steph
This is the second book I've read in the last few months that deals with being a small part of a greater whole. Don't we all just want to belong? To be part of something greater than ourselves? Anna North's "Bog Queen" asks where humans fit in the long history of the world, what humans owe to the collective on the macro and micro scale. The moss will outlive us, despite our best efforts. Maybe not the best comparison, they're very different books. But the idea of the collective, the community, is a hot one right now.
Sarah Gailey's "Make Me Better" instead asks who can be seduced by the collective when the collective is harmful. Celia just wants to belong, to fall in love, to not be left the way she has been left, through no fault of her own. I think we can all see Celia for what she is, a traumatized, lonely person, even if the book doesn't explore that in a direct, therapeutic way. Making her the perspective character adds a certain weight to the book, since Celia isn't an outsider looking for fault. She's an outsider looking to belong.
There's a part toward the end where the book really spells out what it's been trying to tell you for 300+ pages, but that seems to be the norm now, and I'm not sure I can continue to hate it. It isn't going anywhere. But it also shows the direct change in Celia's thinking that is, truly, only a minor shift. We're all just a small push from looking away, since we do it so much in our daily lives.
I don't usually write this much about books. This is one I tore through as quickly as I could, partly because of the sense of foreboding, and partly because I just really wanted to see what was up with this island and this culty community. I've been thinking about it a lot, and I'll probably be thinking about it for a long time.
Oh, and if you usually skip the acknowledgements, don't skip these.
I loved pages 1-126, which create a curiosity about lifting and body building that encourages women to try out things, and to know why their beneficial.
Pages 127-208 can go right in the garbage heap. She turns it so quickly to gatekeeping. It goes to "there is only one way to lift, and that's to be a body builder and obsess over your nutrition and weight and work out 7 days a week," and gives a one-size-fits-all approach to lifting weights. But that's not true. Power lifting and body building and strength training are all vastly different, with different dietary needs, and different approaches.
Loved it until I hated it.
So great! This wasn't as abstract as the other Knútsdóttir (The Night Guest), it was just as amazing. Twice as amazing because nothing happens to the cats in this one.
A book about a cat who brings two people together who need each other? It's so good, and well written. Suspenseful and thoughtful at the same time.
I love all of Gailey’s books I’ve read, but this one is going to take me awhile to digest…
Okay. Here goes:
Sarah Gailey’s “Spread Me” is one of the weirdest, most uncomfortable books I’ve ever read. Based on the description, I was not expecting virus related erotica, but I guess that's what's up.
I’m not a prude, but I can also recognize that this isn’t my preferred type o’ reading. The sex aspects of this novel really took me out of the story, which is honestly the better concept here. I would love to read more about the "villain" and the mutual attraction between it and Kinsey, but I sort of lost interest in that as the more sex-focused aspects took center stage. I can see how some people would like it, but it honestly didn't work for me.
Very well written.
Very, very weird.
It's rare to read the unfiltered thoughts of a narrator and find it interesting, and yet Sister Svangerd and the Not Quite Dead pulls it off somehow. I will say there were times I had to put this book down because of the sheer amount of intellectual, religious arguments that were both probably incredibly allegorical and also true to the real world and I'm just not versed enough to understand. Even still, this book works in a way I can't explain. It's funny, witty, adventurous, and intelligent.
Thanks for the DRC!
Thank you to Edelweiss and DAW for the DRC!
Wiswell does it again! This was an absolutely beautiful version of the Heracles labors. It started out so funny, got me hooked, and then kept me on the line with it's clever and emotional storytelling. I loved all of the characters, and the entire thing. No notes.
This was my last ARC from Netgalley before they slammed the door shut on eink possibilities. So thanks to the publisher for the ARC, but I will not be thanking Netgalley.
Anyway.
Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil was great! Sad and horny and really well done.
I'll admit that I had a hard time getting into this at first because I just wasn't sure how it all tied together, the 3 characters stories seemed so separated. But it paid off to stick with it.
I think fans of Addie will be really pleased with this one.
I am in this book and did not like it .. until I did, which is maybe the whole dang point.
I had to read this in small parts, maybe a chapter or shorter at a time. There was a lot in here that I had to really think about and wonder about my own behaviors.
If you want to really evaluate yourself and your own biases, start with The Age of Magical Overthinking.
Thanks to NetGalley and Timber Press for the digital ARC!
With How Can I Help, Tallamy accomplishes the near unthinkable – making conservation and change easy to understand and possible to enact in your own backyard.
Answering questions like “what insects are in decline other than honey bees and butterflies,” and “how to caterpillars find host plants,” Tallamy provides quick and informative access to complicated issues facing the plants and animals in the country. His answers help redefine insects, birds, and bats from nuisance to vital part of the ecosystem for people who have all too often demonized them.
I'll be recommending this to all of my gardening friends who love seeing butterflies, but hate sharing their plants with caterpillars.
Thanks to NetGalley and Chronicle Books for the digital ARC!
I absolutely love Matt Kracht's Dumb Field Guides. I love them so much I bought The Big Dumb Bird Journal.
It was nice to see some of my favorite Worst Birds in this book! And the Bummr Rating's were great, and definitely inconsistent enough to make me read each and every one.
What. A. Book!
I didn't know what to expect from this based on the description, but wow was I floored. Dracula from the perspective of the ship is what I was expecting, and I got that and so very much more!
I want to recommend Of Monsters and Mainframes to everyone I've ever met. From it's lovable cast of AI ships, classic monsters, and ethically questionable ship doctor-robots, to it's tightly plotted storyline, it consumed me for days! I don't read that quickly anymore, but every free moment I had was dedicated to reading this book.
It's also so fucking funny. Like, seriously. I kept laughing and then having to read passages to my husband, who also got more than a few chuckles out of it. The phrase “Fuck yeah, robot arm” has become a mainstay in our apartment.
I really just can't say enough great things about Of Monsters and Mainframes. The more I think about it, the more I realize how expertly plotted it is, and how wonderfully the plot is driven by the characters.
Thank you to Netgalley and Bindery Books/Ezeekat Press for the digital ARC. I can't wait to order a physical copy and read it all over again!
Dan & I saw this on quite a few staff picks or suggested reading displays, listed as a “whimsical” or “comforting” read. Dan was upset about this, and said it was nothing of the sort.
So I offered to read it and tell him if he was remembering it correctly.
While the childlike wonder of Piranesi is really wonderful, and probably lends itself to the whimsical label people give it .. it is not a comforting or whimsical tale. It's about deceit, and betrayal, and loneliness.
As usual, Dan is correct.
Beautiful, bittersweet, heart breaking, and perfect.
Readers who expect too much explanation of How Stuff Works will be disappointed. But that lack of explanation is what makes this so beautiful. The unknown and unknowable is what makes the magic.
Thanks to Tor and Netgalley for the digital ARC, and to Tor for providing a physical ARC to my library. I'm going to end up preordering it just to see what these illustrations are!
More like roMANtasy.
Sorry, I'll see my way out...
I was given an eARC by Tor and NetGalley for the upcoming re-issue (I think).
A cute little story, to be sure, with some steamy parts. Halla was an interesting enough perspective character, and I loved that she weaponized certain parts of her personality to come out in the middle most of her life.
I know it's an ARC, but there were some style choices that I kept thinking were typos. The characters interrupt themselves with “err” a fair bit, and sentences just stop without any punctuation. It happened enough that I have to believe it's on purpose, but it was distracting enough that I found my way to re-reading whole paragraphs to see if I missed something further up. I'd rate it higher if it weren't for those things.
And also plot points that just ... die, I guess? I'd explain more, but I don't want to spoil it for anyone.
The real deal of the whole thing is Brindle. Five stars for Brindle.
Requested for West Virginia, read for general interest. There were times this book was sort of outside of my understanding, since I've never had land enough to think about these sorts of things. But Whyman's storytelling is both good and relatable. The first few paragraphs really spell out why returning land to itself is vitally important in a climate crisis that no one seems ready to take responsibility for on a macro level.
Thanks for the digital ARC, Timber Press and Netgalley!
What a beautiful collection of poetry and illustrations! The intros to each section are wonderful, and it's easy to read one section at a time. I thought it would be weird to read Gerard Manley Hopkins and then Joy Harjo a few pages later, but Deming has done an excellent job editing this collection to flow smoothly.
I requested this specifically for Aimee Nezhukumatathil, but I got so much more than I expected.
Thanks to NetGalley and Storey for the digital ARC!
