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Books n Comics
Apr. 12th, 2023 11:16 pmComics
I've discovered that my favourite way to engage with comics is with self-contained mini-series, which beats the heck out my previous approach of reading Vol. 1, and only ever Vol. 1, of whatever series I was interested in, and I have read a couple of crackers of late.
Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons - Fabulous feminist origin story of the Amazons where the Goddesses of Olympus go into open rebellion over the treatment of women in the world, absolutely gorgeous art, and only three issues. Highly recommended!
The Variants - Jessica Jones across the multiverse. A good, fun five issues, if not as memorable as The Amazons.
Books
Scorched Grace by Margot Douaihy - I really wanted to like this story of a queer, punk rock nun solving a series of arsons at her convent, and for a while I thought my lack of enjoyment was down to my own stuff - I would describe my religion as 'recovering Catholic' - but I just think that it wasn't very good. The characters are all so thinly drawn that the solution to the mystery doesn't matter, because you could just pick a character at random to be the guilty party and it would make just as much sense. And then there's this through line about why Sister Holiday joined the convent in the first place which eventually gets answered in flashback, and what happed was that she took her terminally ill mother out for a drive, stopped for a drink and left her in the car, and was hammered and dancing on a table when the car spontaneously caught fire and her already dying of cancer mother burned alive, and that is something that could make you want to get square with God, sure, while simultaneously being the dumbest thing I have ever read.
Women Talking by Miriam Toews - I was reminded that I had this and had never read it by the movie coming out. It's very...dry, reading more like a theology/philosophy debate than a novel, which was perhaps for the best because occasionally it'd drop a detail in like the two year old with an STD and I'd feel sick. I still want to see the movie, because that cast looks great.
Now You See Us by Balli Kaur Jaswal - Three Filipino maids working in Singapore investigate a murder for which another maid has been falsely arrested. This was another one where the answer to the mystery doesn't really matter, but in this case the characters and setting were interesting enough that I didn't care.
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou - Satire about an Asian American PhD student discovering the Chinese American poet she was bounced into doing her dissertation on was really a white dude in yellowface. It is hard to maintain satire for four hundred pages and it does get exhausting in places, but it's also laugh out loud funny.
You Just Need to Lose Weight and 19 Other Myths About Fat People by Aubrey Gordon - I listened to this on audiobook because Aubrey was narrating and I kept expecting Mike to chip in. I feel like you'd get the same information from listening to a bunch of back episodes of Maintenance Phase in a more fun format.
Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield - A tense, creepy novella about a woman whose wife goes missing in a submarine for months and comes back wrong. This goes exactly where you think it's going to, but it does it wonderfully. it might have worn thin had it been any longer, but it was the perfect length.
The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older - And we close out the post with another f/f novella. Please be the start of a series. I wish to read twelve of these lesbian Holmes and Watson in space mysteries, and then watch the adaptation. Highly recommended!
I've discovered that my favourite way to engage with comics is with self-contained mini-series, which beats the heck out my previous approach of reading Vol. 1, and only ever Vol. 1, of whatever series I was interested in, and I have read a couple of crackers of late.
Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons - Fabulous feminist origin story of the Amazons where the Goddesses of Olympus go into open rebellion over the treatment of women in the world, absolutely gorgeous art, and only three issues. Highly recommended!
The Variants - Jessica Jones across the multiverse. A good, fun five issues, if not as memorable as The Amazons.
Books
Scorched Grace by Margot Douaihy - I really wanted to like this story of a queer, punk rock nun solving a series of arsons at her convent, and for a while I thought my lack of enjoyment was down to my own stuff - I would describe my religion as 'recovering Catholic' - but I just think that it wasn't very good. The characters are all so thinly drawn that the solution to the mystery doesn't matter, because you could just pick a character at random to be the guilty party and it would make just as much sense. And then there's this through line about why Sister Holiday joined the convent in the first place which eventually gets answered in flashback, and what happed was that she took her terminally ill mother out for a drive, stopped for a drink and left her in the car, and was hammered and dancing on a table when the car spontaneously caught fire and her already dying of cancer mother burned alive, and that is something that could make you want to get square with God, sure, while simultaneously being the dumbest thing I have ever read.
Women Talking by Miriam Toews - I was reminded that I had this and had never read it by the movie coming out. It's very...dry, reading more like a theology/philosophy debate than a novel, which was perhaps for the best because occasionally it'd drop a detail in like the two year old with an STD and I'd feel sick. I still want to see the movie, because that cast looks great.
Now You See Us by Balli Kaur Jaswal - Three Filipino maids working in Singapore investigate a murder for which another maid has been falsely arrested. This was another one where the answer to the mystery doesn't really matter, but in this case the characters and setting were interesting enough that I didn't care.
Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou - Satire about an Asian American PhD student discovering the Chinese American poet she was bounced into doing her dissertation on was really a white dude in yellowface. It is hard to maintain satire for four hundred pages and it does get exhausting in places, but it's also laugh out loud funny.
You Just Need to Lose Weight and 19 Other Myths About Fat People by Aubrey Gordon - I listened to this on audiobook because Aubrey was narrating and I kept expecting Mike to chip in. I feel like you'd get the same information from listening to a bunch of back episodes of Maintenance Phase in a more fun format.
Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield - A tense, creepy novella about a woman whose wife goes missing in a submarine for months and comes back wrong. This goes exactly where you think it's going to, but it does it wonderfully. it might have worn thin had it been any longer, but it was the perfect length.
The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older - And we close out the post with another f/f novella. Please be the start of a series. I wish to read twelve of these lesbian Holmes and Watson in space mysteries, and then watch the adaptation. Highly recommended!