2022 Reading Summary
Dec. 28th, 2022 12:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amado1From start to finish, here's all the books I read in 2022! Since I've been playing my roommate's Nintendo Switch a lot, and got a new puzzle and LEGO set yesterday, I doubt I'll read anymore in the next three days.
ETA: Oh, I'm stupid! I read all of MDZS this year. But I read it in Chinese, and at the time I couldn't find it on Goodreads, so it's not on this list.
January: 21 books
— Age of Reptiles Omnibus, Vol. 1 by Ricardo Delgado;
— When the Reckoning Comes by LaTanya McQueen'
— Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus (can't remember the translator, sorry!!);
— Maus I and II by Art Spiegelman;
— Ousama Ranking Vol. 1 by Sosuke Toka;
— The Changing of the Guard (Star Wars: Jedi Quest #8) by Jude Watson;
— The False Peace (Star Wars: Jedi Quest #9) by Jude Watson;
— The Final Showdown (Star Wars: Jedi Quest #10) by Jude Watson;
— Ousama Ranking Vol. 2 by Sosuke Toka;
— One for Sorrow by Mary Downing Hahn;
— Killing Stalking Deluxe Vol. 1 by Koogi;
— Revival Vol. 1: You're Among Friends by Tim Seeley;
— Black Hole by Charles Burns;
— Necronomicon by H.R. Giger;
— The End of Gender: Debunking the Myths About Sex and Identity in Our Society by Debra Soh;
— Female Husbands: A Trans History by Jen Manion;
— Star Wars Rebels, Vol. 2 by Mitsuru Aoki;
— Hellsing Vol. 1 by Kohta Hirano;
— Hellsing Vol. 2 by Kohta Hirano;
— Hellsing Vol. 3 by Kohta Hirano.
A summary:
January was great. Cold and snowy, I was working at a newspaper at the time, and reading lots of graphic novels and children's books in my spare time. A friend recommended Hellsing and Ousama Ranking to me. I was finishing up Jedi Quest after discovering Jude Watson's Star Wars books the year before. I was just blitzing through all sorts of quick reads at the time! Carrying over from December 2021, when I read a ton of queer books, I hopped into Female Husbands (excellent, fun) and The End of Gender (awful), which was more for the sake of seeing how bad it was. Skeptical Inquirer published a favorable review of End of Gender and after reading it I was incensed. It was the worst scientific writing I've read since The Case for Christ.
February: 3 books
— Star Trek: Killing Time by Delia Van Hise;
— The Rising Force (Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice #1) by Dave Wolverton;
— The Dark Rival (Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice #2) by Jude Watson.
My reading tapered out this month while I searched for Jedi Apprentice copies. By the time Book #3 came, I'd gone into Satanic Panic mode and wasn't interested anymore!
March: 6 books
— Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlmann;
— Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three by Mara Leveritt;
— Turning Red: The Junior Novelization by ???'
— Master and Apprentice (Star Wars) by Claudia Gray;
— Rock: Practical Help For Those Who Listen To The Words And Don't Like What They Hear by Bob Larson;
— Satanism: The Seduction of America's Youth by Bob Larson.
This was a fun month! I tracked down some Satanic Panic-era VHS tapes and watched them with my roommate while we got high on mushrooms. We got a big tub of Chick tracts that month as well and made magnets out of them for our fridge. And "Turning Red" came out, and it was a surprisingly great movie for Disney! Well, Pixar. Also that month I got really into the West Memphis Three and we watched the documentary on VHS, even though we'd just watched it online the year before. I took up painting and did three portraits of Bela Lugosi all in red, called "Bela Lugosi's Red." It was lots of fun.
April: 1 book
— Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson.
The exhilaration of Satanic Panic was fully satisfied with this nonfiction book, which hit me the same way that Elizabeth Loftus' books on memory hit me last year. I was so satisfied that I didn't read anything else all month!
May: 19 books
— Maine: The Pine Tree State by Bill Harris;
— Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World by Paul Stamets;
— Mad Man's Drum: A Novel in Woodcuts by Lynd Ward;
— Trickster: Native American Tales by Matt Dembicki;
— Death Note Short Stories by Tsugumi Ohba;
— Nabari No Ou Vol. 2 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Hikaru no Go, Vol. 1: Descent of the Go Master by Yumi Hotta;
— Hikaru no Go, Vol. 2: First Battle by Yumi Hotta;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 1 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun, Vol. 1 by Aidalro;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun, Vol. 2 by Aidalro;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 2 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Nabari No Ou Vol. 7 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Tribute to Star Wars (manga) by Lucasfilm;
— Lighthouses of Maine by Bill Caldwell;
— O'Brien's Original Guide to Cape Cod and the Islands by Greg O'Brien;
— All That the Rain Promises and More by David Arora;
— Haikyu Vol. 1 by Haruichi Furudate;
— Itachi Shinden Vol. 1 by Masashi Kishimoto.
This month I started writing lots of stories set in 1960s Maine, so I read whatever books I could get my hands on in an effort to add some local flavor. With spring in swing, I also started growing mushrooms again, both gourmet and....otherwise. I set up some plugs in the woods near my house, got a morel mushroom patch going, and seeded some sawdust with wine cap spores in the front yard. Then I moved! Lmao.
June: 30 books
— Restart After Growing Hungry by Cocomi;
— Monster and the Beast, Vol. 1 by renji;
— Itachi Shinden, Vol. 2 by Masashi Kishimoto;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 1 by Kou Yoneda;
— Nabari No Ou, Vol. 4 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun, Vol. 0 by Aidalro;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 3 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 4 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 5 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Loveless, Vol. 1 by Yun Kouga;
— Rick and Morty, Vol. 8 by Kyle Starks;
— Monster and the Beast, Vol. 2 by renji;
— DC Pride 2021 by Andrew Wheeler;
— Restart After Coming Back Home by Cocomi;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 2 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 3 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 4 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 5 by Kou Yoneda;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 6 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Heartstopper Vol. 1 by Alice Oseman;
— Heartstopper Vol. 2 by Alice Oseman;
— Heartstopper Vol. 3 by Alice Oseman;
— Heartstopper Vol. 4 by Alice Oseman;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta Vol. 1 by Keiko Takemiya;
— Claudine by Riyoko Ikeda;
— Stray Dogs by Tony Fleecs;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta Vol. 2 by Keiko Takemiya;
— Our Dreams at Dusk Vol. 1 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta, Vol. 3 by Keiko Takemiya;
— RePlay by Saki Takahara.
I discovered - and adored - Monster and Beast; Kaze to Ki no Uta; and Twittering Birds this month. And I discovered - and hated - Heartstopper 😆 With a passion! Omg, it was SO not for me. RePlay was also Not Great, but not actively offensive to me, because at least the art was palatable. I couldn't tell you WHAT I was doing IRL this month. I think I was just inside reading manga the whole time.
July: 26 books
— A Prince of Our Disorder: The Life of T.E. Lawrence by John Mack;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly Vol. 6 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly Vol. 7 by Kou Yoneda;
— Ghosts of Camp Massacre (Shivers #7) by M.D. Spenser;
— Victims of Memory by Mark Pendergrast;
— The Stepsister (Fear Street, #9) by R.L. Stine;
— The Ghosts of Devil's Marsh (Shivers #24) by M.D. Spenser;
— Creating Hysteria: Women and Multiple Personality Disorder by Joan Acocella;
— The Stepsister 2 (Fear Street #33) by R.L. Stine;
— Andy Warhol: Love, Sex, and Desire: Drawings 1950-1962 by Drew Zeiba;
— Ghost Camp (Goosebumps #45) by R.L. Stine;
— Down a Dark Hall by Lois Duncan;
— The Complete Kake Comics by Tom of Finland;
— Night of the Goat Boy (Shivers #23) by M.D. Spenser;
— Halloween Night by R.L. Stine;
— The Ghost Next Door (Goosebumps #10) by R.L. Stine;
— The Cheerleader by Caroline B. Cooney;
— Bad Dreams (Fear Street #22) by R.L. Stine;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun Vol. 3-9 by Aidalro;
— Seaside Stranger Vol. 1 by Kanna Kii;
Three major interests collided! T.E. Lawrence, 90s kids' horror books, and Satanic Panic! With a side of gay interest and manga, natch. The best books of this month were A Prince Of Our Disorder, which had great chapters about Lawrence's rape in Deraa and the way he manipulated his bodyguard into recreating the torture after the war. Then next up is Victims of Memory, which goes into detail about the Repressed Memory Movement during the Satanic Panic, and how abusive therapists brought the whole ordeal about. Of the horror books I'd pick Down a Dark Hall or The Cheerleader; they definitely blew R.L. Stine out of the water.
August: 17 books
— Monster and the Beast, Vol. 3 by Renji;
— If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio;
— Jimmy's Blues and Other Poems by James Baldwin;
— Please Don't Feed the Vampire! (Give Yourself Goosebumps #15) by R.L. Stine;
— Edward II by Christopher Marlowe;
— Macbeth: A Dagger of the Mind by Harold Bloom;
— Macbeth (Arden Shakespeare) by William Shakespeare;
— William Shakespeare's Macbeth: Critical Essays by Harold Bloom;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta Vol. 5-11 by Keiko Takemiya;
— The Bakkhai translated by Anne Carson;
— The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran.
I got into a major Shakespeare mood this month! I also read a book of essays on Shakespeare that I can't remember the title of, so I didn't include it in the final count. I remember sitting at my kitchen table late at night reading the later volumes of Kaze to Ki no Uta and just bawling my eyes out this month! Same for Jimmy's Blues. And I expected to hate If We Were Villains, but I actually enjoyed it a lot!
September: 5 books
— Humiliation by Wayne Koestenbaum;
— Nerdy Birdy by Aaron Reynolds;
— Ron's Big Mission by Rose Blue;
— In Memoriam by Alfred Tennyson;
— Enemy Mine by Barry B. Longyear;
— Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx.
...And two of 'em are picture books! 😆 "Humiliation" was my favorite this month. A series of short vignettes musing on humiliation in all its different forms. It was a good companion piece to Nope 2022. I believe this month I started Coldheart Canyon by Clive Barker, also an excellent companion to Nope, and made it halfway through before my horror mood unfortunately died. "Enemy Mine" was amazing; I read it and sobbed in my bathtub! Same for "Brokeback Mountain," oh god, I cried forever and then immediately watched the movie and cried again.
October: 8 books
— Dawn (Xenogensis #1) by Octavia E. Butler;
— Halfway Human by Carolyn Ives Gilman;
— Poems: Abridged for Dolls and Princes by Robert Graves;
— The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell;
— A Time to Love (Star Trek) by Robert Greenberger;
— Foreign Foes (Star Trek) by Dave Galanter;
— Imzadi II by Peter David (Star Trek);
— Imzadi by Peter David (Star Trek).
This month I got really into sci-fi again. A friend recommended some gender-y sci-fi books and I blitzed through all three in a night apiece. Then this segued into a rekindled love for Star Trek, especially The Next Generation, especially Riker, so I rounded out the month with a ton of Star Trek mass market paperbacks. The memory for October is a long fall walk through the city to the secondhand bookstore, and walking my roommate home from his job at the library while I read him the summaries on the back of each book.
November: 13 books
— Tooth and Claw (Star Trek) by Doranna Durgin;
— Power Hungry (Star Trek) by Howard Weinstein;
— Ghost Ship (Star Trek) by Diane Carey;
— The Nitpicker's Guide for Next Generation Trekkers, Vol. 1 by Phil Farrand;
— Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion by Larry Nemecek;
— A Time to Heal (Star Trek) by David Mack;
— Vulture in a Cage: Poems by Solomon Ibn Gabirol;
— The Worlds of the Federation (Star Trek) by Shane Johnson;
— Star Trek: The Next Generation Officer's Manual by Rick Stuart;
— Riker: The Enemy of My Enemy (Star Trek) by Dan Abnett;
— The Art of Star Trek by Judith Reeves-Stevens;
— The City on the Edge of Forever: The Original Teleplay by Harlan Ellison;
— Forgiveness (Star Trek) by David Brin.
Only a single non-Trek book in the lot! Those poems are translated from Hebrew iirc. It had the Hebrew on one page and the English translation on the facing page. This month I started a great deal of Star Trek books but didn't finish them, so they're not included in the final count.
December: 19 books
— Never Mind (Patrick Melrose #1) by Edward St. Aubyn;
— The Case of the Green Carnation by David Gerrold;
— The Browning Version by Terence Rattigan;
— The Last Case of Sherlock Holmes by David Gerrold;
— Drag Diaries by Jonathan David;
— The Infinity Box by Kate Wilhelm;
— Twenty-Seven Articles by T.E. Lawrence;
— Drag King Dreams by Leslie Feinberg;
— When Did We See You Naked?: Jesus as a Victim of Sexual Abuse by Jayme Reaves;
— Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteenth Century by Graham Robb;
— To Seek Out New Life: The Biology of Star Trek by Athena Andreadis;
— Putting the Science in Fiction by Dan Koboldt;
— The T.E. Lawrence Poems by Gwendolyn MacEwan;
— Cowboy Culture: Capturing the Spirit of the Old West in the Sierra Nevada by Sandy Powell;
— A Second Harvest (Men of Lancaster County #1) by Eli Easton;
— Encanto: The Complete Screenplay;
— Killing Stalking: Deluxe Edition Vol. 2;
— Strange Adventures by Tom King;
— A Queer Kind of Death by George Braxt.
December as always was a queer kind of month. Queer authors like Rattigan, Lawrence, Feinberg, Gerrold, etc. Queer nonfiction and novels like "A Queer Kind of Death" and "Strangers". I enjoyed all the books I read this month but one: A Second Harvest, which was filled with homophobia and slut-shaming from the author, plus a bizarre 80s-era Say No to Drugs mantra baked into the storyline. Overall though, it was an excellent month for reading. A great year, really!
ETA: Oh, I'm stupid! I read all of MDZS this year. But I read it in Chinese, and at the time I couldn't find it on Goodreads, so it's not on this list.
January: 21 books
— Age of Reptiles Omnibus, Vol. 1 by Ricardo Delgado;
— When the Reckoning Comes by LaTanya McQueen'
— Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus (can't remember the translator, sorry!!);
— Maus I and II by Art Spiegelman;
— Ousama Ranking Vol. 1 by Sosuke Toka;
— The Changing of the Guard (Star Wars: Jedi Quest #8) by Jude Watson;
— The False Peace (Star Wars: Jedi Quest #9) by Jude Watson;
— The Final Showdown (Star Wars: Jedi Quest #10) by Jude Watson;
— Ousama Ranking Vol. 2 by Sosuke Toka;
— One for Sorrow by Mary Downing Hahn;
— Killing Stalking Deluxe Vol. 1 by Koogi;
— Revival Vol. 1: You're Among Friends by Tim Seeley;
— Black Hole by Charles Burns;
— Necronomicon by H.R. Giger;
— The End of Gender: Debunking the Myths About Sex and Identity in Our Society by Debra Soh;
— Female Husbands: A Trans History by Jen Manion;
— Star Wars Rebels, Vol. 2 by Mitsuru Aoki;
— Hellsing Vol. 1 by Kohta Hirano;
— Hellsing Vol. 2 by Kohta Hirano;
— Hellsing Vol. 3 by Kohta Hirano.
A summary:
January was great. Cold and snowy, I was working at a newspaper at the time, and reading lots of graphic novels and children's books in my spare time. A friend recommended Hellsing and Ousama Ranking to me. I was finishing up Jedi Quest after discovering Jude Watson's Star Wars books the year before. I was just blitzing through all sorts of quick reads at the time! Carrying over from December 2021, when I read a ton of queer books, I hopped into Female Husbands (excellent, fun) and The End of Gender (awful), which was more for the sake of seeing how bad it was. Skeptical Inquirer published a favorable review of End of Gender and after reading it I was incensed. It was the worst scientific writing I've read since The Case for Christ.
February: 3 books
— Star Trek: Killing Time by Delia Van Hise;
— The Rising Force (Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice #1) by Dave Wolverton;
— The Dark Rival (Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice #2) by Jude Watson.
My reading tapered out this month while I searched for Jedi Apprentice copies. By the time Book #3 came, I'd gone into Satanic Panic mode and wasn't interested anymore!
March: 6 books
— Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlmann;
— Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three by Mara Leveritt;
— Turning Red: The Junior Novelization by ???'
— Master and Apprentice (Star Wars) by Claudia Gray;
— Rock: Practical Help For Those Who Listen To The Words And Don't Like What They Hear by Bob Larson;
— Satanism: The Seduction of America's Youth by Bob Larson.
This was a fun month! I tracked down some Satanic Panic-era VHS tapes and watched them with my roommate while we got high on mushrooms. We got a big tub of Chick tracts that month as well and made magnets out of them for our fridge. And "Turning Red" came out, and it was a surprisingly great movie for Disney! Well, Pixar. Also that month I got really into the West Memphis Three and we watched the documentary on VHS, even though we'd just watched it online the year before. I took up painting and did three portraits of Bela Lugosi all in red, called "Bela Lugosi's Red." It was lots of fun.
April: 1 book
— Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson.
The exhilaration of Satanic Panic was fully satisfied with this nonfiction book, which hit me the same way that Elizabeth Loftus' books on memory hit me last year. I was so satisfied that I didn't read anything else all month!
May: 19 books
— Maine: The Pine Tree State by Bill Harris;
— Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World by Paul Stamets;
— Mad Man's Drum: A Novel in Woodcuts by Lynd Ward;
— Trickster: Native American Tales by Matt Dembicki;
— Death Note Short Stories by Tsugumi Ohba;
— Nabari No Ou Vol. 2 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Hikaru no Go, Vol. 1: Descent of the Go Master by Yumi Hotta;
— Hikaru no Go, Vol. 2: First Battle by Yumi Hotta;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 1 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun, Vol. 1 by Aidalro;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun, Vol. 2 by Aidalro;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 2 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Nabari No Ou Vol. 7 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Tribute to Star Wars (manga) by Lucasfilm;
— Lighthouses of Maine by Bill Caldwell;
— O'Brien's Original Guide to Cape Cod and the Islands by Greg O'Brien;
— All That the Rain Promises and More by David Arora;
— Haikyu Vol. 1 by Haruichi Furudate;
— Itachi Shinden Vol. 1 by Masashi Kishimoto.
This month I started writing lots of stories set in 1960s Maine, so I read whatever books I could get my hands on in an effort to add some local flavor. With spring in swing, I also started growing mushrooms again, both gourmet and....otherwise. I set up some plugs in the woods near my house, got a morel mushroom patch going, and seeded some sawdust with wine cap spores in the front yard. Then I moved! Lmao.
June: 30 books
— Restart After Growing Hungry by Cocomi;
— Monster and the Beast, Vol. 1 by renji;
— Itachi Shinden, Vol. 2 by Masashi Kishimoto;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 1 by Kou Yoneda;
— Nabari No Ou, Vol. 4 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun, Vol. 0 by Aidalro;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 3 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 4 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 5 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Loveless, Vol. 1 by Yun Kouga;
— Rick and Morty, Vol. 8 by Kyle Starks;
— Monster and the Beast, Vol. 2 by renji;
— DC Pride 2021 by Andrew Wheeler;
— Restart After Coming Back Home by Cocomi;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 2 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 3 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 4 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly, Vol. 5 by Kou Yoneda;
— Spy x Family, Vol. 6 by Tatsuya Endo;
— Heartstopper Vol. 1 by Alice Oseman;
— Heartstopper Vol. 2 by Alice Oseman;
— Heartstopper Vol. 3 by Alice Oseman;
— Heartstopper Vol. 4 by Alice Oseman;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta Vol. 1 by Keiko Takemiya;
— Claudine by Riyoko Ikeda;
— Stray Dogs by Tony Fleecs;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta Vol. 2 by Keiko Takemiya;
— Our Dreams at Dusk Vol. 1 by Yuhki Kamatani;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta, Vol. 3 by Keiko Takemiya;
— RePlay by Saki Takahara.
I discovered - and adored - Monster and Beast; Kaze to Ki no Uta; and Twittering Birds this month. And I discovered - and hated - Heartstopper 😆 With a passion! Omg, it was SO not for me. RePlay was also Not Great, but not actively offensive to me, because at least the art was palatable. I couldn't tell you WHAT I was doing IRL this month. I think I was just inside reading manga the whole time.
July: 26 books
— A Prince of Our Disorder: The Life of T.E. Lawrence by John Mack;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly Vol. 6 by Kou Yoneda;
— Twittering Birds Never Fly Vol. 7 by Kou Yoneda;
— Ghosts of Camp Massacre (Shivers #7) by M.D. Spenser;
— Victims of Memory by Mark Pendergrast;
— The Stepsister (Fear Street, #9) by R.L. Stine;
— The Ghosts of Devil's Marsh (Shivers #24) by M.D. Spenser;
— Creating Hysteria: Women and Multiple Personality Disorder by Joan Acocella;
— The Stepsister 2 (Fear Street #33) by R.L. Stine;
— Andy Warhol: Love, Sex, and Desire: Drawings 1950-1962 by Drew Zeiba;
— Ghost Camp (Goosebumps #45) by R.L. Stine;
— Down a Dark Hall by Lois Duncan;
— The Complete Kake Comics by Tom of Finland;
— Night of the Goat Boy (Shivers #23) by M.D. Spenser;
— Halloween Night by R.L. Stine;
— The Ghost Next Door (Goosebumps #10) by R.L. Stine;
— The Cheerleader by Caroline B. Cooney;
— Bad Dreams (Fear Street #22) by R.L. Stine;
— Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun Vol. 3-9 by Aidalro;
— Seaside Stranger Vol. 1 by Kanna Kii;
Three major interests collided! T.E. Lawrence, 90s kids' horror books, and Satanic Panic! With a side of gay interest and manga, natch. The best books of this month were A Prince Of Our Disorder, which had great chapters about Lawrence's rape in Deraa and the way he manipulated his bodyguard into recreating the torture after the war. Then next up is Victims of Memory, which goes into detail about the Repressed Memory Movement during the Satanic Panic, and how abusive therapists brought the whole ordeal about. Of the horror books I'd pick Down a Dark Hall or The Cheerleader; they definitely blew R.L. Stine out of the water.
August: 17 books
— Monster and the Beast, Vol. 3 by Renji;
— If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio;
— Jimmy's Blues and Other Poems by James Baldwin;
— Please Don't Feed the Vampire! (Give Yourself Goosebumps #15) by R.L. Stine;
— Edward II by Christopher Marlowe;
— Macbeth: A Dagger of the Mind by Harold Bloom;
— Macbeth (Arden Shakespeare) by William Shakespeare;
— William Shakespeare's Macbeth: Critical Essays by Harold Bloom;
— Kaze to Ki no Uta Vol. 5-11 by Keiko Takemiya;
— The Bakkhai translated by Anne Carson;
— The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran.
I got into a major Shakespeare mood this month! I also read a book of essays on Shakespeare that I can't remember the title of, so I didn't include it in the final count. I remember sitting at my kitchen table late at night reading the later volumes of Kaze to Ki no Uta and just bawling my eyes out this month! Same for Jimmy's Blues. And I expected to hate If We Were Villains, but I actually enjoyed it a lot!
September: 5 books
— Humiliation by Wayne Koestenbaum;
— Nerdy Birdy by Aaron Reynolds;
— Ron's Big Mission by Rose Blue;
— In Memoriam by Alfred Tennyson;
— Enemy Mine by Barry B. Longyear;
— Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx.
...And two of 'em are picture books! 😆 "Humiliation" was my favorite this month. A series of short vignettes musing on humiliation in all its different forms. It was a good companion piece to Nope 2022. I believe this month I started Coldheart Canyon by Clive Barker, also an excellent companion to Nope, and made it halfway through before my horror mood unfortunately died. "Enemy Mine" was amazing; I read it and sobbed in my bathtub! Same for "Brokeback Mountain," oh god, I cried forever and then immediately watched the movie and cried again.
October: 8 books
— Dawn (Xenogensis #1) by Octavia E. Butler;
— Halfway Human by Carolyn Ives Gilman;
— Poems: Abridged for Dolls and Princes by Robert Graves;
— The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell;
— A Time to Love (Star Trek) by Robert Greenberger;
— Foreign Foes (Star Trek) by Dave Galanter;
— Imzadi II by Peter David (Star Trek);
— Imzadi by Peter David (Star Trek).
This month I got really into sci-fi again. A friend recommended some gender-y sci-fi books and I blitzed through all three in a night apiece. Then this segued into a rekindled love for Star Trek, especially The Next Generation, especially Riker, so I rounded out the month with a ton of Star Trek mass market paperbacks. The memory for October is a long fall walk through the city to the secondhand bookstore, and walking my roommate home from his job at the library while I read him the summaries on the back of each book.
November: 13 books
— Tooth and Claw (Star Trek) by Doranna Durgin;
— Power Hungry (Star Trek) by Howard Weinstein;
— Ghost Ship (Star Trek) by Diane Carey;
— The Nitpicker's Guide for Next Generation Trekkers, Vol. 1 by Phil Farrand;
— Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion by Larry Nemecek;
— A Time to Heal (Star Trek) by David Mack;
— Vulture in a Cage: Poems by Solomon Ibn Gabirol;
— The Worlds of the Federation (Star Trek) by Shane Johnson;
— Star Trek: The Next Generation Officer's Manual by Rick Stuart;
— Riker: The Enemy of My Enemy (Star Trek) by Dan Abnett;
— The Art of Star Trek by Judith Reeves-Stevens;
— The City on the Edge of Forever: The Original Teleplay by Harlan Ellison;
— Forgiveness (Star Trek) by David Brin.
Only a single non-Trek book in the lot! Those poems are translated from Hebrew iirc. It had the Hebrew on one page and the English translation on the facing page. This month I started a great deal of Star Trek books but didn't finish them, so they're not included in the final count.
December: 19 books
— Never Mind (Patrick Melrose #1) by Edward St. Aubyn;
— The Case of the Green Carnation by David Gerrold;
— The Browning Version by Terence Rattigan;
— The Last Case of Sherlock Holmes by David Gerrold;
— Drag Diaries by Jonathan David;
— The Infinity Box by Kate Wilhelm;
— Twenty-Seven Articles by T.E. Lawrence;
— Drag King Dreams by Leslie Feinberg;
— When Did We See You Naked?: Jesus as a Victim of Sexual Abuse by Jayme Reaves;
— Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteenth Century by Graham Robb;
— To Seek Out New Life: The Biology of Star Trek by Athena Andreadis;
— Putting the Science in Fiction by Dan Koboldt;
— The T.E. Lawrence Poems by Gwendolyn MacEwan;
— Cowboy Culture: Capturing the Spirit of the Old West in the Sierra Nevada by Sandy Powell;
— A Second Harvest (Men of Lancaster County #1) by Eli Easton;
— Encanto: The Complete Screenplay;
— Killing Stalking: Deluxe Edition Vol. 2;
— Strange Adventures by Tom King;
— A Queer Kind of Death by George Braxt.
December as always was a queer kind of month. Queer authors like Rattigan, Lawrence, Feinberg, Gerrold, etc. Queer nonfiction and novels like "A Queer Kind of Death" and "Strangers". I enjoyed all the books I read this month but one: A Second Harvest, which was filled with homophobia and slut-shaming from the author, plus a bizarre 80s-era Say No to Drugs mantra baked into the storyline. Overall though, it was an excellent month for reading. A great year, really!
