Just finished "The Bodyguard Unit" written by Clément Xavier, illustrated by Lisa Lugrin, with colors by Albertine Ralenti and translated from French to English by Edward Gauvin. An excellent and fascinating history of Edith Garrud, a Jiu-Jutsu instructor who helped train suffragettes in Britain to fight the police, and who fought alongside them at speeches and political rallies. It also of course has a lot of details of the suffragette movement, many of which I theoretically knew but never actually thought about, and others which I was totally unaware of, especially the degree of violence and the connections to other radical movements of the time.

An excellent graphic novel, both educational and funny.

#AmReading #ReadingNow #Bookstodon

Just finished "Future Home of the Living God" by Louise Erdrich. It's a beautiful and entrancing novel in many ways, but I couldn't bring myself to like the ending. I think in one of my most recent book posts I complained about a deus ex machina, so it's ironic that in this case as the pages dwindled I was fully prepared to accept and even welcome one, especially with all of the deus-related stuff going on already. I am left profoundly unsure as to whether Erdrich imagines a positive future beyond our current oppressions, or just futility, when for most of the book it seemed like the former, which is something I seek out in earnest these days. It is of course impressive that a book about innocents being hunted through the streets of Minneapolis & Saint Paul, while a volunteer citizens network organizes to keep them safe, could be published in 2017. There are strong echoes of Octavia Butler here, and in both cases I think it's a marginalized position which allows authors to see with clarity that most mainstream authors miss or don't even attempt.

I think I will seek out more of Erdrich's writing, but only after a bit of a break.

#AmReading #ReadingNow #Bookstodon

Just finished "Starfish" by Akemi Dawn Bowman. It was gripping (I basically barely put it down and finished in in a single day) but also feels flawed in some ways.

Things I liked: a protagonist that I really strongly rooted for, and a resolution that landed with a bit of complexity.

Things I'm feeling a way about: complete lack of depth in interrogating heritage, despite that being a huge theme, some tinges of deus ex machina in how the central conflicts are resolved, and a real lack of good messaging around consent.

#AmReading #ReadingNow #Bookstodon

Just finished "Skating Wilder" written by Brandon Dumais and illustrated by AJ Dungo. It's a really amazing graphic novel history of skateboarding, from the 1960s through to the present. It's got multiple threads from the commercial angle, to the magazines and music, to the individual tricks.

I've never skated myself (never taught myself to balance properly) but I loved Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 as a kid and I still like watching skate videos. I learned a lot of details from this book that I never knew growing up and the way it talks about skating surviving multiple waves of commercialization is inspiring.

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Just finished "Quiet Crossings" by Vivi Partridge. A wonderfully cozy short graphic novel about hanging on and letting go, full of cute mushroom sprites.

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Just finished Kageki Shoujo volume 3 by Kumiko Saiki, and figured I might as well post about it even though I'll be reading it for a while more.

My library has a great selection of manga, so sometimes I check one out at random when I'm waiting for next volumes of the series I really love (With Hat Atelier by Kamome Shirahama is top of my list right now). I was expecting Kageki to be more of a classic shoujo manga, but it's actually hardly focused on romance at all, and the deep background on Japanese theater traditions is a lot of fun to learn about along with the drama of the different characters.

#AmReading #ReadingNow

Just finished "You Made A Fool of Death with Your Beauty" by Akwaeke Emezi. I liked a ton of things about it but a few other things bothered me a bit, and I kinda feel like I need to read more of Emezi's work to figure out how I feel. There's a lot of grief and a lot of joy in this book, as well as some nice deep truths about relationships and grief, but maybe also some deep-feeling not-quite truths?

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#ReadingNow "The Essential Book of Black Holes: Master the Mysteries of Black Holes in 12 Short Chapters (Sirius Concepts)" by Sten Odenwald

https://mitpressbookstore.mit.edu/book/9781398858015

#Astrophysics #BlackHoles