May Reading Roundup!

One of my favorite hobbies is pleasure reading, and one of my 2019 reading goals is to get into the practice of sharing and reflecting on my reading.

May’s reading was just fantastic; I kept thinking “it won’t get better than this book!”…and then the next read would stun me just as much. If you are looking for some great summer reading, all of these are great start…or a great summer’s worth of reading!

Wild Seed (Octavia Butler):

Overall Impressions? Stunningly thought-provoking “prequel” to Butler’s Paternoster series, involving the journey of Anyanwu, a supernatural shape-shifter, over three centuries and across the Atlantic and her relationship with the equally-powerful, fearsome, and supernatural Doro. It’s a tale about power and negotiating with it.

Striking Quotation? “But she has formed the habit of submission. In her love for Isaac and for her children, and in her fear of death—especially for the kind of death Doro would inflict—she had given into him again and again. Habits were difficult to break. The habit of living, the habit of fear…even the habit of love.” (p.211)

Recommend? YESSSSSSSS

Lot (Bryan Washington):

Overall Impressions? Short stories of the present, based in the neighborhoods of Houston and telling tales of queer black, Latinx characters. Two of my (many) favorites were “Shepherd,” a boy’s tale of his Jamaican aunt’s stay at his home, and “Navigation.” I really liked how half the stories were connected by a common character/narrator and the other half were entirely independent (though each story can stand on its own.

Striking Quotation? “This is how easy it is to walk out of a life. I’d alway wondered, and now I knew.” (p.141, “Navigation”)

Recommend? Absolutely

Freshwater (Akwaeke Emezi):

Overall Impressions? There is so much going on in this book, from its journeys around gender and sexuality to its ideas about religion and spirituality, as well as its negotiations of families, relationships, and cultures, and psychology. It’s a great story, and it’s imagery and ideas are still sticking with me.

Striking Quotation? “Understand this if you understand nothing: it is a powerful thing to be seen.” (p.213)

Recommend? Yes, and hoping it wins a Lammy for Trans fiction!

The Line Becomes a River (Francisco Cantú):

Overall Impression? I read this because Luther selected it for its summer reading, and—although glad to see the author cited Gloria Anzaldúa and donates proceeds to organizations like No More Deaths—I was a bit skeptical about the premise of “the author graduated from college and joined the border patrol to get firsthand experience.” But I was wrong—there were times I was skeptical—fairly so—but Cantú ends it well, with great reflections about the impossibility of participating in a system without being shaped and affected by that system. I’m very excited to engage this reading and questions of borders and borderlands in my REL-101/Biblical Studies classes this year.

Striking Quotation? “You know, my mother said, it’s not just your safety I worry about. I know how a person can become lost in a job, how the soul can buckle when placed within a structure.” (p.76)

Recommend? Yes, especially alongside the writings of Gloria Anzaldúa and other Latinx authors (especially queer women)

The Song of Achilles (Madeline Miller):

Overall Impressions? Miller’s book tells the stories in and around the Iliad anew, and it is so fresh that, even though I know these stories and plot-lines well, familiar moments felt like a surprise. As in Circe (which I read last summer), Miller’s crafting of characters is complex, but she delivers us humans in all of their flaws and beauties, and she creates two gay men whose relationship and personalities are real, imperfect, and (therefore) quite lovely and compelling. Overall, I loved this book, but it still feels like a “gay story” in comparison to Circe’s feminist-queer tale.

Striking Quotation? “His trust was a part of him, as much as his hands or his miraculous feet. And despite my hurt, I would not wish to see it gone, to see him as uneasy and fearful as the rest of us, for any price.” (p.135)

Recommend? Yes, before or after reading Circe, and alongside Pat Barker’s Silence of the Girls, which retells the Iliad from Briseis’ voice.

Confessions of the Fox (Jordy Rosenberg):

Overall Impressions? This may be the best book I read all year…maybe the best book I’ve ever read. It was the story I needed, the fierce blend of modern and postmodern timelines, of queerness and subversion, of academic theory, activism, and fiction. It is the story of Jack Sheppard, an 18th century trans rogue, and his companion Bess Khan which is framed within the story of a trans professor in contemporary times who discovers this story’s manuscript and is working to edit it. A thrilling tale transpires.

Striking Quotation? “So, yes, we are a wretched, misery-sowing people. But how curious, how beautiful we have been, as well. In our terrible past, my new friends see a different future reflected like light off broken shards.” (p.267, footnotes)

Recommend? YES! YES! OMG, YES! (This is a book I will be reading again and again and again; I read the library copy, and bought my own copy as I finished it!)

What’s on the shelf, most likely for June?

I’m already partially through Un-Su Kim’s The Plotters, and I’m also looking forward to A. Merc Rustad’s So You Want To Be a Robot?, Speak No Evil by Uzodinma Iweala (continuing my “read Lammy finalists” around Pride), and Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God.