Monthly reading update for February
I meant for this to be another bimonthly one, but I forgot to update it a couple weeks ago, and by the time I remembered it was almost the end of the month anyway. At the time, I was thinking "it's a short month, I've not been reading much, it'll be fine" but it turns out I actually did read a lot. So it's gonna be a long one today:
Arkady Martine - A Memory Called Empire
Spent most of this time thinking that it was just a political intrigue type book disguised as science fiction (not necessarily a bad thing, I love scheming!). The sci-fi elements are a bit more important than that, upon reflection (e.g. the imago machines play a pretty significant role), but the scheming is the real reason to read it. If you like the early chapters of Dune better than the revolution part, you probably don't need me to tell you that you need to read this. I'm definitely going to be getting the sequel next time I'm at a bookstore.
Amelia Earhart - 20 Hrs., 40 Min.
Earhart's been a longtime hero of mine, albeit one I don't think about much these days. I found this one in a box of old books I pulled out of the basement to sell to the used bookstore, and that childhood love led me to hold onto it. Sadly there's not really much of interest in there; the autobiographical part doesn't cover any ground I'd not heard before, and the supposed central event of the book (crossing the Atlantic) is handled over the course of about 5-10 pages. If you want to hear about weather keeping her trapped in Newfoundland for weeks, then maybe give it a shot? But I'd not recommend it.
Cecilia Gentili - Faltas
This one was absolutely incredible; really loved Gentili's narrative voice. It's about growing up trans, growing up abused, growing up poor, but despite all that it feels almost triumphant. Probably that's because it's written in the form of letters to people who didn't leave the town, whereas she got out and made something of herself. Not really able to talk about what I loved about it, but I'll definitely be recommending it.
Forman Brown - Better Angel
It's gay fiction (thinly veiled autobiography) from the 1930s, what more need I say? He reads too much, gets a superiority complex about his intelligence, and ends up unfit for heterosexual society. Basically, he's just like me. He seems to have a very dim view of 20th century gay society though; perhaps the result of discovering homosexuality through reading ancient Greek literature? But what would you really expect from a socially respectable gay guy from 90 years ago?
Junichiro Tanizaki - Quicksand
Immediately after reading The Makioka Sisters for the first time, I was ready to proclaim Tanizaki as one of my favorite authors ever. Every book I've read of his since then has slowly been changing my mind on that. Superficially, The Makioka Sisters seems like it sticks out in his discography (it's almost like Jane Austen, whereas his other work seems to be different ways sex can ruin your life), but it doesn't really? It's all just different ways of saying that he thinks modernity is killing Japan; in this one, Tanizaki's modernity of choice is bisexuality. It's kinda fun reading about the evil lesbian for a bit, but it all just comes to a sudden stop, as if he got bored with it and just threw one last chapter in to provide an ending.
Min Jin Lee - Pachinko
I am such a sucker for these multigenerational family sagas. One Hundred Years of Solitude, Homegoing, Pachinko: I'll read them all, just keep them coming. I'd not known anything before about the Korean community in Japan, and now I do (or at least I think I do), so that's pretty cool as well. Noa is, sadly, another "he is so me" type character; always reading, a bit snobby, dead-set on being One Of The Good Ones.
Qiu Miaojin - Last Words from Montmartre
I'd read Notes of a Crocodile a while back and never really knew what to make of it. There was a bit of a narrative there, but not really? And you never got a sense of anyone. Anyway, Last Words from Montmartre is like that too, but a bit more understandable as the narrator is trapped in a spiral of isolation that it's too late to get out of. Knowing Miaojin's fate, it's hard not to think that the distance between author and narrator was extremely thin, if not non-existent. I started feeling really bad about my own life while reading this, and I think that it was probably a contributing factor, because I started to feel better as soon as I finished reading.
Luke Dani Blue - Pretend It's My Body
It's a trans short story collection, but none of the stories really do much for me. Maybe the one about the "con" who's planning to upload her consciousness to the Internet? Maybe it's just a small sample size, but nearly all of the trans short fiction I've read hasn't really done anything for me in the past (Casey Plett's work being the main exception). I'm not sure why that would be the case though, because basically every trans novel ends up impressing me? I guess it's possible I don't like short fiction as much as I think I do. If y'all have any other trans short story recommendations, I would love to hear them though!