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July and August Books

September 15, 2025

 

As I was writing this, I discovered that (most of) the books I read over the past 2 months are companions—either mirror images, cousins, or horseshoe ends from each other. Completely by accident! This post does not include the books I enjoyed at family beach week this year. In keeping with tradition (I guess?), those books will have their own post. 

Pair #1: Contemporary takes on community

I have a love-hate relationship with short story collections. I so desperately want to love them! (I've started Ted Chiang's Exhalation collection at least three times...) But for some reason, my attention always wanders. Of notable exception is my recent adoration of Claire Keegan's works and, now, Lydia Millet's Atavists. (I do wonder if the fact that Lydia's collection is an anthology so we encounter characters that interact with each other throughout each of the stories helped focus my attention...?)

"Atavism" means the act of returning to one's natural form. Lydia's choice of title, then, casts all of her characters as personae in transition/metamorphosis/regression/uncovering. All of the personalities and plot lines that populate these stories are highly familiar to anybody living in contemporary America. There's an incel bodybuilder, a professor on the verge of cancellation due to plagiarism allegations, porn addicts, adolescents acting out (and egged on by the internet)...

Much like the critiques I've lobbed recently at works by Amanda Hess and Eula Biss (2 nonfic works, which is notable that my mind is connecting Atavists so heavily to nonfiction), part of me left some of Millet's stories (and thus the collection as a whole) wanting more resolution. What point are you trying to make, Lydia? What are you SAYING about incel culture? But I also think this is an unfair expectation to foist on an author, especially a fiction writer.

I take issue with some of the critiques of this collection I've seen from NPR and the NYT. The Times review reads, "Atavists concedes ground to the disillusioned among us." I'm not convinced that's true. Ignoring the "disillusioned" that populate our culture is to ignore the vast majority of people who participate in contemporary Western culture (there's more nuance to be unpacked here, but I'm genuinely trying not to write an essay here...). I didn't walk away thinking the main affect of her writing is despair, either.


My July mat book was Mia Birdsong's beautiful instruction manual on building community. Unlike the (mostly) disconnected characters that populated Lydia's Atavists (with 1 notable exception—the young lady who unites her neighbors to better everyone's quality of life), Mia's book is full of the wisdom she's collected from the community leaders, activists, & elders she's encountered. 

Some parts of this book were reminiscent of my experience reading bell hooks' All About Love, about which I wrote: "I find that I am already familiar with (most of) the ideas & principles she's putting forth, but her language and the depth of her careful, studied, researched mastery of the topic have knocked me on my ass several times." 

Other parts of Mia's book were fresh ideas for me. One example that jumps to mind is the chapter about restorative justice. I am familiar with the larger concept of restorative justice, but to experience the concept become tangible through intentional practice in Mia's reporting of her lived experience with it was incredibly moving. That chapter provoked a lot of self-reflection about the societal, familial, social, and personal processes that I take for granted or accept simply because I don't want to upend the status quo. Who are these rituals serving? Do they actually serve their intended goals, or do they secretly uphold a system that perpetuates more harm by acting against my/our values? 

I love Mia's palpable reverence for her citational practice*, to use a seemingly bland term to describe the way she thoughtfully tends to her lineage of knowledge-making. This is something that is evident across all of Mia's work.

*I think a lot about citational practice in my work even outside of The Academy.™ I learned the term first from Sara Ahmed's sensational 2013 blog post: "Making Feminist Points", which I read as part of a Digital Rhetoric class taught by Dr. Caddie Alford. 

Pair #2: Dysfunctional families on stage

My infatuation with plays continued with two classics: August Wilson's Fences and Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie. Wilson's masterpiece is a tight examination of Black American life and the masculinity trap. The main character is Troy Maxson, a washed-up baseball player entrenched in his own bitterness, guilt, and shame. Of all the elements in this work to admire, I loved the way Wilson wrote the character of Rose, Troy's wife. Rose so easily could be afforded no energy in his work, the way that she is obstructed within the plot. She could've been written as a pitiable victim, and yet! In many ways, Rose reminds me a lot of Pilate Dead from Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon—she finds new ways to embody the role assigned to her and, in doing so, she reclaims the agency that could be denied her.

The flavor of familial dysfunction in Fences revolves entirely around Troy. His bitterness at being stuck in a dead-end job after having been such a promising young athlete stymies his ability to support his son, whose legacy he fears will surpass his own. He also harbors a great deal of resentment towards Rose—a projection of his own self-loathing—which (spoiler alert) fuels his long-term affair with another woman. 


And then we have the Wingfields. Reading Williams' play in concert with Wilson's was an accidentally beautiful parallel journey. This play appears to center on the man of the household, like Fences, but the real story is about the women: mother Amanda and daughter Laura. Like Wilson, Williams' play is written by a man that features male narrators and protagonists experiencing a tremendous amount of ennui and restlessness that seem to overshadow the desires of the women in their lives. I wish there were stronger shades of agency afforded to the Wingfield women, TBH. Laura and Amanda don't ever fully overcome their victim status, trapped by the generational confusion of aging (for Amanda) and by the weight of expectations, not to mention chronic illness (for Laura). 

I've discovered an exquisite kind of frustration when reading plays. There is an acute blockage that happens when you read a play because the externalization of the playwright's words and stage directions is constrained entirely by my imagination. I can only project my own interpretation of the play onto a stage of my own making, and that's kind of antithetical! To experience a play without the influence of the artistic choices made by directors, actors, and production designers is to experience only half of the work, if that. 

Pair #3: College kids confronting "The Truth" 

Welcome to Hampden College, the small Vermont liberal arts school of your dreams. At least, on the surface it appears that way. When you look closer, you discover a cult of sorts has sprung out of the Classics department. Richard, our narrator and incredibly unreliable navigator of this story, is an outsider at Hampden—a poor, brilliant kid from the West Coast who desperately longs to join the ranks of the cool kids studying Greek with an enigmatic and highly secretive professor. Of course, Richard manages to snag an invite to the cult and all hell promptly breaks loose. 

One of Donna Tartt's talents as a writer (and I can attest to his as a fan of The Goldfinch) is her masterful ability to evoke the particular anguish assigned to those with outsider status. A common complaint I've heard about this novel is the "lack" of character growth. (A complaint I lodged very recently at Lynn Steger Strong's The Float Test!) But I think readers who make that argument are confusing Richard's core identity with lack of change. I think he does change! And it happens in very small, subtle ways, as opposed to one fell swoop. Grandiose gestures like that are certainly not Tartt's style, anyway. Her writing unfolds like a steady, maddening dripping faucet. 

I do wish we got to see more of Julian, the supposed ringleader of this band of overly intellectual assholes. The greatest influence we feel from Julian is actually that of his absence, and that's not in keeping with the plot. He is God to these kids in many destructive ways—I want to see more of him! 


Technically, the students that populate this play are not in college (anymore). But! The play is set at the chaotic afterparty of a conservative Catholic college's presidential confirmation ceremony and the students are alumni of said school + the daughter of said new president. So... 

Arbery's play is a brilliant examination of contemporary right-wing culture's appropriation of religious belief. Set soon after the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, the four young adults that star in this brilliant work represent four unique identities along the spectrum of political and Catholic belief. Arbery's dialogue is SO smart and quite literally made me gasp aloud at certain points. These characters—Teresa, in particular—know exactly the words to say to cause the most damage to each other, and sometimes they delight in the inflicting of those wounds. The pacing is entirely correct, the imagery is rich, and the caustic message(s) carried by each of the characters is incredibly potent for contemporary audiences. 


The standalone about technology (bc of course)

Zoe and Jack are brilliant(?) Harvard undergrads who believe they've discovered a cure for aging. Hot on the cusp of this incredible (and potentially highly profitable) potential, they rush into the ruthless world of tech startups. Demanding VC firms, Harvard lawsuits, and viral Ted talks ensue. But when the science starts to look a little shakier than they've led the world to believe, the cofounders (and soulmates?) are faced with some extremely difficult questions they are wholly unprepared to answer. 

I really wanted Taylor to explore Zoe and Jack's internal thoughts, feelings, questions, hopes, and anxieties about (im)mortality and science-as-ersatz religion and technology as the new God. Alas, we only get little whiffs (think: a few sentences here and there) along these lines. (I recognize also that this is my own bias based on my own interests shining through.) Also, I take issue with how little page space Jack gets to develop in comparison to Zoe. He has a far more compelling backstory than she does (IMO...there was more potential for Zoe than we saw, too), and we are entirely rushed through it in the final few chapters. And then Jack's entire reason for being becomes, simply, Zoe. While Romantic, it would've been much more powerful to watch this happen alongside Zoe's complex arc of feeling-development as opposed to a breeze-through to wrap the story up. In this way, the end of Notes on Infinity reminded me a lot of my issues with Yael Van Der Wouden's The Safekeep

Note from Kate: Hi! If you buy something through a link on my page, I may earn an affiliate commission. I recommend only products I genuinely like & recommend, and my recommendation is not for sale. Thank you! 

Huzzah! A Day at the Ren Fair

September 8, 2025


Picture it: England, 1539.

This weekend, I checked another challenge off of my "25 Hard Things in 2025" list by taking a trip back in time at the Maryland Renaissance Festival! 

I've never been to a Ren Fair before, so I'm lucky that I have friends with some impressive Renaissance, theater, and LARPing pedigrees to show me the ropes: Tessa is a curator of historic textiles and dress and worked for years as a historic reenactor; Sam is a theater buff and talented seamstress (picture quoting Shakespeare from memory and sewing her own costume); Julia is one of the most well-read people I know, especially when it comes to Medieval and Renaissance poetry, and grew up going to the Maryland festival; and Corrine is a theater professional, playwright, and—the pièce de résistance—spent the first part of this summer working as a Ren faire cast member! They had us in stitches when they adopted their town crier persona to read the official lore of this year's festival on the drive up. (I had no idea so much happened in 1539!)

We visited the festival during Myth & Magic Weekend and tried to dress appropriately. My Celtic-ish coronet was the most overtly themed part of my ensemble, although the dried orange slices hanging from my ears felt vaguely magical(?). Tessa dressed much more on-theme as Strega Nona, replete with her magical pasta pot full of never-ending spaghetti (aka yards of stringy white yarn). Corrine and Sam stitched their own tops, an incredibly impressive feat, and I loved Sam's big purple wizard hat. 

Admiring the costumes worn by other patrons is a major activity at the Faire. We saw vikings, plague doctors chasing plague-infested rats, fairies, princesses, knights, barons, wizards, pirates, bananas, centaurs, dragons, serfs, burlap sacks, Fiona and Shrek, and the Pope. 

Eating is another major pastime and I was pleasantly surprised by the variety available. We'd been at the festival for maybe 10 minutes before Corrine and I stumbled upon the pickle and pretzel cart. Obviously a walking pickle was in order. The heat was particularly brutal in the sun on Saturday and, as I discovered during the Cap2Cap, pickles are quite hydrating! 

Over the course of the day, we also tucked into some funnel cake fries as we watched two fools perform a pantomime, tried to stay cool with ice cream sandwiches and pink lemonade, and enjoyed a lunch of spinach and meat pies, fried jalapeño mac and cheese bites, a scotch egg, and a (quite suggestive looking, might I add) sausage on a stick. 

I've been a pescatarian for over 10 years now. Still, there is something quite compelling about the idea of a turkey leg! I was genuinely hoping one of the meat-eaters of our party would enjoy one so I could live vicariously through them, but it was too hot to eat such a large quantity of food. Sigh. Another dream deferred.
There are so many things to see and do at the festival and we only scratched the surface! We caught some of Jacques ze Whipper's midday show, lobbed insults against the King, had our fortunes read by the Mayoress, and perused as many of the adorable shops that dot the landscape as possible. Unlike some other fairs (apparently), Maryland's festival grounds are permanent, meaning the buildings and structures stay up year-round and the shops move in every year. I really like that element because it lends a more immersive feeling to the whole event. I feel like I didn't see too many people on their phones as we walked around, either, which was really nice.

My favorite event, hands-down, was the joust. Challenged by a visiting Andalusian princess, four champions on horseback vied to win a map to El Dorado, the legendary City of Gold. A campy storyline to be sure, but there is nothing staged about the action in the arena when the mounted knights actually compete for the favor of the crowd. Tessa, Sam, & I went hoarse rooting for Prince Miguel. He might've been the contender assigned to our section, but I'm completely unbiased when I laud his undeniable charisma and the enviable fruit of his haircare routine. 
Not long after we ended our food tour through Revel Grove with frozen bananas dipped in chocolate and covered with chopped Maraschino cherries, enjoyed while we took in Ses Carny's daredevil knife show, the skies opened up and sweet, cool rain drenched us. It was a welcome relief after such a hot, dusty day on our feet, TBH, and we giggled all the way to the car.

In an ideal world, we would've stayed longer. The shows get bawdier as the day goes on, obviously the weather is cooler, and the final joust of the day is, apparently, a FIGHT TO THE DEATH. Alas! We had a long drive back home to Richmond and we were all pretty pooped. There's a reason the fair apparently gets more crowded in October, when the weather is cooler (although tickets for this weekend sold out after just 24 hours!). 

What is a group of tired, hungry, rain-soaked Ren Fest goers to do but seek the nearest stack of pancakes? And so we did! 
We were about halfway home by the time we pulled into this IHOP and everyone was extremely normal about encountering four damp sorceresses from the 14th century. I can't explain why, but group breakfast-for-dinner at the end of a singular event (ren fest, choir concert, theater show, tech rehearsal, swim meet etc.) has a unique patina of hilarity, absurdity, and meaning. You can feel yourself creating a memory that you'll feel nostalgia for while you're still in it, you know? 

That night at IHOP was like that—the four of us tucked into a slightly too-small booth so we were pressed close together, cupping mugs of tea, tucking into mozzarella sticks, waffles, pancakes, and veggie sausage as we laughed, shared stories, and bantered with the bemused waitstaff. I feel so warm when people from different parts of my life come together and get along like a house on fire...I'm so grateful to know & love such cool, creative, intelligent people!

Maryland Renaissance Festival, I'll definitely be back. 

A Weekend in New York

August 24, 2025

In June, I hopped back on my old pal, Amtrak's Northeast Regional, for a long weekend in New York. My friend, Erin, joined me on the train as it passed through Baltimore and we gabbed about how excited we were to be going home. 

E & I met when we taught 9th grade ELA together in Manhattan.

She's always had this effortlessly cool energy that makes me feel like her overexcited little sister. Not because of anything she does! She just has this unflappable exterior that exudes a very integral element of chill. It's (part of) what makes her a really fantastic teacher; kids love consistency, and our students knew they could rely on her steadiness even amidst the turbulence of the pandemic. 

Erin was already teaching 9th grade ELA at our school when I joined the team, and she was so patient with me, a baby-faced recent grad trying to embody any element of authority in front of the classroom. She made me a better teacher with simple, direct reflections and tips, and her creativity was unmatched when trying to brainstorm ways to engage our students in the books we read with them. 

I love gabbing with her about...anything, really, but especially books, contemporary trends in education, and what she's listening to lately. Her music taste is unparalleled, as is her sense of humor. One of my favorite memories involves the two of us laughing literally to the point of tears streaming down our faces while sitting on the floor of my classroom after school. Or the time she literally changed my life when we went to New Jersey just so we could go to the Cheesecake Factory and Erin introduced me to the magic that is their Four Cheese Pasta. (Erin's a lifelong vegetarian—another thing that's just f*cking COOL.) Needless to say, I was pumped to spend the weekend catching up and exploring our old haunts. 

Our first stop was Tacombi for piña coladas, esquites, and tacos. It's probably the nostalgia, or the insane price tag, but I feel like I can genuinely taste a difference when I'm eating back in the city. Unfortunately, I am one of those assholes that proclaim the superiority of NYC bagels and pizza dough. (It's the water!!)

On our first night back in the city, Erin & I decided to pop into The Morgan Library & Museum. Neither of us had been before, and it turned out to be a free entry day! 


The library is gorgeous, all stained glass and lush mahogany wood, filled to the brim with rich paintings and, naturally, thousands of books. Three of the books in The Morgan's collection are Gutenberg bibles—three! The Morgan is the only museum in the world to have that many copies. It was rather astonishing to come across a copy of the ancient text rather casually encased next to a breathtaking edition of Charles Dickens. 

On Saturday, Erin and I made a beeline for old stomping grounds in Brooklyn. We picked up our usual orders from Bagel Pub, took a spin through the Saturday market in Grand Army Plaza, where I sadly did not see my pickle guy (I've been yearning for his wasabi dills since I left the city over 3 years ago), and settled on our favorite bench in Prospect Park.


Prospect Park is one of my absolute favorite places on Earth. My life in Brooklyn revolved around that park. I've been witness to the countless weddings, quinceañeras, memorial services, baby showers, birthday parties, little league games, marathons, pot lucks, open mic nights, frisbee tournaments, dog shows, Bible studies, Mommy & me classes, Tai Chi lessons, roving stand up comedy shows, improv practices, photoshoots, picnics, pick-up soccer matches, & going-away parties (including my own!) held on the regs in the park.

Taking a little walk down Prospect Park memory lane...

Baby Kate's first-ever time in Prospect Park! I think I'd lived in the city for 5 minutes by this point.
I love this photo of me saying goodbye to my friend, Allie, because my face looks like a cartoon character but I was genuinely trying not to cry

Erin & I sat in the park for hours, watching the old neighborhood go by. Eventually, we got up and made our way to the Brooklyn Flea—a Dumbo mecca for all the Brooklyn hipsters. (I had forgotten in my time away that you really can clock the borough where someone lives based on their outfit...sometimes down to the specific neighborhood or cross-streets. Imagine a lineup of tote bags from people that live in Chelsea, Bushwick, FiDi, LIC, and Washington Heights and you'll see exactly what I mean.) We also popped into powerHouse books, where I picked up a copy of Brigid Brophy's The King of a Rainy Country. (Review coming soon—TLDR: WOW!!)


Even though Erin and I once literally walked home from school across the Manhattan bridge (only took us ~4 hours), neither of us are used to how much walking you do by simply existing in New York anymore. We absolutely collapsed upon our return to the hotel room and decided to settle in for a night of scary movies & pizza. 

Erin and I returned to the city for another reason besides Prospect Park: we had Sunday tickets to Gov Ball! 

I've been to Gov Ball once before—it's where I discovered my undying love for MUNA. Sunday's lineup this year was stellar, including Raye, Clairo, Glass Animals (!), and Hozier (!!). The looming rain (mostly) held off and we bopped for HOURS, noshing on ice cream sandwiches and pierogis. Even the heat, which had been pretty punishing the day before, wasn't overwhelming in the massive crowd. 

I know I'm conforming to the stereotype of being yet another non-native New Yorker who lived in the city for a brief stint in her twenties and talks for the rest of her life about being "forever changed" by her time in the city, but.....oh well! I still think about the Miriam Adenay quote I used when posting the pictures from my goodbye party several years ago:  “You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart always will be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place.” 

I'm not itching to move back to New York, necessarily, but there is something to be said for the first place you get the chance to build your own life completely from scratch as a young adult. It's like your first kiss, first love, first pet, first anything of value—it'll always hold a special place in your heart. And how lucky for me that I still get to visit that love (alongside the people I love)?! I <3 you, New York. See you soon.

May and June 2025 reads

July 5, 2025


May was a delightfully busy month, book-wise! June.....was certainly a month! Managed to finish 3 :)

A(n insufferable) family saga

I had high hopes for this book. Lynn Steger Strong wrote a beautiful article in April for The Atlantic titled "Joan Didion's Books Should Have Been Enough" that I completely agreed with. Her article was a breath of fresh air amidst the countless other takes I saw delighting in the publication of an incredibly private person's therapy notes. Alas, Lynn's writing prowess & correct Didion opinions were not enough to save this book. 

Generally, books that explore the highly dysfunctional inner workings of a family unit are right up my alley (see: Long Island Compromise by Taffy Brodesser-Akner). As a rule, the characters that populate dysfunctional stories are selfish, neurotic, controlling, or just plain bananas. But unlike the characters of Taffy's novel, for example, Lynn's characters are broken, selfish, lost...and stay that way. There is 0 character development for them. The novel is filled with insufferable people who act horribly and.....that's it. I kept waiting for even a glimpse at resolution—even if it didn't happen on the pages themselves, surely she'll give us a hint that things get better once the novel ends!? It never came. 

The perspective of this novel is very...unique. Our narrator is Jude (aka Judith), sister to Jenn, Fred (aka Winnifred), and George (the sole brother). Somehow, via Jude's narrative, we are allowed access to Fred and George's inner selves, but not to Jenn nor even to Fred herself? So maybe we're only accessing Jude's projected understanding of her siblings? Maybe....but that's never made clear. I understand—adore, even!—an unreliable narrator, but the arc of discovery of Jude's unreliability is wholly missing. Jude and Fred are quietly feuding the whole novel (I shan't spoil any details) and that just sort of fizzles out by the end without satisfaction for anyone involved. 

There is 0 examination of why Jude and Fred chose traditionally boy nicknames for themselves, or why they both follow the same career & life trajectory but somehow maintain a living grudge. The father of this crumbling mess of a family is a random character that floats in and out of scenes and is, functionally, a set piece. He had much more potential than we ever were afforded the opportunity to enjoy.

An enthralling multigenerational octopus
I love a story that's crafted by the intricate weaving together of (seemingly) distinct pieces and Madeleine proves herself an absolute master at that with this novel. We follow three generations of family through the roiling change of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, culminating in the frantic energy of Tiananmen Square. 

One of the major plot lines of Madeleine's novel follows Wen the Dreamer and his wife, Swirl, in their quest to finish a never-ending love story written by an anonymous author with chapters scattered across China. As the two become victims of Mao Zedong's land reform movement, they begin writing their own installments of the story to hide in plain sight and encourage the rebels. By the end, it's impossible to tell where The Book of Records leaves off and Madeleine's novel begins, a device that reminds me a great deal of Italo Calvino's Se una notte d'inverno, un viaggiatore—one of my favorite experimental lit tales. I spent one full day enthralled in this story, and I was honestly sad to get to the end! I felt so endeared to each of the characters by the end.

A peek behind the Great Firewall

Even in today's hyper-connected world, the daily workings of Chinese society remain shrouded in mystery—no small feat, considering China is one of the most populated and powerful nations on Earth. Emily Feng is a brave journalist that dares to expose the chokehold the ruling Chinese Communist Party (tries to) hold on its people. Emily traverses a lot of ground—literally. She explores far-flung corners of China and the Chinese diaspora, interviewing Uyghur families, human rights lawyers in hiding, and exiles living in Hong Kong, Canada, and Taiwan.

This is a heavy read to get through, lengthy in both page count and topic. Emily is nearly absent from her pages—not entirely surprising in a nonfiction book, but her absence is notable for a topic that is so dear to her, personally. 

Pregnancy hormones meet the algorithm

As a scholar of contemporaneity and digitality, I love reading works that delve into any digital niches. Which is how I stumbled into this book about the intersection of cyberspace and pregnancy & parenthood. Amanda writes about period and pregnancy-tracking apps, mommy influencers, nursery robots, targeted ads, and—her strongest passages, in my opinion—she writes movingly about the experience of her child's diagnosis with a rare genetic abnormality.

As a scholar of contemporaneity and digitality, and an Aquarius (which I find probably the more likely culprit), I find myself existing in a highly reactive headspace when reading about other people's Internet use habits. Amanda describes her fixation with pregnancy and parenthood Reddit threads, message boards, and apps and the incredibly negative impact it has on her mental health. At a certain point...I couldn't help but think, "well...stop looking? Log off?" I realize this is a reaction without nuance, but I ran into that thought over and over again while reading that it became a frequent refrain.

A memoir (Chat-GPT's version)

If I have talked to you about books at all in the past 2 years, it's a good bet that my love for The Immortal King Rao came up. I adored Vauhini's debut novel, so I was extremely excited for the release of her latest book. Well, they say hope springs eternal....

My feelings about AI are incredibly large. I studied it while earning my MA and my thesis dealt in large part with trans- and posthuman technology, which includes machine learning and AI. So I recognize that this may disqualify me from participation in the general populace of people who pick up a common interest book like this one. I wanted to learn something new here, but my first thought at the end of this book was, "That's it?" There was nothing....revolutionary about this text. Vauhini included various interactions she had with chat bots, but I have no idea for what purpose. My eyes started glazing over at the repetition of AI's chapter-end summaries. I'm not sure what we were meant to get from those inclusions...

Much like my complicated feelings about Eula Biss' Having and Being Had, there are multiple elements of the memoir portion, in particular, that delve into Amazon and various other intrusions of tech oligarchy into our daily lives that feel overly casual to the point of complacency. Vauhini writes about an argument she had with a friend who doesn't use Amazon, on principle. Vauhini responds, "Well, one person not using it doesn't really make a difference, does it?" To her credit, Vauhini recognizes the mistread in her response and reaches back out to the friend. But then...she spends the rest of the chapter defending why she still uses Amazon? Her decision is to force herself to review everything she buys on Amazon as a kind of "punishment"? Except, as a tech journalist and author, Vauhini knows that any interaction with the algorithm fuels it further, so...? I really wanted to like this book and I'm bummed I walked away so disappointed.

If an algorithm was also a city

Have you ever asked yourself, "What if a generative AI model became a physical being, and also the living structure of a town? And also, what if said AI-fueled society was on the verge of class warfare?" Apparently, Erika Swyler has, and this novel is her answer. Obviously, I am passionate about the subject matter, which I'm sure has monumentally biased my opinion....because I really like this book, which means forgiving it for issues I would not forgive in other books.

Much in the same way as successful fantasy authors, Erika manages to build a whole world with entirely new rules, social order, beliefs, and language. Unlike most fantasy novels (looking at you, Priory of the Orange Tree), Erika's novel accomplishes this without being the size of a cinderblock. Instead of magic, the society Erika creates runs on technology. Erika's novel is supremely successful at investigating the posthuman tensions that accompany the—for lack of a better term—"birth" of an AI system into a physical form.

I think the plot as a whole tries to bite off more than it can chew. We get a lot of insight into one particular class of characters—the Sainted—and very little insight into the others. So when it comes time for brewing tensions to escalate into a full-on class war, it feels really underbaked. I wish we got more insight into the motivations for the non-Sainted characters, too. (If you're interested in reading a much more well-rounded take than my brief one, William Emmons' reviewed Erika's book for the Ancillary Review and I really enjoy their thoughts.)

A field manual for resilience

In the mornings—on the good ones, anyway—I make a cup of tea, roll out my yoga mat, and pick up a book. In May, that book was Kaira Jewel Lingo's We Were Made For These Times. This book is a balm in every sense of the word. The past few months have been full of tremendous change for me and Kaira's beautiful, thoughtful writing was a calming reminder of how adept our bodies & souls are for handling moments of transition.

Kaira's writing includes personal reflections, anecdotes, journal prompts and guided meditations. I first encountered Kaira on an episode of the 10% Happier podcast. A former Buddhist nun, Kaira is now a layperson with an inspiring practice and the ability to transmit her calm energy to you, even over the page. 

Man vs. bear
Back on my animal fiction game! (I need a better name for that genre...happily accepting suggestions.) This book had a similar vibe to the The Overnight Guest by Heather Gudenkauf in that the setting was as influential and present as a character. Eowyn takes us to rural Alaska in this novel, where we meet Birdie—a flighty single mother struggling to get it together, her young daughter, Emaleen, and Arthur—the town outcast. Birdie decides to move with Emaleen to Arthur's remote cabin deep in the Alaskan woods, much to the chagrin of Birdie's friends in town and Arthur's recluse father.

At its core, this novel is really about wanting. Birdie wants freedom. Emaleen wants stability. And Arthur wants more than anything to take care of Birdie & Emaleen, to prove that he can love them enough to save them from himself. This story is a refreshed version of nature-vs-nurture, and I really appreciate that Eowyn didn't try to answer any of the age-old questions she uses as a starting point. Eowyn also doesn't make this a fairytale. Her characters learn quite distinctly that wanting something isn't always enough.

A running joke for queer women

Alison composes a truly laugh-out-loud novel that skewers the terminally online segment of our community, in a way that makes me wonder if she meant to make as many jokes as she did. (I must confess, I have not read other Alison works before, so I'm not sure of how in on the joke she is.) Alison's novel reminds me a lot of the social commentary Glynnis MacNicol makes in I'm Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself, specifically about Gen-Z.

I suspect that this novel would be more impactful if I were more familiar with Alison's characters (from other reviews I've read, it seems these characters are familiar figures). And Alison's seeming focus on capitalism doesn't really shine through...there are some random elements that pop up throughout, but they don't seem to connect to the plot. Didn't keep me from enjoying it immensely, though! 

"Cat Person," but vignettes

I remain awed by Claire Keegan's writing ability. Authors who can write engaging short stories are SO powerful—the talent it takes to evoke such depth of feeling with so few words?? Clearly, economy of language is not one of my god-given talents. In this collection, Claire creates three worlds: that of a Dublin commuter in the aftermath of his recent breakup; a writer seeking retreat finds her peace interrupted by a demanding stranger; a married woman seeking a weekend tryst finds herself in over her head (to put it mildly). 

The overall vibe of this collection is unsettling. Much like the infamous New Yorker story "Cat Person," women and men may emerge from this collection with very different things. Content warning for the last story: "Antarctica." The plot has elements similar to that of Stephen King's Gerald's Game (IYKYK).

Vignettes about the color blue
A book is the best gift, to give and to get! For my birthday this year, my friend Erin brought me Maggie Nelson's Bluets! These colorful vignettes are odes to Maggie's favorite color—and "favorite" may be an understatement. Maggie obsessed with blue—every shade, tint, and hue. To Maggie, blue evokes divinity, ugliness, profanity, heartbreak, connection, sex, memory, ownership, joy, love....the list goes on. And her obsession makes this collection of vignettes read like your favorite aunt's junk drawer, full of treasured stories, anecdotes, and esoteric nuggets of research. 

I really loved the way Maggie demonstrated her deft citational prowess throughout. She collects fragments that span entire schools of thoughts and eons of history, and still her writing is extremely grounded in the present. I took my time reading this one, putting it down and coming back to it over the span of several months, and each time I picked it back up, I could just slip right inside Maggie's writing. Her words are beautiful, exposing, abrasive, sheltering, and callous all at once. I think she achieved something masterful here, and I'm so grateful to Erin for bringing it into my life! (Erin is also the friend from whom I stole my utter joy of finding used books that have scribbling in them. Reading what a stranger who owned this book before you did thought was important enough to underline, highlight, circle, or scrawl in the margins is a special kind of magic, I think. And now my annotations live right alongside theirs!) 

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