Gabe

I tried to give it a chance cause the premise and setting seemed fun and entertaining but the writing and characters were so juvenile I simply could not.

I probably didn’t sit with this long enough to give it a fair chance, but was just a bit underwhelming. Weird girls sure maybe, but it was really just the opening short story and not the other two that fit the theme so I felt almost short changed.

not me crying at Calipress at 3:15pm trying to finish this book

Reminded me in the end of The Red Tent and how we don’t really die if we are known.

Definitely without a fair queer lens, which lacked for me, but perhaps bound to happen.

Incredible imagining of a universe from scratch, and personhood.

ok this was slow going for me BUT really good, still 4 stars.

book club read

really hard to capture what I liked & got out of this book without repeating extremely specific moments. Less story and more meditation on identity, but in the enticing context of one woman’s brief relationship, with both a young man and with Cairo.

I didn’t love this but I have a (narcissistic) soft spot for Dolly Alderton and London.

I read this to pre-read before recommending to a friend. It made me realise that some women truly love heterosexual men and I can’t believe what a grim grim world they must endure. Sexuality cannot be a choice, this cannot be the good place. Good luck to you all!

nothing really to criticise, was a well-written, well-chosen selection of short stories.

Just read at a time not particularly in the mood for short stories

Full of contradictions and dramatic language. Primary motivation for combatting science denial is for the security of the US, which is typical of an American author but also pathetic and lacking in imagination and humanity.

paused reading, intend to come back. Brandon Taylor’s familiar style is deeply thoughtful, quite sad, a little self-obsessed, and needs a certain mindset/headspace that I’m just not in right now. I look forward to returning during my next crisis of faith!!

first Austen complete! Very good and funny, a lot of winks at/acknowledgement of the reader which I loved

worth a read, quick (despite my reading time) and violent and surreal

extremely academically dense, glad to listen as an audiobook, but great insight in to How Things Could Be for real

I don’t think all my questions were answered but it was pretty good.

answered the question of why my girlfriend doesn’t want to have kids tho

this might be my first experience with magic realism and it was just fine. In some ways the descent into madness story, and uncertain elements of real and unreal, and the complex inner world really works for a tortured, blocked writer, but in other ways it’s a bit impersonal.

I must note that if I had read this a year ago I may have quite liked it, but as it is I am bored by protagonists who are writers. It feels self indulgent and unattached to any real common human experience. That said, I should probably just diversify my library.

Vague Spoilers:

I predicted a “major” twist very early on, I didn’t think it was particularly subtle, particularly as it’s not an uncommon trope.

More serious spoilers:

In a book where what is real or not is so vague, I’m not sure why she needed an explicitly imaginary friend?

fine I guess, nothing groundbreaking if you’ve been engaged with feminist content for a while. A good entry point, but not without an active interest. It gets quite graphic and intense, without a clear “resolution” that could leave a reader/listener uninspired.

Also the critique of “empowerment” seemed narrow. Criticisms of sex, sexuality and pornography are valid to an extent but extremely nuanced and I’m not sure this book came even close to doing these topics justice.

These thoughts are with a young woman reader imagined. If the book was intended for a male readership, I think the marketing and some of the tone was off, but closer aligned.

best read as a handful of interconnected short stories in one sitting

I’ll be thinking about this book, its themes, ideas, and conflicts for a long time. Its relevance is astonishing. It’s grim on grim on grim on grim, and then somehow hopeful? I’m not sure the whole thing was well executed, the writing style was almost lazy, definitely unrealistic and at times distracting. The complexity of the familial relationships will keep me up at night. The search for purpose, the need for and maintenance of community, and the personal sacrifices and potential interpersonal harm that it causes, or seems to cause, in an individualistic era is so agonising, both intellectually and emotionally. I wish it were just a bit better written, and perhaps a bit less excessively violent at times. A great not excellent sequel to the first instalment.

This was a dense read and packed with psychoanalytic themes and details that did not sing to me. It was interesting but in many ways not seemingly connected or meaningful. Sounded very whiney in early chapters. Better maybe than Spent? Better job at the meta-memoir, though difficult to follow the timeline.

kinda weird, I feel like this was far more meaningful to the author than it could be for any reader, and that’s ok. Read a little bit like an angsty YA novel, but also like the kind of thing parents would want banned for fear of radicalising their kids into cannibalism. A couple of throwaway lines about being human that would go off on a 15yo emo’s tumblr.

Also the second book I’ve read this month (year?) where characters are motivated by Korean loan sharks so that was kind of boring but also my choices.

a couple of chapters lost me with their flimsy anecdotes rather than sticking to strong cases, but overall a great perspective and tbh life changing book! Fuck cars!

this was so Fiction Book. so very Story, But Not Quite. Is that realism? Easy to read and engage with, well structured and paced, some interesting reflections into trauma, class disparity, the twists and turns of a life, and the masks we wear, but overall neutral feelings.

genuine slop (America is the good guy)

moving& thoughtful

I don’t feel qualified yet to rate this any lower than a 5/5. Part of me wants to say I enjoyed it to imply that I really *got* it, but I liked it and look forward to reading again, perhaps at different years of my life, and gaining and learning more.