Earlier this month, I read the last of 24 books for Adult Summer Reading Book Bingo, hosted by Seattle Public Library and Seattle Arts & Lectures. This is my second year in a row participating in Book Bingo, and my second year getting a “blackout.” To celebrate, I thought I’d share some brief thoughts about every book I read for this challenge.
I’ll work my way through the squares, left to right, top to bottom.
Romance
Book chosen: The Hellion’s Waltz by Olivia Waite.
Date finished: June 17, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: A low-conflict F/F historical romance with two competent leads. I enjoyed each book in this series but would have liked the “heist” element of this one to have a little more tension. Overall a light, enjoyable read.
On Your Shelf
Book chosen: Hype by Gabrielle Bluestone.
Date finished: May 28, 2021.
Format and origin: Hardback book purchased at Third Place Books.
Thoughts: Enjoyable, rambling, entirely too focused on Fyre Festival, but fun. I posted a full review earlier this year.
Small Press
Book chosen: Blood Like Garnets by Leigh Harlen ft. illustrations by Maria Nguyen.
Date finished: August 2, 2021.
Format and origin: Paperback book gifted by my brother.
Thoughts: Stories ranged from pretty decent to genuinely good; no outright bad stories. Some clever ideas. The black/white/grey illustrations captured the feel of each story perfectly.
Beach Read
Book chosen: Beach Read by Emily Henry.
Date finished: May 23, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: An exemplar of the M/F contemporary romance genre. Likeable characters, hot love scenes, great concept.
Black Joy
Book chosen: How to Find a Princess by Alyssa Cole.
Date finished: May 29, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from So-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: While ultimately enjoyable, I felt like this one relied on its tropes to do the heavy lifting and the ending was rushed. I wanted MORE.
Activism or Social Justice
Book chosen: Mediocre by Ijeoma Oluo.
Date finished: June 8, 2021.
Format and origin: Hardcover book from Third Place Books.
Thoughts: An enlightening and enraging look at how US society has been built to smooth the way for mediocre white men.
Made You Laugh
Book chosen: New Erotica for Feminists by Caitlin Kunkle, Brooke Preston, Fiona Taylor, and Carrie Wittmer.
Date finished: July 27, 2021.
Format and origin: Paperback book from Elliot Bay Bookstore.
Thoughts: An entertaining satire full of bite-sized fantasies of a more egalitarian world.
Coming of Age
Book chosen: Star Daughter by Shveta Thakrar.
Date finished: June 1, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: A beautiful story of friendship, romance, family, and finding your place in the universe.
Recommended by Library Staff/Peak Picks
Book chosen: Yoke by Jessamyn Stanley.
Date finished: July 8, 2021.
Format and origin: Paperback book from Third Place Books.
Thoughts: An insightful look at yoga through the lens of race, body positivity, spirituality, and more. Gave me a lot to think about as someone who practices yoga only as it is associated with her dance practice.
Graphic Novel or Comic
Book chosen: Thirsty Mermaids by Kat Leyh.
Date finished: June 11, 2021.
Format and origin: Hardback book from Third Place Books (via a gift card from my brother).
Thoughts: The silly concept of this book hides a beautifully poignant message about friendship and found family. This book is in turns cute, crude, sweet, silly, and QUEER AF.
Recommended by a Friend
Book chosen: Jackelope Wives and Other Stories by T. Kingfisher (recommended by my spouse and best friend for life Chris)
Date finished: July 3, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook purchased from Kobo.
Thoughts: T. Kingfisher is the master of the short story. In a few pages she can wrest more emotion from me than many authors can in an entire book.
QTBIPOC
Book chosen: Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon.
Date finished: July 11, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: Intensely queer and weird dark sci-fi/fantasy/horror about motherhood and monsterhood and cults and so much more. Sometimes difficult to read but very compelling.
Mystery or Crime
Book chosen: The Lamplighters by Emma Stonex.
Date finished: June 14, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: I learned a lot about lighthouses from this one! The central mystery was compelling but the author was too greedy with how slowly she revealed some secrets.
Cli-Fi or Environmental Non-Fiction
Book chosen: Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake.
Date finished: July 4, 2021.
Format and origin: Paperback book from Edmonds Bookshop.
Thoughts: A really cool exploration of the role fungus plays in our ecosystem. Full review coming soon.
Poetry or Essays
Book chosen: Embodied by various poets and artists.
Date finished: May 20, 2021.
Format and origin: Special edition paperback from Independent Bookstore Day promo at Third Place Books.
Thoughts: Really cool concept that didn’t quite work in execution. More thoughts here.
Asian American or Pacific Islander Author
Book chosen: The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo.
Date finished: June 24, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook purchased from the Kobo store.
Thoughts: A queer, magical retelling of The Great Gatsby. I’ve never read the original, and after this, why would I? Most stories are better when you make them gayer.
SAL Speaker
Book chosen: In The Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado.
Date finished: May 27, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: I read this in a single sitting, it was so compelling. Machado tells the story of a past abusive relationship through a variety of lenses, using different literary styles and tropes. Shines an important light on the fact that romantic partner abuse is not simply a heterosexual problem.
Speculative Fiction
Book chosen: Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells.
Date finished: May 24, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: Like I was going to let a silly thing like Book Bingo get in the way of me reading the latest Murderbot.
BIPOC Food Writing
Book chosen: The Book of Tea by Okakura Kakuzo.
Date finished: June 10, 2021.
Format and origin: A hardcovered book that was actually on my bookshelf. But I am pretty sure I bought it used at Third Place Books a couple years ago.
Thoughts: This book gets into every aspect of the tea ceremony, including the architecture of the tea house, the art on the wall, the floral arrangement, and the implements used to serve tea. The tea itself is actually a very small part of the book. There’s a good bit of philosophy, too. Just a really interesting look at Japanese tea culture, at least as it was in the early 20th century.
Sports
Book chosen: The Resisters by Gish Jen.
Date finished: May 21, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: An interesting concept for a book, hampered by what I found to be an inexplicable choice of narrator. But hey it was about baseball, so it filled this difficult square for me.
Olympics Host City
Book chosen: The Intimacy Experiment by Rosie Danan.
Date finished: June 2nd, 2021.
Format and origin: eBook from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: A fun and sexy romance between a sex educator and a rabbi, conveniently set in and around Los Angeles, a city which has in fact hosted the Olympics.
A Book from a Series (x2)
Books chosen: The Serpent Sea and The Siren Depths by Martha Wells.
Dates finished: May 27 and June 20, 2021.
Format and origin: eBooks from Sno-Isle Libraries.
Thoughts: The world building in these books remind me of when I was a young and creative role player, dreaming up increasingly unique societies. The Raksura are part of a world full of diverse sentient species and dangerous critters, and they just want to find a safe home.
Recommended by a Local Bookseller
Book chosen: Kink by various authors.
Date finished: July 24, 2021.
Format and origin: Paperback book snagged from the Staff Recommendations shelves at Third Place Books.
Thoughts: Turns out that when you’re a somewhat vanilla demisexual, there are few things less sexy than reading about people who often don’t like each other very much having BDSM-flavored sex with each other. The vast majority of these stories were just incredibly joyless, and focused mainly on one aspect of kink. Would have liked to see more variety. Actually what I’d really like to see is an anthology of SFF authors writing kink. Bring on the monsterf*cking and shapechanging and aliens who are up for anything.
Final Thoughts
I love a good summer reading challenge! This year, Book Bingo kept me busy while I waited to be fully vaccinated, dealt with the illness and ultimate death of my beloved dog, and weathered a heatwave. Thanks to this challenge I read a few books that had lingered untouched on my shelves, gave a chance to books I might not have otherwise considered, and still made time to read my favorite genres and authors. I’m so happy I participated, although I am also enjoying a return to reading whatever I like without worrying about what square it can fill.
By the way, as a small town homeschool kid, I never got to participate in any of those summer reading challenges where you could earn a pizza. But the great thing about being a grown adult is that I was able to buy myself pizza after I finished my second book, and it was a nice gourmet pizza from a local restaurant, with a fancy salad on the side and a craft cocktail to wash it down with. Mmm. Pizza.
I didn’t know Martha Wells had another series. I’mma have to look for it now. I love how she has 3 of your 24 books for your blackout. (Fugitive Telemetry was pretty good, too.)
Also, I love your comments on Kink.
… Granted, if you seriously want SFF kink-focused erotica, it exists. It’s just less often actual published works, so you have to sift through more chaff than in normal erotica to find the stuff that’s not crap.
Martha Wells has a pretty big back catalog, seems like she was writing for a good couple decades before Murderbot really took off and brought her to the spotlight. So far I’ve only read the first three Raksura books, I haven’t explored any of her other previous works.
And I’m sure there’s a lot of SFF kink out there, and probably some of it’s really good. What I’d specifically love is a SFF book exactly like Kink: “Hello, we are two editors who gathered a bunch of works by some of the best authors in our genre and they’re all about sex.” I mean, there’s a sex scene in the middle of Sorrowland that is way more interesting and emotional than anything in Kink, and that book isn’t a romance or erotica. I should do some research and see what’s out there.