Mine is Becky Chambers. I've just finished rereading all of her work, and it gave me the exact same feeling of hope I had the first time. Not groundbreaking, but soul-feeding.
I don't have one particular favorite, but up there is Akwaeke Emezi, who wrote Freshwater and The Death of Vivek Oji (among many, many others). Something about their writing style just sings to my soul.
For nonfiction, I’d have to say How to Say Babylon by Safiya Sinclair. It’s a memoir of a woman who grew up in a strict Rastafari household in Jamaica. Safiya is a poet and she has a beautiful command of language that makes her descriptions lyrical, haunting, or painful as needs be. However, if you generally need content warnings I would highly recommend looking them up for this book because she does not pull any punches.
For fiction, my favorite would probably be Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett (Storygraph went down in the middle of me writing this lol, will edit the link in later). It’s a lovely fantasy novel set in an alternate Earth where fae are real. You follow a Dryadologist as she works on documenting a rare type of fae while she works on her encyclopaedia of faeries (hence the title lol). I enjoyed being in Emily’s head as she worked through the problems presented to her, and as she interacted with her colleague.
Just finished reading something and want to share some thoughts, but don’t want to start a brand new thread? Feel free to post your mini-reviews here!...
I recently finished Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin, and while I can see why other people enjoyed it, it was not for me.
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow spoilersI’ve heard that the people who love this book tend to not play many video games, and those who dislike it do, and that holds true for me. While the characters are interesting at times and their development was done pretty well, I just could not get over how the video game design itself was described. Like, take Ichigo for example. It was the first game they developed together and described in the most detail. They talk about the art design, and the story, and the gender of the protagonist, but never once do they say what genre it is. Is it a platformer? Action? RPG? The genre of a game is the most important aspect of it, because all gameplay and mechanics play off of it in order to tell the story. Not to mention the fact that some of the games did things that are really just not possible in gaming storylines, like that Pioneers chapter towards the end of the book. You can do that sort of thing in a text-based roleplay forum, but not in an MMORPG as described in the book. Also, while I was very young when some of these games were developed and wasn’t in tune with technology then, some of the descriptions of it struck me as odd. Several times there were references to “burning out” several graphics cards and processors in a short amount of time trying to create certain visual effects in a game engine, for an indie PC game designed in 1997. Maybe computer components were just more delicate back then but… that just feels weird. Finally, Sadie’s vendetta against Sam really bothered me. Not that she found some things that Sam did a betrayal or wrong - I might as well if it were me! What bugged me the most was that she forgave Dov, her abusive ex, much more readily than Sam, her well-intentioned (if misguided at times) friend. And what she was initially upset about was Sam wanting her to speak to Dov! I just don’t understand that, and it wasn’t well justified to me at all. Also, the shooting was unnecessary and only served as “haha gamers are violent” to me.
Yeah of course the comment on who likes/dislikes it isn’t universal, it’s just something I heard mentioned at some point.
I’m someone who can struggle with minutae like what I mentioned in the spoiler section, so that’s probably a big part of why I disliked it. Like I said, I do understand why so many people like it - Gabrielle Zevin has great prose and the overall character development is interesting and compelling. I just struggled with some parts.
I’m from America so of course our literary classics are pretty widely known in the western world, so I’m going to recommend something a bit more niche: There There by Tommy Orange. It shines light on many different aspects of the Native American experience, specifically in Oakland, California. It covers addiction, poverty, culture, and heritage in a way that I (not Native myself) found moving.
[…] Eco separated his visitors into two categories: “those who react with ‘Wow! Signore professore dottore Eco, what a library you have. How many of these books have you read’ and the others — a very small minority — who get the point is that a private library is not an ego-boosting appendages but a research tool.”
So I’m a big advocate of utilizing your local public libraries. The best way to secure more funding for them is to use their services! So I thought real quick that I should write up a quick posts about the services that many libraries offer nowadays that you may not know about. Some of these points may be applicable mostly to...
Who is your favourite author?
Mine is Becky Chambers. I've just finished rereading all of her work, and it gave me the exact same feeling of hope I had the first time. Not groundbreaking, but soul-feeding.
What was your favorite read of 2023?
Any format counts (audiobook, physical book, ebook, graphic novel, article, essay, etc).
Recent finishes & Mini-Reviews
Just finished reading something and want to share some thoughts, but don’t want to start a brand new thread? Feel free to post your mini-reviews here!...
What are you reading?
Hey Beehaw (and friends)! What’re you reading?...
What are you reading? (August 2023)
Hey Beehaw (and friends)! What’re you reading?...
Chuck Tingle Goes Mainstream...ish ( themillions.com )
cross-posted from: kbin.social/m/books/t/223208...
What are you reading? (July 2023)
Hey Beehaw (and others)! Whatcha reading?
What is an iconic piece of literature from your country?
It doesn’t have to be famous, just a work that you connect with that you feel represents your country in some way.
What's your favorite book(s) of all time?
List as many or as few as you like!
The Virtue of Owning Books You Haven’t Read: Why Umberto Eco Kept an “Antilibrary” ( www.openculture.com )
[…] Eco separated his visitors into two categories: “those who react with ‘Wow! Signore professore dottore Eco, what a library you have. How many of these books have you read’ and the others — a very small minority — who get the point is that a private library is not an ego-boosting appendages but a research tool.”
‘Journalism mustn’t be silenced’: colleagues to complete slain reporter’s book ( www.theguardian.com )
Why Libraries are Awesome
So I’m a big advocate of utilizing your local public libraries. The best way to secure more funding for them is to use their services! So I thought real quick that I should write up a quick posts about the services that many libraries offer nowadays that you may not know about. Some of these points may be applicable mostly to...
Recent Finishes/Mini Reviews (June 2023)
Post about books you recently finished, and if you’d like, a brief review of the book here!...
BookWyrm - a fediverse Goodreads clone, if you're looking to break away from Amazon! ( joinbookwyrm.com )
Just thought I’d throw it out there. You can import your Goodreads (or Storygraph or other) history as well....
What are you reading? (June 2023)
Hey Beehaw, whatcha reading right now?