#my book recs

[bookcub]

Graphic Novel Rec

that have less than 100,000 ratings on Goodreads

The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen- If you haven't read this book, please do it now, it is amazing! It is about a Vietnamese American family telling stories to each other alongside the events of their lives.

10/10, one of my favorite books of the year!

Tea Dragon Society by Kay O'Neill- This series is so sweet and the epitome of cottagecore fantasy! Filled with little dragons, found family, and beautiful pictures!

10/10, a feel good book of mine

Sleepless by Sarah Vaughn, Leila del Duca, Alissa Sallah- Has anyone done bodyguard romance this well? No, they have not. A lovely romance at the center and lots with court intrigue.

9/10, a swoonworthy romance fantasy!

Fangs by Sarah Anderson- Who hasn't wanted a romance between a vampire and a werewolf? Low stakes and adorable.

8/10, a super quick ad satisfying read

Trickster: Native American Tales, A Graphic Collection- A collection of short stories by various writers and artists about the many tricksters from the various cultures.

7.5/10 full of tricks and stories

The Old Guard by Greg Rucka- A little too gory for my taste, but as someone who loved the movie, I really enjoyed seeing the material it was adapted from!

7/10 action packed and emotional

The Girl from the Sea by Molly Knox Ostertag- An adorable sapphic romance with a selkie as the love interest!! Super lovely!

7/10 a darling love story

#graphic novels #trung le nguyen #kay o'neill #the magic fish #tea dragon society #sleepless #the old guard #greg rucka #molly knox ostertag #the girl from the sea #my book recs

[morhath]

Oh I’m very very interested in your nonfiction book recs 👀

EDIT: ykw I'm gonna make this a little more organized

I listed a bunch in this post (the last question) but lemme see if I have any additions because I know I was kinda trying to keep it short when I wrote that. (But that being said, that post is the Top Faves Of All Time, so go for those first.)

Freaky medical shit I also liked:

The Fever: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years by Sonia Shah

The Barbary Plague: The Black Death in Victorian San Francisco by Marilyn Chase (I just read this a few weeks ago and OOUUUGGHHHHHH IT'S LITERALLY JUST. LIKE THE RESPONSE TO COVID.)

The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic—and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World by Steven Johnson

Political shit I also liked:

Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century edited by Alice Wong

The Viral Underclass: The Human Toll When Inequality and Disease Collide by Steven W. Thrasher

Immigrants, Evangelicals, and Politics in an Era of Demographic Change by Janelle S. Wong

History I also liked:

Triangle: The Fire That Changed America by David Von Drehle

The Hamlet Fire: A Tragic Story of Cheap Food, Cheap Government, and Cheap Lives by Bryant Simon (between those two you can tell I was on a bit of a "workplace tragedies caused by lax regulations and bad management" kick)

The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore (I think everyone knows about this book, including it for completeness)

Promised the Moon: The Untold Story Of The First Women In The Space Race by Stephanie Nolen

The Women's House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison by Hugh Ryan

Butts: A Backstory by Heather Radke (this is nowhere near as fun and cute as you'd assume from the title)

Memoirs I also liked:

The Less People Know About Us: A Mystery of Betrayal, Family Secrets, and Stolen Identity by Axton Betz-Hamilton (I read this before I really got into nonfiction and it was WILD, I tell people about it all the time)

The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui (this one is a graphic not-novel-I-guess-memoir)

Know My Name by Chanel Miller

Other:

Playing Dead: A Journey Through the World of Death Fraud by Elizabeth Greenwood

A False Report: A True Story of Rape in America by Ken Armstrong, T. Christian Miller

Lost Feast: Culinary Extinction and the Future of Food by Lenore Newman

It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror by Joe Vallese

AND here are a few on my TBR that I'm really excited for! I decided not to categorize them because they're almost all history:

Silk and Potatoes: Contemporary Arthurian Fantasy by Adam Roberts

Refusing Compulsory Sexuality: A Black Asexual Lens on Our Sex-Obsessed Culture by Sherronda J. Brown

All the Young Men by Ruth Coker Burks

The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara by David I. Kertzer (I am actually partway through this right now but in a bit of a dry/confusing section)

The Broadcast 41: Women and the Anti-Communist Blacklist by Carol A. Stabile

The Golden Thread: How Fabric Changed History by Kassia St Clair

A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II by Sonia Purnell (have just barely started this)

Time to Dance, a Time to Die: The Extraordinary Story of the Dancing Plague of 1518 by John Waller

The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyŏng: The Autobiographical Writings of a Crown Princess of Eighteenth-Century Korea by Lady Hyegyeong

Miss Major Speaks: The Life and Times of a Black Trans Revolutionary by Miss Major Griffin-Gracy

Too Hot to Touch: The Problem of High-Level Nuclear Waste by William M. Alley, Rosemarie Alley (I'm in the middle of this but it's surprisingly, um. not exciting.)

Going Postal: Rage, Murder, and Rebellion: From Reagan's Workplaces to Clinton's Columbine and Beyond by Mark Ames

Pressure Cooker: Why Home Cooking Won't Solve Our Problems and What We Can Do About It by Joslyn Brenton, Sinikka Elliott, Sarah Bowen

Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder

The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World by Virginia Postrel

Women's Work: The First 20,000 Years Women, Cloth, and Society in Early Times by Elizabeth Wayland Barber

Medieval Gentlewoman: Life in a Gentry Household in the Later Middle Ages by Ffiona Swabey

Hitler's First Victims: The Beginning of the Holocaust and One Man's Fight to End It by Timothy W. Ryback

I am soso normal and have very normal interests that are not at all grim :)

#long post #life #reading #books #tempestclerics #my book recs

[brattylikestoeat]

Total book read: 45

Total DNF: 7

Top 3:

Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute by Talia Hibbert

The Weight of Blood by Tiffany D Jackson

Why Does He Do That? By Lundy Bancroft

Most Disappointing: Out There Screaming anthology By Jordan Peele

#brattylikestoeat #currently reading #my book recs

[swanmaids]

favourite nonfiction read in the first half of 2023

one of my reading resolutions this year was to read more non fiction. here are some of my recommendations from the first half of the year, which i’ve loosely grouped together. i’d recommed each as well-written, informative, and thought-provoking.

history

Come to This Court and Cry: How the Holocaust Ends - Linda Kintsler

Empire of Pain: the Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty - Patrick Radden Keefe

society

Sandy Hook: an American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth - Elizabeth Williamson

Men Who Hate Women: the Truth About Extreme Misogyny and How it Affects Us All - Laura Bates

memoir

I’m Glad My Mom Died - Jennette Mccurdy

Inferno: a Memoir of Motherhood and Madness - Catherine Cho

Somebody’s Daughter - Ashley C Ford

science

The Ends of the World: Supervolcanoes, Lethal Oceans, and the Search for Past Apocalypses - Peter Brannen

Otherlands: a World in the Making - Thomas Halliday

Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds, and Shape Our Futures  - Merlin Sheldrake

#my post #my book recs

[winged-fool]

which books are you reading right now? do you have any queer book recs?

Yeah happy to share what I've been reading! I've only knocked out a few but I have a few more on my list.

The City Beautiful – this is about a young Jewish man (around 18 I think) and takes place in Chicago during the World Fair (sometime in the 1890s). Alter is in the US trying to save enough money to bring his mom and twin sisters from Romania and during this time one of his roommates is murdered and he becomes possessed by his dybuk (like a Jewish soul) and is spurred on to find his murderer. Alter is explicitly gay and has had a few relationships with other boys; the book itself is rich with Jewish culture and deals with homophobia and anti-Semitism of the time. It’s incredibly good.

Siren Queen – this one is a little dark and it’s WLW book. This one takes place in the Golden Age of Hollywood, in the 1920s, and features magical realism. It’s about a Chinese little girl who wants to be a Hollywood star and how she is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve her dream. She is also explicitly gay and has two main relationships throughout the book (and ends in a relationship with another one). Its theme focuses on what does it mean to be a monster and challenges your perceptions of monsters. As a queer Chinese woman, she finds her fame in playing monsters in films and makes connections with others in the industry that don’t fit the mold of Hollywood at the time. This one really hooked me, I couldn’t put it down.

The Once and Future Witches – this book isn’t as queer centric but it has a lot of great representation. It’s about three sisters who are witches and are trying to bring magic back to society. It takes place in fictional New Salem also in the 1890s and ties the witching movement with the suffragist movement which sounds weird but honestly REALLY works. One of the sisters is explicitly queer, she has a relationship with a WOC, while another one is asexual-coded, and there is a trans side character as well. I had a bit of a difficult time getting into this one but once it picks up, it REALLY picks up and I couldn’t put it down.

The Secret Lives Of Country Gentlemen - Okay this was a really fun read that's a little less plot driven but so enjoyable! It takes place in the late 1800s England and is about Gareth whose estranged father recently passed away and he inherits an obscure earldom on the marsh and it's about him trying to fit in with this new society and be accepted by his half sister he'd never met before. Prior to coming to the marsh, he had a brief anonymous relationship who turns out to be a crime big shot on the marsh. There's some mystery with Gareth's father's death but not really the focus of the book haha

Lavender House - this is basically a queer whodunit. It takes place in the 20s or so and follows Andy who was recently fired from the police force after accidentally being outed. He's hired by a woman whose wife was killed and turns out she has this house in the country that's a queer safe place where everyone including the staff are queer. It's pretty easy to guess who the murderer is so what really works is the queer relationships.

Last Call At the Nightingale - this is another murder mystery but definitely has more twists and turns than the precious one. This is the only bisexual book on my list so far so while it wasn't the best book, it's still special to me lol it's about Vivian an Irish working girl in NYC during the prohibition era. Someone is murdered at her favorite speak easy which is also her safe haven so she decides to help the owner, Hux who she may have a crush on, solve the murder so the speakeasy doesn't get closed.

I've also read The Song of Achilles which I think is a pretty well known one so I won't summarize that one. Next up I've got these books:

Giovanni's Room (mlm)

Last Night at the Telegraph House (wlw)

Nothing Sung and Nothing Spoken (wlw)

If you're interested, I'd be happy to update this post once I finish the other books :)

#My asks #Anon ask #Book recs #queer books #my book recs #Queer rep

[therefugeofbooks]

It's Non-fiction November! And as I started to read more non-fiction this year, I decided to share some favorites of 2022 for anyone looking for something to read this month or who wants to get out of their comfort zone! In no particular order:

Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner

A memoir about how Zauner's mother's diagnosis of terminal cancer forced a reckoning with her identity and brought her to reclaim the gifts of taste, language, and history her mother had given her.

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah

Trevor Noah shares his story of growing up in South Africa, with a black South African mother and a white European father at a time when it was against the law for a mixed-race child like him to exist.

Last Witnesses: An Oral History of the Children of World War II by Svetlana Alexievich

Stories about what it was like to be a Soviet child during the upheaval and horror of the Second World War.

In The Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

An ccount of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming.

The Windrush Betrayal by Amelia Gentleman:

The story of the investigation of Britain's 'hostile environment' immigration policy that led to thousands of law-abiding people being wrongly classified as illegal immigrants, with many being removed from the country, and many more losing their homes and their jobs.

Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

Persepolis is the story of Satrapi's unforgettable childhood and coming of age within a large and loving family in Tehran during the Islamic Revolution.

Have you read any of these books? Are you guys reading anything for Non-fiction November? :)

#booklr #book recs #nonfiction #crying in h mart #michelle zauner #trevor noah #born a crime #svetlana alexievich #last witnesses #in the dream house #carmen maria machado #persepolis #marjane satrapi #my book recs #the refuge of books

[b-elizabeth-not-brassica]

Every year, I always desire to read more books and I actually am doing it for once! And I have been, for the last week or so, been picking books up!

Already this year, I have read a book! And it was very good!

If Tomorrow Never Comes by Jen St. Jude!

About Avery, a college freshman who is on her way to jump into the river and kill herself on her birthday, when her best friend, Cass, who she is in love with, calls her and is the one to tell her that an asteroid is on a collision course with Earth, 9 days from then.

What do you do when you want to kill yourself but the world is going to end in nine days anyways?

It’s about depression, and religious trauma, and feeling not good enough, and being afraid of disappointing your parents and loving your best friend and the end of the world and hope and love and art and queer joy despite that.

I highly recommend it! I read it in one sitting!

#my post #my posts #books I read 2024 #my book recs #books #book recs #queer books #sapphic books #lesbian books

[aranict]

Challenge of the day: get through the three first chapters of A shadow in the Ember and see if its better than the previous works of this author.

I really like the premise ... but I dont think I can stand the prose . Or the first person POV , which makes the narrative even more flat.

I will give it a chance though.

#aranict #my book recs

[bookcub]

Book Rec of Djinn . . .Jinn. .. Jinni. . .

Rated on how likely the jinn would be my friend

The Stardust Thief by Chelsea Abdullah- Qadir is the jinn with the largest role and I cannot decide if he would find me mildly amusing or mildly annoying. Either way, he would probably not be talkative and not view me as a threat or a priority.

5/10

The Daevabad Trilogy by SA Chakraborty- While the term djinn is a controversial one in this world, there are plenty of djinn to choose from. Nahri might be my friend, if she didn't see me as an easy mark (which is very likely). I would very much enjoy her company if she didn't have her defenses up. Ali would probably find me interesting as a human and ask me a mixture of interesting and boring questions. Both would care if I died, unlike Dara, who wouldn't care if he accidentally caused my death.

6/10

A Master of Djinn by P Djeli Clark- I don't want to cause any spoilers but our main djinn would absolutely find me adorable, if not easily manipulated. We could definitely have a few fun nights for sure.

7/10

This Woven Kingdom by Tahereh Mafi- Alizah would 1000% defend me with her life and successfully save it, but I am uncertain how receptive she would be to friendship, considering how guarded she is. I, however, would absolutely put in the effort for her.

7.5/10

An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir- If I remember book two correctly, I would absolutely never become friends with this jinn. And I think they would actively want to kill me.

0/10

The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker - Ahmed would not be friends with me and be very very rude to me, although he would not kill me. I would rather be friends with Chava, the golem instead. We would be besties.

1/10

Nayra and the Djinn by Iasmin Omar Ata-

Majan is a delight and I think we are likely to get along fairly well, although certainly not to the extent Nayra and Marjan have bonded. But we could tell each other stories and reignite some of the spark in each other's lives, encouraging exploration and connection. A fun and emotional time!!

8/10

#the daevabad trilogy #the stardust thief #the golem and the jinni #nayra and the djinn #an ember in the ashes #this woven kingdom #a master of djinn #tahereh mafi #Chelsea abdullah #sabaa tahir #sa chakraborty #p djeli clark #helene wecker #iasmin omar ata #my book recs #djinn #jinni

[morhath]

trick or treat :3c

You get one (1) book rec, definitely still on Halloween for sure!

A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster by Rebecca Solnit

Ooh, a nonfiction rec! This is a great book I read when I was just starting to get into nonfiction. I loved how thoroughly it debunked the stereotype that humans turn into terrible people when there's some kind of disaster. In fact, as this book repeatedly shows, people are kind and altruistic when faced with disaster, and they form communities and help each other. I especially enjoyed the section on the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, and I think this book is also very relevant right now.

#myriad--starlings #reading #books #my book recs #life #halloween

[smalltownfae]

For the book rec ask game 👁️

The obvious answer would be 1984 by George Orwell because the eye reminds me of "Big Brother is watching you", but I don't want to be obvious so I am going with Life Ceremony by Sayaka Murata, which has this beautiful cover:

Life Ceremony is right in the middle of Convenience Store Woman and Earthlings in levels of weirdness. It's not as safe and cautious as the author's first work and it's not as weird and disgusting as the book with the cute hedgehog on the cover.

This is a collection of 12 odd short stories translated from japanese that provide commentary about different aspects of society. What the author excels at is creating characters that are outside of the norm and she likes presenting how they interact with the world around them.

The titular story, Life Ceremony, includes cannibalism and the first short story is about humans in a near future using materials made from deceased people (including debate about the morality of it). This is just an example of the type of stories in this book.

My favourites were Hatchling and A Magnificent Spread.

This is the book by the author that I like the least because some of the stories were too short and most of them were just alright, but I still enjoyed this book and I think it is a nice introduction to the kind of works Sayaka Murata produces.

Thank you for the ask :)

#life ceremony #sayaka murata #andy answers #my book recs

[swanmaids]

tagged by @theghostinthemargins for five books i’d choose if i could only read those five books for the rest of my life, thank you!

first, this question is cruel and unusual. that said, i think i’d go with:

the silmarillion - jrrt. you know the drill. favourite book, all time obsession, no silm no life. this is one that i really couldn’t live without.

a feast for crows/ a dance with dragons - grrm. ok technically i’m cheating and this is two books but. beloved feastdance <3. they overlap temporally and can be read concurrently, so i’m counting them as one. i know some people think asoiaf falls off here, but those people are wrong. gender! the fallout after war! magic and prophecy and eldritch apocalypse incoming! greyjoys greyjoying! lannisters lannistering! i could read these again and again and keep noticing more.

the tale of genji - murasaki shikibu. love this brick. on its face this is a bit like a soap opera with genji and his many wives and lovers and all the drama that brings, but it’s much more layered, with a ton of political intruige occuring under the surface, and the hints of the deep interiority of the female characters (bargen’s a woman’s weapon: possession in the tale of genji is a great exploration of this.). plus of course the way it echoes through japanese art, literature and theatre throughout the centuries.

bloodchild - octavia butler. a good short story collection is essential if i’m only allowed to read five books for the rest of my life, and every story here hits. they’re beautiful and disturbing and each one leaves you thinking about it long after completion. each one also comes with butler’s in-depth and illuminating commentary.

complete poems - christina rossetti. likewise, some great poetry also feels essential to round out this challenge. rossetti’s body of work is so broad that it would take a decent amount of time to get through it all, and so beautiful and touching that it would be a greatly worthwhile process. plus, goblin market is just the best.

tagging @matrose2 @courtjestermerlin @mirillel @meadowlarkx @jouissants

@imakemywings @polutrope @aipilosse if you’d like to do it!

#tag game #my book recs

[booksandpusssy]

Beat my reading challenge this year ! 6999999

#bookworm #currently reading #books #book review #girls who read #poetrysociety #my book reviews #used books #my book recs #my bookshelf #book recommendations #bookish #booksbooksbooks

[californiannostalgia]

so I did not expect Piranesi to be an abuse survivor narrative but? here we are?

immersive and haunting; very glad I read it

#piranesi #my thoughts #tw abuse #my book recs #piranesi spoilers #spoilers

[mscaptainwinchester]

Queer Recs Week 1

It’s Pride! I’m an asexual librarian. Read some gay shit recced by me! 

I’ve include author pronouns where I’ve been able to find them stated publicly.

Title:  Across a Field of Starlight

Author(s):  Blue Delliquanti (they/them)

Tags/TWs: graphic novel, enby mcs, trans characters, gender-nonconforming character, entirely queer cast, space travel, friends to (maybe??) platonic life partners, intergalactic war, betrayal, egalitarian community, science nerds, fat main character, POC-coded characters (including both mains)

-

Title: Forward March

Author(s): Skye Quinlan (she/they)

Tags/TWs: ya contemporary fiction, asexual lesbian mc, Black lesbian love interest, enby major secondary character, marching band, boarding school, homophobia, fake dating profile created without character’s consent, mistaken identity, politics, intentional nonconsensual public outing of mc, mc is daughter of a republican presidential candidate, parental emotional abuse, parental possession/entitlement, jealousy, betrayal, panic attacks, anxiety, school dance, this is a lot fluffier than the tags make it sound i promise

-

Title: Mamo, Vol. 1

Author(s): Sas Milledge (she/they)

Tags/TWs: ya graphic novel, queer fem mcs, witchcraft, fae, the cutest fucking trolls you’ll ever see, wild magic, emotional abuse, found family, cozy villages, bones, familiars

-

Title: Chef’s Kiss

Author(s):  Jarrett Melendez (he/him), Danica Brine (Illustrations) (she/her), Hank Jones (Colorist) (he/him), Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (not stated, but masc presenting)

Tags/TWs: graphic novel, gay mc, chefs, restaurants, delightful pig, parental pressure, struggles with post-college wtf do i do with my life questions, recipes i cannot wait to try, found family, roommates

-

Title: Jay’s Gay Agenda

Author(s): Jason June (he used in bio, genderqueer)

Tags/TWs: ya contemporary fiction, gay mc, sex-positive, small town boy moves to the Big City, lists, first kiss, first time, multiple relationships at once, high school senior sleeps with college guy, costumes, found family, supportive parents,

-

Title: Coming Back

Author(s): Jessi Zabarsky (she/her)

Tags/TWs: graphic novel, poc mc, magic, growing apart and growing back together, fat mc

-

Title: Kiss & Tell

Author(s):  Adib Khorram (he/him)

Tags/TWs: ya contemporary fiction, boy bands, canadian mc, poc love interest, break-ups, rebounds, sex-positive, public humiliation, private messages released to the public by an ex, jealousy, passive racism and homophobia, underage drinking, soft dates, white mc learning to recognize casual racism done to his peers, learning to stand up for oneself, harmful gay stereotypes, this book was hilarious and lot more enjoyable and delightful to read than the tags make it seem i promise

-

Title: How to Bang a Billionaire

Author(s): Alexis Hall (he/him/any)

Tags/TWs: gay rewrite of 50 shades of gray, no seriously, but SO MUCH BETTER, bdsm, horny af, erotica, gay mc, first in a trilogy (haven’t read the other two yet, but i’m working on it)

Currently Reading: 

Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo (she/her)

Out of the Blue by Jason June (he used in bio, genderqueer)

All That’s Left in the World by Erik J. Brown (he/him)

#pride 2022 #queer books #lgbt lit #fiction #graphic novel #books #my book recs

[aranict]

DEFINITELY not having stayed up till 4 am for the past week , reading the Flesh and Fire trilogy

I dont think I have ever gone from 'this is meh' to 'ffs how can this be so good im up reading all night' like i did with this one 🫠

#aranict #my book recs