We were tagged by @prettyasapic for this getting to know you meme. The other post was getting very long, so we're putting our answers on their own to save your dash. (Also, we're a whole team of reader's advisors, so we have a variety of answers for each question!)
Here we go! If you particularly like someone's answers, we've included everyone's individual rec tag in the tags - you should be able to just click it and see what they've recc'd in the past.
Oh, and if anyone else wants to do this, consider yourself tagged :)
📖 Currently reading:
Anne: The Blonde Identity by Ally Carter
Jae: Dot Slash Magic by Liz Shipton
Susan: A Fountain Filled with Blood by Julia Spencer-Fleming
Robin: Ash by Malinda Lo
Julie: Fela: Music is the Weapon by Jibola Fagbamiye and Conor McCreery
Kate: In Perfect Light by Benjamin Alire Sáenz and The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet by John Green (We had to ILL In Perfect Light - don't be afraid to use your library's purchase request service!)
Ashley: The Housemaid series by Freida McFadden. On book 3: The Housemaid is Watching
📺 Last series you watched:
Anne: Percy Jackson & the Olympians
Jae: Percy Jackson & the Olympians
Susan: All Creatures Great and Small (coincidentally, just what prettyasapic was watching!)
Robin: Frieren: Beyond Journey's End (I'm still in season 1 - don't tell me anything!)
Julie: The last series I finished was Stranger Things. Currently watching Landman with Billy Bob Thornton
Kate: Columbo
Ashley: Bridezillas, The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, and The Real Housewives of Potomac
🎞️ Last film:
Anne: Ready Player One
Jae: Polar Express
Susan: Downton Abby the Grand Finale
Robin: Wake Up Dead Man
Julie: Hereditary (the 2018 horror movie starring Tony Collette)
Kate: The Muppet Christmas Carol
Ashley: Wicked: For Good
🎶 Last song:
Anne: "Solar Power" by Lorde (yearning for warm weather)
Jae: "God Games" from Epic: the Musical
Robin: "What Is This Feeling" (from Wicked, Broadway cast)
Julie: "Watermelon Sugar" by Harry Styles
Kate: "Parachute" by Hayley Williams
Ashley: LoFi Hip Hop playlists on YouTube
🍬🍟 Sweet or salty?
Anne: Salty
Jae: BOTH
Susan: Sweet AND salty!
Robin: Love a combo, me, but if I have to choose - sweet
Julie: CHOCOLATE!
Kate: Salty
Ashley: Sweet!
☕ Coffee or tea?
Anne: Coffee x 3000
Jae: Tea, but really picky about it
Susan: Tea
Robin: Tea
Julie: Both, but not at the same time.
Kate: Coffee
Ashley: Tea!
🌟 Currently working on...
Anne: Crocheting a scarf for a friend
Jae: Crocheting a blanket!
Susan: watercolor painting
Robin: Putting together a new system to run the digital display screens in each of our branches, which SOUNDS like it should be simple but...
Julie: ME! I'm training for a 20 mile hike in the spring
Kate: Shrink art keychains for an upcoming teen program
Ashley: In light of the new year, I am currently decluttering my house one room at a time! It has been a cleansing experience!
hello! I was wondering if you had any young adult urban fantasy recommendations? When I say urban fantasy I mean it's just realistic fiction except some magical ish stuff happens, if that makes sense. Thank you!
A few of our team have suggestions for you!
Anne recommends:
These Deadly Prophecies by Andrea Tang - Knives Out but with sorcerers
I Am the Swarm by Hayley Chewins - A novel in verse in which women in the Strand family are born/cursed with powers
The Iron King by Julie Kagawa - Starts in an urban setting but transitions into the faery realm
Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare - Part of the Shadowhunters universe and set in the 1800s. You don't have to read the main series or any previous books set in the universe to understand this one. (Jae seconded the Shadowhunters books!)
Rachel recommends:
Lovely War by Julie Berry: I have suggested this book before. I LOVE it. The story is historical fiction with fantasy elements as some of the Greek gods narrate the story.
Halflings by Heather Burch
In a World Just Right by Jen Brooks
Dragons in Our Midst series by Bryan Davis
Percy Jackson and the Olympians by Rick Riordan
Jae recommends:
The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong
Legendborn by Tracy Deonn
--
I hope you enjoy some of these! I'm sure our readers will have more suggestions in the replies, too :)
The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang, a fantasy novel inspired by the Second Sino-Japanese War, was one of the most lively reading experiences I’ve had this year. After watching Kuang’s "Asian American Representation in Literature" talk through LCPL's online author talks program, I knew I finally had to pick this up.
The Poppy War is known widely to be a difficult read, so I definitely suggest checking potential triggers before giving it a try. We've included some resources at the bottom of the post to help you out with that.
The story was stunning. The book follows Rin, a peasant girl from a country called Nikara which was based on China. She trains to become a shaman and soldier, and what ensues is a magical, horrific, gut-wrenching, and enchanting story of a child forced into a war she inherited.
Rin has to make unimaginable choices which paint her as the most morally gray character I have read. The story was so striking that I was rooting for Rin the whole way through even though she made more-than-questionable judgement calls.
We see Rin grow up from a small teenager to a ruthless warrior. Her path is complicated further by the Phoenix god channeling chaos and fire through her during battle. Because of this, she has incredible, undescribable power. Rin, however, is fueled completely by her anger. At times, she becomes rage itself which calls the fire to her far beyond her control.
Her explosions of fire come across like physical expressions of the pent up emotions she’s been living with since being an orphaned little girl thrown away to opium smugglers who use her for child labor. Her country gets invaded and her home brutalized, and Rin isn’t considering what’s right versus what’s wrong; she’s just concerned with survival. And revenge. Not in that order.
My experience with The Poppy War was rather nerve-wracking because I didn’t trust the author. I couldn’t tell what Kuang would do to the characters I had grown so fond of. I was scared for them because nothing was off limits. Usually, a reader can tell what an author is willing to do or where they draw the line, but not in this instance. Kuang wrote with the same ruthlessness Rin had while fighting entire armies.
It was so worth it. The book shows the heinous acts humankind commits during wartime and how innocents are shaped and manipulated by their environment. This book had no good or evil; it just had two countries doing what they felt was necessary not to die.
Plus, Kuang said The Poppy War is like the TV show Avatar: The Last Airbender if Azula was the main character, if you needed any more persuading to check it out.
Let's Talk Triggers
To see if I could read this, I prepped myself with the Wikipedia page of the Massacre of Nanjing which I found far worse than the book itself.
Some people have had very different reading experiences with The Poppy War, so here is a list of triggers. Most things happen in the last quarter of the book:
Strong language, child death, child abuse, graphic death, graphic depictions of body mutilation, recount of off-page sexual assault, self-harm, drug abuse/addiction, graphic description of dead bodies
Kuang also has a list of resources at the back of the book to help the reader find more historical context, particularly with the Massacre of Nanjing.
I also found an NPR article ("In The Poppy War Series, R.F. Kuang Asks: 'What If Mao Was A Teenage Girl?" Nov 24, 2020) that shows the author's motivation to tell this story (contains minor spoilers).
She also did a BookRiot interview ("R.F. Kuang on THE POPPY WAR, Peace, and Confronting History" Aug 8, 2018) which addresses the importance of becoming educated on Asian history even if it's painful (contains larger spoilers, mentions of rape).
The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa, translated by Philip Gabriel
Review by: Anne
The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa follows Nana and his human Satoru as they go on a long and scenic road trip. The two have lived together for five years, but Satoru tells his beloved cat he has to rehome him due to unavoidable circumstances, so they travel person-to-person trying to find Nana the perfect forever home.
Each stop reconnects Satoru to loved ones from his past in a warm and heart-tugging way that even evokes emotion from self-proclaimed "tough" cat Nana. However, each home has something that makes Satoru decide not to rehome Nana and catapults the reader into beautiful stories of relationships, grief, nostalgia, jealousy, love, and more.
There are so many stories about dogs and people, but finally there is one about cats! This book cut into me and healed me all at once. My cat Ivy is FIV+ (similar to HIV in humans), and I'm constantly worried about her health. This book came to me at the exact time I needed it, and I'm changed. It's one of those stories that linger, and I can't tell if I'm happy, sad, or some other emotion I've no name for.
And what a cool concept! A story of humanity narrated by an animal who doesn't understand social conventions. The author wrote the voice of a cat so well which somehow made the humans' stories draw more emotions from me. This would be a great creative writing exercise.
Arikawa's storytelling was exquisite because it injected life into every character, animal or human. I felt the ferocious love of Nana through each line and margin.
I highly recommend the audiobook which was performed like a play. Audiobooks have never been my favorite, but I started this one on Libby thinking it would be quick and cozy. I don't think it would have affected me as much had I read the physical book.
George Blagden, who read the book, made me feel like I was there right between Nana and Satoru. This, mixed with Arikawa's moving and descriptive writing, sucked me in just as much as any physical book ever had.
Give it a listen or read if you want to remember how special animals are, the impact they have on our lives, or if you're in a deep reading slump!
