherwise. rating: 4
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the only thing better than books = books about books
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
This book was THIS CLOSE to being okay. Not good. Not great. But okay.
Didn't quite get there, though.
This is, ostensiThis is...an extremely apt title.
This book was THIS CLOSE to being okay. Not good. Not great. But okay.
Didn't quite get there, though.
This is, ostensibly, a love story (or at least a sex story) between two deeply f*cked up individuals, a man who has just attempted suicide and the older therapist who saved him (and is also pretending she is not a therapist), and then also (view spoiler)[even though they spend the book falling in love and all that, and are unable to not be in touch at the end, they do not end up together. (hide spoiler)]
In truth the depictions of mental illness felt offensive to me, but maybe they just weren't good. Who's to say!
The romance as it stood, I believe, should have come second to these extraordinarily unwell people trying to heal themselves, and it didn't until the end, which meant not only an unsatisfying story but an unsatisfying conclusion to it.
I don't have many nice things to say!
Bottom line: Not sure if this is bad, or I'm curmudgeonly, or both. But it's a no from me!
----------------- pre-review
if there's one thing i love in this life...it's drama.
maybe not like that, though.
review to come / 2ish
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
I, for example, come extraordinarily close, and even I have my flaws. I work too hard. I give too much to charity. I cannot, FOR THENobody is perfect.
I, for example, come extraordinarily close, and even I have my flaws. I work too hard. I give too much to charity. I cannot, FOR THE LIFE OF ME, WRITE A POSITIVE REVIEW.
I can write negative reviews all day, and have fun doing it. Give me a book that is offensive, or dumb, or just plain bad, and we'll have the time of our lives roasting each other up.
But when I love a book?
Hoo boy. Bad news bears.
The highest compliment I can give a book is that it reminds me of Sally Rooney, the author of my heart, and Brandon Taylor's clear and lovely style does that in spades. This book wrapped me up in it, affecting the language of my internal monologue and the nuances of my mood and refusing to allow me to put it down until I finished - keeping itself at the forefront of my mind even if I did manage to take a break.
I read the author's short story collection earlier in the month, and while I didn't completely love it, I couldn't really shake it. Reading this seemed like a foregone conclusion, and was almost exactly like reading a novel-length version of some of my favorite stories from it.
This story, of Wallace, a gay Black science grad student surrounded by whiteness and solitude, even when in the company of others, has so much to say about violence, about race, about loneliness, about sex and love and cruelty.
Bottom line: Just read it!!!
----------------- book club update
i loved this book when i first read it, and i loved it even more this time. and now i really need to talk about it with someone so please join book club discussion: https://www.instagram.com/p/C3i17w1LZpD/
5 stars!
----------------- pre-review
"when you know you know" - most people about true love / me about authors i like
for once having the presence of mind to actually review each short story in a collection!
1: potluck i'm really into this writing so far. immediately i for once having the presence of mind to actually review each short story in a collection!
1: potluck i'm really into this writing so far. immediately i would compare it to sally rooney, which is the highest praise i can give a writing style. a lot of astute observations and cutting turns of phrase to characterize common behaviors in a new way (i just sent this thought to s.penkevich, who is far smarter and a significantly better writer than me, and he affirmed it and said taylor is an admirer of rooney's. i'm just writing all this because i feel wise.) still. the ending few pages didn't hit as hard as the rest of it, to the point that i wish i could have magically removed a certain chunk. rating: 4
2: little beast kids are spooky and life is hard. rating: 4
3: flesh we return to the characters from the first story and, true to form, this felt more like a chapter than a story. then the end was good, but still. not enough!!! rating: 3
4: as though that were love people do be hurting each other. rating: 3.5
5: proctoring ok...appearing that every other story returns to the same group of characters. let's try this one on for size!! i feel like i can't decide whether i want fewer stories from this world or i want a whole novel in it? i think i'm just unhappy regardless. inherently. rating: 3.5
6: filthy animals title story title story title story!!!! holy moley. "Milton thinks again of all the homes and all their interchangeable lives and wishes it were as simple as stopping at someone else's door, knocking, and switching places with the version of himself who lived there. If only he could enter into another version of his life, one in which things have not gone as horribly awry - if only he could pass from this world into the next or into the next." and "What he wants is not to maim himself but rather to pry open the world, bone it, remove the ugly hardness of it all, the way one might take the spine from a deer or a fish or some other animal snared." when a beautiful theme (the need to escape from being surrounded by violence, but you are imbued with violence) is beautifully written (see above), what more can you ask for. i love when a title story is a standout. rating: 4.5
7: mass aaaaand same world, different characters in it (who were already mentioned). we keep up the every-other pattern. nevertheless we persist. we beat on boats against the current. et cetera. a little more obvious than the others, maybe. rating: 3
8: anne of cleves this one just feels close to my heart, i think. and also very good. rating: 4.5
9: apartment the relationship between these three recurring characters is à la conversations with friends, but instead of growing more interesting to me over time, it's getting significantly less so. bummer. rating: 3
10: what made them made you this is a book mostly about the ways that men are violent to each other, and grow up and live within that cycle and environment, so this depiction of how that impacts women was needed (and good!). rating: 4
11: meat final story, and it's back with our gang of bozos. not my favorite but that's not so surprising. rating: 3
overall the best thing a short story collection can be is greater than the sum of its parts, and this is certainly that. would recommend for: sally rooney stans, people who like lit fic about terrible women and are willing to see the same theory applied to men. rating: 4
----------------- currently-reading updates
not sure what i'm in the mood to read so who's to say it isn't short stories
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
We all know the phrase "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all."
But is there an equivalent phrase about when you read a booWe all know the phrase "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all."
But is there an equivalent phrase about when you read a book and rate it 3 stars only to come back a little over a month later to realize you actually, in point of fact, don't have anything nice to say?
I'm looking for advice.
I don't know why I initially three starred this. Maybe I was just so slumpy that I assumed it was an "it's not you, it's me" situation?
How many human-interaction-based clichés can I fit into one review.
Anyway: This book seems like it has a lot going for it. Mainly in that it's a rom com with a cute cover and the idea of a boyfriend project is cool to me, as a project obsessive. (Don't even look at how many of my Goodreads shelves have the word "project" in.)
But take that promising feeling off the table entirely, because...
There is no boyfriend project.
DUN DUN DUN.
Literally nothing at all that could qualify. I'm furious even thinking about it.
And even worse, this is one of those rom coms with SO MUCH ELSE GOING ON that the actual rom is a weird afterthought, and there's no com to speak of at all.
For example: These two and their work.
The male love interest is a deep-undercover tech-based US government secret agent for, like, money laundering, so you just have to accept that as a normal and reasonable thing if you want to continue with the book without screaming or throwing things. Fine.
But if you can believe it, that's not even the most distracting part?
Our protagonist, who is just a normal human woman doing tech stuff, makes SO MANY bizarre and inexplicable work decisions - not calling out a coworker even though she herself is beloved and respected, in spite of the coworker undermining her and taking credit for her work; turning down an opportunity that sounds like a once in a lifetime chance to better herself and the world for something she could do at the same time - that I wanted to tear pages and/or my hair out.
I felt the chemistry between these two at the beginning, but both characters' insane work plot lines took up all the page time and my patience.
AND, on top of everything else, our protagonist is in a viral video mocking a previous date that led to her making a new group of friends, which I almost forgot about in spite of the fact that it also takes up more time than the romance.
There's too much going on.
Bottom line: I wrote myself into dropping this to 1.5 from 3. What a day.
----------------- pre-review
instead of a "boyfriend project" i'm continuing romance novel quest.
they both result in disappointment, but only one of them helps my reading challenge.
review to come / 3ish stars
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
Here is the thing: In a sense, I'm loyal. I'm dedicated. I give everything my all.
Or, in other words: When I hate something, I really really hate someHere is the thing: In a sense, I'm loyal. I'm dedicated. I give everything my all.
Or, in other words: When I hate something, I really really hate something.
And one such example is poetry.
I decided I hated poetry one day in seventh grade and I've never...quite...been able to shake it. And I've tried!
I've read poetry by authors I like. I've read prose poetry and poetry-y prose. I've read new poems, old poems, overwrought poems, that kinda Instagram poem where you just hit enter a lot at random points (the worst kind of all).
None of it works.
And so while I wanted to like this so much, and it is fundamentally about my favorite thing (different people and how we are all flawed but the best), and it is so impressive, and I am so susceptible to the power of a good ending, but the truth of the matter is that this style - a sort of slammy poetry - didn't work for me at all!
I think if the style or structure had varied person by person, it would actually have added to my enjoyment, but the liberal use of the enter key kept me at a distance from everyone, and definitely didn't help in keeping the characters straight.
It's a bajillion different characters with interchangeable perspectives! The voice never changed and I couldn't keep anyone straight, and it capped my enjoyment level pretty low.
This is still a good book.
It's just not for me.
Not every unpopular opinion is a fun one.
Bottom line: I'm sorry!!! I wish I were different.
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
Classics by any other name are "books that are good enough to stick around for a bajillion years."
I learn something. I feel smart. I hI love classics.
Classics by any other name are "books that are good enough to stick around for a bajillion years."
I learn something. I feel smart. I have a good time.
In this particular case, I learned not just about the colonization of Africa and about missionaries and about Nigeria, but about people, about masculinity, about society.
It's awesome.
Bottom line: Project Reread Books I Half Read When They Were Assigned To Me rules.
----------------- pre-review
some books are really classics for a reason.
review to come / at least 4 stars
----------------- tbr review
sometimes i like to add books i half-read in school to my tbr and pretend i'll return to them. just for fun
update: surpassing my own expectations
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
This Christmas season, I spent all of December - nay, all of the time since it dipped below 70 degrees - looking forward to the Big Day.
And then the This Christmas season, I spent all of December - nay, all of the time since it dipped below 70 degrees - looking forward to the Big Day.
And then the very same night I arrived home for the festivites, I tested positive for COVID-19 and thereby had to spend the entirety of the Christmas-to-New-Years lineup in quarantine.
That feeling is roughly the same as how I feel being disappointed by a Talia Hibbert Christmas romance.
Romance novellas are always tough because I NEED EVERY PART. I need the getting to know the characters. I need the yearning. I need the falling. I need the drama. I need the happily ever after.
This skips the getting to know the characters in favor of yearning that is based on so much miscommunication it converted me, someone who is so anti-love that I wish every romance was 99% angst, into a miscommunication trope hater.
On top of that, the little bit of characterization we do get is inconsistent. The love interest, for example, spends first scene depicted as anxious and then later as "laid back" and "not giving a f*ck."
So do with that what you will.
Bottom line: I need a win.
2.5 stars
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
This took me a week to finish, but that's a compliment.
It's a brutal and grueling read, and it takes ages to get through because it should, but I apprThis took me a week to finish, but that's a compliment.
It's a brutal and grueling read, and it takes ages to get through because it should, but I appreciated every minute even still.
I found this to be really unflinching and realistic in its depiction of slavery and what people are like, even those white people who are just "cogs in the machine" of slavery, even when the plot or a feel-good moment would have benefited from a break from that, which is an achievement (and I imagine something that the author would have had to fight for, considering the status quo of most slavery novels and films).
I thought this was primarily an exploration of humanity - or at least that's what I got from it - but the sci-fi elements, the interracial relationship study, the theme of time's impact and lack of impact...
All of it hit.
A one of a kind book, really!
Bottom line: I have to read more Octavia Butler for sure.
----------------- currently-reading updates
doing my homework (assigning myself classic books because i miss being in school)
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
They say there's a first time for everything but I, as a member of the never shuts up community, doubtGotta tell you, I don't really know what to say.
They say there's a first time for everything but I, as a member of the never shuts up community, doubted this day would ever come.
So I will keep this quick!
Lately I've had a hard time feeling books - as in actually have them impact me emotionally - so I've read increasingly crazy lit fic to attempt to undo it.
This just shattered all of that and fixed it no problem. I teared up.
I'm not ashamed, even if this wrecks my badass image. This book is emotive and touching and I care about the characters so, so much.
But enough yearning on main.
Bottom line: A book so good it broke me!
----------------- pre-review
going to stare at the wall for the next couple of hours
review to come / 4.5 stars
----------------- currently-reading updates
can i still call myself a bookworm if it took me this long to read this?...more
Apparently, a book can sound really good, but still not be fun to read?
Doesn't seem fair but what do I know.
Clearly I am not in charge of the world's Apparently, a book can sound really good, but still not be fun to read?
Doesn't seem fair but what do I know.
Clearly I am not in charge of the world's affairs, because if I were everyone's sleep schedule would be shifter 4 hours later and work weeks would be shorter and cookies that are chewy on the inside with crispy edges would be significantly more readily available.
Instead, here we are. In hell.
Anyway, this book just launches you in, which I like, due to I Think Everything Is Boring And Thereby Plots Should Start Immediately reasons, but it doesn't have any exposition at all.
Things just come up like they would if you'd existed in this world all along, which in a universe in which the Black Lives Matter movement is half about sirens, and also sprites and gargoyles and various other (but not all) magical creatures are real, is so damn confusing.
I read this whole book (I swear) and I couldn't tell you a single magic rule.
It becomes just very hard for me to be interested in...or invested in...or care about. If I don't know the rules or the circumstances or the meanings of anything, how do I know how seriously to take them???
Also: too many mentions of skin conditions.
Bottom line: It's all about worldbuilding baby!!!!
----------------- tbr review
the only thing better than books about girls being friends is books about girls who are also sirens being friends
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
Best feeling is when you finish a book and you're like...why did I wait so long?
I don't like reviewing nonfiction, because then it's just my thoughts Best feeling is when you finish a book and you're like...why did I wait so long?
I don't like reviewing nonfiction, because then it's just my thoughts vs facts, and usually the facts are presented by someone far smarter, more knowledgeable, and cooler than me.
And in this case...Audre Lorde beats me out on all three categories.
So - this is excellent and you should read it and that's the whole review.
Bottom line: Just read it!!
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
I always feel really weird about reviewing nonfiction. Reviewing fiction is cool, because it's just my opinion versus something somebody made up, but I always feel really weird about reviewing nonfiction. Reviewing fiction is cool, because it's just my opinion versus something somebody made up, but reviewing nonfiction...what am I against facts?
So I will keep this quick.
Famous last words.
A lot of reviews say their issue with this book is its repetitiveness, which is kinda fair, but I do think it's necessary - it's an introduction of a new theory and historical/sociological perspective, so repeating the lesson for the sake of ingraining it makes sense to me.
And it is a very compelling argument. I learned a lot about the connection between Nazi Germany and the American South, which (shockingly) in my experience American education was not very eager to teach us about in detail.
And the anecdotal and historical examples of caste (both in the author's theory and in established thought) were well done too.
I did find the discussion of modern day politics very lacking compared to all of the above. Where everything else was fairly groundbreaking and convincing, the way Trump was discussed as the keystone and the source of pure evil and whatnot felt...like a parroting of a million other arguments. And not necessarily good ones.
Which isn't to say I don't hate Trump. I do. But I also think the goofy way that some people responded (and still for some reason do) to him - for example, people with psych degrees all bonding together to drop a press release diagnosing him with narcissism, for example, in contrast to what counselors are supposed to do and as highlighted in this book - undermines the believability of other arguments.
Don't get mad at me. I'll expand on it if I have to.
Bottom line: Good stuff! Mostly good. Very good. I'm going to stop talking now.
----------------- pre-review
reading my once-annual nonfiction
update: i should do this more often.
review to come / 4 stars
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reading all books by Black authors for Black History Month!
For many years, I had no idea what kind of book I liked.
People would say that catty stuff about how people with low average ratings (generally known aFor many years, I had no idea what kind of book I liked.
People would say that catty stuff about how people with low average ratings (generally known as critical people) just don't know their own tastes, and I would be like HEY STOP, but secretly I would be like...maybe they're right.
But now they are wrong, and also I know.
I like short literary fiction.
This book won't take you long to read, but it's beautifully written and brilliant and will make you think.
This is what is known in the biz as a "win-win."
Bottom line: So many wins!
--------------------- book club update
this book is excellent and you should discuss it with our book club here
----------------- pre-review
things are dire.
even a short and good book can't end my reading slump.
review to come / 4 stars
----------------- currently-reading updates
adding more and more books that are shorter and shorter to pretend i'm not in a reading slump...more
The beginning of this was so cute and fun, and then the middle of this was so cute and fun, and then the ending was too?
Since when is that possible.
ThThe beginning of this was so cute and fun, and then the middle of this was so cute and fun, and then the ending was too?
Since when is that possible.
This is just a cute and fun book I guess. It wasn't perfect for me - it was a little silly and a little fairytaley and I found the characters a little forgettable - but it was cute and fun.
I think that's all I have to say?
Bottom line: Cute, fun, what else matters.
3.5
----------------- pre-review
i said that once i started reading romance again, i would keep going until i found my perfect book.
and i meant it.
(thanks to the publisher / netgalley for the e-arc)
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reading all books by Black authors for Black History Month!
book 1: caste book 2: business not as usual...more
I have said, many times, in many contexts, one could even claim "willy-nilly," that I am, at heart, a hater.
And in many ways, this is true. I enjoy maI have said, many times, in many contexts, one could even claim "willy-nilly," that I am, at heart, a hater.
And in many ways, this is true. I enjoy making fun of people, writing negative reviews, and generally being a lovable but curmudgeonly presence in my community.
But also, I always want (and even usually EXPECT) to love what I read.
Sometimes it simply proves impossible.
In this case, I expected a kind of literary romance situation (and you can accuse me of judging a book by its cover, and you might be right!), but it is not what I got.
Instead, I got half extremely silly fun pop culturey second-chanceish love and (abruptly!) half very disturbing very messy very upsetting backstory of the original chance in question!
Let me back up.
This book follows Eva, a semi-struggling romance writer and single mom, and Shane, an enigmatic wildly successful bad boy of the literary world. We find out that they spent 7 sordid days together in, you guessed it, June of one high school year or other, and also by sordid I mean "violent, sexual, addictive, and generally a huge unexpected tone shift for lil old me and our lil old characters."
Unfortunately this just included too many things for me, and I didn't like how they were handled. Definitely visit a trigger warnings list for this book before diving in, if you need them! I do not need trigger warnings but I do really hate when things that may be triggering aren't treated in a way that feels delicate to me, and unfortunately that's how I felt about the fairly gruesome self-harm in this book, which seemed to me to be barely addressed except to be referenced as part of these teens' terrible traumas.
Alliteration unintended.
I cared about the characters, but I also wanted to shake them, and that never went away, not even in the overly-significant epilogue (where a lot of events were relegated!) or by the ending itself.
(view spoiler)[In other words: This couple couldn't be together by the end of the penultimate chapter, but in the following one, nothing really changed! (hide spoiler)]
This meeting of the unpopular opinion club concludes here. Until next time, fellow haters.
Bottom line: Not what I expected, and with a handful of handy-dandy dealbreakers thrown in!
----------------- pre-review
this was filled with so many feelings that i feel like i have to wait for my own feelings to load.
review to come / 3?? stars??? i don't know
----------------- tbr review
when everyone is talking about a book, i wait until no one is talking about it anymore, and then i read it...more
i am a fiction stan. i am an advocate for made up things. i am a fangirl for imagination alone. i read maybe 1% nonfiction.
but for some reason........i am a fiction stan. i am an advocate for made up things. i am a fangirl for imagination alone. i read maybe 1% nonfiction.
but for some reason....................
roxane gay's nonfic works much better for me.
maybe it's because her nonfiction is so personal? in comparison, her fiction draws heavily enough on her life to feel familiar but not as evocative and intense (for me!).
beyond that, these were all too short for me to feel much...but were still very good?
i don't know. roxane gay quest will continue.
also i just noticed i've been writing this whole review in lowercase.
bottom line: not bad, just not really for me!
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reading books by Black authors for Black History Month!
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