If you've ever wanted to draw a line from ancient Roman rings to chain emails, this is the book for you! A humorous and well-researched dive into history and our collective psyche. And Ocker bought a cursed dog statue on eBay so you know he put his fate on the line for this project!

This quote from the epilogue sums up the author's personality and humor. A fun spooky season read!

You want poetry to make you cry from both grief and beauty? Boom. I love Young's prose and his vignettes of navigating death and birth with his family. I left lots of underlines in this book because there are some powerful quotes. TW: deals with death, including a miscarriage.

4.5/5, a great start to a space opera. The POVs and their plots came together in unexpected but "so THAT'S what that meant" kinds of ways. Also some great twists. TW: violent fights and deaths; systemic sexual, physical, spiritual, and psychological abuse; non-consensual medical procedures. Fortunately, Lewis isn't graphic in these things, just evocative.

My first Asimov experience, it's easy to understand why he's a classic scifi pillar. I like the broad sociological sweeps captured by the arcs of individual characters. Shout out to Finn for graciously volunteering as my photo background.

First book I read from my Christmas haul, I was not disappointed! I came for the corvids and stayed for Haupt's insight into the urban wilderness, which she teaches is no less "nature" than a national park, but one with different rules. This book is a good way to mourn what the world is losing in its ecosystems while encouraging you not to give up. TW: occasional non-graphic descriptions of harm to animals.

This book began because Carrie Fisher found her diaries from age 19, written as she filmed Return of the Jedi. She is an incandescently talented writer, witty and raw and poetic. She examines how Princess Leia began and reveals the bittersweet legacy of being forever entangled with her. She also (modestly) pulls back the curtain on her affair with Harrison Ford (who should've known better, but she gives him grace). 5/5

My first experience with Virginia Woolf. Absolutely recommend! Its train-of-thought prose is sometimes so gorgeous I had to stare into space for a moment. I love books about the interconnectedness of lives.
TW: PTSD, depression, suicide

Reading this for the fourth evening in a row. It's an easy book to fall into 📚 Everything feels genuine.

Sociologically fascinating and spiritually hopeful, I'll definitely be rereading this.

I love his YouTube channel, Hello Future Me, and this book puts all of his writing analysis in one place. Definitely recommend for any writers!

"Failure is just part of the process, and it's not just okay; it's better than okay. God doesn't want failure to shut us down. God didn't make it a three-strikes-and-you're-out sort of thing. It's more about how God's helps us dust ourselves off so we can swing for the fences again. And all of this without keeping a meticulous record of our screw-ups." p. 29
As a still-recovering perfectionist: *phew*

Y'know, just in case. #quaranreads

"The very scary thing about religion, to me, is that people actually believe God is who they think He is."

I stopped and reread this line a few times, because Miller put into words one of the biggest, hairiest, most infuriating problems I've been staring down lately: humanity's bullheaded inconsistency.

Kelsea is fierce, with very real internal issues and strengths. Johansen references fantasy tropes (a sheltered heir, magical gems, evil queen, etc.) then flips most of them. Engaging writing, tho some of the Mort Queen's POV just underlines that the Evil Empire of Evilness is Evil. TW: Violence & sexual violence typical of gritty medieval fiction (rarely explicit, blessedly not framed to thrill). The creepy albino trope appears for no reason.

I liked Lucado's writing style, his philosophy feels solid, and the study guide in the back was intensive. There wasn't much insight into anxiety as a clinical disorder, but he did cover many emotional roots of day-to-day anxiety, and this is a valuable read for if the world sets your teeth on edge.

Solid theological insight, but it was tempered for me by Batterson's simpler writing style and reliance on analogies. The last half of the book was a bit better. I know plenty of other people have enjoyed this work and my gripes are purely stylistic, so have it for yourself!

This book makes you so aware of how fragile life as we know it is. The characters, time-jumps, plots and clues are perfect. It's strange to be so happy about a post-apocalyptic novel, but I love stories that highlight the tapestry of human lives. TW: global pandemic, death, some violence (almost no gore), an off-page suicide, brief references to sexual violence and child brides. It's worth noting that darkness is never played up for drama here.

Listen. This is visceral Eastern Europe-based fantasy full of eldritch gods, Orthodoxy imagery, cults and blood sorcery. You've got your female characters, your POCs, LGBT representation and two characters who give Zuko and Kylo Ren vibes, respectively. My only complaint was that the cult stuff cut the princess contest plotline a bit short. Also HIGHLY rec Story on the Square in McDonough, GA. TW: casual bloodletting and some body horror

It's Hemingway -- his settings and characters are so vivid that they become all you know. It's taken me forever to get to reading this and I'm glad I did.

I've loved Sy's writing since "The Soul of an Octopus," and I can't recommend this memoir enough. Animals give us so much incentive to see everything differently. It's a wonderful, optimistic read, and yeah you'll probably cry a little.

Read on a stormy morning, perfect for one sitting. Hemingway remains one of my favorite authors for his poignant characters and psychology. If he includes a detail, it's both important and beautiful.

Two AWESOME novels centered around First Nations culture: Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse, and The Vengeance of Mothers by Jim Fergus. Roanhorse's worldbuilding is incredible, and Fergus is the rare male author who writes women not just well, but spectacularly.

I can't imagine how much research (culinary and otherwise) went into this book. It's a vibrant read. Characters are 10/10. TW: piratical punishment, battle, and gore, plus frank discussion of human sex trafficking (one character is a victim).

I knew a few chapters in that I'd have to reread this book. It's packed, tamped down, and packed some more with philosophy, history, and emotion. Rasmussen looks long and hard at humanity. This is one of the most hopeful books I've ever read.

I knew a few chapters in that I'd have to reread this book. It's packed, tamped down, and packed some more with philosophy, history, and emotion. Rasmussen looks long and hard at humanity. This is one of the most hopeful books I've ever read.

Time travel? Alternate history? Puns? Hopping between the pages of your favorite book? All wrapped up in an urban fantasy/scifi police drama? Sign me up!

Story of the perils and adventures of adopting an eldritch anemone child. People who love each other but don't always know how. POC characters, including the badass, tender MC herself! Finished at 1 a.m. FEELINGS.
Sex present but not explicit, so the only real warning here is some language, plus creature/human violence like you'd expect in a post-apocalytic biopunk wasteland.

"Anyone else confronted with Favor Borne would have run screaming."
Love this book.

Awesome book, 10/10 plan to buy a copy of my own so I can reread it and underline at will. Great for beginning to understand my own weird story.

My therapist loaned me this book to help me learn about my people-pleasing, self-depricating tendencies and where they've come from. That's important to understand because for me, they've let to anxiety and depression. This book takes a great look at that - geared more towards married/dating women, but insightful even if single because of how it delves into childhood relationships with parents, and different categories of adult pleasers.

Promising concept, but the detached writing style, pedantic exposition, and forced plot points almost made this one a bail for me. It's not "throw it out the airlock" bad, but there are many better sci-fis. Plus, if we haven't collectively outgrown sexism by the year 6 billion, then what's the point?

A good book to be reading right now. Happy Earth Day!

The Christmas book haul! (My stack is under a for tall this year because I also asked for a lot of art supplies, lol.) I've already started Mad Enchantment, and so far it's fantastic.

Lev and Kolya are thrown together by their mistakes, and their lives depend on an impossible task: find a dozen eggs for a Colonel's daughter's wedding cake, in a city racked by starvation. Benioff portrays the arbitrary and cruel nature of war without soaking the story in despair. There is humor and rage and sadness and friendship in perfect balance. Excellent novel! Warnings: violence, talk of violence, sex, talk of sex, you get the idea.

"'That's our plan? We're going to walk fifty kilometers, right past the Germans, to a poultry collective that maybe didn't get burned down, grab a dozen eggs, and come home?'
'Well, anything would sound ridiculous if you said it with that tone of voice.'"
If you're not a little in love with Kolya within a few pages of meeting him, despite some of his flaws or because of others, then I dunno what to tell you.

Broke a reading dry spell with Neil Gaiman - I don't know if I've ever read a book that feels so much like the old tales of the fae, despite not limiting itself to just those. There's a lot of creatures in London Below...
(I'd love to visit, but tbh I would absolutely freak out and die within 48 hours. It would be an awesome 48 hours, though.)

Holy crap, what a book. Atkinson is a master of the Butterfly Effect, and it makes for a compelling, beautiful read. Alternate timelines are a surprisingly comforting thought. Trigger Warnings: rape and domestic abuse shape one timeline but are undone in subsequent ones; a side plot involves a pedophile murdering two girls (or just one).

Extremely informative, totally hilarious, and probably one of my fav impulse buys. It's easy to read and hard to put down. I think I understand myself much better now, but then again, that could be a delusion...

There's some really great history here, "Salt" does lag a bit from time to time - that could either be the subject matter, or the fact that I'm more of a fiction person. Kurlansky's best writing comes when describing the sociology of salt, and all the innovations, wars, and rules therein. He also keeps the focus global, which leads to some great cultural comparisons, insights, and humor.

It turns out I can't read two nonfiction books in a row (ah, adulting), so I'm splitting my time between Salt and Life After Life.

This is one of the best books about Shakespeare I've ever read, full of history, sociology, religious studies, psychology, and Packer's own extensive theatrical experience. She reveals the way Shakespeare's attitude towards society and women evolved with his skills and experiences - including his probable affair with a certain "Dark Lady," Aemilia Bassano, one of the first feminists.

McRobbie gives a witty, detailed view of historical women who had the power and weren't afraid to use it. Definitely not a kids' book - these princesses aren't Disney, and neither is history - but highly enjoyable for people who like the messier side of history.

"The thin girl" begins the story after arriving in rural Britain from shelled-out London, and finding a book of Norse mythology. This may be a book about a child, but it's not a children's book. She made an A++ representation of Loki, if that's a hint. Byatt brings out all the gods and their world in full, vibrant color, and in detail that makes you wonder where myth and reality end.

Five-year-old me had absolutely no desire to explore Oz (the movie was more than enough), but 22-year-old me has enjoyed it immensely. Dorothy is a surprisingly strong child heroine - she speaks her mind, finds allies, and sticks to her morals. The characterization of her companions is complex and ironic. Plus, the story's dark side is way deeper here. Enslavement? Fights to the death? Unresolved ethical dilemmas in Oz culture? Sign me up.

Roverandom is so little-known, but it's beautiful! Tolkien wrote it for his son Michael. It's a fantastic romp about a dog trying to break a wizard's curse, and it goes to the moon to the ocean floor, and through several proto-LoTR elements. And of course, the writing awesome.