Category Archives: Readin’

Favorite Books of 2024

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Let’s start with the numbers:

For someone who does not do a lot of unnecessary math in adult life, I really do love statistics. So I’m about to hit you with some good ones! I read 132 books in 2024. I always set my goal as 100–because there have been years when I haven’t made it. For example I only read 88, 97, and 67 (what?) books, respectively, in 2020 (hello, global panini), 2016 (second year at a new school, had changed content areas) and 2013 (early teaching). In the 13 reading years from 2012-2024, I averaged 117 books a year. The last five years I have apparently given up other parts of life because I’ve averaged 140 reads a year for 2020-2024. Nuts.

I am a repeat-author offender. I read eight books by Percival Everett in 2024 (I’m sort of on a mission to be an Everett-completist; however some of his older books are not in the Chicago Public Library collections so we’ll see), five by Veronica Roth (three rereads), and three each by Naomi Novik (one re-read), Nghi Vo, Elle Kennedy (sometimes a girl needs her smut), and Neal Shusterman.

I read 55 fiction books, 29 science fiction or fantasy, 13 non-fiction (WHOA!), 21 poetry collections and 11 graphic novels (three non-fiction and 11 fiction). So across genre and type: out of the 132, 95 were fiction (71%, a little low for me, frankly, ha), 16 were non-fiction, which is a wildly high number for me, and 21 were poetry collections, which honestly tend to contain both fiction and non- within the span of a collection, although I do notice that Storygraph files them as nonfiction.

Highest of Highlights:

My very, very favorite read in any genre, but particularly fiction, for 2024 was “Wounded” by Percival Everett. Yes, I read James. Yes, I see it getting all the glory. Yes, I found it a good read. I did not find it as good a read as Wounded. I’ve read roughly 22 of Everett’s books at this point, and my favorites are: 1) Wounded; 2) The Trees; 3) Erasure; 4) Watershed; and 5) I Am Not Sidney Poitier.

I have really been reading a lot more non-fiction here in the old age of my 50s and I can lay at least part of the blame at the footsteps of Hanif Abdurraqib who put out my favorite nonfiction of 2024, a breathtaking memoir “There’s Always This Year.” Swoontastic. Abudurraqib’s writing is so beautiful that it actually becomes deceiving–when he writes about music, I want to buy every album he recommends. In fact, I did for a while, and it turns out our musical taste overlap is only about 25% of what he listens to, heh. Fortunately this memoir contains a lot of basketball, which I already loved, so I wasn’t fighting my instincts the whole time. It was glorious.

And my favorite poetry of 2024 was Victoria Cheng’s collection “With My Back to the World.” Beautiful, self-deprecating, humorous, and so much play with form. But warning: if you’re already depressed, this might not be a good prescription for you.

My favorite graphic novel reads in 2024 were the three books that comprise the Friday series by Ed Brubaker, Marcos Martin and Muntsa Vicente: 1) Friday Book One: The First Day of Christmas; 2) Friday Book Two: On a Cold Winter’s Night; and 3) Friday Book Three: Christmas Time Is Here Again. These are also the books that made me most want to: 1) reread Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden; 2) rewatch Veronica Mars; and 3) be a precocious teen again.

Other Very Favorite Fiction:

  • Menewood, by Nicola Griffith. Finally the sequel to Hild. It was my first fresh read of 2024 and it broke my heart into a million tiny pieces. I will never be done reading these two books.
  • Enter Ghost, by Isabella Hammad. Definitely a book of this time and this moment in history. Also just a beautiful book with gorgeous ideas, interesting relationships, and such a tangibly fleshed out world. I went back and read her first novel after this. She joined my favorite living authors list this year and I’m so glad my dad told me about her, and then the NYRB told me about her, and now I am telling everyone about her.
  • I also really liked Big Swiss by Jen Beagin; James by Percival Everett, mentioned above; Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar, which is just wildly gorgeous on a sentence level, and did you know you can’t hashtag that title on Instagram? Politics rule the world; Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino; The Maniac by Benjamin Labatut, another “I want to read everything he publishes author for me, after “When We Cease to Understand the World” in 2022; and, perhaps last summer’s hottest book, God of the Woods by Liz Moore.

Other Favorite Non-Fiction:

  • Say Nothing, by Patrick Radden Keefe. OMG this book is so good. It sent me seeking out PRK all over the place. I’m listening to his podcast about the CIA potentially writing a German band’s hit song, I’m listening to every interview he’s ever gone, I’m obsessed. I guess I need to watch the series.
  • The Barn: The Secret History of a Murder in Mississippi, by Wright Thompson. Wowza. This book is amazing. It has a very spiraling structure (like a math curriculum, ha) and there are points at which you wonder why a particular tangent is happening, but it all ties together in the end. Very powerful. Here’s my GoodReads review if you need to hear more.
  • I also really liked How Far the Light Reaches, by Sabrina Imbler, a gorgeous exploration of identity via exploring sea creatures; Here After by Amy Lin, the best book I’ve read on grief since Madeline L’Engles’ book about her husband’s death from cancer in The Crosswick Series (volume 4 I think); and Becoming Little Shell: A Landless Indian’s Journey Home, by Chris LaTray, a poet I’m kinda obsessed with.

Other Favorite Poetry:

  • I loved Good Boys by Megan Fernandes, as I dig into her back catalog after adoring her 2023 release “I Do Everything I’m Told.”
  • I am also loving finally digging into Diane Seuss, both Frank: sonnets and American Poetry were excellent; and I also loved Safia Elhilo’s January Children after predviously loving “Girls That Never Die.”

Other Favorite Graphic Novels:

  • I’m still reading the ongoing series Saga (Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples), Monstress (Marjorie M. Liu), and Something Is Killing the Children (James Tynion IV). I also really enjoyed Shadowlife by Hiromi Goto.

A few other thoughts:

The books I found most unexpectedly charming:

  • Headshot by Rita Bullwinkel
  • Familia by Lauren E. Rico (a purchase at the San Juan airport)
  • Parliament by Aimee Pokwatka

The books that broke my brain the hardest: everything in the Atlas Complex series by Olivie Blake.

The most fun series I read was the Scholomance books by Naomi Novik (I reread the first one and fresh read the last two with a student and we had such fun conversations about them, so shout out Kamilo!).

The sexist books I read were Wolfsong by T.J. Klune and its sequels (although there are elements that get very repetitive and I haven’t been able to finish the last one, Brothersong).

The book I liked that was certainly the most unexpected to become a movie: Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder.

The author I’m coming around on: Sally Rooney. I really liked Intermezzo (and previously “Beautiful World, Where Are You”) after not loving either “Normal People” (and its overwhelming sadomasochism).

And I loved revisiting Ray Carney and his world in Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead (I looooved “Harlem Shuffle”).

What about you? What were your favorite reads last year? What am I missing? Comments are open!

(Also if you want to see the complete list, you can view it on GoodReads or StoryGraph both of which I am doing. StoryGraph is better, ethically, but the community aspect on GoodReads is much stronger.)

Favorite Books of the 2000s (so far)

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A while ago (sometime in mid-2024 I guess based on where I found my list, heh), someone on Instagram was going through and choosing their very favorite book from each year in the 2000s. Here’s mine (nine months after I made the list, heh)!! Books are selected / listed in the year they were published as opposed to the year that I read them. I really tried hard to limit myself to one book per pub year, unless I could split it by genre, but in some years, I just wasn’t able to cut it down to one. I am only human!

2000
Fiction: I absolutely loved Kavalier & Clay (Michael Chabon, FTW) and nothing else comes close. In fact, I didn’t even write anything else down for that year!

2001
Fiction: I would say now, in 2025, the best book published in 2001 was Erasure by Percival Everett, who I knew nothing of in 2001, but am all about in the 2020s.
Fiction runner-up: But at the time, I think I would have said Atonement, by far Ian McEwan‘s best book and the least icky of everything he’s written because some are…just skeevy, creepy, yucky.
Nonfiction: Shutterbabe, the first memoir from photographer Deborah Copaken Kogan.

2002
Fiction: No question, the best book published in 2002 was Audrey Niffennegger‘s The Time Traveler’s Wife. What a beautiful and beautifully crushing story. Ack, that ending. ACCKKKKK. How sad it was that they completely butchered it in the movie.

2003
Nonfiction: No fiction or anything else I read published in 2003 can come close to challenging Jon Krakauer and possibly his best book Under the Banner of Heaven.

2004
Fiction: The Plot Against America is fantastic and Philip Roth will never be reviled on this web site.

2005
Nonfiction: I have come to think very differently of Joan Didion these days, but I do remember really loving The Year of Magical Thinking.

2006
Fiction: I absolutely adore Black Swan Green, the least David Mitchell of all the David Mitchell books.
Poetry: This is also the year Natasha Trethewey’s Native Guard collection was published and it is excellent.

2007
Fiction: this was the year the first Tana French book In the Woods came out and that book is truly impressive. (There is a point where that series kinda fell off the rails for me, but the first three are outstanding.)
Nonfiction: Love Is a Mixtape (Rob Sheffield) really speaks my language.
Honorable Mention: The Watchman (Robert Crais) was the first book to feature my one true love Joe Pike. I’m still considering getting his tattoos.

2008
Fiction: Kristen Cashore’s Graceling is such a fabulous book and the beginning of a truly beautiful series.

2009
Fiction: How can one resist the siren call of Wolf Hall? My dad had introduced me to Hilary Mantel long before she latched on to Cromwell, but this book… This is Dorothy Dunnet levels of fabulous (Lymond + Nicolo + Thorfinn 4-ever). (I did not read it in 2009 however, heh.)
Honorable Mention: The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly is just a lovely middle-grade book that I wish more kids would read and just seeing that title on my list brings it more vividly to mind than most of the adult books I read published that year.

2010
Fiction: A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. Done.

2011
Fiction: I love Maggie Stiefvater so much, and two of her series reside deep in my heart, but none of those books even hold a candle to The Scorpio Races, a stand-out stand-alone. OMG I LOVE THIS BOOK SO MUCH.

2012
Fiction: Tell The Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt. This might be the best book on this entire list.

2013
Fiction: The glorious, glorious HILD. Magical. Nicola Griffith is another follower in Dorothy Dunnet’s footsteps.

2014
Fiction: There were lots of great novels published in 2014, but none that I have continued to think about as much as A Brave Man Seven Storeys Tall, by Will Chancellor.
Non-fiction: H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald.

2015
Fiction: There are two truly fabulous science fiction series that started in 2015 and I just cannot acknowledge only one of them. So I’m declaring a tie between Children of Time, by Adrian Tchaikovsky, who is the writer to start reading if you never want to run out of material; and The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin, a complete tour de force.

2016
Fiction: I really fell for The Mothers, by Brit Bennett.
Honorable mention: Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood is truly fantastic.
Poetry: Counting Descent by Clint Smith.

2017
Fiction: One of only a few YA nods on this list: The Hate U Give, by Angie Thomas. I really, really wanted to read this with my sixth graders, but there is just ONE s-e-x-u-a-l scene that makes that impossible and I do think I might have edited that out were I the author since there are more YA books on this topic than there are middle grades. Sigh.

2018
Fiction: Holy crap, is There, There by Tommy Orange not the most stunning debut. Swoon.
Poetry: American Sonnets, by Terrance Hayes.

2019
Fiction: I am still in 100% completely, head-over-heels in love with This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone.
Runner-Up: But I cannot even fathom leaving Gideon The Ninth by Tamsyn Muir off this list. A life without Gideon? Not worth living.
Poetry: I didn’t know Hanif Abdurraqib for his poetry at first, but that has become my favorite of his many genres and A Fortune for Your Disaster is just drop-dead beautiful.

2020
Fiction: This is the year of Deacon KingKong by James McBride. Amazeballoons.

2021
Fiction: The Trees by Percival Everett. The most topical of topicals. Sly. Sarcastic. So Very funny. And yet, just a complete and utter chill to the bone.
Runner-Up: Detransition Baby by Torrey Peters. ‘Nuff said.
Non-fiction: How the Word Is Passed by Clint Smith.

2022
Fiction: The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka becomes such a surprisingly different book as it goes on. Everyone I told about this one raved about it for months.
Nonfiction: Elaine Castillo’s fiction is great, but these essays were chef’s kiss: How to Read Now.

2023
Fiction: To Shape a Dragon’s Breath, by Moniquill Blackgoose How is this so good?
Non-Fiction: Hijab Butch Blues, by Lamya H. So very good. But I just don’t see how it would be possible to maintain anonymity…
Poetry: I was completely stunned by The Kingdom of Surfaces by Sally Wen Mao.

2024
Fiction: My very, very favorite read in any genre for 2024 was “Wounded” by Percival Everett. Yes, I read James. Yes, I see it getting all the glory. Yes, I found it a good read. I did not find it as good a read as Wounded.
Non-fiction: Hanif Abdurraqib with a breathtaking memoir “There’s Always This Year.”
Poetry: Victoria Cheng’s collection “With My Back to the World.”

Now tell me yours… Comments are open.

À la Super Eggplant, currently I am…

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Watching: I am in season 4 of Yellowstone and… I love it and hate it to equal degrees. I think Taylor Sheridan is an amazing writer…but I hate his acting on the show (thankfully he’s a minor character). It’s hard to find anyone to root for here–every character you like turns out to also be a murderer or worse. Beth Dutton is possibly the world’s worst person, but she’s so amazeballoons, it’s just awe-inspiring to watch. It’s SO violent, I’ve actually had to cover my eyes for some scenes. But the dialogue is just aces. So. Kindof a toss-up, heh. I am also eagerly anticipating Mayor of Kingstown season 2 (another Sheridan show, I watched season 1 all the way through twice this summer).

Reading: I just finished a reread of The Barren Grounds by David A. Robertson in preparation for reading the sequels which I finally bought over the summer (so so good, just touches your heart) and No Gods, No Monsters by Cadwell Turnbull, who I found out about from this short story collection (and its two sequels. So many good stories in that trilogy!!). It was a wild ride (and I should have done a character map as every new-seeming person seems to be connected to numerous previous characters in many ways) but very good. I am terrible at updating this blog (doh) but if you follow me on either Goodreads or Instagram, I do update my reading on those sites in a pretty timely manner.

Listening to: All about the new Lizzo. I also looove the new Maggie Rogers. And my friend Becki turned me on to Gang of Youths new album, which the more I listen to it, the more I realize it’s this summer’s substitute for a new National album, heh.

Writing: This is a repost from last September, and it’s STILL TRUE. Lesson plans. Wasting time spelling out the 97 steps I already know how to do to teach what I need to teach. What a waste of veteran teacher time. I will admit, I think they should be required of new teachers. Lesson plans were very helpful to me the first few years, especially if I needed ideas to fill extra time (paralyzing!), or really know what I was going to teach. And if you had a mentor teacher, they gave you a base to start from. You could use them for reflection: what worked, what didn’t, Now I already know how to do all of that and it’s so stupid to have to write them out, especially when it’s become very clear that NO ONE is actually reading them.etc.

Cooking / Eating: Due to ridiculous stomach issues, especially during school, I am back to PB&J for lunch every single day. Yup. Current non-lunchtime food obsession is this summer sweet corn and cucumber salad. SO GOOD.

Drinking: Trying to decrease my soda consumption (why? I’m going to die anyway), I am obsessively drinking the orange and lime Sunkist Singles to Go. I pour all the packets out into a Tupperware because I only use half a packet at once. I use a tiny bit less than 1/2 a teaspoon with 8 oz water (turns out I have NO glasses that can hold 16 oz!) and this thingie to mix it up.

Sewing: I made two new dresses the week before school… but never got to the one I cut out months ago. Hopefully in a week or two I’ll feel less overwhelmed by the school day and be able to get back to some crafts at home.

Quilting: Thinking about it, but not doing it.

Knitting: I’m a one-project, only-on-facetime-Saturday-nights knitter right now. I’m making a scarf from some red and orange Lobster Pot Yarns cashmere I bought a bajillion years ago at a yarn store in South Street Seaport (back in my NYC days). (Ooooooo look at this pretty skein.)

What’re YOU up to? 🙂

À la Super Eggplant, currently I am…

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Watching: The O-G CSI. I started back at the very, very beginning. HA. It’s wild how many episodes I’ve randomly seen surrounded by others I don’t remember at all. The joy of rewatching an old show like this is the constant popping up in the extras–people who are NOW famous who often were no one then. Oh wait–Voodoo Tatum! OMG a young Blake Lively! Oh look it’s the grandpa from Everwood. I mean, you always know that person is going to be either the killer or the victim. Also I am SO EXCITED to be back in movie theaters and last week I saw the quite odd, definitely disturbing, yet oddly compelling The Card Collector.

Reading: I am really burning through books these days now that I’m back on the bus AND modeling 15 minutes of silent reading for my students in three different classes. I’m up to 104 for the year, already past my annual goal. Some recent hits (linking to my Goodreads reviews) are Ladyparts, The Second Rebel and The Women of Troy. I’m also WAY back into poetry right now.

Listening to: I was listening to tunes every morning on the bus, but my latest refurbished iPod decided to die so I’ve been bereft for about a week. However, until that point I was REALLY into the new Big Red Machine, an EP by a band called Pronoun, the latest Liz Phair, lots of singles/EP releases from Yoke Lore, and I am also currently, bizarrely obsessed with the song “If I drink this beer” by Will Chase (as Luke Wheeler on Nashville, which I rewatched all of in July/August).

Writing: Lesson plans. Wasting time spelling out the 97 steps I already know how to do to teach what I need to teach. What a waste of veteran teacher time. I will admit, I think they should be required of new teachers. Lesson plans were very helpful to me the first few years, especially if I needed ideas to fill extra time (paralyzing!), or really know what I was going to teach. And if you had a mentor teacher, they gave you a base to start from. You could use them for reflection: what worked, what didn’t, Now I already know how to do all of that and it’s so stupid to have to write them out, especially when it’s become very clear that NO ONE is actually reading them.etc.

Cooking / Eating: Mid-school year, the cooking gets to be such a drag. I do it every weekend so that I keep adding to the options for my lunches, rotating through the freezer, but it’s so much more drudgery than it feels during the summer! Here’s a couple yummy recipes I added to the rotation in 2021. Also I have become OBSESSED with Magic Spoon cereal. I have all the but the newest flavors. My favorites are: 1) Fruity; 2) Frosty; 3) Cinnamon; 4) a tie between Blueberry and Strawberry; 5) Cookies & Cream. I did not like the peanut butter which kinda bummed me out but OH WELL I will just eat peanut butter on toast. Heh.

Drinking: I’ve gotten really into V-8 over the past week. Huh.

Sewing: New masks. I have a few other things cut out but I haven’t gotten to them.

Quilting: Thinking about it, but not doing it.

Knitting: Ditto.

What’re YOU up to? 🙂

À la Super Eggplant, currently I am…

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Watching: Every old episode of NCIS–ha! I started at season 1 at some point in December and now I’m up to season 11. I’ve got to say the post-Ziva episodes are…not great. But I had forgotten about Ellie Bishop and I really like her, so we’ll see.

Reading: I am in my usual “attempt to read every book that will be in the Tournament of Books in March” flurry of January reading. I had already read “Sharks in the Time of Saviors” by Kawaii Strong Washburn (LOVED IT! Mythic) and “Transcendent Kingdom” by Yaa Gyasi (didn’t love it, recommend her previous book “Homegoing”!). I have now also read “Deacon King Kong” by James McBride (so good! lots of slapstick while still going super deep) and “The Vanishing Half” by Brit Bennett (fabulous). I started “We Ride Upon Sticks” by Quan Barry last night. It’s entertaining but a little uneven.

Listening to: I am re-listening to every single piece of music I bought in 2020 because I KNOW you are eagerly anticipating a report back on my favorite albums. I think I’m in March right now because I keep getting distracted. But it’s on my list to finish up this week!

Writing: Lesson plans. 2021 intentions poems. Not much really. 🙂 Heh.

Eating: I’m still cooking at TON from Chrissy Teigen’s cookbooks (Cravings and Cravings: Hungry for More). I like the second book better, partly because I got it first, and partly because of the font/layout (HA!, seriously). This weekend I made Jok Moo already and am whipping up some scalloped potatoes in a bit.

Drinking: Lots of bubbly water, which means…at least I am finally drinking water?* I still don’t love it but I probably drank 8x as much liquid in 2020 as in any year previously. Mostly I’m drinking mini-Cokes to help with my tummy which is in a bit of disarray. *For those who are unaware, I detest the taste of water. And yes, it has a taste.

Knitting: I just redove into a sweater that I started in January of 2018 (Lemongrass by Jojo Locatelli) using some Rowan Magpie yarn. Maybe 2021 will be the year I finish it! 🙂 The back and front are both done and it’s time to start the sleeves.

Quilting: I made a mini quilt for my mom’s bday, and I am finishing the binding on four mini-friendship log-cabin quilts for Secret Club. Feeling kinda productive quilt wise, frankly, since I also made six placemats (very mini quilts) for a friend in December!!

Sewing: I have the fabric ready to be cut out for three more Farrow dresses. But I want to finish up my quilts in progress first!

Focusing on: Trying not to freak out too much about how my job is planning to force us back to F2F teaching before we can get the virus… Trying not to focus on my impending death by coronavirus contraction via public transit as I have a 45-minute bus ride each way… TRYING.

There’s a lot going on around here, despite not leaving the house for 11 months at this point and being very miserably alone for 99.9% of the pandemic. What’s up with you????

“The Lager Queen of Minnesota” by J. Ryan Stradal

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First finish of 2020 for me! This book was pretty fantastic. The majority of the book is about two people obsessed with making beer—one because she loves (LOVES) it from her very first taste of it and the other because she loves chemistry and she’s got to prove herself to be interesting—and the person they’re both related to that a lot of the plot revolves around. I will say that it was a good thing it was written with alternating perspectives though, because if it had all been from Edith’s POV (as the first chapter was), I probably wouldn’t have finished it. There was just a *wee* bit too much “hey this about Minnesotans, are Minnesotans so charming” setup in that first section for me… but perhaps that’s the curse of actually having lived a large part of your life AS a Minnesotan. HA. I loved Helen, I loved Diana (and her evolution). And man, I would still probably love to work in a brewery. Maybe that’s my next career. My beers, I will warn you, will be high on sweetness and low on hops. Cheers, y’all.

À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…

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Watching: I just finished a rewatch/watch of One Tree Hill (I had only seen some of the first few seasons) and now I’m rewatching Firefly, which as you may know will hardly take any time at all. 🙁 I can’t figure out what I’ll watch next!

Reading: I’m about a third of the way through “Theft” by Peter Carey, which is definitely fun so far. I read quite a bit of Peter Carey back (BACK) in the day.

Listening to: Completely bingeing on Maggie Rogers “Heard It in a Past Life”, but also really obsessed with J.S. Ondara‘s “Tales of America.” It’s so good!

Writing: Sexy daydream poems on the bus, in the duplex form created by Jericho Brown (whose poems I’m obsessed with!).

Eating: Suddenly finding myself in sammy mode, I’ve been making nice big fat ones with ham, turkey, provolone, pickle slabs, roasted red peppers, giardinera, tomato, spinach and a little mayo. Oh yum they’re so good.

Drinking: So much lemonade I think it might be giving me acid reflux. Ha!

Knitting: Ah, nope. 🙁

Quilting: Also nope.

Sewing: Just made another tunic! And two more cut out. Let’s keep that momentum going…

Focusing on: Not spending any unnecessary money. Not bringing work home. Not staying at work beyond the hours I get paid for.

What’s up with you? 🙂

Words I Had to Look Up While Reading This Fabulous Novel.

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Go read this: “The Angel of History” by Rabih Alameddine. (Here’s a review if you want a synopsis.) My dad introduced me to this author last year (with his novel “An Unnecessary Woman”) and then I just happened across this new(er) novel in the library on Saturday. It was So!GOOD! And so literate and compelling.

  • caisson = a large watertight chamber; a chest or wagon
  • chelonian = basically turtle-esque
  • jellabiya = traditional Egyptian garment
  • dithyrambic = a frenzied impassioned hymn and dance; an irregular poetic expression; a wildly enthusiastic speech or piece of writing
  • rachitic = rickety; like having a inflammed spine
  • recrudescent = revival of material; recurrence of symptoms; renewal
  • inanition = exhaustion; lack of mental or spiritual vigor
  • cephalore = a saint who is generally depicted carrying their own head

Cephalore was my favorite. 🙂 Inanition I do feel like I should have already known, heh.

I was also really proud of myself for picking up on random literary/musical references:

  • “I couldn’t write, I couldn’t write, stop all the clocks, poetry has gone and left me…” (W.H. Auden reference, a poem I JUST taught my students!).
  • “Hope might be the thing with feathers but in the Middle East we hunt those birds for sport. (Dickinson)
  • “I sound like a Miles Davis trumpet, like a Bach partita, no, wait, a Bendel bonnet, a Shakespeare sonnet, whereas you’re a worthless check, a total wreck, a flop, but baby, if you’re the bottom, I’m the top.” (Cole Porter)
  • “Do you understand me now, Satan said, when things go wrong I seem to be bad, I”m just a soul whose intentions are good, oh lord, please don’t let me be misunderstood.” (Nina Simone, et al.)

(I’m sure there were more I didn’t notice!!)

À la Super Eggplant, currently in March, I amwas…

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Hey, here’s a post I drafted March 31 and never finished… Enjoy! HA!

Watching: In February, I watched (some re-, some fresh) all of Revenge. I figured out that I had only seen about 2.5 seasons originally. It got a little ridiculous (as those kind of shows do, especially once they start killing off characters) but I’ve been an Emily Van Camp fan since Everwood so I still enjoyed it. Now I’m rewatching White Collar. I mean you’ve got to find something to watch when all the current season shows go on what seems like the world’s most extended holiday break. I’m still loving Brooklyn 99 but, about to share an unpopular opinion warning, I hate (HATE! HATE!) the Doug Judy episodes so every time I see one, I have to take a few weeks break from that show! Chicago Fire has been pretty intense the past few weeks.

Reading: Since I last updated you (and the tournament began), I read another Rooster book “My Sister, the Serial Killer” by Oyinkan Braithwaite. It was a lot of fun… but it still really surprised me that it wound up winning the whole thing. It was definitely unique, but the characters were all a little flat–no one ever looked at things from more than one side, and the lack of true astonishment over the happenings within was a bit amazing. I guess for Korede this has been going on long enough since before the book started, that any feelings she may have had like that are already gone. I also read a really good middle-grade novel about the war in Iraq (“Sunrise Over Fallujah” by Walter Dean Myers), a good horror book for bookclub that I then forgot to go to (“Haunting of Hill House” by Shirley Jackson), a silly but sweet middle grades graphic novel (“Ghostopolis” by Doug TenNapel) and a stand-alone Laurie King novel “Lockdown” passed on by my mom. It had a LOT of interlocking threads but I thought it was really good and not as sick or nasty as some of her stand-alone books are (you may know her from her Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series). I’m currently reading book 3 of Sabaa Tahir’s “Ember in the Ashes” series “A Reaper at the Gates”. It’s been out for a while so I’m not totally sure what’s taken me so long to get to it. I am not loving it as much as I loved books 1 and 2, though. I’m not sure if it’s due to distance in time, or Elias and Laia’s changed roles or what. It feels a tiny bit flat.

Final Rooster Update!

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The Tournament goes live tomorrow with the Pre-Tournament Play-In Match which unfortunately is two books I LOVED and one book I liked and damn it, at least two books I liked are therefore getting knock out on the first day!!! The unfortunate luck of the brackets.

SO: I read 11 of the 18 books (15 in brackets + 3 play-in). I read the wrong book by one author, didn’t finish one book due to both boredom and its library due date (#12), and am in the middle of my 13th. So although I didn’t make my goal of reading ALL of them, I feel pretty thrilled with how close I came! 🙂

Here’s what I finished since my last post:

The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner — it was a super easy, quick read. But I didn’t really like it. I think I just don’t jibe with this author since I didn’t like the last book of hers I tried to read either.

Call Me Zebra by Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi — This was a long complicated read full of lots of philosophical ideas about heritage and literature and how we carry our world within us. And so much of it was really interesting and so much of it was whacked out weird. I finished it, but it did become a slog as the book went on. Neat ideas but I didn’t love it.

So Lucky by Nicolas Griffith — you may remember I am a huge (HUGE) fan of Griffith’s viking historical novel “Hild.” This is an entirely different thing: a contemporary novel with a bit of a mystery. I didn’t outright love it, and there was a sort of side- or sub-plot to the mystery that ultimately proves wrong and felt very distracting. But there was a lot to like here and a lot of things I’ve definitely never read in a novel before. Also so nicely coincidental to have just read this and learn of Selma Blair’s diagnosis. I do feel this book gives a strong picture of being inside a body being attacked by MS. Definitely worth reading.

I did not finish:

The Overstory by Richard Powers — a novel about people and, in some ways, a specific type of tree. Each chapter introduced a new character and some sort of family or disaster relationship to a tree. Presumably at some point the characters will interact? But some of the chapters were long and quite uneventful / not that interesting, and it’s due back at the library tomorrow, and I’m just not that bothered by not finishing it. It’s been NOT compelling enough that I didn’t even have it with me on my commutes this weekend, so… that says it all.

And I am currently reading:

There There by Tommy Orange — which is not at all what I expected and pretty good so far. Although it annoys the FRAK out of me that the GoodReads search engine is incapable of finding this book by searching for its title!!! (I thought maybe it was just a mobile / phone problem but I just tried on the desktop and nope!)

I’ve still got the three other books I didn’t get to on hold at the library so I’ll read them when they come in–although my stupid library branch by me is closing FOR A YEAR and it’s going to be SO NOT ON MY WAY ANYWHERE to go to these other branches to pick up and return books and I am Officially. Annoyed. OK, bye for now.