I saw some of his art online and thought it looked like “Invisible Hands” from Liquid Television, which I LOVED. Same artist! This didn’t have quite the same level of twisted, creepiness as that animated series, but I was so happy to find his work in comic form. There’s more too.
Always loved Parrish's art: painted panels, odd proportions and perspective. This was kind of a bummer for me, but their art makes me want to break more "rules" with mine.
Refreshingly simple premise about a dystopian future where people live inside a silo their entire lives. The author wasn’t up to writing the inevitable “action set piece” as compellingly as the quieter parts of the book, and the ending felt a tad rushed, but I enjoyed it. Will read the remaining books in the trilogy.
A gay Latino returns home to the suburbs for a high school reunion and encounters key people from his past. Narrator alternates between 1st person to describe scenes and 3rd person to analyze social inequities. After a while, it feels a little like the kind of defensive writing people do on social media: it’s not enough to tell a story; you have to demonstrate your grasp of the conditions that led to it.
I'm moving my 2023 book thread to #Bookwyrm, the Fediverse equivalent of Goodreads. Apparently, you can see/interact with Bookwyrm posts from Mastodon and vice versa but it took me awhile to figure out how:
I had to follow my Bookwyrm account from here + (optionally?) vice versa. Now I can Boost my Bookwyrm posts into Mastodon for you to see. Gonna try it in a few...
Reporting back on cross-posting from #Bookwyrm to Mastodon: it works! And without the expected delay of the post appearing in my Mastodon feed.
However, it doesn't pull the body of the post over, just the headline of my review (rating and image too). Which makes you have to click through, and removes discoverability since the hashtags are in the body post as well as my tag for the #Bookstodon group. Also! No way to enter ALT text for the image. 😕
Conclusion: at the moment, cross-posting from #BookWyrm doesn't meet all of my needs (ALT text for book cover image, hashtags for Mastodon discoverability, no importing of full Bookwyrm post text, adding additional images since I read comics too, no tagging Mastodon accounts).
I'll keep posting separately on each platform since I want to contribute to both. So resuming my 2023 reading thread here. Eh heh heh. 😬
I love Katchor's line work and style. The observations and point of view in each comic strip are always interesting, but there's a density to them (visually and conceptually) that require a lot of effort from me to parse: architecture, history, urbanity, narrative.
I think I used to read them in an alternative weekly a while ago, and that's the kind of reading pace that worked for me: one per week.
I wanted to read more mysteries. Slowly making my way through The Inspector Armand Gamache series, mostly in winter. This one strengthens a sense of continuity between the books and offers history lessons on Quebec; the long-standing tensions between French & English Canadians. If it wasn’t clear before, Gamache isn’t infallible, and we see the large-scale and deeply personal effects this has on him and those around him.
By the end, I really liked this. Up until then, it felt a bit YA in how it treated the leads’ feelings for each other. Why draw things out with the whole “not talking to each other honestly” trope? I have nothing against prolonging things, but it needs to be deftly done to not feel cheap. This wasn’t cheap though! I loved these boys. Their marriage (not a spoiler) feels hard-won. Plus, look at that cover. SO gay.
Written like bad streaming TV: mandatory "plot twists" clumsily done, artificially draws things out, a rushed final episode, and introducing a shadowy character in the last shot to laugh menacingly.
Frustrating, like most #DarkAcademia books. It’s got some interesting ideas and moments, but the writing doesn’t sustain them. The magic system and world-building are underdeveloped. Is it a rule that magic users are assholes?
A local artist I’m lucky to call a friend. I did not expect such a serious and mature story. The art style seems so … innocent. The villages have their own traditions, belief systems, and a shared history that I didn’t follow enough to fully understand. But I know how to load a cannon now, and there are some lovely moments beautifully drawn.
Book 11: "It Won't Always Be Like This" by #MalakaGharib
Her second graphic memoir, it explores her Arabic and Muslim side. A bit more angsty given it was Gharib's teenaged years (and it was the 90s). I love her openness in relating messy family stuff, and cringe at the same insecurity I felt from wanting to fit in with dominant (American) culture.
The colors and panel structure in this book are more varied. It's exciting to see this cartoonist grow.
I've read and enjoyed all of Kowal's books. The worldbuilding is considered & smart, and her characters are always horny for each other (often, newlyweds).
Didn't expect a mystery, but this was fun. Initially annoyed by all the cocktail recipes, but she persuaded me to seek out complex flavors of the non-alcoholic variety (my preference). I always learn something from her, including a 5-senses grounding technique.
Book 13: “Violenzia and other deadly amusements” by #RichardSala.
Four stories, the two with Violenzia were the best. I love Sala’s creepy sensibilities, but this didn’t do it for me. My library doesn’t carry many more of his books so this may be my last (for now anyway). We’ll always have “Invisible Hands” though, which I’ll link to (again!) for your delectation: https://youtu.be/n5sP4yRb8Mw
Book 14: "Who Will Make the Pancakes" by #MeganKelso
Five really different short stories, most drawn in different media: ink, watercolor, colored pencil. Kelso's writing comes from a place I often can't predict, her observations a revelation. I don't think it was her intent, but I felt unsettled in the way that good art often leaves you.
Well-written and smart in the way that makes you notice just how many sci-fi books … aren’t. The ideas aren’t new—alien life forms, AI, mind-hacking, new linguistic systems, and questions of sentience—but Nayler’s take and world-building are inspired. Especially how he connects capitalism to climate collapse, exploitation, and species extinction. Humans really are terrible. Highly recommend this book. 🐙
Part 2 of a trilogy, this one depicts how we got to all of the events in Part 1. More of a near future scenario with white guy™️ protagonist constantly failing up until he has the power over all of our lives. None of the characters are particularly sympathetic, and like the first book, some parts went on too long: could’ve been a full third shorter at least. Curious if the TV show is any good.
Does well making up for the first book’s faults: less tortured metaphors of an embodied NYC, more story and world building. Still, none of the five boroughs/characters has a chance to really develop. I’d rather just a low key hang with them all rather than the multiversal drama. I love Jemisin, but this series is my least favorite. She really did rescue it with this second installment though.
For me The City We Became was a very enjoyable read. It completely changed the way I see NYC, and nowadays I always think about the city through this book whenever I come across it in any context.
My favourite Jemisin book.
This second one felt a bit rushed, which is really not a surprise, considering Jemisin squeezed what was originally planned to be two books into one.
I love Southern literature (American South)—almost specialized in it in grad school. Something in its sensibility reminds me of Caribbean lit. Almost every page of this novel-within-a-novel CRACKED. ME. UP.
Make sure to read this edition. It requires you to flip the book over & around to read the intertwined stories: a really cool tactile mechanic that brings new layers of meaning to the experience. Really is book art.
This was on a list of #DarkAcademia recommendations. And with POC? I borrowed it from the library with a quickness. But I kept waiting for the magic and instead got a #GossipGirl vibe. I watched the original TV show, so I'm not hating. This book just wasn't what I expected.
Which is a shame because I would normally be into a story about the only two Black kids at a private school. Categorize 👏🏽 books 👏🏽 properly 👏🏽
I went through a brief love affair with Doctorow. But the sweetly clunky how-to-do-X-techie-thing-to-bring-down-Y-bad-guy-slash-system got too clunky for me. And repetitive too.
These short stories were OK though. Maybe he's gotten better, or maybe it's been long enough between my readings. Either way in all his writing, I still don't understand how encryption and private/public keys work (not asking for an explanation).
Cool premise that the author can't carry all the way through. The story unfolds through several POV characters, but there's always the one (or more) that you're bored with, or there's a boring stretch for one you do like. So I always felt like it wasn't quite hitting.
Cool premise that the author doesn't carry all the way through. The story unfolds through several POV characters, but there's always the one (or more) that you're bored with, or there's a boring stretch for one you do like. So I often felt unsatisfied.
The conceit that the book itself is written by a man in a matriarchal world is fascinating. It only bookends the novel with "research" interspersed—I wished there was more.
@ottsatwork@bookstodon I stopped reading it after the women took over that nation state and started treating the men like they were being treated. I won't watch the Amazon show.
I'm including #zines, small press stuff, and #ArtBooks in this 2023 "What I read" thread.
"Civic '99" by #BenjaminPaulKraco is a riso zine about a kick-ass 1999 Honda Civic, "Speed! Action! Violence!" Hell yeah! Before I bought it, we talked about my 1995 Toyota Tercel. Had to get this.
You can find more of Benjamin's work on Instagram @ WorldsBiggestMinecraftSbarro.
I expected to be lost—it’s been a while since I read the prior 2 books—but nope! And we get to spend more time with the Grattna, a species whose bodies, language, and worldview is based on 3s, not binaries. Fascinating!
Overall, the series has too many species, cultures, etc. to fully track, but the way they solve problems and work through their shit is how more people should be in the universe.
What a great writer. Learned after the fact that he’s one of the co-authors of “This Is How You Lose the Time War”. Makes sense.
The ideas here felt new and exciting. Exposition and world-building doesn’t happen in clunky blocks like it does in so many books. It takes real skill not to frustrate readers when you throw together dead gods, magic from starlight, gargoyles, vampires, contract law, and a whole lot more.
I really wanted to like this. And I did until just after Robin gets into Oxford. Maybe it’s because so much resonated with my own life & studies, I didn’t need to be lectured to as much as he did—I get it, girl. My frustration may just be disappointment in my younger self. What is going on with editors these days? It did NOT need to be this long. The magical system rooted in translation was pretty cool. #DarkAcademia fails me again.
The second title in The Craft Sequence, I didn’t like it as much as the first. Gladstone doesn’t hand-hold in his world-building, which I prefer, but I felt I missed a lot of subtleties with the new characters, time period, and location. This is the kind of thing a re-read will address though, and I look forward to that.
I do love every part of the world across these books, just certain parts more than others.
Book 26: “The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet” by #BeckyChambers.
Wow, not what I expected: actual character development in a sci-fi title with lots of new species, cultures, and morphologies. How refreshing to take the time for this and not just plot plot plot! It does drag just a teeny bit: I wanted more to happen at one point. But I have faith Chambers can calibrate plot and character development for the rest of this series. Excited to read the rest.
Book 27: “Performances for Waiting in Line: Performed Alone or in Collaboration with Others” by #PaulShortt.
Shortt’s print work “plays with, mocks and appropriates cultural norms, authority and rules”. I like his stuff. It’s accessible and brings art into everyday life. First encountered it in “How to Art Book Fair”: straight up advice.
This book has 60 performances. I’ll let you know if I ever attempt any. 😅
This series is too smart for me—not in a bad way, just that I think I'd get more enjoyment out of it if I were able to have both a pulled back and a focused in view of the world. The interconnections and the highly specific details of this city, this magic, this social strata.
Like the second book in this series, I think I'll enjoy it more on a re-read, which I'm really looking forward to doing.
Book 29: “New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color” edited by #NisiShawl.
Read this after learning a Mastodon mutual is in it. Tend to have a hard time with short story collections, but this one slowly grew on me. I loved the author bios and having a better sense of what informed their pieces, especially as POC authors in this genre. “New Suns” makes up for some of its less successful parts by gathering these voices together into a greater whole.
Really enjoyable, and only the second book in this series. This one follows two characters from the first book, and like the first, devotes good time to their arcs. Unlike the first, the plot moves quicker: it jumps back and forth in time to explore one character’s history.
I think it works as a standalone book, but even better if you read the series. Taking my time to read the next one to prolong it.
@bookstodon@Grizzlysgrowls@ottsatwork did you also pick up the Monk and Robot series novellas? The first one is one of my very favorite reads this year and I’m rereading it before finally tackling the second. I didn’t read it sooner, because the first was so magical. ..I didn’t want any risk of it being ruined :-)
@patl@bookstodon@ottsatwork I just got the first 4 of the Spiral series. My KU is now full, and I'd have to drop books I haven't read yet to get more. I'll consider it later.
“one cat bus away” by local artist #MyraLara (ti.ra.de.ro).
A sweet, wordless comic about public transportation, activism, and weed. I love Lara’s art, politics, taste in music … I’m lucky to know them. This was a limited edition I picked up at Short Run this year. The digital image doesn’t do the yummy riso textures justice.
Book 31: “The English Understand Wool” by #HelenDeWitt.
Never read DeWitt before but apparently she’s a big deal? This lives up to the hype. I’m a petty bitch and this was licks fingers DELICIOUS.
Part of the publisher’s slim hardcover fiction series that “aims to deliver the pleasure one felt as a child reading a marvelous book from cover to cover in an afternoon.” Truly marvelous. If they’re all this good, I feel a strong urge to buy every single one.
Kept waiting for the central allegory to explain itself: things disappear on an island, then the memories of them, all enforced by the titular authority. Felt similar to Miéville’s “The City and The City” but fuzzier. There’s no logic to what disappears—birds, stamps, green beans, roses—and people give them up with no resistance. Seeing how the banning of books and critical race theory played out, I think I get it now.
Ended up really enjoying this despite the shaky second quarter when it struggled to maintain its opening premise: murdering abusive husbands! 🔪
There wasn’t automatic sisterhood among the women (caste, religion, marital status, etc.), which was refreshing. Their ability to work together and support each other, in their own ways, felt grounded and real. And it’s got jokes too!
A Kentucki is a little animal toy with cameras and mics, randomly paired with a “dweller” somewhere else in the world. The dweller can observe but not (meaningfully) communicate with the “keeper,” whoever owns the Kentucki.
You can imagine where it goes from there given how fucked up humanity can be, either the dweller or keeper. It’s pretty bleak by the end. People really are the worst. Fascinating and horrifying.
I realize now that I have no idea what #DarkAcademia is as a genre (see my journey in this thread). This is supposedly the best example. Magic really isn’t part of it.
This book isn’t for me. Outside of my mistaken expectations, the characters are assholes (a requirement!) and it went on way too long. The writing at the start made me take notice—Tartt can write—but I just didn’t care for her world and its people.
A retelling of a Tyrolean folk tale. So sweet! Both the story and the illustrations. I love his art style.
Before making this, Klassen revisited the book where he first encountered the folk tale and the ending was totally different from what he recalled. This version is what he remembered.
Books like this give me hope. That it’s possible to talk about being a queer, (South) Asian immigrant without retreading the same self-pitying tropes. That stories POC tell and share can show all our messiness as we try to figure out how to treat each other and be in the world. That nuance, community care, and sex can all be part of it. The best ending to an opening chapter ever.
Thoroughly enjoyed this. #RuralFantasy (new genre for me) that follows a Navajo monster hunter as she deals with deities and witches with a hot medicine man on the rez. There’s a second book already out that I can’t wait to read.
I mean, this cover, that title: how could I not? I read Cooper’s “Closer” and Frisk” in the 90s, and it felt transgressive, dangerous: everything the world told me gayness was. This was also a heady time of increasing representation, navigating sex, morality, pleasure while narrowly missing AIDS’ clutches.
But Cooper’s only got one set of tricks, as it were. The same repugnant characters preying on each other … psych! 🥱
Book 40: “Didn’t Nobody Give a Shit What Happened to Carlotta” by #JamesHannaham.
Yes! More stories about trans Blatinas! Carlotta transitioned while in prison on jumped up charges and is released into a changed world.
The writing randomly switches from first person unfiltered stream of consciousness to third person, the former often without punctuation. But it works since Carlotta’s voice is so distinct. And funny as hell, even when what she faces is no joke.
Book 41: “Where the Drowned Girls Go” by #SeananMcGuire.
The Wayward Children is always a solid series to return to. This entry is more of a stepping stone: set in our world instead of another on the other side of a door that a child stumbles through. It feels like a necessary, if slightly less compelling, step to prepare a larger stage. But McGuire still gives us unsettling glimpses into the particular deliverance/torments each person finds on the other side. 💔
I’ve wanted to learn how to mend (more), but wasn’t sure how to get started. Specifically, in a way that would be interesting to me. Someone #OnHere mentioned this book and I put it on hold at the library.
It’s so, so sweet! 🥹 Instructions interspersed with stories and illustrations. I’ll share what I do once I get started. ❤️🩹
Book 43: “The Fragile Threads of Power” by #VESchwab.
I love all of Schwab’s work. This continues the story set up in The Shades of Magic series.
That series got a teeny bit muddled by the end for me, but Schwab’s growth as a writer is evident here. Except for the monarchy, which I’m just more impatient with these days in my entertainment, (enough of the in-born virtue of royals), such a pleasure to re-visit this world and characters.
I envy Delisle’s drawing style: clear lines, deceptively simple, limited color palette. This is about his first job working in a paper factory as a teenager in Quebec.
Gaaah! That’s a wrap on what I read for 2023! I didn’t include all the zines, comix, and art books like I wanted though. Three minutes before the New Year. 😅 Promise to be more timely in 2024. Here’s the whole thing on #Bookwyrm: https://books.theunseen.city/user/otts/2023-in-the-books
@ottsatwork I read this and a sequel and really liked them but then I read the author's wikipedia page and was put off by what I found there. @bookstodon
@Nonya_Bidniss@Jennifer@ottsatwork@bookstodon I read it, that's fair enough criticism. To me, a lot of it comes down to how you separate professional and personal, if at all, for people in the public eye. Life and people are complicated, and never perfect. We choose what we can live with and what crosses the line. Personally, I am pretty forgiving and will normally focus on their professional work and ignore their personal. But yeah, the controversies are not to be taken lightly in this case.
@theotherotherone@Nonya_Bidniss@ottsatwork@bookstodon oh that. I read about that years ago and also read that a lot of other native writers thought the criticism of her was not warranted and was basically censorship. None of her critics were fiction writers and didn't seem to understand modern fiction. The criticism seemed to be she's not Navajo so shouldn't write about Navajos even though she worked and lived on the Navajo reservation for years and is married to a Navajo. I still like her.
@theotherotherone@Nonya_Bidniss@ottsatwork@bookstodon the criticism is that she wrote about Navajo culture, the main character in the books is Navajo and some characters are Navajo gods etc. She said her relatives were a member of that pueblo, but she was adopted when she was a baby and so she didn't grow up there. A bunch of people criticized her for lying about her heritage since she wasn't a registered member of the pueblo, but it seemed mean to me to pick on her since she was adopted.
@ottsatwork@theotherotherone@Nonya_Bidniss@bookstodon she is also half black and I remember reading that may have played a role in the controversy. I was so thrilled that she came up with such a great fantasy story set within a culture that not many people know about. After I read the book I did some research on Navajo mythology and learned a lot about their real world culture and religion. Now I seriously doubt she'll write anything else like it which is a real shame.
@CandaceRobbAuthor I definitely liked parts of it later on. The author has something to say about imperialism, but didn’t weave it well with the world she built. It got so grim! But it is hard to “talk about the issues” in one’s art well. Not many can pull it off. I’ll keep reading her work.
@ottsatwork@bookstodon the Craft Sequence is one of my favorite series! I felt all books in the series were really solid and most of the story lines unique while fitting together into the world and overall arc.
@ottsatwork@bookstodon I think maybe he has gotten better? I enjoy his past work (despite some thin charactarizations at times and intrusive tech how-to, like you said) but there’s something about these four stories that impressed me. Still think about them.
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