Somehow, June felt overly long, and like it blew right on by. Celebrated my mom's birthday, made some art in sticker form for her, went to the zoo, sculpted a bird out of glass, took up latte art. And how could I forget, the suncatcher I made for the yarn shop. I guess it was pretty busy! I know I said I was going to take this month easy on the reading front, but I feel like I still managed to read a fair amount. A good chunk of novellas (I love you, Murderbot), but still!
Bluebird by Ciel Pierlot ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ – A lot of fun! Hurt my feelings a little bit! Non consenual body mods is my favorite genre. I kept thinking [REDACTED] was going to betray them, and was pleasantly surprised to find out they didn't.
All Systems Red by Martha Wells ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ – rereading all of Murderbot to refresh for the new installment! Still love it. Love how quickly Bot goes from "I hate humans" to "no one touches my humans". Love how much Gurathin is like bot. Love how bot hates him for it. This is the first time reading since the show came out, and I still don't like Skarsgard for it.
How To Hold Someone In Your Heart by Mizuki Tsujimura ⭐⭐⭐⭐ – Back on my Tsujimura bullshit! Didn't enjoy it as much as the first one in some way. I think it's the lack of Newness. But still full of Feelings. Grief again. Loved ones are gone from the world, but not our hearts. Ouchie. Would be hurt again.
Artificial Condition by Martha Wells ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ – Continuing my Murderbot reread. No new Thoughts, except maybe I think this is my favorite because of the Bot ART interactions. A Private Channel With My Friend. Keep The Communication Device In Case We're In Range Again Someday. ART playing Santuary Moon episodes and OST to calm Bot. Chewing the plaster about this. I love them your honor.
The Blighted Stars by Megan E O'Keefe ⭐️⭐️⭐️ – This one is hard for me to rate because there are a lot of things that hit My Buttons. Feelings about AI spaceships, mind controlling fungus, tiny robot companions, there's a lot here that I really did enjoy. And yet. It's not even that the romance was bad, but every time they ogled at each other I was left thinking can we move on? Y'all are running for your lives, this is not the time. I'd like to read it with my own eyes and see if the narrator had anything to do with it, because this is not adding up.
Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ – For some reason the ending didn't change this time? [REDACTED] still crushed to death? Has anyone else experienced this? I'm also fascinated with when Bot calls itself SecUnit vs when it calls itself Murderbot. It does so twice in this entire novella. Once when its cover is blown and everyone's pointing guns at it, and again when [REDACTED] dies and it fails to save it. I'm sure this means nothing.
A Magical Girl Retires by Park Seolyeon ⭐️⭐️⭐️ – Book of the month! This was cute and silly and fun and needed to be longer. More fleshed out. Love that the message seems to be It's Never Too Late. Would have loved to have taken a bit longer to get there. It was Almost Gay, but again. No time to discover that. Even the Big Fight seemed too short. The illustrations were lovely and added a lot, and the translation didn't feel stiff or choppy.
Wolfworm by T Kingfisher ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ – Okay this one Got Me. It wasn't the body horror, it wasn't the locked underground, it wasn't the animals acting weird. It was The Bugs. Not the least bit helped by the fact somehow every time I read this, some sort of bug was crawling on or around me. Enjoyable, and the ending was cute, which is rare for a horror novel, would be scared again.
Blood Over Bright Haven by ML Wang ⭐⭐⭐⭐ – Read because tumblr told me to! What tumblr did not tell me that it was a Tragedy on par with Gideon the Ninth and The Once and Future Witches. Thanks, tumblr! In all seriousness this was a great book with great and terrible characters, and the only thing keeping it from being a full five stars is there was a lot of textbook-y info dumps right at the beginning. They were relevant (they were so, so relevant), but it's hard to get through. I figured out the magic system before the characters, and let me tell you! It still punched!
I don't think I can pinpoint a Favorite of the month. I want to say Wolfworm, but I think that's just recency bias. I have fond thoughts about Bluebird, and Blood Over Bright Haven was wonderfully done. I will endorse any of those in a heartbeat.
I have a few fun things lined up for July! Celebrating a friends birthday this weekend, and again later in the month when we go to the cool bug exhibit at the zoo! I also signed up for a tote bag making event led by a Queer group out of Providence which I am very scared about but also very excited about. Going to go with my friends as my emotional support. We will do things, even if we have to Do Them Scared.
