Peach Pit is a short story collection for anyone who loves it when female characters are a little off-kilter. None of the women in these stories are really likeable, but that's not the point. They enact satisfying revenges and have fraught relationships with those around them. Put together, this collection highlights the many ways women are wronged in today's society, and allows them to fight back in the morally-gray ways we secretly want to, but never would.
Living perhaps not her perfect life, but an ideal one fresh and away from her past in Copenhagen is PhD candidate Phoebe from Dublin. Her balance is thrown off when her ex Grace, from seven years ago and pre-transition, unexpectedly pays a visit. Told over the course of a weekend via timestamps, Phoebe's interactions with grace force her to face her past self and insecurities, but also realize how far she's come. Their interactions also show how love and relationships evolve over time and force us to grow and find acceptance (or not).
When I first read this collection of short stories, I was initially struck by their humor. As I read though, I began to appreciate the sincerity of each person, and how their story added to the mosaic of Lebanese-American experiences in Dearborn. Yes, there is humor in each story, but Dearborn isn't romanticized either. Taboo topics such as masculinity, gender expression, addiction, xenophobia and domestic violence are explored, adding importance to these stories.
I first read this collection as part of a poetry seminar, and it fully cemented my love for poetry after not reading it in a long time. In it, you get to experience Brown's invented form, the duplex, which even inspired me to write my own imitations. I find Brown's poetry to be powerful in its approach to the issues of systemic racism and violence in American society today. In my personal opinion, this is a must-read of contemporary American poetry.
Until coming across this collection I had honestly never heard of Farrokhzad. It has a brief introduction that explains her importance in 20th Century Iranian culture, but I found her craft to be universally excellent. Her poems, especially in this skillful translation, are atmospheric in their approach to topics such as belonging, love, regret, and loneliness. Two of my favorites are "In the Green Waters of Summer" and "The Sun Comes Out". I will certainly cherish and reread this collection for many years to come.
I tore through this book and enjoyed each page. Despite its length, the action and pacing were so well done that I finished breezily. Xingyin is one of my favorite female main characters in fantasy that I've read recently. She's determined, resourceful and brave. Hundreds of years pass and Xingyin grows from a girl into a woman whout losing sight of her goal. If you're trying to get into fantasy I'd recommend this. PS there IS romance <3
Even though it has been a couple months, I still can't stop thinking about this book. It was a little bit of a slow read for me at first, but by the time I finished I was fully hooked. The town Vera lives in is eerie and vaguely threatening, even sinister at times. The mysterious disappearances of mothers highlights motherhood and mother-daughter relationships in a way I've never read before. I also thought Vera's story brings into question what it means to belong to a "group" and the roles in it.
Through short vignettes that act like pieces of a mosaic we are given a picture of Zaji Cox's mind as a child. I felt like each short piece really captured the child-like wonder we viewed the world through in our youth (or at least me...). This memoir invokes the senses in a way that shows us, rather than telling, what it's like to grow up neurodivergent and I deeply enjoyed the writing.
Though this is actually her final work, if you have never met Clarice Lispector, consider yourself introduced. This book uses a unique metafiction structure, narrating the life of a poor through an enigmatic and self-important writer. He's philosophical and rambling at times, but his descriptions of Macabéa (unintentionally) raise the issues of poverty, education, sexism, the existence of God, and so on. Reading Macabéa's story caused me, in a somewhat existential way, to ponder what it means "to be".
In this collection, Barrett remixes narratives of what it's like to be queer, a person of color, and disabled. They share their experiences with chronic pain and its setbacks, but also moments of love with their family. These poems are bold and clear in their messages, and I personally found this collection more than worth the read.
Anequs is a young girl who lives on the island Masquapaug. One day she encounters an egg that hatches into a Nampeshiwe (dragon) and it quickly attaches itself to her, making Anequs a Napeshiweisit. The joy over the birth of this dragon is short-lived, as it becomes clear they are no longer prepared to raise a dragon on the island. To make matters worse, the Anglish, who have conquered Anequs' land, hear of the dragon and demand she enroll in an Anglish school to train it. If she fails, they will kill her dragon. This book adds pertinent Native representation to fantasy and I look forward to the rest of the series.
This debut collection centers around lush descriptions of food, highlighting its importance in Filipino culture. However, this collection is about so much more than simply food. Through these poems we sit in the kitchen with lola, deal with natural disaster and experience what it's like to be a person of color in White America. Cariño's imagery is so vivid and striking that I felt transported with each line.
This debut novel follows a girl named Stevie, who has secretly dating another girl named Nora in a conservative small town in Pennsylvania. At the very start of the novel Stevie suffers a brain injury and forgets the last two years of her life, including Nora. Stevie is left confused as to why her relationship with her parents and her "best" friends is strained, while she also feels inexplicably drawn to Nora. I found Stevie's journey to re-self discovery to be touching and relevant. I tore through this book in one sitting and I hope you'll enjoy too!
This work is a collection of diary entries and photographs taken by the Ukrainian artist, Yegenia Belorusets. Her diary entries detail her perspective from her home in Kyiv from the start of the War in Ukraine on February 24, 2022. She speaks honestly and movingly about how the residents of Kyiv and Ukraine reacted and then adapted to the growth of this war. I believe this is a necessary read if you have been following the war or want to acquaint yourself with it, because this book captures the resilience of the Ukrainian people.
Don't let the title dissuade you with its gloomy nature, because this memoir is actually very lighthearted! The main focus is on the transcripts of Baek Sehee's therapy sessions, followed by her reflections on the topics discussed. I found Baek's voice to be funny, yet honest and the bluntness of her therapist added humor too. I found Baek's anecdotes to be relatable, because she didn't only talk about depression but also how we struggle to find our place in the world as our authentic self.
This is most likely my favorite memoir that I have ever read. In it, Machado tackles the subject of domestic abuse by sharing her own personal experience from a past lesbian relationship. Each chapter Machado uses a different literary form, and alongside her own experiences she weaves in a discussion of how we view abuse and most importantly stereotypes and misconceptions that lead us to miss what is right in front of us. Machado balances these themes to write a memoir that is so much more than a sharing of life.
This is a collection of autobiographical stories written by Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov, who was imprisonedin a Russian prison after he protested Russia's occupation of Eastern Ukraine and Crimea in 2014. Sentsov worked on this collection while imprisoned and was released in 2019, around the same time as its publication. I found Sentsov's to be introspective, sarcastic, and melancholic. They paint a strong image of his life growing up in the USSR and how his life experiences shaped him to be a voice of opposition, and in turn they made me reflect on my own life.
In this memoir Nelson shares the story of her life with her gender-nonconforming partner, Harry Dodge, and their journey together through pregnancy and early parenthood. This memoir is personal but also intellectual, as Nelson forces us to rethink our ideas of love, gender, sexuality, and family. For such a (relatively) short book, by the end I felt like a different person because how much I re-evaluated my own thoughts.