Books I read in May 2024
Jun. 7th, 2024 10:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amado1Total: 9 books
— The Inhuman Condition by Clive Barker;
— Santasploitation: A Christmas Horror Story by Judith Sonnet;
— Playground by Aron Beauregard;
— Bloodchild and Other Stories by Octavia E. Butler;
— A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara;
— Little Deaths by Ellen Datlow (editor);
— Claude Cahun by Francois Leperlier;
— Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield;
— My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness by Kabi Nagata.
Still Reading:
— You Glow in the Dark by Liliana Colanzi;
— Splatterpunk by Paul M. Sammon;
— Queer Little Nightmares by David Ly;
— Headcheese by Jess Hagemann;
— The Sexual Politics of Meat by Carol J. Adams.
Of these, I greatly disliked "A Little Life" and "Headcheese"! The others were all great, some overall, and some just within the confines of their genre, like "Playground" -- I don't expect much from a splatterpunk book tbh, and Playground was laced with typos, clumsy writing, sexism, etc. But it was entertaining. I rated "A Little Life" much harsher because it's advertised as a literary work, so I had to rank it against other literary works, and it really came up lacking.
I was very pleasantly surprised by "Little Deaths," and was shocked to see myself as the outlier on Goodreads. Most other readers gave it only 3 stars, but I thought every single short story was a banger, with juicy theme and layered subtext. "Queer Little Nightmares" has also been a very pleasant surprise, with only one exception so far in the stories.
"My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness" was not as good as I expected either. I think you can tell that the author's depression struck her about halfway through working on the manga; the heft and drive of Act 1 peters out and leaves the story drifting. But yeah, the art is excellent, and it's still a 4-star book imo.
— The Inhuman Condition by Clive Barker;
— Santasploitation: A Christmas Horror Story by Judith Sonnet;
— Playground by Aron Beauregard;
— Bloodchild and Other Stories by Octavia E. Butler;
— A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara;
— Little Deaths by Ellen Datlow (editor);
— Claude Cahun by Francois Leperlier;
— Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield;
— My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness by Kabi Nagata.
Still Reading:
— You Glow in the Dark by Liliana Colanzi;
— Splatterpunk by Paul M. Sammon;
— Queer Little Nightmares by David Ly;
— Headcheese by Jess Hagemann;
— The Sexual Politics of Meat by Carol J. Adams.
Of these, I greatly disliked "A Little Life" and "Headcheese"! The others were all great, some overall, and some just within the confines of their genre, like "Playground" -- I don't expect much from a splatterpunk book tbh, and Playground was laced with typos, clumsy writing, sexism, etc. But it was entertaining. I rated "A Little Life" much harsher because it's advertised as a literary work, so I had to rank it against other literary works, and it really came up lacking.
I was very pleasantly surprised by "Little Deaths," and was shocked to see myself as the outlier on Goodreads. Most other readers gave it only 3 stars, but I thought every single short story was a banger, with juicy theme and layered subtext. "Queer Little Nightmares" has also been a very pleasant surprise, with only one exception so far in the stories.
"My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness" was not as good as I expected either. I think you can tell that the author's depression struck her about halfway through working on the manga; the heft and drive of Act 1 peters out and leaves the story drifting. But yeah, the art is excellent, and it's still a 4-star book imo.
