I was excited when Simone St James announced a new book and immediately pre-ordered. It took me while to get to A Box Full of Darkness but finally got around to it last week. The writing was solid, and I enjoyed her humor. But a few things made this one my least fave book of hers. One being that this time we have 3 protagonists and their voices were very similar. A few times I thought one sibling was narrating when in fact, it was another one. Also, the pacing was uneven.
Last but most importantly, the book lacked cohesion. Everything seemed to hinge on "it's the weird town" as a blanket explanation. The problem (and I will try to not spoil the story) is that the inconsistent treatment of the story and characters were pervasive. Like... the MCs' parents were cold, yet their actions were incongruous with that characterization. Page by page, the rules shifted to fit the plot and as opposed to the story's reality. Even the supernatural rules made absolutely no sense at all. Both in the context of mythology and within the story itself.
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Everywhere Antennas is a fictional graphic novel by Juli Delponte about a woman who suffers from a sensitivity to radio waves. It’s an introspective dive on what it would feel like to have a disability that is not only invisible, but inconceivable to others.
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I very much wanted to enjoy Garden Spells. I really loved Other Birds and I generally enjoy magical realism. But this one was so… cringe and despite the diverse cast it just felt dated. Like the villain woman was satirized and slut shamed so much that it made the whole thing feel like something I would have read in high school. And don’t get me started on the that man is mine energy and the sisters misunderstanding each other trope which just feels overdone in the 21st century. I liked the magic. I loved the tree and the garden. I related to an extent with Claire. But otherwise it just was really meh to me.
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Monthly in the Garden with my Landlord is a manga series about a woman looking for a reboot after a breakup who ends up with an unorthodox lease to rent a house, landlord included. I was an iffy on the age gap, but overall the story was very wholesome. Women supporting women, a relationship where both parties accept each other wholesale, where healing happens as they rewrite each other’s trauma related scripts by showing what it’s like to be safe.
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A finally took the time to finish the Monk and Robot series! It's short, so not sure why I deferred it for so long >.< I had a hard time relating to Dex, but appreciated that the book tackles existential questions even in the context of a society that is wholesome, where people don’t exploit each other or greedily depletes the earth. I did adore Mosscap and the tea scenes and the villages with their eco friendly infrastructures and norms. Another wholesome read that I imagine coming back to when I need a literary hug.
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Words were easier said than implemented, so Claire said, “Okay.” Then she wondered how in the world she was going to get past something that had taken her decades to perfect.
– Sarah Addison Allen (Garden Spells)