Julia

A book club friend finished this earlier than I did, and said she felt like she needs a re-read to fully absorb this; now having finished, I feel similarly. Now having read 2 nonfiction books and a novel by Betasamosake Simpson, I don't know that I will ever love her nonfiction as much as her fiction (If you're reading this, go read Noopiming: The Cure for White Ladies right now!), which is glorious, but this is almost on par with Hospicing Modernity for me in terms of reads where you have feel your worldview experiencing growing pains (and delight!) as you go along. I'm excited to see what that pain and delight looks like in action as I continue to let Betasamosake's vision for radical resurgence sit with me, and what solidarity with that resurgence looks/feels like.

Wonderful. I think all U.S. history taught in high school include An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States and this book - maybe bookending the year? Treuer powerfully interweaves historical documents, speeches, policy, etc. with personal narrative in his central argument: the story of Indigenous Americans has never ended, but persisted, with all the complexity that any human history has. His interviewees were generous in sharing their stories, and Treuer is also generous in sharing his own positionality. At the end, I did find myself wondering what this book would look like if published after 2020, but I think that's all part of Treuer's point: Native peoples will continue to change and adapt with the times as will we all.

The Ravenel series is starting to blur together for me, but I think I really liked this one? A Kleypas weakness is that she doesn't write enough heroines in bigger bodies, but Cassandra is one. Also plenty of good banter from other characters met in the series. I was curious to see how she would redeem Tom Severin, who has been an ass in a few of the previous novels, but she pulled it off. Overall, a fun, characteristic romp.

Really loved this - dystopian in all the best ways. Comparisons to Atwood are completely inevitable, I think (and Atwood's blurb is on the cover), but Alderman as akin to Atwood without being derivative. Multiple narratives are deftly interwoven, the countdown chronology is the drumbeat of a propulsive plot, and there are so many interesting questions raised by the world Alderman has conceived. The only thing I didn't love was the denouement. It felt a bit didactic in a way that none of the rest of the novel did, and I think it might have been stronger without it. Still, a great read!

These are just so consistently pleasant! The main issue here is that West Ravenel isn't nearly as terrible as he thinks he is, especially after exposure to his charm and kindness across the previous 4 Ravenel books. I'm a sucker for the the reappearance of the Wallflowers and their spouses, however, and this book has good heat. Plus it's nice to have a break from the female protagonists as virgins.

I liked this! Nice to have a Kleypas novel not focused on the "upper class," and lots of fun historical doctoring details in here. This suffers a bit from being several years old, because I think a current re-write could have leaned more into British colonial violence against the Irish, which was an interested subplot. Good mix of suspense and romance.

I suppose it's odd to say I really enjoyed a book while only minimally understanding the plot, but here we are! Nona is a gem, the plot became marginally more comprehensible by the end, and I really hope John/God gets his comeuppance at the close of the series.